I had a heifer abort her calf today, she was due in May. When I broke the sac (I'm curious) the calf had no eyes, and the nose appeared to be wrinkeled. Can anyone tell me if this is what a 6 month old fetus is supposed to look like. And if not what was wrong with it?
aborted calf / something wrong??
- Thread starter Red007
- Start date
Gale Seddon
Well-known member
Red007, sorry to hear about the aborted calf...never easy and always shocking to find. Do you have a state lab you can take the fetus to? They might be able to do some testing to find out what happened, especially in case you have other cows that are due to calve.
jkwilson
Well-known member
Vaccination program? That's got to be the first question if a calf is aborted.
The last thing we did was treat the cows for lice, but we used a product that was safe for pregnant cows.We think that it may have been caused by the other cows, they beat up on this heifer quite often, but we still don't know. I found out that the eyes on a human fetus develope during the 12th -14th weeks, so I think the calf should have had them also. Thanks for all the advice. We'll just have to try again next year.
jkwilson
Well-known member
Many unexplained abortions are a result of disease. If you haven't vaccinated against Lepto, BVD etc., you might consider blood tests. If you have a cow who was infected with BVD during her gestation, she will give it to everything you've got.
BTRANCH
Well-known member
I don't know if this is too late to use but according to Storey's the fetus of a 2 month old is about the size of a mouse, 3 mo a rat, 4 mo small cat, 5 mo a large cat, 6 mo a small dog, hair around the eyes and a tail, 7 mo fine hair on body and legs, 8 mo hair coat complete, teeth slightly erupted, 9 mo incisor teeth erupted, calf is full sized.
