Everything goats & vitamin B
And why you always need to keep vitamin B on hand.
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Last week Didi, my friend and fellow goat farmer, called me up to let me know there was a billy goat looking dazed and confused all by himself in the church yard. He wasn’t one of ours, but he needed help. He wasn’t skinny or sick looking, but light weight as if made of cardboard. He walked in circles, got stuck in corners, wouldn’t eat and needed help drinking water. He had goat polio, also called polioencephalomalacia. A disease caused by vitamin B1 deficiency and completely unrelated to polio.
A goat rumen’s microflora synthesizes vitamin B that is crucial for many of the goat’s bodily functions. When a goat stops eating or something is wrong with his digestion, the vitamin B production may decrease or halt and may lead to vitamin B deficiency. Always provide vitamin B for your goat if he is off feed or feeling sick.
When goats produce more vitamin B than they need or getting a high dose injected, they will simply discard the excess with the urine. This is because vitamin B is water soluble. You will find that the goat has a rich yellow colored urine when treated with vitamin B. This is completely normal.
Vitamin B1, also known as thiamine, is especially crucial for the goat’s nervous system. If you find your goat staggering and star gazing, walking in circles and appears to have gone blind and possibly has a stiff neck, he most likely has goat polio, however it may be mistaken for listeriosis. Both are deadly diseases and require prompt action. Do your research and contact your vet. Goat polio can easily be treated with thiamine injections. Listeriosis is a bacterial infection and needs to be treated with antibiotics. Don’t wait to find out! Start treatment immediately.
A goat’s diet should never be of sudden change as the microflora need time to adapt to the new ruminal environment. A diet with too much grain may slow down the thiamine production. We have had billy goats chasing tail all day and just completely forget to eat(!) and that again, can make them go down quickly. Thiamine deficiency can also be caused by high levels of sulfur and sulfates in their diet (like in spent grain). Or water sources may contain sulfur during drought periods. I’m sure you know that rotten egg smell of stagnant water. There are also certain plants that contain an enzyme that stops the thiamine production in the rumen.
Goat polio can occur to kids, nanny - and billy goats at any age, but is easy to treat and the goat should respond quickly to treatment.
You can get injectable thiamine with a vet prescription or you can opt for an injectable fortified/high level Vit B Complex, which means it should have 100 mg of thiamine per ml.
A goat off feed or with goat polio should get 2-3 injections daily. A 100 pound goat should get 4 cc of fortified Vit B complex per injection. Or use the formula: weight of your goat in pounds x 0.04. The injection can be given intramuscular (into the muscle) or you can take the needle off and carefully squirt it into his mouth.
Vitamin B12 is also known as cobalamin. The synthesizing of cobalamin in the gut relies on sufficient cobalt in the diet. Cobalt is a mineral that is found in plants and soil. Your pastures may be low on cobalt! Mineral supplements and high quality feed and hay should supply sufficient B12.
Cobalamin is essential for metabolism and crucial for production of red blood cells. If your goat is anemic, has a dull, rough fur and a swollen face, she may have a combination of high load of parasites and cobalamin deficiency. Parasites may cause a decrease in the food uptake and thus lead to a decrease in cobalamin production. B12 liquid or injection, iron supplements and a de-wormer will help your goat bounce back. Other signs of cobalamin deficiency include weight loss, weepy eyes and loss of appetite.
Newborn kids get cobalamin through the colostrum and store it in their liver. A kid that does not get sufficient colostrum or gets colostrum with low levels of cobalamin, is more susceptible to get sick and be infected with parasites later on. Always make sure newborn kids get enough colostrum. It is important that kids are provided with feed and hay from early age to give the rumen microflora a chance to develop. This will make weaning off milk easier on them and they will be less susceptible to parasites, vitamin B deficiency and scours.
It is hard to treat a sick goat. Don’t beat yourself up! Do your research and always contact a vet for consultation. I find it hard to get straight answers though, because further testing is always necessary for a proper diagnosis. As an island farmer far from animal hospitals, we have learned to take care of our animals the best we can. Learning to pick up on early signs of sickness and prevention are keys to keeping your goat herd healthy.
My first line of defense is to give a sick goat a daily injection of Vitamin B Complex. If your goat is on antibiotics, space the two apart.
We did fly our favorite pet goat Roxy to the capital on a small plane once. It was our first case of goat polio on the farm. It was in the early days of our farming adventure and we didn’t know much about goat diseases and treatments. She got well, but it took a while to find a pilot willing to fly her back. She ended up overstaying her welcome and became their office pet and a nuisance and everyone’s favorite at the same time. With vitamin B on hand, we could have saved her the hospital trip, high vet bills and two flights. But you gotta do what you gotta do. And you don’t know what you don’t know until you know. Roxy grew up skateboarding and used to drive our dogs crazy.
