Thank you for all the responses re: RPS on goats. It's been fun in
this house talking about it! I never expected the responses we got.
I'm going to address some of the questions posed by K. Jean Cotterman
with some help from dd but I know we can't answer them all!

<<Allison posted about coaching her daughter in successfully using RPS
on their 24+ hours postpartum goat because the twin kids were unable
to latch on one side. My first reaction was "Lucky for mamma goat!!"
and my second was "I wonder just how Allison explained to her what to
do? And since 12 ounces was mentioned, I am presuming that the RPS
made the teat comfortable enough for her (no doubt dairy care
experienced) daughter to milk or pump the 12 ounces out before it was
OK to let the "kids" have at it!!>>

We are hobby farmers, the goats are friends and pets. My 13 year old
daughter raises the goats and shows one a year at the County Fair for
4-H. She is solely responsible for the goats, has 2 mamas and the new
babies bring it up to 6. When she needs an answer, she goes online,
figures it out and puts it into practice.

When we realized mama goat was incredibly engorged, she expected to
milk the goat w/her hands as she has done before. She described that
when the babies would try to nurse on that side, they couldn't reach
since the udder was so distended and then would go to the other side.
In person, I described the flower hold holding my fingers in that hold
and told her to allow mama's teat to extend down the length of her
fingers. I told her to press her fingers into the udder and she
recalls me saying that longer is better.

Mama goat does not like being milked. We only do it once a year when
she has babies and not many times then. We can't say how painful it
was since she doesn't enjoy it or allow it regardless. It does require
another person to hold the goat still since the goats aren't trained
for milking.

I asked her why she milked out 12 oz and she said she was trying to
make the two sides even. We've had some troubles w/baby goats in the
past and having some colostrum on hand is a good idea. She decided to
freeze the colostrum for an emergency. We have saved a very weak baby
in the past by having some available.


<<<Since mamma goat went into spontaneous labor, with no IV fluids or
pitocin at any stage, and had immediate "mouth to skin" contact and
vigorous demand feeding attempts from both her kids, and so, probably
prompt onset of L-2 (whenever it happens in goats), my assessment is
that in that swollen side she probably did NOT have what I call
1) "pre-L-2 edema" which is mostly what I have been seeing in human
moms in my locale for 3-4 decades since the dawn of perinatal
medicine,

2) "post-L-2 edema" seems a more likely explanation.>>>

I would expect this was post-L-2 edema. Goats "bag out" a few weeks
before babies arrive. Here is a picture of her udder one week before
delivery. http://intayetsshoes.blogspot.com/2012/02/uhuras-udder.html
Now that babies are nursing well on both sides, my daughter states
that her udder is much smaller and not engorged at all, much smaller
than the picture.

Mama goat is a pygmy so she is short and her udder was very close to
the ground. Babies were feeding at will so I am assuming they were
eating where it was easiest and the neglected teat engorged for that
reason.

Keep in mind that goats are standing, jumping and running about very
quickly after birth. With human babies, we generally put baby in the
vicinity of the breast they will be nursing from, baby goats leave if
they don't get immediate results and move on. They head butt the udder
to make the milk letdown. Lots of very short, quick feedings. 30
seconds is not uncommon.

Thank you for the questions. It has been interesting discussing this
at length with my eldest daughter. Apparently, I don't know as much
about lactation as I thought. We learn new things everyday!

So, I will be the LC for humans and my daughter will be the LC for her
beautiful goats!

All the best,

Allison Laverty Montag IBCLC, RLC
Green Lake, WI USA

"Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we often might win,
by fearing to attempt."
William Shakespeare
Measure for Measure

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