09/20/2026
If you are raising goats or have thought about raising them, one of the first pieces of advice you get is "Find a mentor". Goats are NOT "beginner" animals. You need to find someone who has been in this for years, seen all the most common scenarios and several of the uncommon ones as well, and can give you the tools and knowledge to navigate through it.
For us, that person is Suzanne, owner of Onion Creek Ranch . We met when we attended Goat Camp in 2018 and thought about how fortunate we were to be very close (about 2 hr drive). Through the next few years we bought some animals from her, stayed on her ranch in the spring for her kidding internship, and just soaked in as much knowledge as we could. The last several years, we have also gone out in the fall to help with her herd vaccinations. Every adult gets pneumonia & CD&T shots (kids are done in the spring). Every year we gather supplies, syringes, dewormers, hoof trimmers, gloves, notebooks, water bottles, and a hundred other things. As we get ready to start, she'll do a final check, do we have the epinephrine? It's a tiny dark amber bottle, probably holds only 10mLs. It has the typical rubber top for the needle. The label is so worn some of the writing is no longer legible. Around it is a 1cc syringe held there with a rubber band wrapped several times around the petite little bottle. Every year, we make sure it's in a styrofoam tub with an ice pack on our working table. This year, we found out why.
It was day 2 of vaccinations. We finished the much larger doe herd on day 1 and now we were down to the bucks. In all their rutting glory. 🤢 Seth grabbed one guy, Renee handed me the shots, I gave him his pokes, and he was done. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. The next big guy was Ty. He's cranky on his good days, but he definitely did not enjoy being "chased" out of his home and into the working pens. Seth got ahold of his horns and had to turn him to face a corner because he was putting up a bit of a fight. Renee handed me a syringe. 1 shot and all good. New syringe. Shot number 2, and he was down. It was instantaneous. One minute he was with us, and the next second he was trotting toward the bright light at the end of the tunnel. Seth dragged his head around so we could see him. He was flat on his side. Healthy goats will stay sternal when they're awake. I tapped his wide open eye and was surprised that he still had a blink reflex. Seth was the first one to say "Epinephrine". I was closer, so she handed it to me. I drew up .5cc (I learned after that .5cc is the dosage for a kid. Adults can get 1 cc.) Seth jabbed it into his rump, and then we started rubbing on him trying to stimulate him and get his brain rebooted. I checked his blink reflex and it was about the same. We kept at him and noticed he was breathing on his own. I checked his blink again and it was much better. We pulled him up sternally and let him sit and breathe for a few minutes while we all processed. 😵💫 Finally he started supporting himself. Several minutes later, we decided to move the 2 other boys that were with us out of the pen and give him more time to recover. As soon as we opened the gate, the 2 boys ran through, then Ty got up and bolted after them, "Don't leave me behind!" We finished vaccinating the rest of the boys from that pen and gave them extra time before moving them back home. We checked on Ty several times throughout the rest of they day and he was keeping close to the rest of his herd. Standing around, munching on some leaves, miraculously looking none the worse for wear.
Epinephrine is an absolute must have in our med kit. Suzanne taught us that at Goat Camp. When you need it, you need it immediately. There is no time to drive them someplace for medical treatment. They have minutes at most.
I cannot explain enough how much valuable information is available at Goat Camp. It has been a game changer in the way we manage our herd. There are speakers there who are experts in goat nutrition, parasitology, and a veterinarian who will perform a necropsy. Dates are Oct 26th - 29th. There are some spots still available, but not many! Contact Onion Creek Ranch to sign up.
I didn't think to grab a pic of Ty after his ordeal, so this is a pic of our TexMaster buck OCR Alec who will be our breeding buck this fall.
