I have posted before about this pregnant goat with hypocalcinemia. She was doing well on her calcium supplementation and eating normally. This morning we fed her and she ate normally. Before my husband went to work he gave her a shot of lutelase as she was overdue and I heard that hypocalcinemia causes them to not go into labor on their own. Would have induced her the day before but we were busy with assisting a breech delivery and reviving chilled kids.

Anyway, I had my baby monitor on so I could hear any signs of impending labor in the barn. About 1 and a half hours after morning chore time. I heard Lila screaming in the barn. I went out quickly and found her panting with mass quantities of foam hanging out of her mouth. SHe hollared for about 5 minutes than dropped dead right in her tracks. Of course, we lost the kids too.

Does this sound like anything? This is really puzzling. She was receiving regular calcuim supplementation, probios, and had free choice baking soda. SHe had no signs of ketosis. Could the lutelase have caused heart failure?

-- Tiffani Cappello (cappello@alltel.net), March 28, 2001

Answers

Tiffani, I don't know what happened but I wanted to offer my condolences to you. I am really sorry. Take care and God bless.

-- Doreen (animalwaitress@excite.com), March 29, 2001.

I'm not an expert on these things, you should call your vet and ask him about it, but from what I understand, hypocalcemia doesn't exactly keep them from coming into labor. What happens is that labor requires a lot of calcium for the contractions. So the doe will go into labor, but her contractions will be weak and ineffective. At least that's what happened to one of my does last year. Also, from what I understand, calcium supplements can make a doe MORE prone to hypocalcemia, because the doe becomes dependent on the ingested calcium to the point that her body does not utilize the calcium from her bones properly, and the ingested calcium is not sufficient for the massive requirements of labor and freshening. So I could be wrong here, but it's possible that the combination of calcium supplements and an induced labor actually helped cause the hypocalcemia to occur. Or her body may not have been fully ready to birth, and fully softened, and the uterus could have ruptured, or any number of things. I am sorry that this happened though, maybe someone else can help shed a little more light on this.

-- Rebekah (daniel1@itss.net), March 29, 2001.

What a sad thing to happen. I am sorry. :-(

Cindy

-- Cindy in Ok (cynthiacluck@yahoo.com), March 30, 2001.

I'm sorry that happened, Tiffani. I sure hope you find out what the problem was, I know nothing about this. So sad.

-- Cindy in Ky (solidrockranch@hotmail.com), March 30, 2001.