I have a doe that had premature quads and she retained some of the placenta. I have had her on heavy doses of Penecillin since Sat. 4-13. Now my question is she looks fine and alert not stinky or anything when will I know to stop giving her the penecillin, or should I just continue for 10 days. Her temp is normal. Thanks in advance.

-- Linda Mn. (Boers) (boergoats@earthlink.net), April 17, 2002

Answers

I always continue for 10 days. I just don't want to be able to blame her not having a good heat and pregnancy the next time on me not doing everything I was able to do. With penicillin for 10 days you also want to only give it subq, with no fever you can go back down to the 3cc per 50 pounds and only once a day, also Probios for her rumen. Good luck with the doe! Vicki

-- Vicki McGaugh TX (vickilonesomedoe@hotmail.com), April 17, 2002.

Thanks again Vicki, I think I will start giving it once a day to see how she does, but will continue for a total of 10 days. She is eating good and drinking good too so thats a plus also. Thanks again.

-- Linda Mn. (Boers) (boergoat@earthlink.net), April 17, 2002.

Always continue antibiotics for 10 days, a full course. Otherwise you might just be breeding bacteria that is resistant to it in the future. Even People tend to not take their antibiotics for a full course when they start feeling better. One of the reasons TB is resistant to all but one antibiotic available today. A full course should kill ALL the bugs before they can become resistant.

And here I go with the ProBios again, but antibiotics tend to kill the good bugs with the bad ones, and the good bacteria in the rumen can be detrimentally affected. I'm not a rumenant (although I ruminate a lot mentally;-) and I take Lactaid if I have to take antibiotics.

-- Dennis Enyart (westwoodcaprine@yahoo.com), April 18, 2002.

Vicki, it's me again. Just out of curiousity...I was wondering about this...my vet told me to only continue penicillin on my 2 week old buck for 7 days (1/2cc twice a day) for his infected naval. Sounds like maybe I should go for 10 days?? Will 7 days kill all the bad stuff? Also, I'm new at all these antibiotic, probiotic things for goats. Is there a certain, major brand of probiotic that I'd use after penicillin treatment on my little buck? Can you get them at a local feed store or are they specialty? The only thing I've used was NutriDrench, and I'm not sure exactly what it is (besides being a drench of nutrients ;o) because a friend had only given me a little sample of it for an emergency. Should I use that?

-- Danielle (thiessens@att.net), April 18, 2002.

You bring up a good point Dennis, I think I will continue with the full doses for 10 days wouldn't want to take any chances. She's doing to good at this point to do something that I would regret later. Thanks!

-- Linda Mn. (Boers) (boergoats@earthlink.net), April 18, 2002.

Honestly the answer is a couple of days of antibiotics after the infection is gone. In the doe above she is being treated to keep an infection from starting. Rarely do vets give goats enough penicillin so it does take a very long time, and also is the reason folks think penicillin doesn't work well for wound infection. They also have you giving these shots in the muscle, which hurts the goat and after awhile you plain run out of places in the muscle to give it. In a sick animal like yours I would give the penicillin in the muscle for a couple of days, but then go to under the skin. Did you know that penicillin is out of the system in less than 24 hours, and its peak like is 12 hours? So to keep that blood level up in a very sick animal you need to be giving these shots every 12 hours. In the doe above who is not sick but we are treating perhaps a uterine infection from happening, you can give it every 24 hours. In my opinion any 300,000 unit pen should be give every 12 hours, and the long lasting pen should be the one you choose for 24 hour shots.

Probios is a brand name and then their are tons of probiotics. They are live naturally occuring bacteria to repopulate the rumen and gut. Acidopholous is one of the many bacteria, which is in yogurt, so some folks use it. Probios has hundreds of colonies which yogurt does not have. Our feed store carries Probios in the horse section. And of course cheaper to order all the stuff you need yearly from jefferslivestock.com

And like Dennis, when on antibiotics, like now :) I take acidopholus tablets from the health food store. Vicki

-- Vicki McGaugh TX (vickilonesomedoe@hotmail.com), April 18, 2002.