I was wondering if anyone could tell me whether or not I can use Strongid paste horse wormer on goats and sheep. I know it is okay to use some horse wormers on them, but am not sure about Strongid.

-- Tammy (btawilliams@juno.com), June 21, 2000

Answers

Safeguard would be better. Zimerctrin is good too. I use the paste stuff for horses.

-- Bergere (autumnhaus@aol.com), June 21, 2000.

Tammy in test ran by Texas A&M paristology department in Austin, Safeguard, Panacur, Strongid paste wormers were dosed at 2 and 3 times the amount on the syringe. So if your goat weighs 100 pounds you treat at 200 or 300 pound weights. Even at the they gave only a 67% kill on Hemoncous worms (the worms that eat your goats blood, and Tristongides, the nasty black diarrhea causing worm. Hardly worth using at that! Valbazen is also a bensazole like the above 3 yet is having a great kill here of 99%, we are using it at 6cc per 100 pounds. It has the added bonus of killing, tapes, liverflukes, lungworm. Once you have used a bensasole wormer for a season, you will want to switch to another class of drug, a mectin, Ivermectin 1% cattle injectable (we use it at 2cc per 100 pounds given orally) there is also dectomax, cydectin, top line, etc. It is recommended to use most cattle wormers at double the dosage, to use all products orally, not to inject or pour on. Vicki McGaugh

-- Vicki McGaugh (vickilonesomedoe@hotmail.com), June 21, 2000.

Tammy, I have used Strongid on my goats, I use it on the dogs too, but then I use Ivermectin on both the goats and dogs. No problem with either except the vet ssid Ivermectin can hurt a collie breed. If you use Valbazen or Ivermectin-F just remember it will cause abortions in pregnant does. karen

-- Karen Mauk (dairygoatmama@hotmail.com), June 22, 2000.

Do you know that there are no studies to show that there ever was a goat who aborted, being wormed with Valbazen, even in Goat Medicine where they tried with overdose? There was long bone fuzion on kids in utero when given Ivermectin during 7 to 11 days (of the doe being bred and conceiving). Valbazen's warning not to use during the first trimester is for cattle. And in a good management situation you really don't have any reason of worming a doe during this 50 days. Worm your does before they are bred, the buck also. Then run a fecal at 50 and 100 days to see if you even need to worm. Even in Hot Humid worm growing East Texas, we worm very rarely during the fall and early winter, on any age of goat here. We do routinely worm the doe the day she kids, and if we had a fecal count over 1000 grams we would worm, and yes with Valbazen or Ivermectin. Vicki

-- Vicki McGaugh (vickilonesomedoe@hotmail.com), June 22, 2000.

Please worm with the correct amount, I have wormed every month, when my sheep are not pregnant with Valbazen, pregnant either ivomentic sheep drench or panacur. I used to little of an amount, I have close to 200 pound ewe which I was either giving 5cc Valbazen or 17 cc of ivomectin sheep drench. Too little of an amount, I now have a ewe suffering anemia, bottle jaw, we worm tripple amounts every other week now on her and the worms are cleared but still has bottle jaw, I am feeding her giveing her anibitics and she may not get pregnant this year for me because of all this. My ram has a slight condition of the same, so I really messed up. On further studying of the matter by underworming I was creating more of a mess than had I not wormed at all, the worms were learning to be immune to every wormer on the market. Take it from me, I learned the hard way about worming. Here in Eastern Ok. you have a terrible parasite problem. We need to worm almost every three weeks. Debbie

-- Debbie Wolcott (bwolcott@cwis.net), June 27, 2000.

I'm going to contribute an organic reply just in case anyone is interested. First, they need a healthy, free-range environment with plenty of clean water. I mix diatomaceous earth into their feed EVERY DAY. I also mix thier feed with rasberry tea and grapefruit seed extract. I feed them oats, flaxseed meal, and kelp daily. I have been working with this for several years. This years I had all twins, with no rejections. Hopefully this trend will continue. My sheep aren't perfect, but I've never had a vet out to my farm. I haven't had a lot of problems. Good luck!

-- Jenny Buttke (rdb@ticon.net), June 27, 2000.