Sassy, our little girl with the cleft palate (left), is now over four months old. She is learning to cope with her disability, which prevents her from eating as much as the other goats– even when we give her private snack time. We give her nutritional supplements, too, but she just isn’t growing very fast.
I [...]
Posts Tagged ‘animal health’
Cleft Palate Update
Animal First Aid Resources
Emergencies happen– and rarely during our vet’s business hours. In the photo above, a friend’s goat had broken its leg on a Saturday, so we splinted it for her. Having the resources and some basic knowledge can save money on emergency vet visits, and sometimes save an animal’s life.
A reader sent me this link to [...]
Independence Day First Aid
It never fails: when something bad happens, it’s on a holiday weekend. We’ve seen this often enough to be prepared for it. Whether it’s a dog getting caught on barbed wire (Pioneer Day, 2007) or gashing herself on a piece of ice (Christmas 2007), or a goat with a torn ear (Colombus Day, 2009), it [...]
Peach Trees Can Be Toxic to Goats
Goats love trees, and we love to give them trees. But as folks around town trim their fruit trees, it’s worth noting that the leaves of stone fruit trees such as peaches, plums, and apricots can be toxic to goats.
According to this information sheet by the National Agricultural Library, as the leaves of these trees [...]
Minnie is finally getting better
Last week, we reported that Minnie was recovering from a uterine infection after giving birth to two beautiful kids. That turned out to be an incorrect diagnosis, as well as optimistic. What followed was four days of life-threateningly high fever, blood in her urine caused by kidney damage as a result of the fever, and [...]
More on Cleft Palate in Goats
Yesterday I spoke at length with Dr. Kim Panter of the USDA Poisonous Plant Research Facility in Logan, Utah, about Sassy’s cleft palate, shown above.
Dr. Panter has for years been researching cleft palate in goats, which has resulted not only in better understanding of the condition in goats and other livestock, but also new treatments [...]
Caprine Cleft Palate
Sassy, now a week old, is an adorable little goat. She’s happy and fun and cute. But when she drinks her milk, she gets very congested.
Today, Suellen had the vet check her out. We learned that Sassy has a severe cleft palate, too bad for reconstructive surgery to be an option.
Cleft palate in goats can [...]
Astra Update
A week after her “incident,” Astra is doing fine. Her ear even sticks out at a normal angle!
Here you can see the stitches, which run from top left toward the bottom right and then up again perpendicularly. I count ten of them. Dr. Bagley really did an amazing job considering how big the wound was.
Astra has completed [...]
Astra Gets Stitches
Yesterday, we found that Astra, one of our 4-month-old kids, had gashed her ear quite badly. The gash was about 3″ long, and clearly needed stitches. At first, I intended to stitch it myself– we have sutures and staples on hand– but on closer inspection I realized this was beyond my ability.
Naturally, these things always happen in [...]
Goat Milk for Kitten Emergencies
(Eleda 1 photo.)
A friend of ours writes,
I foster baby kittens from time to time. I found this information in the LA City Animal Shelter’s Kitten Care Handbook by Carolyn McCray, DVM:
“Unfortunately, cow’s milk is not nutritious enough for kittens – they will slowly starve to death on it. It also causes diarrhea which is extremely [...]
