My fullblood boer busk has lumps on the side of his head. He has 3 on one side and 2 on the other. They are the size of a golfball and larger. One of the lumps has a white-yellow pus running from it. Please respond.

-- (lanelynn@hotmail.com), October 22, 2001

Answers

Response to Waht are the lumps on my goats head?

sounds like some kind of infection to me

get him to a vet

-- Rose (open_rose@hotmail.com), October 22, 2001.

Response to Waht are the lumps on my goats head?

My doe also has a golfball sized lump on her neck, and almost as hard. An abscess maybe? There isn't any indication of a bite or sting, that I can see, no open wounds. I sure would appreciate any suggestions or prior experience.

-- Melody, AL (RealWorld3D@hotmail.com), October 22, 2001.

Response to Waht are the lumps on my goats head?

Call your vet. Likely what they will you do is to come and and pick up a test tube in which you will collect some of the pus. From the Merck Veterinary Manual the symptoms appear to be related to Actinomycosis. If it is, there is no known successful treatment. However, I am not a vet.

-- Ken S. in WC TN (scharabo@aol.com), October 22, 2001.

Hate to break bad news to you, but this sounds like caseous lymphadenitis to me, based on personal experience. It's a bad bug. I learned about it from dealing with some rescued goats that came to our place.

-- Shannon at Grateful Acres Animal Sanctuary (gratacres@aol.com), October 22, 2001.

Sounds like CL to me also. In reference to the doe that has a lump on her neck you may want to run a fecal and check for worms.

-- Leslie in Western WA (sundaycreek@gnrac.net), October 22, 2001.

Lots of stuff in the archives about CL. Side of the neck up to the ear, down the front of the neck to the brisket (the lump of meat/muscle between the leg) over the ribs, especially right at the elbow of the goat, under the goat over the flank, infront of and behind the udder up into the rump is the lymph node system of a goat, lumps here are usually CL. A zoonoic disease that will contaminate your soil if left to burst, if contaminates your wooden structures, feeders, walls of the barn, fence posts, for years. Babies born to nursing moms with these burst in the udder are infected drinking the milk. The lumps usually show themselves after you purchase the animal, from stress. They will have more lumps appear over their lifetime usually after kidding, the disease can lay dormant in the system for years. A 6$ blood test can tell you what you are dealing with, better yet, put some of the exude in a tube and send it yourself 1 day mail to UC Davis, have them culture it, and then proceed when you have the results. The only way of cleaning your herd is to quaranteen all your old stock. Build a new facilty away from these animals and glean the kids off of them at birth. Heat treat the colostrum or better yet get it from a clean source, and pasturise the milk, and never let them mingle with their infected parents again. CL is right at the worst problem you can have in your goat herd. Vicki

-- Vicki McGaugh (vickilonesomedoe@hotmail.com), October 22, 2001.

I bet on CL also

-- Susan K. Lyons (slyons@pbtcomm.net), October 22, 2001.

Is the pus actually running from the lump, or is it just kind of sitting there, looking sort of like a disgusting cottage cheese? If the pus is runny, it's probably not CL. There are other infections that can cause abscesses with runny pus. Put on some latex (or other similar) gloves and clean out the abscess. If it is cottage cheese- like, I'd revisit owning this goat. I worked on a petting farm for several years where the herd was affected by CL. We reduced the incidence of abscesses by isolating any animal that had an abscess until it burst, cleaning out the abscess thoroughly until it healed over, then returning the animal to the flock. You can't really lance the abscesses before they are ready because they'll simply reform. Good luck!

-- Sheryl in Me (radams@sacoriver.net), October 22, 2001.