Mastitis Treatment for your nursing or milking goat:

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Simply put mastitis is an clogged milk gland  or inflammation of the mammary gland in a nanny goat. Typically this is not contiguous to other goats in your herd. This condition tends to affect only one udder or side. It is reported to be a fairly common condition in nursing goats.

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The most common signs of Goat Mastitis are:​

1. Your goat has a swollen udder or udders. Typically goat mastitis only affects one udder.

2. Goat udder is HOT and sensitive to the touch.

3. When the udder is touched the Doe will show signs of pain or discomfort.

4. Nanny's udders are hard and or swollen.

5. Nursing baby goats will appear hungry and weak.

6. Doe may run a fever.

7. Doe may not eat or seem depressed.

8. Clumpy milk, off colored with a presence of blood.  Looks like cottage cheese or string cheese!

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During our first kidding season we lost a dairy goat to mastitis despite a vet visit and treatment. Often times the kids will tend to nurse on one udder so it is hard to tell by looking at your Doe if she is developing mastitis. We treated her with no luck and he skin began to detach from her udder. It was so sad we did everything we knew to do but it wasn't enough. 

 

When the spring kidding season rolls around at our goat farm I do bag checks to watch for udder development and ligaments to go before our Does kid, Now I do udder checks often after kidding. 

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Medical Goat Mastitis Treatment:

1. Consult your vet! 

2 .Use a broad spectrum antibiotic for 5 to 7 days

3. Use today or tomorrow treatment.  Can be purchased a local farm store. 

4. Use a udder balm with peppermint oil.

5. Apply hot compresses to the infected goat udder. 

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Natural Goat Mastitis Treatment: 

1. Add a few drops of tea tree oil into a carrier oil and apply it to the infected goat udder.  If you feel like your goat is in pain add a few drops of lavender oil. Avoid getting this mixture on the teat itself so that the baby goat does not ingest it while nursing,  People recommend doing this 2 to 3 times a day until improvement. 

2. We had another mild case out first kidding season and used Mastoblast, It seemed to help within 24 hours. 

3. I have also seen people give Vitamin C and Apple Cider Vinegar as a treatment.

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​**After extensive research I have read you should dry the Doe off. We did not do this with our Nanny goat. 

 

Note: We are not giving medical advice just sharing what we have learned over the years of goat ownership. Please consult your Vet! Good goat vets are hard to find. We are still looking. I feel like we have been given some bad advice and often times I find better treatments from experienced goat farmers. 

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