Mastitis in mature cow with new calf

[TNcowman]

Never had this problem before. Cow with two week old calf milksack was growing bigger and bigger. Suspected Mastitis. Had vet come and he did his thing. Gave her a dirutic shot and LA200. Sack is very hard on one side but calf is still sucking and getting some milk. Not sure of the quality of milk though. I will give her another shot tomorrow of LA200. Cow does not move around alot. She is eating and drinking but not as much as normal. She is put up and I have tried milking some. Sack is still hard. Will it ever go back down? Anything I can do more to help? Anything I need to do for the calf? Thanks

 

[dun]

Is it hard from mastitis or hard from edema?

dun

 

[TNcowman]

Vet figured it to be Mastitis but he was not 100% sure.

 

[dun]

Vet figured it to be Mastitis but he was not 100% sure.

Message and milking it out is about all I know of other then intramamary infusions. If it's thast bad I would want to culture themilk from the affected quarter/s to make sure I was using the right stuff.
Here's a mastitis horror story. A couple of weeks ago one of the cows came into the parlor at the dairy and had one very hard quarter. Infused her and stripped it clean. The next milking she came in and a good shar of her udder had turned black. They stripped her clean and infused her again. The next milking she didn;t come up for milking. She was dead as a pimps morals.

 

[*Cowgirl*]

Vet figured it to be Mastitis but he was not 100% sure.

Message and milking it out is about all I know of other then intramamary infusions. If it's thast bad I would want to culture themilk from the affected quarter/s to make sure I was using the right stuff.
Here's a mastitis horror story. A couple of weeks ago one of the cows came into the parlor at the dairy and had one very hard quarter. Infused her and stripped it clean. The next milking she came in and a good shar of her udder had turned black. They stripped her clean and infused her again. The next milking she didn;t come up for milking. She was dead as a pimps morals.

:shock: never heard of one dying from mastits before........

 

[dun]

Vet figured it to be Mastitis but he was not 100% sure.

Message and milking it out is about all I know of other then intramamary infusions. If it's thast bad I would want to culture themilk from the affected quarter/s to make sure I was using the right stuff.
Here's a mastitis horror story. A couple of weeks ago one of the cows came into the parlor at the dairy and had one very hard quarter. Infused her and stripped it clean. The next milking she came in and a good shar of her udder had turned black. They stripped her clean and infused her again. The next milking she didn;t come up for milking. She was dead as a pimps morals.

:shock: never heard of one dying from mastits before........

I'm not sure but I think it was determined to be a staph infection. I'ld never heard of a living cow have the udder turn black either.

dun

 

[rkm]

Seen a lot of dairy cows die from mastitis.

 

[Bez>]

Let that calf stay on the cow - sometimes it works and it is removed by the calf - constant sucking and massage - been there and seen it work - also been there and seen it not work.

But for the record - on this place it DID work about 3-4 times out of 5.

In fact one that is here has had a real bad case - raised a decent calf and never had it come back again.

If you doctor intra-mammary (sp?) you might as well remove the cow and dry it up because the calf will suck everything out - including meds.

Bez>

 

[milkmaid]

Vet figured it to be Mastitis but he was not 100% sure.

Message and milking it out is about all I know of other then intramamary infusions. If it's thast bad I would want to culture themilk from the affected quarter/s to make sure I was using the right stuff.
Here's a mastitis horror story. A couple of weeks ago one of the cows came into the parlor at the dairy and had one very hard quarter. Infused her and stripped it clean. The next milking she came in and a good shar of her udder had turned black. They stripped her clean and infused her again. The next milking she didn;t come up for milking. She was dead as a pimps morals.

:shock: never heard of one dying from mastits before........

I'm not sure but I think it was determined to be a staph infection. I'ld never heard of a living cow have the udder turn black either.

dun

I've heard of it before but never seen it -- one of my vet books talks about a lot of strange pathogens that can cause mastitis. I don't have the book with me now and can't remember all the names; the only one coming to mind right now is clostridial infections, which can cause some strange symptoms. Part of the udder turning black sounds familiar but without my book I can't recall what pathogen causes it.

 

[bigbull338]

Vet figured it to be Mastitis but he was not 100% sure.

Message and milking it out is about all I know of other then intramamary infusions. If it's thast bad I would want to culture themilk from the affected quarter/s to make sure I was using the right stuff.
Here's a mastitis horror story. A couple of weeks ago one of the cows came into the parlor at the dairy and had one very hard quarter. Infused her and stripped it clean. The next milking she came in and a good shar of her udder had turned black. They stripped her clean and infused her again. The next milking she didn;t come up for milking. She was dead as a pimps morals.

:shock: never heard of one dying from mastits before........

I'm not sure but I think it was determined to be a staph infection. I'ld never heard of a living cow have the udder turn black either.

dun

I've heard of it before but never seen it -- one of my vet books talks about a lot of strange pathogens that can cause mastitis. I don't have the book with me now and can't remember all the names; the only one coming to mind right now is clostridial infections, which can cause some strange symptoms. Part of the udder turning black sounds familiar but without my book I can't recall what pathogen causes it.

thats what i call posines mastitis it will kill a cow within 24hrs of getting it.dun is right the teat an bagg will get hard as a rock.most cases its bloody mastitis as well.only lost 2 or 3 cows from it in 27yrs.

 

[vquinn2]

I lost a jersey cow to mastitis. Turned into gangren mastitis (black bag).

 

[TNcowman]

Update on cow/calf
Calf has been sucking two front teats. Calf is now passing bloody stool. Still not sure of quality of milk from cow. Maybe it is time to bottle feed.
Gave cow LA200 yesterday and 60ml of pencillin this morning. Coop person said to give penicillin every day for the next week. I put in teat "drain plugs" or whatever you call them. Back two teats drained for a long time. It was reddish fluid that came out. Front two teats drained white fluid. Her milksack went down some but still larger that normal. Also hard in places. Noticed some skin has come off (about the size of a quarter) on one side. Coop sold me some meds to put up in the teats every day. Put the meds that dry out the back two and put the meds that hopefully will keep the front two lactating. Had to pull calf away from her. Checked on her a few minutes ago and milksack is large again.
Any additional advice?

 

[warpaint]

Continue to milk the affected quarters out. I agree it was time to pull the calf. Along with the meds, milking out should strip mastitis away, if that indeed is what it is. Good luck.

 

[cowvet]

Update on cow/calf
Calf has been sucking two front teats. Calf is now passing bloody stool. Still not sure of quality of milk from cow. Maybe it is time to bottle feed.
Gave cow LA200 yesterday and 60ml of pencillin this morning. Coop person said to give penicillin every day for the next week. I put in teat "drain plugs" or whatever you call them. Back two teats drained for a long time. It was reddish fluid that came out. Front two teats drained white fluid. Her milksack went down some but still larger that normal. Also hard in places. Noticed some skin has come off (about the size of a quarter) on one side. Coop sold me some meds to put up in the teats every day. Put the meds that dry out the back two and put the meds that hopefully will keep the front two lactating. Had to pull calf away from her. Checked on her a few minutes ago and milksack is large again.
Any additional advice?

Who gave you the recommendation to give LA200 and penicillin to a cow. One of the "rules" of good antibiotic usage is not to give tetracyclines and penicillins to the same animal as they interfere with one another and then don't work very well - one of them alone is better than both used together!!!!
(The only exception I can think of is injectible penicillin at the same time as tetracycline pessaries into the uterus is okay)

Injectible Penicillin is not my first choice for mastitis - it does not cross the blood/milk barrier into the udder as well as some of the other antibiotic families. Going into my cupboard of drugs it would probably be the last bottle I would reach for if dealing with mastitis!!!
Sounds to me like the co-op person needs to do some learning with regards to good antibiotic usage rather than just trying to sell the stuff!!!

What was the medication you infused into the back two quarters to dry them off?

Hope you used a sterile technique when draining the front two quarters. Teat drains have a nasty habit of causing mastitis by introducing bacteria into the quarter if they are not sterile or if you have not cleaned the teat end appropriately...

 

[milkmaid]

Ditto to what cowvet said.... except that there are occasions where pennicillin IS my drug of choice for mastitis. It's once in a blue moon, yes, but there are times when I'd rather use that than anything else.

I've had almost no luck with LA200 combating mastitis.

When you run across a drug that will cause total cessation of a lactating quarter without causing a reaction, let me know. I haven't found one yet.

Intramammary drugs only need to be given in the affected quarter, not the clean quarters.

And....... do us a favor, TNcowman, and use terms we're familiar with; udder (singular), teats (4 - normally), quarters (4 - each teat on each quarter), and mastitis (infection within a quarter). 'K? ;-)

 

[cowvet]

Ditto to what cowvet said.... except that there are occasions where pennicillin IS my drug of choice for mastitis. It's once in a blue moon, yes, but there are times when I'd rather use that than anything else.

I've had almost no luck with LA200 combating mastitis.

When you run across a drug that will cause total cessation of a lactating quarter without causing a reaction, let me know. I haven't found one yet.

Intramammary drugs only need to be given in the affected quarter, not the clean quarters.

And....... do us a favor, TNcowman, and use terms we're familiar with; udder (singular), teats (4 - normally), quarters (4 - each teat on each quarter), and mastitis (infection within a quarter). 'K? ;-)

The standard injectible penicillin we use crosses from the blood into the udder poorly. It is great on specific bugs when given as an intramammary preparation. There are some "special" penicillins (not sure what brand names they are called on the US market) that have been specifically formulated to be used for mastitis and as an injectible do cross into the udder well. These are mostly used in cattle with multiple quarter involvement or for those that are difficult to treat with an intramammary!!!

There are many different families of antibiotics - some work better than others on udder infections (mastitis). Also, some work better on different bugs compared to others. In an ideal world it would be great if each case of mastitis could be cultured to identify the bacteria involved so that the best antibiotic for that bacteria could be used and therefore increase the chances of a successful outcome.

It is common knowledge that if you don't cure on your first attempt at treatment is gets progressively harder with each attempt after that - hence the importance of using the correct antibiotic in the first place!!!

 

[GMN]

Vet figured it to be Mastitis but he was not 100% sure.

Message and milking it out is about all I know of other then intramamary infusions. If it's thast bad I would want to culture themilk from the affected quarter/s to make sure I was using the right stuff.
Here's a mastitis horror story. A couple of weeks ago one of the cows came into the parlor at the dairy and had one very hard quarter. Infused her and stripped it clean. The next milking she came in and a good shar of her udder had turned black. They stripped her clean and infused her again. The next milking she didn;t come up for milking. She was dead as a pimps morals.

This form of mastitis is a E. Coli form, called Coliform mastitis, which leads to gangrene of the effected quarter. When I first started milking I had it happen. The Vet came out, cut the dead quarter off, said it would drain and heal up, however the infection had travvelled into her bloodstream already and she was dead the next day. Best preventative for this form of mastitis is the J-Vac Vaccine, started it right after, never had a problem since. Also, other forms of mastitis can kill a cow, if they get acute mastitis, soon after calving, and it goes unmedicated, it will travel into the bloodstream, and kill within days. Best treatment for any severe case of mastitis, is putting a mastitis infusion up the effected quarter, heavy doses of Penicillen or other form of IM injectable, stripping it out, repeating the doses, but if it is a severe case, have the Vet out to give IV antibiotics.

Also the effected quarters in your animal, will more likely not be productive any further, they will be dead quarters.

GMN

 

[milkmaid]

Ditto to what cowvet said.... except that there are occasions where pennicillin IS my drug of choice for mastitis. It's once in a blue moon, yes, but there are times when I'd rather use that than anything else.

I've had almost no luck with LA200 combating mastitis.

When you run across a drug that will cause total cessation of a lactating quarter without causing a reaction, let me know. I haven't found one yet.

Intramammary drugs only need to be given in the affected quarter, not the clean quarters.

And....... do us a favor, TNcowman, and use terms we're familiar with; udder (singular), teats (4 - normally), quarters (4 - each teat on each quarter), and mastitis (infection within a quarter). 'K? ;-)

The standard injectible penicillin we use crosses from the blood into the udder poorly. It is great on specific bugs when given as an intramammary preparation. There are some "special" penicillins (not sure what brand names they are called on the US market) that have been specifically formulated to be used for mastitis and as an injectible do cross into the udder well. These are mostly used in cattle with multiple quarter involvement or for those that are difficult to treat with an intramammary!!!

There are many different families of antibiotics - some work better than others on udder infections (mastitis). Also, some work better on different bugs compared to others. In an ideal world it would be great if each case of mastitis could be cultured to identify the bacteria involved so that the best antibiotic for that bacteria could be used and therefore increase the chances of a successful outcome.

It is common knowledge that if you don't cure on your first attempt at treatment is gets progressively harder with each attempt after that - hence the importance of using the correct antibiotic in the first place!!!

I did quite a few cultures on cows back when I was on the dairy... it sure taught me a lot about drugs and different pathogens, that's for sure! I certainly agree with what you've said about treatments and such.

I will note that the only time I ever saw a staph aureus infection eliminated in a cow (not just clinically, but by multiple cultures) was after using 60cc's of Twin Penn (long lasting pennicillin; procaine and benzathine) daily plus intramammary infusions of Amoxicillin. I did see a few s. aureus cases clear up in fresh heifers after using 7 days of Pirsue, but that wasn't completely reliable either. Strep and ecoli cases weren't that hard to get rid of - it was the staph cows that were tough for me.

I know pennicillin isn't the drug of choice for mastitis most of the time (esp since so many of the staph pathogens are resistant to it), but it has worked for me from time to time.

While I'm thinking of it, what drugs do you use over there for mastitis? have any favorites for certain pathogens?

 

[cowvet]

Ditto to what cowvet said.... except that there are occasions where pennicillin IS my drug of choice for mastitis. It's once in a blue moon, yes, but there are times when I'd rather use that than anything else.

I've had almost no luck with LA200 combating mastitis.

When you run across a drug that will cause total cessation of a lactating quarter without causing a reaction, let me know. I haven't found one yet.

Intramammary drugs only need to be given in the affected quarter, not the clean quarters.

And....... do us a favor, TNcowman, and use terms we're familiar with; udder (singular), teats (4 - normally), quarters (4 - each teat on each quarter), and mastitis (infection within a quarter). 'K? ;-)

The standard injectible penicillin we use crosses from the blood into the udder poorly. It is great on specific bugs when given as an intramammary preparation. There are some "special" penicillins (not sure what brand names they are called on the US market) that have been specifically formulated to be used for mastitis and as an injectible do cross into the udder well. These are mostly used in cattle with multiple quarter involvement or for those that are difficult to treat with an intramammary!!!

There are many different families of antibiotics - some work better than others on udder infections (mastitis). Also, some work better on different bugs compared to others. In an ideal world it would be great if each case of mastitis could be cultured to identify the bacteria involved so that the best antibiotic for that bacteria could be used and therefore increase the chances of a successful outcome.

It is common knowledge that if you don't cure on your first attempt at treatment is gets progressively harder with each attempt after that - hence the importance of using the correct antibiotic in the first place!!!

I did quite a few cultures on cows back when I was on the dairy... it sure taught me a lot about drugs and different pathogens, that's for sure! I certainly agree with what you've said about treatments and such.

I will note that the only time I ever saw a staph aureus infection eliminated in a cow (not just clinically, but by multiple cultures) was after using 60cc's of Twin Penn (long lasting pennicillin; procaine and benzathine) daily plus intramammary infusions of Amoxicillin. I did see a few s. aureus cases clear up in fresh heifers after using 7 days of Pirsue, but that wasn't completely reliable either. Strep and ecoli cases weren't that hard to get rid of - it was the staph cows that were tough for me.

I know penicillin isn't the drug of choice for mastitis most of the time (esp since so many of the staph pathogens are resistant to it), but it has worked for me from time to time.

While I'm thinking of it, what drugs do you use over there for mastitis? have any favorites for certain pathogens?

Well I suppose one way of getting around the poor penetration of penicillin into the udder is to give a huge dose (60 cc) !!!!

Staph aureus is hard to treat but I would be inclined to think an appropriate intramammary over a longer treatment period is going to do way more than jabs in the muscle where only a small proportion of the drug gets to the udder. (Appropriate intramammary will vary between countries but a culture/sensitivity test would help the decision)

Being a pasture based, spring calving dairy system we get a lot of Strep uberis mastitis in the spring, then the staphs come mid to late season. We don't see much E coli mastitis.

 

[milkmaid]

Well I suppose one way of getting around the poor penetration of penicillin into the udder is to give a huge dose (60 cc) !!!!

Staph aureus is hard to treat but I would be inclined to think an appropriate intramammary over a longer treatment period is going to do way more than jabs in the muscle where only a small proportion of the drug gets to the udder. (Appropriate intramammary will vary between countries but a culture/sensitivity test would help the decision)

Being a pasture based, spring calving dairy system we get a lot of Strep uberis mastitis in the spring, then the staphs come mid to late season. We don't see much E coli mastitis.

60cc's is standard (prevention) for a mature cow following DA surgery over here. 35-60cc's daily for uterine infections. That's at 150,000 units procaine, 150,000 units benzathine per mL if I remember correctly, and of course, given SC. How much do you usually give?