aborted calf?

[brenda]

had a nice young red brangus cow that aborted her calf today. this was just going to be her second calf. any thoughts as to what might have caused this? vet said it could have been from this terrible heat wave we have going on here in ms, lepto, etc. we run around 70+ head and this is the first experience we have had with this problem. our cows are worked twice a year, dewormed, etc. minerals always available, good body condition. this has just baffled us.

 

[dun]

Had the same thing happen with a 5 year old cow right after the icestorm. The vet had been seeing a lot of aborts so we just layed it to the icestorm trauma.

 

[I luv herfrds]

We had pasturelia bacteria in our herd and lost a total of 15 head this spring.

Did the vet do a post on the calf? Did they take any blood from the cow? You didn't mention your vaccine program.
We changed ours to include pasturelia.

 

[KNERSIE]

if you didn't sent the aborted foetus away to be tested, I would at the very least have the cow bloodtested for brucellosis and also an earnotch test done for BVD.

 

[bob g]

Had a 3yr old abort last week....would have been her 2nd calf, she was 4-6 months bred...heat index hit 115 here in our part of Mississippi...hope to get my vet to check her tomorrow...concerned about her clean-up.

Dry spring, wet July, hotter than hades August, poor cows don't know where to hide.

Bob Graves
Winona, Ms

 

[milkmaid]

TNMasterBeefProducer wrote- My vet has told me that when a cow aborts there is a reason. Weather wont do it, getting butted, wont do it. Either something was wrong from the calf which from time to time happens kind of like mis carriage in people or a disease plays a roll. If your vet told you it was the weather id be finding me another vet and quick.

Nonsense. Heat stress, ruminal or systemic acidosis, switching feeds, hormone problems, carrying twins, outside stress ie being worked, live vaccines, etc, can all be factors in abortions.

 

[dun]

TNMasterBeefProducer wrote- My vet has told me that when a cow aborts there is a reason. Weather wont do it, getting butted, wont do it. Either something was wrong from the calf which from time to time happens kind of like mis carriage in people or a disease plays a roll. If your vet told you it was the weather id be finding me another vet and quick.

Nonsense. Heat stress, ruminal or systemic acidosis, switching feeds, hormone problems, carrying twins, outside stress ie being worked, live vaccines, etc, can all be factors in abortions.

I totally agree with MM. If my vet gave me the advice you received I'ld be looking for a new vet

 

[KNERSIE]

TNMasterBeefProducer wrote- My vet has told me that when a cow aborts there is a reason. Weather wont do it, getting butted, wont do it. Either something was wrong from the calf which from time to time happens kind of like mis carriage in people or a disease plays a roll. If your vet told you it was the weather id be finding me another vet and quick.

Nonsense. Heat stress, ruminal or systemic acidosis, switching feeds, hormone problems, carrying twins, outside stress ie being worked, live vaccines, etc, can all be factors in abortions.

I totally agree with MM. If my vet gave me the advice you received I'ld be looking for a new vet

even if you test every aborted foetus, every cow that calved later than expected, there will still be about 2% of abortions that happened for no determinable reason. Every abortion should cause alarm and needs to be investigated, because you never know when its the start of an outbreak, but abortions are like flies, we will always have some.