Sorry, I sometimes forget Americans don’t speak English
Reason for giving copper is to correct a deficiency. The effect on a
deficient goat is dramatic. From being hangdog with poor appetite,
yield, and avoidance of exercise, it suddenly holds up its head, eats
lots, yield improves and starts playing again (affected coats take
longer). During the rest week, if the goat reverts to listless, dropped
appetite and yield, it needs more copper. ‘Dropping back’ is the
expression used to describe a resumption of symptoms in any condition
where the medication is given in cycles.
No way would I put copper sulfate out free choice. The warnings it is
covered in when you buy it make many people scared to use it even at 1%.
There was a case came up on another list where someone poisoned their
goats using the 1%, because their goats DIDN’T NEED extra copper.
I cannot emphasise enough, that you need to be very sure you are
treating copper deficiency - exhaust all the other possibilities first.
Symptoms of copper poisoning. Goat that has been fat and glossy ans
producing well, bouncing around and being generally goatish, slowly
becomes thinner, appetite and yield drop, coat stays glossy, becomes
slow and unplayful, very sensitive to heat, cold, rain, and wind, very
susceptible to plueropneumonia, insides of bright pink eyelids show a
yellow tinge indicating the liver is under stress. Some get swollen
livers which an experienced person can pick up by palpation.
The following is from a couple of emails I wrote last year.
- Irene.
Symptoms of copper deficiency:
Coat is rough and starey, faded in coloured goats, and greyish in white
goats. Goat holds on to old coat much longer than usual and when it
falls out the goat may be almost naked for a week or so because the new
hair is not coming through readily. Sunburn on the naked skin slows
down hair growth still further.
Ribs and vertebrae stick out very noticeably as the goat carries no
extra flesh. Where calcium intake is compromised by lack of copper, you
may find knobs on the ends of the floating ribs and the points of the
jaw. Fractures of even such solid bones as shoulderblades can occur.
The head looks too big for the body.
Leg bones look very fine and joints tend to be enlarged. Again this is
lack of copper compromising calcium uptake.
Goat walks cautiously and doesn’t want to jump on and off heights.
Probably won’t play much either because the bones aren’t supporting it
very well.
Erect-eared goats tend to carry them drooped to 20 minutes to 4
position, and head low, may be permanent frown - signs of permanent
headache. I’ve never had Nubians so I don’t know what their ears do
with copper deficiency - I would expect them to go bald round the edges,
though, same as erect-ears often do.
Severe anaemia - check insides of eyelids. Cream is bad, grey is worse,
and green is just about totally lacking in haemoglobin.
Worm count in my herd at its worst varied from nil to 7500 - the nil
goat was sicker than the 7500, btw - most were about halfway between.
Worm burden is uncontrollable in severe copper deficiency because the
goat’s immune system is too far down to resist the little sods.
Milk yields may disappear to nothing, though it’s surprising just how
long they stay in milk, even though looking like concentration camp
inmates.
Depressed appetite.
Kids born with swayback (enzootic ataxia).
In really severe deficiency the animals may have chronic scours,
sometimes of semi-digested food, because they haven’t enough blood and
blood quality to make the gut work properly (luckily mine never reached
that stage).
When most of these symptoms are present, you may then find bald tips to
tails - my experience it’s one of the last symptoms to appear, and
doesn’t always. Some of mine, the only decent hair left on them was the
tuft on the tip of the tail.
As I wrote this off the top of my head, I may have missed a symptom or
two, but these are enough to be going on with……….
The following letter was in reply to a vet whose colleague had seen some
goats poisoned by copper treatment.
This sort of thing is what worries me when people want my copper
regimen. It is meant for treating copper deficiency, and is at a level
which will not cause toxicity in a deficient goat.
Obviously, as your quote shows, it will cause toxic symptoms in
goats
which are not copper deficient.
But trying to get it through people’s thick heads that the goats
must
show several serious symptoms of copper deficiency before they start
throwing copper about is very very difficult.
It seems to be the fashion to think that a bald tail tip is
copper
deficiency, and in 99 cases out of 100, it’s nothing of the sort.
A goat that is fat and shiny and eating and milking well is NOT
copper
deficient, however bald its tail - I’d be looking for a tail muncher.
I would want to be sure that the goat was exhibiting serious
copper
deficiency symptoms before giving copper. I do emphasise this to
people, but have no control over how much of what I write is passed on
to other people.
My dose rate for an adult dairy goat with copper deficiency is
using 1%
solution of copper sulfate, 20 mls twice daily for 7 days, rest 7 days,
repeat 7 days, rest 7 days, 20 mls once daily for 7 days, rest 2 weeks,
and repeat the 20 mls once daily for 7 days if necessary.
Reason for the rest periods is to monitor the goats closely. If
they
don’t drop back in improvement and yield during the rest period, you
stop dosing the extra copper. Strict record-keeping and observation is
essential. So is not exceeding the correct dose.
It is very hard to get through to people how invidious copper
poisoning
is. There’s very little between enough copper and too much, and a goat
can tip over into toxicity without the handler realising it. Must say I
have never seen discoloured urine in a copper poisoned goat myself, and
I’ve had to treat a few. Only one was mine, and I was using a high
copper kelp powder on her, it was years before I developed the 1%
solution method. Two of the others had been overdosed on high copper
liquid seaweed. One had been accidentally exposed to Bordeaux mixture.
This is the first time I’ve ever heard of anyone overdosing on
what
could have been my recipe. I can only keep emphasising that people
should not treat goats for copper deficiency unless they show several
serious symptoms, and all the other things they have tried to correct
the goats’ condition have failed.
