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Abstract

It has been established by various researchers that bovine mastitis which is simply an inflammation of mammary gland is a complex and costly disease in dairy herds globally. This study therefore was aimed at assessing the prevalence of clinical and subclinical mastitis among lactating bovines from pastoral herds. A total of 147 bovines were selected from 30 pastoral herds within 7 Fulani settlements in Kaduna State, Nigeria. Prevalence of Clinical mastitis was assessed by the result of physical examination of udders and milk by palpation and visual inspection. The California Mastitis Reagent was used according to the manufacturer's instructions to detect the prevalence of Subclinical Mastitis. The CMT positive samples were bacteriologically analyzed following standard microbiological procedures for the presence of coliform bacteria. The results obtained revealed that 19.7% (29/147) of animals examined was positive for subclinical mastitis at cow level. The highest prevalence of subclinical mastitis was recorded among bovines from settlements G in Birnin Gwari Local Government Area of Kaduna State, while bovine's raw milk samples collected from settlements C and E in Chikun and Zaria Local Government Areas of Kaduna State haboured the lowest number of 1(0.7%) each, and no Coliform bacteria (0.00%) was isolated in the samples collected from settlement D in Soba Local Government Area. In this study, a total prevalence of 8.2% was established for coliforms associated with subclinical mastitis among pastoral herds based on phenotypic identification. Furthermore, the species of coliforms associated with bovine mastitis within the study population based on the findings in this study were (Klebsiella pneumonia) 7(4.8%) and (Escherichia coli) 5(3.4%). Hence, this study confirmed that the consumption of raw milk from CMT positive commercial bovines is a potential threat to public health as the isolated species of coliforms have been implicated in several human diseases.