By Rosemary Tukundane
Rains come with joy to crop farmers but with lamenting challenges to goat and other livestock keepers.
Farmers have smiles on their faces when rain begins although it leaves most unprepared livestock farmers in tears that they end up losing most of their animals meant for sell.
Goats do so well during the dry season and most of the goats look so nice during this season because they are not open to infections due to eating grass with a lot of moisture, wet and soft ground that expose their bodies to numerous infections.
Grace Bwogi a goat farmer from Rakai and a trainer for farmers interested in keeping goats said that keeping goats is as profitable as rearing cattle and pigs but rain spells cause numerous death rates and sickness on the farm therefore farmers have to be well prepared for this dangerous season.
CHALLENGES THAT FARMERS FACE DURING RAINS
- A lot of costs on drugs in treating infections like pneumonia, cough, flue because rain brings a lot of coldness to the goats. Diseases that affect the udder, it should be noted that when the udder of an animal is affected, you can easily lose the animal. The immunity of goats during the rainy spell is completely down.
- Goats don’t look their best because they feed a lot of fresh feeds with a lot of moisture and feeds get moldy due to wet and cold conditions making animals carry bacteria after feeding on them.
- Animals can easily break their legs because of the wet and soft ground and carry stones in their hooves which leads to injuries and damages of an animals.
- Ticks have all the rights to spread fast during the rainy season causing loss of blood from the goat due to the sucks from the body causing diseases.
PREPARATIONS FOR RAINY SPELLS
- Reduce the number of goats on the farm to control over crowding because they will get sicker during this time which will cost a lot in buying drugs therefore sell or take them to a different farm of a colleague who rears less animals where they can survival diseases and deaths in the rainy spell.
- Stock a number of drugs to take you through that hard time of rainy spell. Because a farmer spends a lot of money buying drugs during this period since animals over fall sick during this hard season. A farmer spends less money when they buy drugs in blocky than buying one item at a time.
- Consult veterinary officials before stocking drugs for advice on which medicine is better for the livestock.
- Goats should have a foot bath that they should walk through to kill all the germs and bacteria in the feet while grazing.
- Disinfect goat pens at all time at least twice a week to kill germs and bacteria.
- Treat the sick goats in the rainy season until they have recovered to prevent death rates.
- Sell bad goats for slaughter because they can come back to your farm when sold to another farmer.
