Milk Quality Matters

On this episode we sit down with Dr. Fauna Smith from the University of California - Davis to discuss milk quality on goat dairies of all sizes. 

Topics of conversation include federal and state milk safety regulations, metrics for evaluating milk quality, components of producing quality milk, milking equipment maintenance, troubleshooting basic milk quality issues, and considerations for differences between goat and cow dairy production metrics. 

Helpful Links:
State Milk Laws: https://www.ncsl.org/research/agriculture-and-rural-development/raw-milk-2012.aspx

National Mastitis Council - Guidelines for evaluating teat skin condition: https://www.nmconline.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Guidelines-for-Evaluating.pdf

Penn State University - Equipment Maintenance for Milkers: https://extension.psu.edu/equipment-maintenance-for-milkers

University of Minnesota - Maintenance and Monitoring of Milking Equipment on the Dairy Farm: https://www.vetmed.umn.edu/sites/vetmed.umn.edu/files/oct_26_230_thomson_china_monitoring_milk_equipment_2016.pdf

American Dairy Goat Association Dairy Herd Improvement Registry (ADGA DHIR): https://adga.org/performance-programs/production-testing/

Food Animal Residue Avoidance Database (FARAD) - http://www.farad.org/

Charm SLBL test kit (validated for detecting 5 beta lactam antibiotics in goat milk): https://www.charm.com/products/test-and-kits/antibiotic-tests/rosa-lateral-flow/slbl-charm-sl-beta-lactam-test/

FDA Grade "A" Milk Safety Program: https://www.fda.gov/federal-state-local-tribal-and-territorial-officials/state-cooperative-programs/fda-grade-milk-safety-program#:~:text=The%20FDA's%20Milk%20Safety%20Cooperative,milk%20products%20for%20human%20consumption.

College of Veterinary Medicine Milk Quality Laboratories (non-exhaustive list): 
California - https://www.vmtrc.ucdavis.edu/laboratories/milk-quality-laboratory
Georgia - https://vet.uga.edu/diagnostic-service-labs/milk-quality-laboratory/
Iowa - https://vetmed.iastate.edu/vdl/laboratory/bacteriology/bacti-milk-quality
Minnesota - https://vdl.umn.edu/laboratories/laboratory-udder-health-luh/laboratory-udder-health-overview
New York - https://www.vet.cornell.edu/animal-health-diagnostic-center/programs/quality-milk-production/about

This podcast is sponsored by the American Association of Small Ruminant Practitioners as well as USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Agricultural and Food Research Initiative Competitive Program, Antimicrobial Resistance grant # 2020-04197.

Questions or comments about today's episode can be directed to DairyGoatExtension@iastate.edu

Transcript

Michelle: 0:31

Hello, I'm Dr. Michelle Buckley from Iowa State University's College of Veterinary Medicine. Thanks so much for joining us on Voz and Bleeds, sponsored by the American Association of Small Ruminant Practitioners. Just a quick note before we get started, this work is also supported by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Agricultural and Food Research Initiative Competitive Program, Antimicrobial Resistance Grant No. 2020-04197, which funds my research on improving antibiotic stewardship in dairy goats to assure food safety and milk quality. As always, if you have any questions about any of our episodes, please email them to dairygoatextension at iastate.edu. I hope you enjoyed today's show. Thanks for joining us today on season one of Boz and Bleats, the American Association of Small Ruminant Practitioners podcast. This season, we're focusing on improving milk quality and food safety in dairy goats. Today's guest is Dr. Fauna Smith from UC Davis, and we'll be chatting about milk quality in various types of goat production settings. Thanks for joining us today, Dr. Smith. Could you start us off with a little background information on your role in veterinary medicine and the dairy goat community?

Fauna: 2:08

Yeah, thank you for having me. Yeah, so I um am an assistant professor of livestock medicine and herd health at the University of California, Davis. Um I'm new to this role, um, but I have been a lifelong dairy goat producer. Um so I grew up on a goat farm, a dairy goat farm in California, a non-commercial, but um a homesteading farm. So um we used the goat milk for all sorts of our own um use, um, milk, cheese, yogurt, etc. Um, and then I actually um I graduated from veterinary school in 2005 and took a job in New Zealand where I practiced um for 10 years. And um during my time down there, I um did uh quite a bit of work with um commercial cow and goat dairies in New Zealand. Um and um have always been really involved in the dairy goat industry and have been involved in um, you know, herd situations where um, you know, we're trying to figure out why there are milk quality issues or how we can improve milk quality um both in a commercial setting as well as um kind of in your homesteading type um environment.

Michelle: 3:37

Awesome. Well, it's some international experience uh that'll I'm sure have uh you've got some interesting stories to tell from that those few years of your life. Um so let's just kind of start with the basics as far as milk quality goes. How do we define milk quality and um what metrics do we use to evaluate it?

Fauna: 4:01

There's four components to producing quality milk. Um and it starts with healthy animals, and it's not just utter health, and it's not just like the milk after it comes out of the animal, but starting with healthy animals, and then in particular, healthy mammary systems, um, and then um the good milking hygiene practices and then good milk handling practices, right? So it's kind of this chain of custody. It starts with the animal, it it's what you do during milking, and then what you do after milking once the milk, once you're handling the milk. And all those things are those all have equal impact on our ability to produce quality. Really good milk quality is having milk that is just milk, right? So it's gonna be free of debris and sediment, it's gonna be free of abnormal color or odor or off flavors, um, it's gonna have low bacterial counts, it's gonna be free of chemicals, which might include things like antibiotics, um detergents that are used to clean the milking equipment, um, teat dips, all those types of things, making sure that the milk doesn't get contaminated with those things. Um, and then being of normal composition and acidity, so things like um, you know, normal fat content, protein content. So those like all of that goes into like what is milk quality and really the quality of the raw milk as it comes off of the farm and then is used, it like that's really what determines the quality of milk products. So it's really that raw milk product, whether it is being consumed as a raw milk product, or whether it's going into be pasteurized milk for consumption, or whether it's going to be used for um cheese making, or even if it's going to be used for like non consumable products. So things like lotions and soaps, like the quality of the milk is gonna impact the quality of your product.

Michelle: 6:13

How do those regulations vary based on your location? And let's just keep this to the US.

Fauna: 6:19

So there's like when it comes to commercial operations, um, there are federal regulations that are like an umbrella that every state has to um abide by. And then individual states have the ability to make those regulations like more stringent. And so I live in California, it's a really good example. California has more stringent regulations than the federal requirements. So um for um, and those regulations are gonna include things like the somatic cell count of a bulk tank sample, the bacterial count of a bulk tank sample. In California, we have a coliform requirement. So coliforms are a specific type of bacteria that are associated with fecal contamination. And so California has regulations regarding coliform counts, whereas the federal regulations don't actually have coliform count regulations. Um, and then there's also like components, so you have to have a certain percentage of fat in the milk, you need to have a per certain a certain percentage um solids non-fat um in the milk to like meet the the regulations if you're um producing at a commercial level, um, like a grade A dairy, and then in some places you have something like a grade B dairy, which is for um cheese production only. And um there's like in California, we used there are no new permits being given for grade B dairies, but grandfathered in grade B dairies are still allowed to produce milk. Um and then and then where things really get different are um your cottage industry producers. So in California, there is no cottage industry production of um dairy products. So somebody with their small herd of goats on their farm cannot sell milk products in California. However, if you go to Oregon, who's our next door neighbor, in Oregon, if you have less than nine milking doughs in your herd, nine doughs or less, you are actually allowed to sell milk to the public off your farm. Um, you actually can sell um cheese products off your farm to the general public as long as they come to your farm to buy them. Um and that also there are places I know in the um in New England where that's allowed. So the state-by-state regulations of cottage industry is very, very different. So it's really important if you're a producer, whatever state you're producing in, that you find out what the regulations are and whether or not you're allowed to sell milk as a cottage producer.

Michelle: 9:12

And where can people go to find those um regulations?

Fauna: 9:17

Typically, it's gonna be your state food and agriculture department. So in California, it's the California Department of Food and Agriculture. Um, and you can go and see what the milk ordinances are and like what are the regulations about selling milk. Um, so it that's that would be the best resource. Um, and then if like you're having problems finding that kind of information, um, use reaching out to extension people is another really good way to like find they will have the resources to help you find that information.

Michelle: 9:49

So it sounds like even the definition of a commercial herd varies widely based on the state definition. There's no federal definition, right?

Fauna: 9:57

Correct.

Michelle: 9:59

Well, that's really good to know. It sounds like um folks have some digging to do before they even start trying to sell uh products, whether it's you know, from their own home or or to a commercial producer or a processor. So let's talk more about the variations in the dairy goat industry um and all the different types of production settings that we see. Um, how do expectations for milk quality vary based on um the size of the operation and the desired end product?

Fauna: 10:30

I feel strongly that if the milk is going for human consumption, we should all be trying to have the best possible milk quality that we can. And obviously, in commercial operations, there's like a minimum standard in which you have to meet. And from my point of view, like that's a really good metric for even home producers to use to assess their own milk quality. Um, so I think for me, it might not be as much about the size of the operation or whether they're commercial or a cottage producer. It's it uh it's really about the product. So, for example, raw milk versus pasteurized milk products. Like there are commercially, there are hugely different standards for what raw milk needs to be if it's going to go go for human consumption as a raw milk product, either as fluid milk or as a cheese. And then, like the what if you have milk that you're selling that is raw milk but is going to be pasteurized, the regulations are different. Um things like TB and Brusella testing, if you're consuming raw milk products from your animals, like in a commercial operation, that's gonna be in California at least, it's a requirement that once a year the whole herd is TB and Brusella tested. So um if you're producing um raw milk at home for personal consumption, then that's something that you might want to consider is TB and Brussels testing your herd, particularly if you are in places where that might still be an issue. So, like the upper peninsula of Michigan, um there that is not a Brucella-free zone. Um so that is something to consider if you're raising goats and drinking raw milk in that region of the country. And then in terms of like coliform counts or bacterial counts, so the state of California for raw milk, it's less than 10 coliform colonies per mill and less than 15,000 um total bacterial counts per mill. And like for a cottage producer, they can still get that information. So they can send samples to the lab. Um, most your most of your like um animal health and food quality labs um run by like the state university. So like at Iowa or at California, at Davis, like you can send it to those labs and get that information. Um, so I think like there are ways that producers, cottage producers can follow the regulations for commercial. And it also you have to think about like liability and your risk to yourself if you're gonna sell those products, like you should be doing everything you can to make your product as safe as possible. For products where the risk to human health is less because they're not necessarily being ingested, right? Like so soaps and lotions, you know, yeah, you might be a little more lax. However, good milk quality, if you have milk that is salty because there's mastitis, or the acidity is wrong, or there's uh odor to it because it's mastic, like that milk is not going to be as good quality for making those products and might actually alter the chemistry that's involved in making those products if you don't have good milk quality. So while you're unlikely to make somebody ill from it, your product might not be as good.

Michelle: 14:24

So essentially it sounds like the goal of milk quality is safe milk for consumption, right? We want a lot of the good things in milk and as little or no of none of the bad things in bad quote unquote things as possible, right?

Fauna: 14:37

And the other thing um is that regardless of what product you're making and whether you're drinking just milk for yourself in your home or you're selling milk, um, is is also freedom from adulteration. So antibiotic withdrawals, anti-inflammatory withdrawals, deworming withdrawals, all those things are like, I think super important. And particularly the places where I see the most problem, like with people not understanding that like giving a dewormer or giving an anti-inflammatory animal means that they should not be consuming that milk in their herd, I mean, from their herd during the time when that animal's being treated. Like it shouldn't be different between a commercial producer and at home producer and making sure that you are talking like your veterinarians are giving you withhold periods for drugs that you're administering to your animals.

Michelle: 15:30

Okay, so can you touch on kind of the different ways that um operations might evaluate milk quality?

Fauna: 15:40

So, milk quality evaluation for commercial operations is gonna be monitored by their processor or creamery. So, like under the regulations of that state, and it's also gonna be under the regulations of that state. So, like the dairy inspector coming to your farm and making sure that your bulk tank temperatures are low enough and they're doing coliform counts on and bacterial counts on your milk, um, somatic cell counts on your milk, all those kinds of things. So that like that's all routinely done every single time like you send milk to the creamery, you're gonna get some feedback from the creamery as to your milk quality. Um, so in in point of fact, like commercial operations, like they're they get way more feedback um without having to like seek it out, so to speak, right? Like they are monitored all the time. So when we start talking about cottage industries, um, then it really becomes it's really up to the individual producer to like set the standards by which they want their product to be um marketed and you know what you know what they're gonna do on farms. So my thing would be if you're gonna do off-the-farm sales in a state where that's allowed, um you still want you know your product to be safe for public consumption. So doing due diligence and monitoring things like testing the animals for zoonotic diseases, looking at what your bacterial counts are in your milk, having regular somatic cell count testing. So one way that is um like in our herd, and we only use our milk for personal consumption and raising other livestock, not we don't sell milk, but milk quality is still really important to me. So we're on um DHIR, so and we that means once a month we sample all our individual animals and we get a somatic cell count back once a month. If I have animals that have high somatic cells or my herd is higher than normal, um, you know, then I'll start thinking about doing things like bacterial cultures on individual animals or um, you know, doing some investigating as to like why my bulk my somatic cell count has gone up. Um, so there are programs in place that cottage industry people can use, like DHIR, that can help them to um maintain good milk quality um in their herd. And then um, you know, working with your veterinarian or your local lab to like do milk cultures as needed, or bulk if you are milking into a small bulk tank, or if you are um, you know, bucket milking or whatever it might be, just making sure that your product has low bacterial count. Um but it's the onus in those cases is really on the producer to do those things um because nobody is checking them.

Michelle: 18:51

To me, uh the you know, commercial creameries or you know, wherever you're selling commercially is kind of the gold standard for milk quality because they have such stringent regulations. So could we break it down in the sense of what are they doing um uh to evaluate milk quality? And then how can we translate that down to like a smaller scale?

Fauna: 19:12

So, I mean, if we start um, you know, from the animal health point of view, like so having healthy animals, um, you know, a lot of these big farms, they have like standard operating procedures in place, right? So they're gonna have a set of protocols that they have worked out with their veterinarian that says, okay, like this is how I look for sick animals, this is how I treat sick animals, if I am gonna treat them, here's the withhold period. So they need to make sure that they're paying attention to those types of things. But making sure there's no reason why a herd of 20 goats can't have standard operating procedures, the same as a commercial operation that has standard operating procedures for how to deal with animal health. Um, and then on an individual basis, if there's an animal that falls outside that standard operating procedure, right, where it's not making sense, that's when you need to get your veterinarian involved. But your veterinarian should be helping you to set up your, you know, protocols for how to deal with a case of mastitis, how to deal with a case of pneumonia, metritis, whatever it might be uh that's going to affect overall health and qu of the animal. Um, then in terms of m mammary health specifically, the

Michelle: 20:28

One thing that I would argue um small scale producers can do that is done at a at a commercial um processing facility is um test uh milk before it's put in the bulk tank or before it's utilized. If you know the animal's been treated with a medication, especially like animals that are coming fresh, if you're using dry tubes, um you can absolutely get a hold of um a test kit that you can run animal side, um, or they're meant to be run on the bulk tank, obviously, but your veterinarian can help you utilize that type of technology, which is used on every shipment of milk that goes to a creamery, um, and that can be used on an on-farm basis as well.

Fauna: 21:11

That's a great point. I always forget, like you can get the snap kits that you know you can test for the antibiotic that you've put in, you know, that you've treated an animal with to make sure that there's no residues. And I think the other thing, um, really common mistake that I see is um goat producers just using the cattle withhold for drugs. Um, and um so the way that things work is that um a withhold period that's on a label for cows is like basically this below this level is acceptable, right? With goats, when you use it basically almost every single antibiotic, with the exception of septiophere in Axel only, um, the the residues there are none allowed, zero. It has to be zero, nothing. Um, and so um I think like that's a really um important difference because A, goats don't metabolize drugs necessarily exactly the same way as cattle, and B, um what is allowed um for a labeled use and what is allowed for an extra label use are different. Um, things that can be done to like monitor healthy memory systems. So part of it is um, you know, you're you're milking hygiene. So um a lot of like commercial operations, they'll like strip pre-strip the four milk, right? So you're looking for signs of abnormal milk before you put the machine on the animal. Um, so things like gargot, which is like little chunks, off-colored milk, like if it's yellow or red or brown or whatever, um, you know, touching like when you are milking, you're handling the mammary system. So feeling for heat, pain, changes in size between the two sides, all those types of things. And then the other thing that I think all producers, all producers should have in their milk room at all times is a California mastitis test. Um, and I literally like in my own herd, um, and my recommendation to my clients is that if a goat doesn't eat, if it um seems down in production, if the two sides are different, if um, you know, they normally are in the first string and they come in in the last string, that goat gets a CMT. Um and um CMT is not the be all end-all. Um it tells you, it tells you, so CMT is basically a test for the number of somatic cells that are in the milk. Um, and it's a very subjective test. Um, but basically it's a detergent that you add to the milk, and if there are lots of white blood cells or somatic cells in the milk, it coagulates. Um, and you get this like purple snot looking stuff in your paddle. So you have a paddle and you mix milk and this detergent together. Um, and there, you know, things like end of lactation, low production, you're gonna have a higher somatic cell count in the milk, so your CMT is gonna be higher. Um, animals that are just sick, like so. If they have systemic inflammation, they might have an elevated somatic cell count. Um, but for me, it's really about like monitoring the same goat over time. If there are significant differences between the halves of the mammary system, then that's an indicator that it's that it's in the mammary system, like that it's in the half of the mammary system. If you have one side that's totally normal, one side that's gelling. Um, so having um CMT in your parlor, I think, is really important.

Michelle: 26:11

And we do have an episode on um with Andrea Mongini that's uh that'll be already out by the time this episode airs that um talks a lot more about how to utilize the California mastitis test, um, especially for monitoring for like sublinable mastitis. So people can make sure they go check that out.

Fauna: 26:31

So um the next kind of component is your milking hygiene practices. And like for me, good milking hygiene practices are the same for any dairy animal: sheep, goat, cow, water buffalo, whatever. Um, so and for me, it it actually starts before they ever come into the milk parlor. So one is their housing. So you want type of housing that's gonna minimize like fecal contamination of the mammary system. Um, and so um, you know, with cows, we think about um like having um free stalls or like there are ways to keep them up out of their own feces. The nice thing about goats is that their fecal material in general tends to be um a little bit less sticky um to the animal itself. So um a lot you'll see places like that do bedding packs, or they have like um when I was practicing in New Zealand, we had a lot of um like these like basically tube um type um barns where once a week they would just literally take a bobcat and just scrape the you know everything out and then re-bed it. And um, you know, so it um just making sure that the mammary systems are coming in with minimal like environmental contamination. The other thing with goats, which is very different to cattle um though, is that they have a lot more hair, particularly the Swiss breeds, on their mammary systems and their legs. Um, so like one of the things I think, and like when I worked in a commercial dairy um for a few years is at kidding, is we would dairy clip them. So basically you it's kind of it'd be very similar to crutching uh a sheep. You basically like clip all the hair off the back of the legs up around the escutcheon and then the mammary system and forudder. Um and that A around kidding time that um reduces like the amount of locha and like at post-birthing like fluids that like get mixed into the hair. Um, and it also just like if you do, you know, like if it rains and you have mud and or whatever, like it reduces the amount of like contamination up the legs and around the mammary system. So I think that's a big difference. I know like in cattle, like um shaving the tails or um um uh burning the you know flash burning the hair off the udder, like those kinds of things. But like with goats, it's actually it's like there's a lot more hair. Um and so I think that you know that is something that you can do before they these are things like before they ever come into the milk parlor that are gonna affect milk or hygiene.

Michelle: 29:43

What about in cattle? I always think of um taking actual care of the udder itself, because even if you have a really beautiful environment, if you're blowing out Tens while you're milking, then they're gonna be way more susceptible. Um, or if you're not doing pre-or post-sip in cattle, um you're leaving them open. So, how about stuff like that?

Fauna: 30:06

So that's exactly the same. So for me, so you have try and have as clean environment as you can, reduce the about amount of contamination that's on the animal, then they come into the milk parlor. And when they come into the milk parlor, like their I would say, like my ideal protocol would be to pre-dip if you want to strip for milk. I actually do it after the pre-dip, not before the pre-dip. So um do pre-dip, and then um depending on what pre-dip product you're using, like I use a my I use a pre-dip or pre-spray, I actually use a spray, not a um dip. We can talk about the differences between those. Um, and then I actually use a betadine um like water wipe, and then I use a dry towel. Um, and then if that's when I would do the strip the four milk, um, and then you um put your machine on or you're gonna hand milk, whatever it might be. Um, and then if you're going to machine milk, other things that are really important to utter quality are your pulsation rate, your um your pressure, how much vacuum you have on the teat end, um, maintaining your liners in good condition, and so making sure, like during milking, that there's no squawking, which is where air is getting um sucked in um next to the teat, um, making sure that you're not over milking um animals, so leaving the inflations on for too long. Um, so there's all these things that, especially if you're milking by machine, need to be paid attention to. The other thing, and I have mixed feelings about this, is your hand hygiene, right? So the milkers' hand hygiene. Um I so gloves seem like the easiest thing, right? Like, if you wear gloves, like then you're not dealing with any of this bacteria and stuff that it's on the human skin. One of the things that I find that people that wear gloves do is that they think just because they have gloves on that they're clean. And so you'll like see them, and you're like, when was the last time you changed your pair of gloves? Like you've milked 200 head and you have a hole in them, and like there's shit on the back of one. I should, you're gonna take out the shit, right? There's fecal material on the back of your, you know, your glove, like that defeats the purpose of wearing gloves, right? So I find sometimes people who hand milk they're much more conscientious um when they're not wearing gloves because they like wash their hands between every goat. Just wearing gloves is not enough. Wearing gloves and still practicing good hygiene is really important.

Michelle: 33:13

And also, even if you are wearing gloves and practicing good hygiene, you could still transmit pathogens from one goat to another. You your goats could be a source of contamination as well. So um in birds that have issues with like staph aureus or other, you know, contagious mastitis, um, that might mean changing gloves between strings if you have like a separate contagious mastitis string or um potentially between goats if you only have a small number of goats.

Fauna: 33:42

Right. And like m if you get milk on your hands or like that kind of stuff, like just being conscientious and like change if there's a problem, like change your gloves, like you know, so I think yeah, that's a really um kind of important thing. And then um, so you milk your goat out, make sure, so like um now I am not a milking machine expert um by any means. Well, I don't think many of our listeners will be either, so that's actually great. So, but I do like so for a small, like uh goat side um portable milking machine, I run when the the machine is on, you should be between about 12 um and 15 pounds per square inch of pressure. Uh 12 and 13, what did I say? It should be 12 to 13. Um, and the other thing that you'll notice a lot of goat producers, and the problem is is there's not a lot of science for this, but like pulsation rates. Goat producers tend to run much faster pulsation rates than cattle paddle producers. And part of it is because over the years we've just had to trial and error and figure out what what our goats milk out the best on. Um, and I, you know, I had an old dairyman when I was growing up, and his thing was goats milk out the best if your pulsation rate is about what a kid nurses at. And I was like, that's really, really fast. Like, um, I don't run mine that fast, but mine's definitely faster than like if you walk into a cow parlor. Um, you know, but I do find that there's a lot more variation in pulsation rate for goats than there between producers than there is for cattle. And part of it is because we don't actually have a lot of science to tell us what is the best pulsation rate.

Michelle: 35:41

Right. And there's probably difference in breeds too, wouldn't you imagine? Like a Toggenberg or a Nubian's gonna milk out differently than a Nigerian dwarf or something like that.

Fauna: 35:50

Well, and and then that's the other thing is like having the appropriate quit equipment, right? So um there are standard breed, say inflations, and there are miniature breed inflations. Um, I do know a couple of herds that have mixed um miniature and large, and they tend to use the Nigerian inflations on everything, um, not the other way around. Um and so, yeah, so making sure, and then your in terms of like your machine maintenance is really important, like in turn so um changing out your liners right um regularly. I for like so the recommendations for rubber are to change them out every 2,000 to 2,500 milkings or every four to six months. Um, latex is about twice that long, um, but um again, always having spare parts on hand for you don't want to like patch if something goes wrong with your inflations, like you do not want to patch them. Like, so you need to have like have spare liners, have spare, like depending on what type of inflation you're using. Like I use an inflation that has a lot of moving parts and it's got like a spring, and it's got like the there's like a a flange that actually allows the air to come in and out. That flange breaks, that's like the most common place where my inflations break. So I have a bunch of those flanges that I can like replace in my unit so that I'm not trying to patch together something and it's not working, and then the pressures aren't right, or I'm over milking or under milking the dough. Um so yeah, so just making sure that your milking machine is running well and that like the inflations are all good. And then once you're finished milking out the animals, um is post-dipping. So, and you'll see a lot of different um products on the market. Personally, I prefer betadine-based or iodine-based products. Um chlorhex, I know I we um a lot of people like to use fightback or chlorhexidine-based. Um, that has zero efficacy against Pseudomonas, um, mastitis or pseudomonas in general, and pseudomonas is a pathogen that causes mastitis. Um, and so it's definitely um a concern when you're only using a chlorhexidine-based um product. And then um we can kind of there's also um spraying versus dipping. Um, so you'll see like teat dip cups, and then you have sprays. Um, the weakness of the spray is that often people don't pay a lot of attention to like how well the teeth is coated, and uh the biggest mistake I see is like I'll go look behind somebody that has sprayed teats, and the back of the teat looks great, and then the front of the teat has nothing on it. Um, so if you're going to spray, you just need to like be really conscientious that you are getting the whole end of the teat. Um, dips, you get a lot better coating of the teat. However, you need to keep your dip cups clean because we have cultured really gross things out of dip cups where the hygiene of the dip cup is bad. So um at you know, at the end of milking, removing any of the you know, dip that's in there, um, keeping it covered in between milking so that there's not like debris from the environment getting in there. If you dip a goat and you see that some debris falls off of her into the dip cup, like empty the dip cup and you know, refill the dip cup. Um, so those are um using different, so I think it's really important to use a different pre-dip dip cup and post-dip dip cup. Um, because at one the the mammary system is dirty with the pre-dip and it's clean, should be clean with the post-dip. So um those, whereas like if you're using a spray, it's never coming in contact with the animal. So you can use the same spray pre and post um if you want.

Michelle: 40:18

Or um since there's not really any hard and fast rules about at all what levels you should use in your equipment as far as like strength of the vacuum or frequency. Um what are some signs of issues with equipment that producers might see on their animals when they're in the parlor that could indicate, hey, you're kind of headed for um some teeth problems later on?

Fauna: 40:45

The common theme when we compare cattle to goats is variability, both in producers and animals. So cattle have spent many years with lots of like numbers and genetics, like breeding animals that all have the same teeth size that are all pretty much on the same place in the other. And yes, you see variations, but not like you see in goats. So, like in goats, you have everything from like a three quarter inch long half inch across teeth to a teeth that is five inches long and four inches across. Like, so the so the teat size and shape is like super variable. So it also, and also orphous size can be super variable. But in general, it should make take five to ten minutes to milk out a goat on the machine. And if it's taking longer than if it's taking less than that, you have really not very good milkers. If it's taking more than that, then there's likely a potential problem with letdown. If you have individual animals, like I have a doe, and if she was in a commercial dairy, she would have probably been culled because she has tiny little orfuses and she takes forever to milk out of the machine. But that is normal for her and she's not being over milked. But she's like my pain in the ass because it makes that one string take really long time. Um, so in general, it should be five to ten minutes to milk a goat out. Um, if you're taking, if all your strings are taking substantially longer than that, there is some issue, some issue with your machine. Um, and it could be that does are holding their milk up because they don't like the pulsation rate, they don't like the vacuum, whatever it might be. Um, there's not enough vacuum, there's too much vacuum, um, there's not enough rest time, right? So in your pulsation rate. Um, and when you start to have the machines being left on for too long, you're gonna start to see teeth end injury. So you'll start to see um, like basically kind of what if you look at the orphous, kind of like cauliflowery tissue starting to like develop around the teat ends. Um, what that does is it damages the ability of the teeth to seal after milking. Um, it creates cracks and crevices where the skin, so we have bacteria on our skin, goats have bacteria on their skin, it's normal. It's like normal fauna and flora that live on your skin. Um, those are often pathogens that we then see mastitis with because they get into the mammary gland, which is not a normal place for them, but it's full of this nice nutrient milk where they can replicate and grow, overgrow, and then they create mastitis. When you have damaged T dens, when you have cracked T dens, or you have these like little cauliflower frondie um orfices, like that can harbor the bacteria, it gives it easier access to the mammary gland itself, and so you're gonna increase your risk of mastitis. Um, so those are kind of things to look for um in terms of milking machines not working and then therefore damaging the mammary. Um then I guess the other one last comment that I actually had on um hygiene, milking hygiene. Um, and this is again, this is actually after they leave the parlor. And you'll notice on cow dairies, like they feed out when the cows, like right before the cows leave the milk parlor. So the string that is getting milked, like their barn is getting fed while they're in the milk parlor. So they go back to the barn, so they've been post-dipped, but their orfices are really open, right? Because they've been just been milked. So there's like no keratin plug, there's nothing. Like it's open to the environment. So having feed for them when they return to their living facility keeps them standing, it keeps their udder out of the environment for a period of time. So that is the best practice is to feed right after, like right after you milk, or have feed in the bunks when they return from the milk room. Um fresh feed, like no, no, yeah. So like your fresh feed that you feed twice a day should be right after milking or during milk. Like my husband feeds for me, I'm very lucky, and he so he feeds while I'm milking. So the goats go straight out of the milk room and back to the mangers and start eating. And then the last component is how you handle your milk. And really, the kind of two key things are filtration and and cooling. Um, so in a commercial operation, you're gonna have an inline filter. So as the milk is milked out of the dose into the bulk tank, it's gonna go through an inline filter, and that's gonna remove like basically gross contamination. Um, and then going into the bulk tank, it's gonna immediately be chilled. So in a commercial operation, um milk should be cooled down to 50 degrees within the first hour and 40 degrees within the second hour, and then any milk added to that bulk tank in subsequent milkings shouldn't go above 40 degrees. Um, and so when you then want to take that for your cottage producers, that means having some way to chill your milk quickly. Um, and if you think about like so the the volume that you're trying to chill, um, the larger the volume, the harder it is to chill it down quickly, especially if you're using um like a non-bulk tank method. So some of the things that I've seen done are like half-gallon jars put into ice water. Um so you basically take your get your milk, strain it, and then put it into um ice water so that it cools really rapidly. Just putting a half-gallon jar into the refrigerator probably actually doesn't get it down to the what would be considered regulation for a commercial producer, um, by just sticking it into the fridge. So you could stick it in maybe into a freezer wood, but yeah, I the ice bath ice water I find for like your backyard or um small producer it is a really good method. Um, you want it to be clean, ice like it needs to be clean, and your jar needs to be really, really well sealed. Um, so like using mason jars um with the sealed lid really tight is a good way, and not not submerging the seal under the water. Our goal is to produce milk with really low bacterial counts, right? But everything we've talked about, these are barnyard animals that we're taking a product from, and they live in an environment where there's bacteria, there's bacteria that lives on their skin. Like we cannot keep bacteria from getting into the milk, like that's an impossibility. So, what we're trying to do by chilling it is to stop any reproduction of the bacteria in the milk. So the so that the counts of bacteria that are basically there are the counts that were there when they milked the animal, and that's all, and we don't get any bloom or growth of bacteria until we make cheese, and then we put the bacteria that we want in there. And then I think the other thing um in terms of um flavor, uh chilling also affects flavor of the milk and the long like this, and this may be a little bit anecdotal, but I have a lot of experience drinking goat's milk in my life. And um the faster you get it chilled, the better it maintains its like sweet, rich flavor. Um and when you don't get that chilling quite right, then spoilage in the refrigerator, like if you're if you are drinking your own product, is much quicker if it doesn't get cooled. And and does that have to do with bacterial growth? Yes, it might have to do with bacterial growth, but I think there are also other components in milk that the aromatic compounds of milk that change when it's not cooled. And I would even say chilling before you pass, like I would chill it, and then if I'm gonna pasteurize it, I would pasteurize it.

Michelle: 49:39

Awesome. That was a very thorough review of like all of the steps of milk quality. This is fantastic, this is what we need. Um, I think our listeners are gonna learn a lot from this podcast. Um so I did have one other question, um, because I imagine that a lot of the veterinarians listening to this could be small animal vets that don't have a ton of experience with parlor evaluation or mastitis or tea dend evaluation, and even some of our dairy vets that might be not be, you know, they're not all my boss, Dr. Gordon, who that's his bread and butter. Um so what kind of resources are out there for veterinarians? Um what kind of resources are out there for helping with equipment equipment maintenance or even deciding if there is a problem with equipment and then parlor evaluation stuff?

Fauna: 50:28

When it comes to the machines and the particularly parlors, like the um the manufacturer is your like first go-to like stop. Like they, if it's a commercial parlor and they have set it up, like they know the ins and outs of that machine. So if you think there's a problem with the milky machine, like in a commercial dairy, like your first stop should be talking to the manufacturer and having them come out and test the machine. So look at are the pressures right? Is the milk flow right? Like, is you know, has something happened and like the pipes aren't actually in the same place that they were in before? And so you're having like pooling of milk somewhere, like they know what you know, all of the like ins and outs of how the parlor should be set up. And so that's like my first stop for those, those for commercial producers. Um for cottage producers, it's a little bit more the wild, wild west because so there, so you still can go to the manufacturer, right? And there are some really, really good um like portable machines with really reputable manufacturers, and going back to them, like if you have a problem and being like, okay, I'm losing pressure and I can't figure out why I'm losing pressure in my machine. Um, and they should be able to help you with that. One of the difficulties is that like I bought my machine from Missouri, and and so like I'm not gonna, I can't afford to send my machine back to Missouri to get to get like um uh like maintenance once a year, you know, like so I've had to learn to do the maintenance, but I've done it by talking to them, by saying, okay, like I was having a problem when I was losing pressure. Well, there's these like little um valves in the machine that I use that they actually need to be cleaned regularly. So I learned how to pull my machine apart and clean those. But I did that after consulting with the manufacturer who was like, okay, what are the problems you're having? Let's troubleshoot, like what the problems are, and then these are the things that I can tell you that might be the problem. And so then look at those things. Um, you know, there are um places like um where there are um people that do like small engine work, a lot of times they're pretty knowledgeable about like vacuum pumps and stuff. Um, or like the local dairy supply shop might have somebody that knows about milking machines. So like those are places that you can turn to like try and get help if you're struggling to like with some issues with the milking machine.

Michelle: 53:28

Or I mean you can always call your uh preferred um vet school if you, as a veterinarian, if you're getting you know want help troubleshooting or doing parlor evaluation evaluations. Um I know like quality milk up at Cornell and um Dr. Gordon at Iowa State, they they love talking about milk quality. So and uh now Dr. Smith as well. Um all right, so my last question here for you um to wrap up is just kind of an overview of what are some aspects of goat milk quality that are different in goats than um than on the cow side, as I'm imagining a lot of bovine vets are listening to this as well. Um so things maybe like the considerations for cheese production, um, as most of our bovine milk seems to go for or a good portion of bovine milk goes for fluid milk. Um and then differences in protein types or uh component concentration differences. So um can you just touch on the differences between uh milk cattle and goats?

Fauna: 54:34

Right. So in terms of um qual like milk quality, bacterial counts, um I don't there is no difference. Like clean milk, free from debris, free from antibiotics, free from bacteria, any adulteration to the milk is the same. Um, one difference that you'll see in the regulation side of things um is somatic cell count. Um, and I have really mixed feelings about this. Um, I the somatic cell count limits for goats tend to be between a million and a million and a half, is what is allowed um by regulation. And this is because historically, goats have had higher somatic cell counts. Now, they do shed more epithelial cells into their milk than cattle do. So that is a somatic cell, right? Any cell with a nucleus is a somatic cell. Um, that said, having milked goats for all of my life and been on DHIA for all of my for 25 plus years, um I my herd has a somatic cell count that would rival any like quality cow dairy. Like in general, my somatic cells run between per per animal, between 50,000 and maybe 600,000. And um if I get an animal over 750,000, I start to worry. If I get an animal over a million, I am culturing that animal. So I do wonder if historically milking hygiene has not been maybe as good. The other thing is I think that in general, um, my experience with some of the big commercial dairies in the early years of dairying in California was that animal health was more of an issue. Um it was um cheaper to replace goats than it was to treat them, or you know, so it um I think the emphasis on herd health and animal health was not as much as it was in in dairy cattle farms. And so we have this like historic, I think that healthy goat herds can easily have a bulk tank somatic cell under 500,000. Um, the for cattle, the federal regulation is 750,000. Um, and for like where I live, state of California, it's below 100,000, 600,000, goats are allowed to be less than a million and a half in California. Um so that is a difference, but I I I question whether or not that is how it should be. We want to have as low a somatic cell count as possible because the somatic cell count is a reflection of the health of the mammary gland. Um, it's it's one parameter that we can use to measure the health of the mammary gland, and we want to have healthy mammary systems producing milk. Um so that would be one difference in regulation, whether physiologically that should be the difference or not is still debatable. Um the other thing is that um there is so the vast majority of the dairy cattle herd in the United States are Holsteins. And then we have Jerseys being number two, and then you know, I would just say a smattering of the other breeds, but do they really have an impact on the overall like components of the milk, the herd, the herd, cattle, dairy cattle herd in the United States?

Michelle: 58:21

No.

Fauna: 58:22

Um, goats, we have a huge variation in breed, like the variation in the components between breeds is spectacular. So our for example, um, fat percentage ranges probably from Toggenberg's would and maybe Oberhosley's would be on the lower end, around 2.5%, to Nigerian dwarfs, which regularly uprun the seven to eight percent butter fat range. Um and so, and then everybody else kind of falls somewhere in between. So depending on your operation, what breeds you have, the components, and then protein follows fat, but not as I would say proteins are actually more compact um than fat percentages. We see less variation in protein um than we do in fat percentage. Um the way that the fat um miceells are arranged in the goat is different to cattle. So it's a it's a smaller um miceell, and so it has there's way more surface area. Um, and it's why they don't glom together and then rise to the top, like you would see in like if you took um non-homogenized cow's milk. So, and it doesn't get homogenized, even like Meyenberg, who sells fluid goats' milk, they don't have to put it through a homogenizer. Um so the fat mice are really different. And then in terms of the proteins, they actually have like they have the same proteins, like they have alpha S1 casein, they'll have beta casein. Goats have all those proteins. The genes are slightly different than what are reported in cattle, and there are a lot of producers that are now really starting to focus on using those, particularly people that are um making cheese, um, because the different um alleles or genes for the casein um produce different amounts of protein, and protein is really the most important factor in cheese production, in your yield of cheese production. The other thing is that all the reported literature, the high protein alleles also have higher fat. So you're you have higher solids, total solids, including fat relative to other um animals, if you have the high high protein allele. Um interestingly, and like in cattle, you have the A2 milk, right? Which is where it's the um beta casein, and it's only the A2 form or more of the A2 form than the A1 form. And there's theories that that might be less allergenic. Um, we do have people looking into that with the goat's milk and getting the null or the low alpha S1 casein alleles and trying to produce. milk for fluid consumption um for from those for people that are not as tolerant of casein protein. So those are those are kind of I think those are like the biggest differences or and things unique to goats. But yeah, right now there's um I know quite a lot of cheese producers that are actually testing their animals and selecting bucks that are the high alleles, particularly in some of our higher production breeds, so saunen and alpine where their volumes are hot really high, but they haven't traditionally had as high a protein or fat. But by selecting those high alleles they're trying to increase the percentage of protein that is um in the milk. And then the last thing I'll add is that a lot of um commercial producers are often paid um premiums for protein or for solids um that would be that would be different to cattle as well. Like the way that milk um is paid for like you is is not just about uh hundredweight like it's not just about how much volume there is it's about components playing a role in how much you get paid for your milk.

Michelle: 1:02:55

Well thank you so much for sharing all of your knowledge with us today Dr. Smith um it's really been an educational experience for me um getting to chat with you and I I'm sure that our listeners got a lot out of this episode. So if folks have questions that we didn't quite get to on the podcast today as always you can email dairygoatextension at Iastate.edu and um we will try and get those questions answered for you. Thanks so much for listening and have a great day