Milking equipment components, function, and evaluation

Abstract

Few dairymen will deny that the most costly disease which they observe in their cows is mastitis. Bovine mastitis, although by no means a newly recognized disease is surrounded by more confusion on the means of control than any other disease. It has always been necessary to determine the cause of a disease before control measures can be developed. Therein lies the problem of bovine mastitis. All the years of research have only confirmed the complexity of the disease and its many etiological agents.

Although it has many etiological causes, it is basically caused by an interplay between mechanical forces (milking machine) and bacterial infection. Nutrition, heredity, and environment may also be involved but not to the extent of the previous two factors.

The role of the milking machine in mastitis is threefold. First, it acts as a vector in transmission of the organism involved. Secondly, it causes trauma which is necessary to incite many forms of the disease. Thirdly, it actively injects bacteria into the gland under certain circumstances.