WHEN THINGS GO WRONG…

The heifers are continuing to drop babies… CONSTANTLY! But as you’ve seen over the past few posts, things don’t always go smoothly. What was nice about the previous births you’ve seen is the fact the heifer took the baby. That means she’s allowing the baby to suck from her teets, she’s watching over it and Darrin doesn’t have to become a surrogate father. But at 11:36 one night last week, Darrin and I were out checking a calf he had pulled that day. You can tell I was thrilled.

He had to pull the calf out backwards, hind legs first, and the calf couldn’t stand. Hours later, he still couldn’t stand. This means he can’t suck on his mom. And that means the calf will die if Darrin doesn’t step in.

You can see his hooves are bent under.

The next day, Darrin’s brother Steve casted the calf’s hind legs. Who knew you could cast a calf! Thes guys will try anything to save their animals. The next step was to get the heifer into the squeeze chute so the kids could milk her. Just like in humans, the first milk in a cow is colostrum. It’s filled with anti biotics and helps the calf survive the first few days of life. The kids are milking out the colostrum so they can bottle feed it to the calf.

This looks fun, but your hands get tired fast. Plus, you always have to be aware of the heifer’s legs. One quick kick and she could break your arm or worse. After milking her out, the kids put the nipples on the bottles and headed out to feed the calf. I’ll show you that tomorrow.