While the vet was out we asked her to test 3 of our goats for CAE. We have not tested before. All our goats are descendant from these 3 goats. Minnie came back positive :tears: (above) Minnie and her daughter Nisha who is grown up and having her first kid. (above) Minnie and her daughter Aster born 2009 (above) Brisa our orphan goat (Mom died) All the kids have nursed from Minnie and could have CAE. We will be getting them tested. No one is showing any symptoms. Has anyone else dealt with this issue? :tears: Suellen
have the kids tested once they are over 6 months. If they come up CAE positive you will want to pull their kids at birth and bottle feed them. Then you can slowly replace your does with negative does from your own herd. You dot have to sell them but do make sure when they are in milk if positive that they dont let kids nurse off them. Lets hope the odds go in your favor and the kiddos dont have CAE.
hope they all come out neg! you know even though the kdis nursed off the dam there is still a chance that they are neg.
I know the kidds are too young to test and my research suggests waiting 2 months after giving birth to test the Mom. We are going to act as if Nisha does have it and take her kid away before she can nurse. We will bottle feed her kidd milk from one of our negative Moms. I also read that it is possible for a goat to be a carrier of CAE and never get sick. Suellen
I had a buck turn up CAE positive. I was done with him and just sent him to the auction. But like others said just take kids at birth and bottle feed them from negative does or pasturize your milk. I have heard rumors of them being carriers and never show any positive results but i dont know how true it is. I have also heard of animals being immune to it. beth
The lady that helps me, recommended that if you have a doe test positive, that you have her retested, just to make sure that you didn't get a false positive on the first test. Just a thought.. Everyone else gave you excellent advice. The only thing that I'd add is that if she's a "natural mother" I'd try to keep her segregated from the other does' kids. I have a doe like that, I think that she'd even let the dog nurse on her, lol. Thankfully, she CAE neg.
Yes, we can still use her milk. We use a milking machine so we have to milk +CAE goats last so that milk doesn't get transfered. On goats I don't want nursing I use teat tape(cloth tape) with some pine tar on it during the day. Kidds don't like the pine tar because it smells bad, its sticky and tastes bad. If I don't use pine tar the little darlings just pull the tape off. I separate the moms from kidds at night so I don't have to tape them. When the kidds are old enough that mom will boot them if they try to nurse we stop using the tape. The +CAE goats will still need to wear the tape during the day to make sure noone nurses from them. Yes, we plan on getting the other goats tested and will get her tested again. Suellen
You'll also need to be extra careful and clean when it comes time for your CAE positive does to kid to prevent horrizontal transfer through all the "blood and gore" of birth. I have a friend with several possitive does that she has rescued. Many of those girls are top the line and she strongly feels that CAE shouldnt cause the waste of such good genetics, it just requires a little extra. She also likes teat taping the does teats a week or so before the doe kids to prevent any kids stilling a sip before then. ((hugs)) I'm so sorry. You have some absoluetly beautiful Alpines. I'm growing more and more partial to them everyday. Minnie looks just like my little Nuttah!
I read this and remembered it so thought I'd post. I am not sure what the realness of this is, I have never dealt with this. However, the farm this comes from is pretty well known for it's info. "Even with tests, and practicing CAE prevention (pulling kids, separating CAE positive animals, etc.), there is no way of guaranteeing that a herd is totally "free" of CAE. You can only know if a herd has recently tested negative to the antibodies. Goats have been known to be raised in a totally "free" herd for many years and all of a sudden, as many as seven years later, "revert". Any goat can "revert" at any time." Read more at http://fiascofarm.com/goats/cae.htm Hope that helps and good luck.
Oh, so you could still breed the doe so long as you pull everything and bottle feed? Not that I am suggesting this but theoretically you could?
I have heard it can happen, but im not sure how true it is. Another way CAE can be transfered is if a positive goat is butting heads with a negative and the both have an open wound that is coming in contact with eachother. Kind of like AIDS. beth
Really, now I am not sure too much about this, but thought with HIV this can happen, it is slim on that quick a contact. I am not sure if this is the same way? At the same time if it were bodily fluids like this then you also would have potential contamination during breeding? Also, do they have medication like HIV where the viral load can go undetectable to make the transfer an even lower probability? Sorry for the 101 questions, but I used to be on the board of an HIV support groups so I know how it works, just trying to figure out how much the analogy is the same.
