Oh, he really is beautiful! Bless you for taking such good care of Buster in his times of need. He was very lucky indeed to have a home with such wonderful people.

So sorry to hear about Buster, Lynda. It is very painful to lose a beloved pet. I enjoyed "meeting" Buster in a recent thread - don't know how I missed hearing about him before that. I don't know about having a goat in the garden, but I wish some of Buster's friends could come over and eat all the invasive plants growing in the neighborhood.

RIP Buster.

I am so sorry to hear about Buster, I have secretly been a fan of his. It is ever so hard to put them down when they are healthy other than bad legs. I had to put down a Newf of mine for that very reason. It was hard....I send you big hugs and prayers of comfort that yes, you did the right thing for your little goat boy.

A candle burns brightly for Buster.

I am so sorry about Buster. He will live on in your heart and your garden. I know he will be watching over all your yellow flowers and your delicious tomatoes and you will think of him every time you see one. Maybe you can make a plaque in your garden for him. Sending you hugs and a shoulder to cry on.

Ah, Lynda. I'm so sorry about Buster. It's hard to make the decision you and your husband faced. His legs didn't work. He couldn't return to the herd. Yes, it's terrible but you put Buster first when you made that decision.

gardenluv is right when she said that he will live on in your heart and your garden.

That's just so terribly sad. You fought so hard for Buster. That was my grandma's dog, English Spaniel, when I was a little girl.

One day, I don't know how long it had been, I noticed he wasn't around and asked my grandma where Buster was. They had to have him put to sleep. That was the first I knew about euthanizing animals.

I've lost pets, too. It's very hard and seems harder now that I'm older, but I can't help getting attached to them.

You will miss Buster especially this year, hope it gets better, but you never really forget them.

I'm very sorry for your loss. You gave him a wonderful life full of love, caring and friendship.

Trudi

I'm so sorry, Lynda. It's always hard to lose a pet for any reason. It's been years since we had to have our golden retriever to sleep. I guess I've never gotten over it. As much as I want another, I can't set myself up for another loss like that. At least I haven't reached that point yet.

Karen

Lynda,

My heart feels for you.

Nicole.

We appreciate all of you sweet comments.

Buster's garden memorial is going to be a tire garden full of comfrey. We used that to help with his arthritic knees and even with all of his mobility problems as least we were able to give him pain free knees. I'm sure he'd want us to make sure to have a good parent colony of comfrey at the ready in case any of his herd mates ever need it.

Our plans for direct sowing on the land also take Buster's needs into account. His immune system was a mess over the past few years. We've planted a lot of echinacea in the garden and this winter direct sowed a good amount of echinacea on the land (thanks for the seed Jim_6B). It will take several more years to grow substantial amounts of seed and to get echinacea colonies established out in Goatland, but long term we hope to have it growing all over so that the goats can self medicate as needed.

Some of Buster's troubles were due to deerworm (menningeal worm) a parasite that is spread by deer and that causes paralysis in goats. It also appears to cause muscle wasting, long term immune problems, usually kills the infected animal. We've lost one other goat to it, but have two that have made full recoveries. One had her back end completely paralyzed last year and needed months of special care but is now fully recovered and can out run everyone. Deerworm is common in our region and will always be a risk for our herd.

After Buster's first encounter with deerworm about four years ago he was recovering well but then broke his leg. After the leg healed he contacted deerworm again the next winter and we began the downward slide.

It seems that it takes an otherwise healthy goat about 2 to 3 years to fully recover from deerworm and we now believe that echinacea could help speed that process significantly. Part of Buster's legacy is what it taught us about disease progression for both deerworm and chronic arthritis and what we learned about managing parts of that with medicinal herbs. If we had known at the start what we know now, we could have done better managing the after effects of his first infections with deerworm and the bone and joint issues following his leg break.

So part two of the Buster memorial will be this year's echinacea seed harvest from the flower garden and direct sowing it into the dogland and goatland areas next winter. Long term we want to free range a large variety of medicinal plants in goatland, and we'll have additional colonies in dogland. That way if the goats make it tough to get large colonies established the dogland area gives us an area to grow big amounts with them fenced out, but we still can let goats in to self medicate when they need to.

I do hope that the things we've learned from working with Buster help us in our ability to care for the other herd members as they age, or as they encounter disease or injury.

Lynda

"I do hope that the things we've learned from working with Buster help us in our ability to care for the other herd members as they age, or as they encounter disease or injury."

That is quite a story, interesting even though sad. Maybe it will help other goat owners except I doubt they will see it here. I always kind of wished I could have some. I love goat milk. Keeping animals is good for the environment and other things as well, but it keeps you tied down.

I presume you've thought about it, but is there any danger they could over-medicate, understand you'll keep them fenced out unless you want them in the area? Should be pretty, too, and draw bees and butterflies.

So sorry to hear about Buster!!

I think it is so great you are planting flowers to help the goats self medicate. Plus what a nice memorial to Buster.

Karen

Lynda,
I am so sorry to read this sad news about Buster, i have enjoyed reading about him when you share your garden stories,you will miss him greatly,how nice that you took such good care of him,how did you learn about echincea being good for goats and deer worms?
I love the fact that you do all this natural health managment.
You gave Buster a good life.I will miss your stories about him.
cAROL

Lynda, I am very sorry to hear about Buster. I was just reading all about him last night and was rooting for his recovery. I think any goat or for that matter any animal would be lucky to find a home with you and your family. You can tell that he was much loved and will be sorely missed. I think it is a wonderful memorial to Buster to plant the medicinal herbs to help keep the rest of his herd healthy. I look forward to reading about your herd in the future.
We lost our 2 goats many years ago to bloat. They got into the newly sprouted peas and ate them to the ground and we lost them a few days later. We still miss their antics. Carol

Aliska - we shouldn't have much risk of overmedicating. Most of the medicinals are more gentle and safer than pharmaceutical type medicines. And the only ones that go into goatland are the ones I'll use myself.

Most of the medicinals have distinct flavors and textures and are the kind of things goats taste and nibble, but don't chow down on - so that also keeps intake at very moderate levels. They tend to just eat them when they need them.

We also only put the safest types of plants in goatland and dogland. Things that can be medicinal but are very strong meds (like foxglove)are only grown in the flower garden in the section closest to the road - a place where seed can't wash back up into the goatland hills. I won't self medicate myself with that and there's no way I'll let it free range on the land. I do want the pretty flowers in my garden though. :)

On Buster's garden tours it was very interesting to see his reaction to plants that he had not encountered before. Most of them got a little nibble. He liked the malva and hollyhocks which are stomach soothing and anti-inflammatory. He also like marshmallow which is similar.

He loved the mugwort which is used for rheumatism. He had no interest in the St Johnswort. He had a nibble on the valerian one day and liked it, but it wasn't particular favorite for garden munching. He nibbled on the hyssop a bit but didn't care for it. He was keen on the peppermint for a few days, but after that ignored it.

We did go down the path with the foxglove one day. I had been watching his garden nibbling for several days and knew by then that even in the middle of winter he was being very selective in his munching. So we went down that path and I was ready to pull him away from the big, lush foxglove leaves if he went for them. He gave them one sniff, made a face and wanted nothing to do with them.

Those garden tour days convinced me that as long as we have a food rich environment in goatland we don't really have to worry about them mis-medicating. Now if a plant is mild, gentle and a favorite they might prevent it from ever getting established, but that's a different problem.

When Buster joined us in the house in December he was really on edge the first night. The next several nights he and I both had a cup of herbal tea (homegrown valerian and skullcap - valerian to promote sleep and skullcap for sleep and muscle pain relief) at bedtime. It really helped both of us sleep through the first few days of our new routine. Buster already had the understanding that humans sometimes provide medicines that make ill goats feel better, and after our first tea party it was clear that he knew that the drink was something soothing and relaxing.

We've also used herbs for a goat that had either pink eye or a corneal scratch. Of course that happened after the vet's was closed for the day so we did a quick check of the herbal medicine book. It recommended chamomile tea as an eye rinse so we brewed some and bathed her eye. Goats hate getting wet so she wasn't sure about the wet washcloth on the first application. But within seconds she was gently leaning into it and obviously feeling relief. It cured the problem up quickly - as good as ever had with veterinary pharmaceutical eyedrops. We gave her several more eyewashes over the next two days and she would come to us for treatment when she saw the washcloth. That's the same goat that comes to the fence and asks us for mentholated cough drops when she has a stuffy nose. (She wasn't keen on the very first one, but once she figured out what it did for her nose she knew to come to us for medicine if she couldn't breath through her nose.)

Bit by bit we are learning first hand what to expect from various medicinal herbs as we establish parent colonies. Getting a second opinion on the treatments from the goats has been very helpful. The most promising herbs gradually get planted beyond the herb garden - first into my flower garden/seed farm and then out into goatland & dogland.

It was so cool to have garden time with Buster to see what he thought of the various types of plants. He was very particular about what he'd eat outright, what he'd nibble a bit and what he'd avoid - even down to which particular parts of the plants he'd eat. He obviously had some sort of plant knowledge that he could apply to the flower garden - quite amazing when you consider that because of the mild winter there were over 65 plant species with actively growing greenery at the time. There must have been 50 species where our garden walks were his first ever encounters with them, but he knew how to assess them and make judgments about them.

His illnesses have been an awful lot of work for us but it really was cool having those garden walks with him. I guess I'll need to bring one of the others out for a stroll sometime and listen to what they have to tell me about the plants and herbs. I bet cough drop fan Sandy would like to see what's out in the front garden. :)

Lynda

cAROL, we aren't positive that echinacea will be ideal for deerworm, but it seems like a good fit. I've got a link below to the book that we rely on the most.

The echinacea section has a lot of detail about it's effects on immune system and collagen rebuilding. It was really amazing how many of it's medicinal actions treat the type of symptoms we saw Buster display. Unfortunately our garden echinacea was all first year seedlings so we never got a good chance to test it out on him. But the medicinal actions of echinacea appear to be such a good fit for systemic damage that comes with deerworm that we don't feel we can grow too much of it.

That's one of the reasons I sprung for that 9 echinacea species seed set from Horizon I mentioned not too long ago. I figure to try to grow all 9 species and we should end up with 3 or 4 that can handle growing conditions out in goatland.

Carol - so sorry to hear about your goats. Bloat is so scary. How awful.

Lynda

Here is a link that might be useful: Book - Medical Herbalism

Lynda,
I'm so sorry to hear that your sweet Buster is gone.
take care,
Sending you (((hugs)))
Laura

So sorry about Buster. I know how I felt when we had to put down our 15 year old Basset Hound.
Glenna