swollen knees

[deetu]

one of my 3 month old whethers has swollen knees. Only in the front. They are squishy (like water balloons) and do not seem to bother him at all. No fever.
What could be the cause? And how can I fix it?

[deetu]

anyone?

[susanne]

mycoplasma? i would test for that and keep him in quarantine until result is back

[mamajohnson]

mycoplasma is possible. I would start there.

One of my does came up looking like that and it turned out to be CAE. But, he is too young for the test even, I think they need to be 6 months old before the test is accurate for that, and usually show symptoms between 6 mo and 1 year.

[susanne]

never too young for testing. although it doesn't tell the real status, it will tell if at any time the kid got colostrum/milk from a positive doe, which can be a very valuable information.
i doubt there will be arthritis showing up in young kids like this.

[deetu]

"This is the situation most likely to be seen by goat herders. Healthy young kids will suddenly start limping, hunch their backs, stop eating, go down crying in obvious pain and die within a few hours. Blindness has also been reported. In some instances, the mothers will be obvious cases of mycoplasma mastitis (see below), but the link is not always guaranteed. The diagnosis must be differentiated from enterotoxemias of Clostridium perfringens C and D and "navel ill." "

No, no, none of that with this little kid, just puffy knees. Runs, plays, jumps up on things, eats. They were not as puffy today but still there. Like partially filled water balloons for knees.

[mamajohnson]

Possibly he just twisted his knees?
That is what the vet first suggested when I thought my girl had CAE (which she did)
It could be he played too hard and caused a little injury?

[deetu]

Humm.... You'd think if it was an injury he would be limping or something. Well, it seems to be getting better but I still wish I knew what it was.

[southerngurl]

He may have injured them, but they weren't sore to stop a goat kid from playing. Animals can really ignore pain or soreness.

[celadon]

My two girls had the puffy knees also. they had cae. I hope it is not cae.

[Vicki McGaugh TX Nubians]

Sorry no idea where you gleaned yet another tid bit of crapola off the internet but it doesn't pertain to mycoplasma in goats. Lkely info from Mereck that someone who has never dealt with mycoplasma embelished. It either strikes as penmonia, a gruesome mastitis, or swollen joints, I have never seen a goat with mycoplasma have any of the symptoms in that post, ever. I would guess there were hundreds of dairy goats put down in the 90's for mycoplasma because of the CAE hysteria. It looks just like CAE knees.

I am not much of a guesser I would have a blood test ran, and yes you can also test the fluid in the knee. If you put this off much longer his knees will never loose the fluid and he will permanately walk on his knees as an older goat.

I have never had a kid this young have CAE symptoms. It's usually a yearling, coinciding with rut or with their first kids. Vicki