Strange Mastitis Question

andabigmac · #1 09/15/11, 05:21 PM

One of my girls has mastitis. She has never been interested in drinking milk at all. Since she's been sick though, she's been fanatical about drinking her milk. It's been in a separate bowl that I dump outside as I switch goats. I've done this before when I've separated milk because of worming, etc. She never even glanced at it. Now, when she's done being milked she's been making a mad dash for the wagon and puts her head in the bowl and slurps it up. She's only done it twice because now I'm dumping the milk before I let her loose and then pulling her away.

Does anyone else's goats do this? Will it hurt her to drink the milk? Is she drinking it because her body needs it? This is only my second bout with mastitis. The first one came with it when I bought her and it was sub-clinical so it wasn't gross or anything. This stuff is chunky.

Thanks in advance.

Alice In TX/MO · #2 09/15/11, 05:23 PM

Actually, there are some who believe that you SHOULD feed a goat her mastitis milk in order for her body to develop antibodies to the organism causing the mastitis.

mekasmom · #3 09/15/11, 05:33 PM

I would let her drink it. It obviously won't hurt her because it is coming from her own body, and you aren't using it if you think she has mastitis,correct?
Personally, I would treat her with injected antibiotics, high dose, for ten days then see if the mastitis is gone for good. If it comes back, then I would cull her or simply use her for a pet. I suppose you could do a round of silver if the antibiotics fail, but if it is a chronic condition, you aren't going to be productive with her. And some people are afraid to drink the milk after treating a goat with a lot of colloidal silver even though it clears up the issue. It's just a personal matter of squeamishness or not. Plus you have to worry about the natural bacteria that is supposed to be in the gut when you treat with silver because it kills it all.

I bought a beautiful nubian one time that went through two rounds of PennG and something else the vet gave me, clindimycin?, anyway the mastitis came back after all those antibiotics. Then I went to the naturopath who said to use silver. And it worked with a ten day dose, but it was hard to get it down her. You had to put it on grain and not let her eat anything else overnight, so she ate the grain first thing in the morning.
But because she had the mastitis so long, and who knows how long before I got her, her udder wasn't good anymore. I ended up sending her to market. It was a shame because she was such a nice, big nubie.

andabigmac · #4 09/15/11, 05:59 PM

I'm not drinking her milk. I've been dumping it in my herb garden.
My vet sent a sample off Tuesday. She's on 3ml IM Naxcel once a day and Spectramast 1X/day for 4 days. I'm milking her out 3X/day and rubbing my cure-all salve that I make on her udder while I massage.
I test every weekend and on Sunday she was totally clear. The SCC test didn't even turn a color. Then Tuesday she wakes up with a rock hard udder on one side and was off her feed. I wonder if its an injury because everyone is fighting out there.
It's already clearing up. No more chunks in the milk, anyways, and her udder isn't hard. I thought about using silver on her because that's what I would use on myself but I am scared to death to lose an udder. The Naxcel should be done in a few days. Maybe I should give her silver for a week when the Naxcel is done. Would that be overkill?

I'll let her drink the milk if she wants. I guess it would be homeopathic. Its gross though.

windblown · #5 09/16/11, 03:09 PM

I used a ginger tea for my doe when she was sick using fresh ginger and made a tea with it kept it fairly hot not to burn tho put a rag or small towell into the water and wrapped it around the bag three times a day massaged gently after treatment them milked her to get out the lossened up stuff just my 2 cents worth and what worked for me

andabigmac · #6 09/16/11, 03:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by windblown

I used a ginger tea for my doe when she was sick using fresh ginger and made a tea with it kept it fairly hot not to burn tho put a rag or small towell into the water and wrapped it around the bag three times a day massaged gently after treatment them milked her to get out the lossened up stuff just my 2 cents worth and what worked for me

I actually have ginger essential oil in my cure-all salve. Ginger is amazing. I keep ginger chews in my purse at all times. I gave one to my foster son when he had an upset stomach and he told me I was the only person he knew that gave people candy when their stomach was upset.

I'll keep the ginger tea in mind. Hopefully I never have to use it. Mastitis is scary.

chamoisee · #7 09/16/11, 03:48 PM

The goats I have had who drank their own milk tended to be the sorts who milked so heavily that they were in poor flesh. I always figured that if they were craving their milk, chances were they needed it, and it helped keep the flesh on them.

Hollowdweller · #8 09/16/11, 06:12 PM

I have read that actually some forms of mastitis can be passed from the dam to the kid, only to infect the kid when she freshens.

So I would be somewhat cautious about letting a doe that had mastitis drink the milk for fear she would be recirculating it.