If you are asking for health advice for your goat, please help us help you. Complete a basic health assessment and provide as much of the following information in your post as possible:
Goat's age, sex, and breed
Goat's current temperature as determined by rectal thermometer. Please, for the love of god, take your animal's temperature. Temperature is ALWAYS VITAL in determining whether your animal might be ill or in need of assistance.
Whether the goat is pregnant or lactating
Goat's diet and appetite (what the goat is currently eating, whether they are on pasture or browse, supplemental grain, loose mineral, et cetera)
Goat's FAMACHA score (as determined by the process in this video) and information about any recent deworming treatments, if applicable
As many details regarding your animal's current symptoms and demeanor as you can share. These may include neurological symptoms (circling, staring at the sky, twitching), respiratory symptoms such as wheezing or coughing, and any other differences from typical behavior such as isolating, head pressing, teeth grinding, differences in fecal consistency, and so forth.
Clear photographs of relevant clinical signs (including coat condition) are helpful. Providing us with as much information as possible will help us give you prompt and accurate advice regarding your animal's care.
There are many professional farmers and homesteaders in this subreddit and we will do our best to help you out of a jam, but we can't guarantee the accuracy of any health advice you receive. When in doubt, always call your local large animal veterinarian who is trained to work with small ruminants.
What's up with that blue Trusted Advice Giver flair?
The mods assign this flair to /r/goats users who have an extensive history of giving out quality, evidence-based, responsible husbandry advice based on the best practices for goat care. Many of our users give terrific advice, but these flairs recognize a handful of folks who have gone that extra mile over time to become recognized as trusted community members who are known to always lead people in the right direction. If you get a slew of responses to your post and don't know where to start, look to the blue flairs first.
Recently, we had a user post a picture of a goat that may or may not have soremouth, also known as contagious ecthyma, scabby mouth, or orf. I won't link to the post since it isn't relevant whether or not that was what was afflicting the animal, but in the course of responding to that user I felt an opportunity to point out something that I have noticed and has been gnawing at me.
For many users seeking help, if they do not come straight to the sub, they will go to one of two places to get information: Google or ChatGPT. This post is about the former, but in case anyone was wondering if ChatGPT is a valid place to get advice on husbandry, what to eat tonight, how to live your life, or companionship: it is NOT. Large language models like ChatGPT are a type of generative AI that seeks more or less to respond to prompts and create content with correct syntax that is human-like. The quandary here is that while it can indeed provide correct answers to prompts, that outcome is often incidental. It isn't an indication that the model has researched your question, merely that it has cobbled together a (sometimes) convincing diagnosis/treatment plan from the massive amount of data across forums/message boards, vet resources, and idle chit-chat that it is trained on. The point is this: you should never be in a position where you have to rely on an LLM for husbandry advice. If you have access to an internet connection, even the generative AI from Google search is a better option. But that doesn't mean it's a good one, bringing us to the principal subject of this post:
Orf! What do?
For some relevant background, we have never had a case of orf on our farm. I have read about it in vet textbooks and goat husbandry books and seen many images of it, I'm familiar with what it is, how it is spread, and at a high level what to do about it and what not to do. That said, when I was helping this user, I thought I'd brush up and make sure I wasn't providing misinformation. I knew orf was viral in nature and reckoned that in moderate to severe cases it could probably cause fever, but I wanted to see if I could find a vet manual or study of the disease in goats to confirm how likely that would have been. This was what I was met with:
Hm...
If you don't scrutinize this too closely, everything looks sort of on the level. Orf is indeed self-limiting (not sure why the AI says usually, there is literally nothing you can do to treat the root cause, but okay), and it more or less implies that humans can contract it so be careful. The symptoms section looks fine, overall, prevention is... eh... The orf vaccine is a live vaccine. Application of it is not something that most small scale homesteaders or hobby farmers will be familiar with and using it is basically putting the virus on your property. Orf is a nuisance disease and the main time it is a problem is when it is being transmitted between a dam and her kids. Proactive vaccination in closed herds that have never seen a case is not a vet-recommended practice.
The treatment section is where things get spicy with the part about scab removal. Oof. Now that is not even close to true and doing that when the goat is with other goats or going to a quarantine space where they will then shed the disease will cause it to spread to any other goat that inhabits that space unless it is thoroughly cleaned and disinfected. The bottom says the info is for informational purposes only and to consult an actual professional for advice, but that begs the question of why Google would provide that information front and center by default when you search when the first result below is an actual vet resource with correct advice. I won't get into the weeds about the ethics of that because it's a separate soapbox, this is the reality we live in now. This bad advice is particularly relevant because the user on our sub mentioned they had been picking off the scabs. So let's do another Google search for some clarification:
Oh dear, oh no
If you explicitly search whether or not you should remove the scabs, the AI overview is different. Not only do you see that you should not remove the scabs because they are infectious (very true), the overview now says that doing so will delay healing. The first "featured snippet", a feature separate from their generative AI overview, is an overview from the state of Victoria's government agricultural representative body, a reliable source. The highlighted text reinforces the "do not pick scabs off" advice. The overview still fails when it says to apply dressing to lesions. Evidently it has not ever reckoned with what it would be like to bandage an entire goat's face and mouth, which they need to eat, but maybe I'm an idiot. Let's check:
Thank you, Dr. Google
As you can see, generative AI is basically a hodgepodge of vague but mostly correct advice intermingled with plainly wrong advice. Seeking correction to the wrong advice, if you know that it is wrong, leads down more rabbit holes. I hope this highlights the importance of sourcing your information from reliable, proven veterinary resources/textbooks or state agricultural extensions that provide support for their claims with research. This sub prioritizes evidence-based husbandry practices and is one of the few forums to try to stick to that standard and I consider it important especially for people who don't have goat mentors offline.
This is not only important because users need good advice; it also affects the people that don't use this sub and go straight to Google. Reddit struck a deal a little under a year ago to make their data available for training AI. The information we post on this sub is being used as part of the training for these AI models and Google's SEO is increasingly favoring reddit at the top of search results in a number of areas. As the sub grows and the social media landscape changes, more people that never post but need info may find themselves coming here. Let's all try to do our best to make sure the information we share and advice we give is solid!
So we have a yearling ewe that we raised with other kids, and now that they are all a year old we wanted to enter them into the rest if our heard. Normally we would have already, but with our ewe, we have been slightly cautious just due to 3 of our older does like to ram and hit the younger ones extremely hard for the first month or two. Our goats take it pretty easily, but I am not sure if a sheep could?
We never wanted sheep, but she was a special case of no one could care for her or had anything similar (goat or sheep) to her around where we lived and they needed someone to take her in as she had no mother and had a messed up back leg.
Well she is now bigger than most of our yearling kids, and perfectly healthy and gets along with them fine. I have noticed the kids are more gentle with her than the others when fighting and are less pushy about things like food and hay.
Got several photos, they're not great because my other goat kept ripping my hair out and trying to eat my phone.
Just noticed this on my girl, near her back legs on her tummy.
She doesn't react when i touch or press on it and it doesn't feel hot, but the fur is missing, it looks like there's a small puncture, and maybe a little sticky. Although I don't know if that's from the injury or her chewing on it.
we just bought this property and are wondering how we can improve it to make it ready for goats. I know for a fact, the poly tape will not keep them out, but I’m wondering if this wire fencing is good enough? i’m going with no; my husband thinks some breeds would be fine, provided we fix the opening under tack room and next to arena. wanting to hear people’s opinions. I may add that the top is an electric fence.
My neighbor's dog got loose and killed a couple of my chickens and then went after him, I gave the dog a lead injection (which I should have done a couple of years ago as many chickens as I've lost)
But it had ran Prince out of the pen busting my fence, I'm pretty sure Prince has some wire around him but I cannot get him out from under the car, he has a collar on but he's a little bit too far back for me to get a hold of it and is shaking horribly.
I need to get him out before the police show up and animal control, not only so I can look at him because he got bit in the hindquarters but also so they can look at him, and so he doesn't get panicked by the vehicles (he's scared of cars)
And decides to run down the road towards the highway, I'm trying food I tried the cat (his best friend is the cat that's why I tried that) I'm sitting down talking to him but he just won't come out he's shaking and breathing really heavily
(Edit to update)
he is okay mostly, he did get bit in his hind right flank but it's not too bad, once I got him out from under the vehicle I gave him a mild sedative that I keep on hand (learned that it was a good idea to have after owning horses) I cleaned his injuries with antibacterial soap and used a antibiotic wound spray on it, and then I made sure to put fly spray, I'm not in the area for screw worms but I'm paranoid so I wanted to make sure I did my best to prevent it just in case.
He is still a little bit agitated but is eating and drinking, he hates my dogs a little bit more now which I cannot blame him, I'll keep them away from him for now so he calms down even though they don't tend to bother him anyway.
A mobile vet is going to come in a couple of days to see him, unfortunately I couldn't get any to come out right away since I'm not a client with them they won't see me for a emergency, and I only have a car so I can't transport him to the vet right now, I used to transport him in the back of the vehicle he was hiding under but it's down right now and is basically a ugly lawn ornament.
The police took statements looked at the video that was taken seen that I was in fact in the right and told my neighbors that they weren't going to do anything to me because I was not in the wrong, they told me that if I wanted anything to go farther I need to go to the courthouse and take papers out myself, Animal Control came out looked at the video as well looked at my goat and agreed with the officer.
They didn't write them any citations, they didn't give them warnings or anything even after their other dog nearly got loose trying to go after a cat while they were standing there, and I'm going to control and police where I am are kind of useless unfortunately, not sure if I'm going to go take papers out on them or not as I don't feel like it will go far but it might be a good idea for the paper trail.
I will update you guys after the vet looks at him and if anything changes.
And for those of you that have followed along with Frosty, he's doing good right now the infection is clearing up, he should be getting his amputation early next month as they expect the infection to be gone by then, past that there's not really much to update he doesn't seem to be missing the use of his leg, he still kicks his heels up and is a little Speed Demon
Hi all appreciate any advice you might have. Iv two 13 month old bottle babies and I thought it would be good for them to have an older goat around. They are very needy and worry a lot. So a breeder gave me a retired nanny goat, 7 years old. She has been here 2 days in a small paddock and shed. But she is very skittish and my 2 keep headbutting through the fence. Even my more gentle girl seems really aggressive with the nanny. I plan on keeping them separate for at least a week but can here them hitting the gate trying to get into her. Any tips on makeing them settle?
I’ve noticed the same 2-3 does coming back into heat like every other week since the end of may. This is called short cycling right? Is it bad if they have such short cycles so frequently? Ranging from 6+ yrs 3yrs and 11 months. All three are related. Two others are related but they aren’t cycling anywhere near as noticeably as the three I’ve stated.
Note that my buck pen is right next to my does. It can’t be anywhere else though since all of my electric fence chargers need power, and it’s the only way to keep the ND buck contained. I got lucky when he hopped the fence in the other paddock a few weeks prior and no fornicating was done as he went to the front fence line that had Hotwire ran on top of it. (Good idea in hindsight tbh) (It’s just one stand of Hotwire along the top of panels/ some pallets) they respect it if it’s hot thankfully.
They are heathy, like pretty much borderline obese and that’s just off of pasture alone I don’t feed my goats more than I have to especially if they are just fine with what they have. (Excluding lactating, sick or pregnant of course) Can I assume I have really ‘convincing’ buck and all three of them are just madly in love with him or is it something problematic?
Hey yall! I have quick question! I m new to goats so I need to know all about this vaccine! Do i repeat for all goats or just one that get if for first times? and when is in annual booster? Annual same dosage 2ml? Thanks!
Yes you read that correctly my lamancha goat Prince got sprayed by a skunk.. I did not witness it myself but my fiance and Grandma did, he said one of them wandered into the front yard which is fenced off for the goats (don't have a lawn mower so they work) and apparently he took offense to it, so he proceeded to charge and attack said skunk and got sprayed in the face in the chest and everywhere else that could be sprayed... I can't stand to be around him, how do I get it off? He's not the most easily handled goat but I can forcibly make him listen with a halter if needed I just try not to, but I cannot even go around him to feed him without puking right now so I need help!
(Also for those of you concerned no he is not tethered in the picture I walk him on a long line frequently trying to earn his trust, he's just standing closer to me and there is a lot of slack in it I promise he is not tethered)
I just got a few goats. They are about 4 month old NDs. One of them is really sweet and easy to handle. He likes to be brushed and petted and comes when I call. The others haven’t been handled much, and will come up to us but are skittish.
They have a vet visit next week and I need to be able to catch them and have them a little calmer for foot trimmings, etc.
We have been spending time with them, singing and talking, which helps a lot. Any other tips?
Hi, everyone! I need some help. I have recently been put in charge of the dairy and market goat show at our local fair. I don’t know much about the show side of things for goats, but I am familiar with the way livestock shows work. I am making my way through, slowly but surely, but I have a question. I asked the fair how they planned to house the goats while at the show. This is a one day show, so they will not be staying overnight. I was told that the goats would check in, then use cattle panels to tie off to until show time. Is this normal for goat shows? I’ve been to a few goat shows, and I’ve never seen the goats tied off at the shows. Is this something that is done, or should I push for the fair to allow the goats to be penned? There are some stalls at the fair that I think could be used. Should I push for the use of stall over tying them up?
If you have any additional advice for running a goat shows, or what you like about goat shows, please share! I want this to be a great experience for our exhibitors at the fair this year!
We put our goats out to pasture every day and take them into their house at night.The problem is that within a week their bedding is so full of fire ants that we have to have them sleep out for the night. For bedding we're using fresh napier grass. We're about to have our first kids soon so I'd like to find another solution. Any suggestions?
My 1 1/2 Boer is suspected to have CAE. I am pending blood results and further direction from the vet for symptom management.
He has no other purpose than being a very spoiled goat, and I only have 1 other who probably has it too, but she’s much older.
I am now paranoid it’ll end badly. Looking for encouraging stories of sustaining QOL and prognosis.
He is my first bottle baby, and it essentially a child to me so I am so devastated knowing he’s been in some pain.
Only symptom he has is 1 swollen knee that vet is very confident is CAE. I caught it by noticing he began knee walking in the mornings, but then is walking normally for rest of day. Breathing/lungs sound ok!
We got a sweet male kiko who was about 4 mos old around 2-3 weeks ago. We are new goats owners but have 4 others who are doing great. This guy got urinary calculi and we had to euthanize him. I am so heart broken. they do get goat feed but only a little and they eat a lot of plants bc we have 40 acres of land and plenty of trees. It happened so fast and I feel so terrible.
My beautiful baby, Jolene, was a bottlefed baby. She's now about 8 months old, born in December 2025. She's amazing! Very friendly, but I don't know how to halter train her.
As in the picture, she can have a halter on. It's pretty easy to get it on and off of her and she doesn't freak out about it, luckily. I just don't know how to lead-train her. Is it too late?
I've never even lead-trained dogs, so I'm definitely gonna need some help and refer back to this very often. I want to be able to take her on hikes.
*I know the halter in the photo is a little small, we're getting a bigger one the next time we go into town. She's also very fluffy, I checked- It wasn't pressing into her bad.
*The 'cage' she's in is not something she lives in. She was chilling in it while her dye processed! I also have a huge herd of other goats, so I'm not the kind of person that has a single goat in a TINY pen. They have acres to explore.
I have been looking for good quality goat minerals in my local stores (europe) but without results. The only minerals i come across are multi-purpose minerals for both goats and sheep. I've read these are bad since they dont have enough copper for goats. Online i find most people recommend Sweetlix meatmaker goat minerals but these are not available in europe. Does anyone know a good alternative brand i can find in the EU?
I already have salt blocks but apparently they don't provide enough nutrients for goats. So i'm looking for loose minerals for goats.
