Prevalence and incidence rate of clinical lameness in three New Zealand dairy goat farms

Figures & data

Table 1. Descriptive statistics for three dairy goat farms, located in Waikato, New Zealand, within the July 2019–June 2020 production year.

Farm characteristic	Farm A	Farm B	Farm C
Number of locomotion scoring events/year	5	4	4
Herd size (lactating goats, May 2020)	1497	623	763
Milking parlour setup	Rotary (100 bales)	Herringbone (40 aside)	Rotary (80 bales)
Kidding season	July 2019–October 2019	July 2019–August 2019	July 2019–August 2019
Bedding type	Wood shavings	Wood shavings and elephant grass	Wood shavings
Percentage of goats with extended lactation (>305 DIM)	55.6	23.9	38.6
Median age of the extended lactation group (years)	4	6	5
Interquartile range of the extended lactation group (years)	3	4	2
Median age of the seasonal lactation group (years)	2	2	2
Interquartile range of the seasonal lactation group (years)	3	3	2
The number of herd groups^a	2	1	4
Stocking density (m^2 per goat)	2.19–2.68	2.94–3.61	2.63–2.70^b
Treatment between hoof trimming events ^c	Sometimes^d	Weekly	Sometimes
Footbath or mat protocols (using CuSO4)^g	Sometimes^e	Sometimes	Daily^f

^a This excludes any hospital groups that were sometimes present throughout the season.

^b This figure is the area of the inside barn. These goats have access to an outside area that decreases the stocking density to 3.59–3.77 m² per goat.

^c Comprised of drafting out a lame goat, inspecting the affected foot and treating it.

^d When the workers had time to treat the goats.

^e After hoof trimming or a couple of times a week after milking.

^f Only daily from February 2020 onwards and was not present before this time.

^g CuSO₄ = Copper Sulphate.

Figure 1. The timeline of locomotion scoring events for each dairy goat farm A, B and C- located in Waikato, New Zealand. The x-axis is the month starting in the first week of July 2019 and ending in the third week of June 2020.

Table 2. Locomotion scoring strategy used to measure lameness in dairy goats (adapted from Deeming et al. 2018).

Severity score	Label	Clinically lame	Limping	Gait description	Modifications
0	Normal/not lame	No	No	Moving forward with even strides where hooves track up. Weight-bearing and no apparent head nodding.
1	Uneven gait	No	Uneven	Moving forward with shorter strides where hooves do not track up^a. Weight-bearing, and having an absent head nodding, however, have joints that may show stiffness.
2	Mildly lame	No	Yes	Moving forward with shorter strides where hooves do not track up. One or more legs/feet may be affected. Weight-bearing, and having an absent head nodding however may show a mild limp.
3	Moderately lame	Yes	Yes	Reluctant to move forward and may display a moderate limp. One or more legs could be affected and may display some goose-stepping.
4	Severely lame	Yes	Yes	Refusal to bear any weight on one foot. Severe limping or extreme goose-stepping or walking on the knees.	If there is no limp, but there is reluctance to move forward. Multiple feet are involved.

^a Track up refers to the movement of the hind hooves stepping into the hoofprints left by the front hooves.

Figure 2. The prevalence of clinical lameness (locomotion severity scores 3 or 4) in dairy goats across three New Zealand farms (A, B, and C) during the 2019–2020 production year.

Table 3. Number of dairy goats at each locomotion scoring event between July 2019 and June 2020 across the three commercial farms in New Zealand. The percentage of dairy goats scored at least once at each scoring event are displayed in parathesis.

Locomotion scoring event	Farm A	Farm B	Farm C
July 2019	1229 (80)	–	–
August 2019	–	758 (77)	840 (80)
October 2019	1626 (89)	767 (84)	825 (91)
December 2019	1639 (90)	749 (90)	798 (88)
March 2020	–	744 (90)	–
April 2020	1542 (87)	–	–
June 2020	1366 (80)	–	401 (87)

Table 4. Average prevalence and annual incidence rates (with 95% confidence intervals in parenthesis) of lameness and clinical lameness in dairy goats within three New Zealand commercial farms across the 2019–2020 production year.

Farm	Lameness^1		Clinical lameness^1
	Prevalence^2 (%)	Incidence rate^3	Prevalence (%)	Incidence rate
A	38 (28–48)^a	172 (163–181)^a	23 (18–28)^a	104 (97–111)^a
B	31 (20–42)^b	191 (174–208)^b	10 (8–12)^b	57 (48–66)^b
C	34 (29–39)^b	161 (147–175)^c	12 (9–15)^b	55 (47–63)^b
P value	<0.001	<0.05	<0.001	<0.001

¹ Lameness and clinical lameness were defined as having a locomotion score of 2–4 and 3–4, respectively, using a 5-point scoring system (0 to 4).

² The average prevalence across the 2019–2020 production year.

³ The annual incidence rate was defined as the number of new cases per 100 goats.

^a,b Means with different superscripts within the same column are significantly different (P < 0.05).

Figure A1. Percentage of dairy goats within the herd with consecutive clinical lameness events (locomotion score 3 or 4) across recording events within the 2019–2020 production year in three commercial farms (A, B and C). Farms were in Waikato, New Zealand.

Deeming LE, Beausoleil NJ, Stafford KJ, Webster JR, Zobel G. 2018. Technical note: The development of a reliable 5-point gait scoring system for use in dairy goats. Journal of Dairy Science. doi: 10.3168/jds.2017-13950.

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