# Skin issues (Warning graphic pictures)



## DostThouHaveMilk (Oct 25, 2007)

This is not my goat. However, it is from our herd and I play a major role in the vet type care of the herd.
Ingrid is 3 this year. She is 1/4 Boer, 1/4 Saanen, 1/4 Nubian, 1/4 Alpine. Raised on CAE Prevention on our farm (raw cow's colostrum and raw cow's milk). The doelings went over there on 4/30/09. They bought 6 as a starter herd from us.
They were bred to kid as yearlings to an outside Boer buck. No clue about his history. Beyond that, the only exposure to outside animals has been a small pygmy wether and bucks from my herd. The herd is in an old heifer barn we used back when the school ran a Dairy farm (up until 2007). For two years prior to adding the doelings to the herd they ran bucks/wethers in the same pen for meat each year from two herds. There have also been pigs in the pens.
Just want to make sure I cover the bases of history on exposure of potential bugs.
The doe is bred with her third pregnancy. This is the same herd, using my genetics (does from our herd bred to a homebred buck) that had quads this year (I have never had quads). So their health, overall, has not been bad. They lost one of Ingrids' doelings and almost Ingrid and another doe to parasite overload when they didn't listen to my advice. Ingrid grows out the best kids, but all the problems show in her first.

Last year she had these scab type issues with her legs and it moved up a bit to her flank area and a little around her mouth and eyes. I assumed it was soremouth. Told them it would likely go through the herd and she would gain some immunity. It never spread and eventually went away. 
This winter it is back in full force. Nasty looking stuff and simply cannot be easy for her to eat with. I've not seen the like so I thought I would post here. It is actually starting to clear up. They went ahead and called the local vet and the vet's office said to just wash it with iodine. They have not done that. There are three people who take care of the herd (beyond me) and the official farmer just had knee surgery so is out for now.

My aunt and uncle (who also bought Prevention doelings from us) have dealt with an actual bacteria that has eaten away the skin. They had to euthanize one doe because it ate away the skin and into the abdomen area. She finally found a treatment for that. This is not exactly like that though.
The only skin issue we have ever seen was on our CAE + ("Prevention raised") Boer cross doe. Her first winter she had crusty legs. That ended up responding to hoof rot treatment.

I plan on Copper Bolusing Ingrid in the next few days. Her eyelids are a good color (they were wormed before putting Sancho in for breeding). Didn't know if anyone had any other suggestions or thoughts.
The herd does appear to have lice as well.
Here are the pictures. They aren't pretty.

































Thanks!


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## Ashley (Oct 25, 2007)

What is she eating, what mineral do they get?


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## Holly Govero (Mar 26, 2009)

Oh my goodness. I hope someone can help you with this.. It is my first time to see like that. I would like to know what others think about it..


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## DostThouHaveMilk (Oct 25, 2007)

I almost put that in, Ashley, but was worried about getting too wordy.

They are fed the local Co-op's goat feed (decent enough feed) and they usually have Sweetlix Meatmaker 16:8 mineral free choice. I say usually because it took months of convincing for them to leave it out free choice. The goats are the Freshmen class project. This is a private boarding high school. The woman teaching 9th grade Humanities has a lot of say but absolutely no experience prior to the first goats were brought back in 2006 (by myself and the farmer). Doesn't want to trust our decade plus of experience. They were offering the mineral a little bit each day as something for the students to do. Last I knew it was free choice now.
They also get quality hay put up on the farm. If Don knows one thing, it is how to put up hay!

The herd has never been copper bolused, but all the other herds I know and work with are bolusing. That is why it is one of my first steps with her. We saw a big improvement in our herd when we started bolusing.


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## Holly Govero (Mar 26, 2009)

I am wondering if it is from some kind of caustic that caused the skin fall off and become blistered. It just my thoughts. Becuz I have never seen like that before. It makes me feel sorry for that goat.


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## icboers (Feb 1, 2009)

The scabs on her legs are mites. They can and will spread to the flanks, belly face etc. I use 4oz olive oil with 40 drops of eucalyptus oil and smother the legs with it. also Ivermec given orally will help also.

Karla


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## DostThouHaveMilk (Oct 25, 2007)

Holly,
They are more scabs than blisters. There is pink skin on the legs now.

Karla,
Mites, eh? Thanks so much! The herd needs dusted for lice, but I didn't want to deal with that until I had a better idea of what the stuff on Igrid was in case I could kill two birds with one stone.
I just don't know my nasty little bugs all that well yet and the vet wouldn't even come out and look.


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## Caprine Beings (Sep 19, 2008)

Roseanna,
looking through Goat Medicine, I found two possibilities.

1. Trombiculidiasis: mite (larvae are reddish w/six legs) that that are free-living, Attack the pasterns, muzzle, and ventrum. Spread by contaminated fields, pens, or feed. Need skin scrapings taken in to test.

2. A Staphylococcal folliculitis: infection and inflammation of hair follicules (S. intermedius and S. aureus) normally as a secondary to mite, the book is saying this is normally on the teat and udder/underbody so I do not know if this is related.

Our PB nubians get a yucky hair follicule problem every winter as well on their muzzles. I used my All Purpose Butter after cleaning it and they went away.
Tam


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## DostThouHaveMilk (Oct 25, 2007)

Thanks, Tammy!
I had not brought myself to look through Goat Medicine yet. Kept meaning to but was hoping by posting pictures someone with first hand knowledge would chime in.


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## adillenal (Feb 6, 2009)

Coming from an elementary school background, it reminds of scabies in humans. We had a big outbreak one year. Anyway that would be a mite so that would be my first thought also.


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## Holly Govero (Mar 26, 2009)

Sorry. Roseanna.. I am just thinking.

That make sense now it can be mites. Never thought about it..


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## icboers (Feb 1, 2009)

We had a few get it before and we tried treating with Prolate and Ivermec but it just didnt seem to work very well, the olive oil and euc oil usually works in one treatment.

It probably spread to the muzzle from them scratching their legs.

Spray the pens down with a permethrin spray.

Karla


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## Twillingate Farm (Oct 26, 2007)

I agree with Karla... those scabs on the legs and eyebrows are definitely mites! Classic symptom here in January/February on the Boers. The Toggenburgs seem to be resistant to them completely. Same treatment as Karla too... it works.


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## Anita Martin (Dec 26, 2007)

This looks like pemphigus foliaceous. I've seen only one case and the owner tried just about everything possible with not a lot of success. It seems to come and go at various times of the year and has not spread to any other goats. It seems to be very rare and not much is known about it. It can make the goat very uncomfortable and looks pretty awful. Hopefully they will find a cure for it one day.


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## Angela (Feb 13, 2010)

I have a grade nubian that had something that looked about the same but it was on her ear and it never spread. She had it when she came to me and the previous owner told me it was from another goat chewing/licking/biting on her ear?? It did improve after she came here but in a few months it started getting worse again. I found a couple of goats with lice and treated everyone with Cylence. The lice went away and so did the scabby looking stuff on her ears. Haven't seen it since. 

Angela


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## NubianSoaps.com (Oct 26, 2007)

I would have a skin scraping done. I just don't get why that wouldn't be the first thing to do. If you start gooping up, or using things that break down the skin futher, pemphigus will set in, which is a breakdown of the autoimmune system and everything will get worse. A vet could easily put a skin scraping down for an initial diagnosis of mites in the office, if he didn't see mites he could send it off to have a lab look at it. Why not simply find out what they are dealing with. But yes nuisance problems like this come from failed immunity and nutritional stress. A goat came here with a horribly crusted chin, in quarantine she always had minerals caked on her face, by the time she was out of quarantine (wormed, and yes I did use Ivermectin also for external parasites, bolused etc...) she went home healthy. I lost a doe that was purchased as a yearling to a immune function break down, she became so unsightly I put here down. Please don't start treating this doe with anything, and how I handle this with people who won't listen is "She needs a vet to send in skin scrapings, call me back when you get the results so I can help you with treatment, I can not help you until you get the skin scraping paperwork back from the vet or lab". If someone isn't willing to listen to you, cut ties with helping them, it will drive you crazy. Because everything just gets worse and worse, kidding season becomes a nightmare, kids rearing becomes worse every year, at some point it does become my way or the highway, otherwise it becomes a huge waste of your time. Does who are nutritional deficient simply have more health crisis, especially nuisance problems like this. Vicki


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## DostThouHaveMilk (Oct 25, 2007)

I actually told them that a skin scraping was the best approach since I had no clue. :sigh
The vet's office wouldn't do it for whatever reason. Not sure which vet's office he called. We are down to one large animal vet at the moment covering two practices by himself. (and multiple Counties)
I'll see if I can push for them to do a skin scraping.
It sounds like the individual who does not want to listen to me (until one dies...she was willing to listen at that point and has not argued and fought me on everything quite so much since) will likely be moving on after this year. Assuming she can find another teaching position. 
The farmer himself is a family friend and the only reason he agreed to goats was because he knew he could count on me. I actually worked there for the last 3 years of them running the Grade A dairy farm. Their cow herd and the main farm was donated by my family.
I am very closely tied to the school.
I have put some distance between me and them. Helping when they call and giving advice when it is asked for. I was there when the quads were born. I thawed one of a set of triplets and got her started on a bottle for them. This as their first year with bottle kids and you can tell which ones they are. They did not follow through with the Vitamin D milk. They switched to milk replacer and got tired of the bottle feeding so weaned at less than 10 weeks...but not onto creep feed for another month plus. They insist on learning the hard way.
I have pointed out that my help will be less and less if they continue to leave horns on as well. I don't like getting hurt. It is why our herd is (mostly) hornless.
To make it all the more interesting...my niece is a Freshman, so the goats are her project this year.

I'll push for them to get a scraping done before I start doing too much. I will copper bolus her Sunday morning when I do their feeding for them. Probably trim some more hooves as well.....Glutten for punishment? Me? Nah...


Thanks so much everyone for the input! It is truly a wonderful thing to be able to come on and post a problem and have a chance at someone else having dealt with the same thing1


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## Loden Farms (Dec 21, 2010)

It does look like mites to me (which is the same as mange in dogs, scabies in humans, etc... and you CAN catch it, wear gloves!), just from experience of seeing dogs with it constantly coming into the Vet clinic where I use to work as a groomer.
Do you have access to a microscope? It wouldn't have to be the greatest in the world... Just take a razor blade and carefully, lightly scrape the crusty skin (get down to clean flesh, don't just use the crusty scapings), put it on a slide and take a look. You'll see them if they're there, they look like little tick looking things under a microscope. Then if you'll use injectable Ivomec (if it were me, I would actually do an injection, so it gets into the bloodstream quicker), that will kill them. I would think that would be the quickest way to get rid of them so she could heal up and feel better. 
I hope you find what's causing her problems, she must be miserable.


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## dragonlair (Mar 24, 2009)

My new buckling has that issue. At first, since it started about the time he started realizing he was a buck, I thought urine scald. I treated his legs with blu kote and bag balm. Then it was on his eyes, so I knew....mites. I treated him with Ivermectin but didn't dare put anything on his eyes or legs because it was below 0. Once it warmed up a bit I applied a little bit of olive oil mixed with Neem oil to the area around his eyes with a cotton ball. So far it's working.

So, I have never ever had mites or lice on my goats in 30+ years of goat ownership. Where did the mites come from? There are no other goats around my area. I get hay from 2 farms, neither of which has goat or has had them since before the owners can remember. Did they come with the buckling from where he was born and the stress of rut caused them to take over? So far none of the does have it, and he was in with them for several weeks during rut.


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## buckrun (Mar 7, 2008)

Yes he was likely carrying his own low level population Sully.
Susceptibility to these problems are related to immune function and tip top skin condition is hard during rut.

I would get some zinc oxide cream and slather on this goat and start with zinc supplements.
Mineral Max2 for quick jolt and a capsule of zinc citrate daily. Seeds in the diet will keep zinc levels high. I would buy some pumpkin seed oil and give a capsule of that daily too.
Get some extra seed oils in the diet.


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## Loden Farms (Dec 21, 2010)

Here is a good read on Mites, Mange, and Scabies put out by MSU.

http://www.pested.msu.edu/Resources/bulletins/pdf/2601/LPNE2601chap3.pdf

Pretty much any kind of oil (like mineral oil or baby oil) applied generously and reapplied often, will kill them because it basically "drowns" them (Think of rabbit ear mites, most people use baby oil).


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## dragonlair (Mar 24, 2009)

Good article, thank you. However, I am wicked itchy now. :crazy :/


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## Loden Farms (Dec 21, 2010)

I know, right! LOL!


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