Prestige Farmwide - Herd Management

Herd management is one of the most important aspects when raising goats.

I will add items here as they come up!

I AM NOT A VETERINARIAN AND THE BELOW IS ME SHARING WHAT WORKS FOR ME. THIS IS NOT A RECOMMENDATION TO YOUR ANIMALS OR HERD.

Deworming:

This is the #1 thing I see people doing wrong and getting bad advice on the internet about. We do NOT deworm on a schedule. Goats are notorious for having worms with resistance to dewormers due to incorrect use of dewormers.

We invested in a microscope, and we will periodically do fecals using the Mcmaster test method on pasture goats to determine worm count. HERE is a link to the exact method we use! We also do famancha checks on a few goats every single time we enter the pasture. Here is a how to on checking famancha!

IF I need to deworm, I always dual deworm. Typically with safegaurd and ivermectin. I am posting a chart below from goat emergency team on Facebook as it aligns with what I do.

Coccidia:

Coccidia is treated preventative in our herd every 21 days to coincide with the lifecycle until goats are 6 months old. We use toltrazuril for this. This is another time that the microcscope comes in handy, as it is easy to do a fecal and see if you are having a coccidia bloom.

Bottle Feeding:

We try to give our goats colostrum from the dam (or colostrum replacer if needed) for the first 2 days of life. We aim for 15% of goat's body weight in milk daily. Overfeeding milk typically results in scours, so we avoid it if possible. If we do get milk scours, we usually pull milk for 2 to 3 feeds, and give electrolytes instead in a bottle.

We typically body feed goat milk OR red cap whole milk from the store. We will add in per 1 gallon of whole milk 1 can evaporated milk and 1 cup of full fat buttermilk.

We feed bottles at least 4x daily until 1 week old, then transition to 3 if goats are doing well. We usually don't make it to 2 bottles a day until around 8 weeks, and then we wean around 12 to 16 weeks of age.

We start offering hay and grain at 2 weeks old and give as much as the goats will eat. Once they start consuming a decent amount of grain, we pull back on grain giving twice daily, and give as much hay as possible. Reminder this is what works for us, and we will modify if needed or we see a goat struggling with our normal protocol.

Adding in feeding chart found on the internet for the % of body weight. We do not follow this per the feedings per day: