WARNING: SOME OF THE IMAGES IN THIS POST WILL BE GRAPHIC BUT ARE FOR EDUCATION PURPOSES! IF YOU’RE SQUEAMISH PLEASE CLICK AWAY!
In the spring of 2022, we had a nuisance bear attack our goats. It killed a baby goat and injured my girl Roca pretty bad. She had been bitten on her shoulder and hindquarters. But the real damage was to her udder. There was a large gouge with lots of blood. The wound in her udder was so deep you could stick your fingers all the way in on the left side. The bear was put down by my husband before it could do anymore damage. *NOTE: This bear had already killed goats from about 3 other neighbors, so there was already a kill order on this bear by DOW. If we didn’t kill it, they would have once it was caught.
How did the bear get in? The bear first climbed our perimeter fence that just 4 ft welded wire. Our goat’s pen is raught iron bars with tough horse fencing over the top (bear proof). But as our neighbors’ goats pen had been demolished by the bear a week prior, we were helping them out and housing their goats in that pen. This meant moving my girls into the smaller more vulnerable birthing pen that only had welded wire fencing. The bear had climbed it, tore the canopy of wire where it was connected to the tree. And climbed down the tree into the goat pen. Anyway, the question became, “What do we do with Roca?”.
She was my first goat and had been an excellent animal (gives a lot of milk, quiet, gorgeous, mellow, friendly). So, I decided I had to try and save her. We called the local mobile vet, and she came out within the next few hours. She took a look and felt she had a chance. But she also warned me this wouldn’t be an easy process should I continue to proceed with treatment. I was ready for it.
The vet first gave Roca a morphine type injection in her neck vein for immediate pain relieve before proceeding to trim away the dead skin around the wound and clean it up a bit. She also gave her a subcutaneous antibiotic injection, as well as another antibiotic that was a milky fluid that went right into the udder. The vet came up with the brilliant idea of using my daughter’s diapers as a bandage to keep the wound clean for the first few days. Then I was given homework . . .
-Fluid antibiotic in udder the following day (with an extra just in case it gets infected days later, but it was never needed)
-Subcutaneous antibiotic injection every other day (2 doses total)
-Pain pills orally every other day (5 doses total but only ended up using 3 doses)
-Change diaper twice per day for at least 3 days before removing and allowing to air dry
-Keep area clean and watch for any changes in appetite or behavior
I followed these instructions as directed. Roca did well and was her normal self, other than resting a lot more and seemed to have a smaller appetite. She also had an appetite for odd ball things like tree bark and cardboard. This changed her poop from its normal dark color to a lighter color (but still solid). With her body healing, this made her more sensitive to cold. I put on her coat to help keep her warm on the chilly days.
About the 3rd day when the diaper was removed, I began applying coconut oil daily to keep the wound hydrated but not too moist. We also made her own little day pen in the meadow where she could stay cleaner. Otherwise, if left to her own devises, she would choose to lay in the dirt. At night, she had her own kennel with clean bedding.
After 6 days she had finished all of her treatments aside from a couple more pain relief doses that were left. Now it was a matter of keeping the wound clean and watching for infection.
She was a champ throughout the whole process, and slowly made a full recovery. There was nothing but a small scab left after about a month into recovery. I’m glad my girl was able to pull through and I hope that she can live to the ripe old age she deserves. From the looks of her recovery, she should have no problems kidding again. The future will tell how much milk she will be able to produce for those kids, but we’ll have back up milk available just in case. Either way, she’ll always have a home here.
This post is to help those who may be in a similar bind and want to know the story of another. When this happened to Roca, I couldn’t find another instance in which this had happened to someone else’s goat. So, this is Roca’s story and how it turned out (which was successful).
The following images are the healing process of Roca’s udder . . .
1 Year UPDATE: 1 Year after the attack, Roca was able to give birth to 2 beautiful twins with no complication. The left side of her udder is a little smaller with some scaring, but she was still able to feed both kids just fine.
