Toby L.
Well-known member
It sounds like a lot of people go through the same thing as I had with buying cattle from sale barns and so called ranches like I did. The difference between them and me is that I wasn't prepared, heck I even waited a week before posting anything on here, for fear of getting beat up. A good beatin is what I needed to get my butt worried about it. In my first post I stated that I wasn't worried so much about it, and that it was just a concern. I figured that they'll get better on their own. Well, I learned that they don't get better on their own, they get dead. First thing to do is call a vet, I figured they would want to come out here and charge me some extraordinary amount of money, so I treated on my own and not knowing much about the different sicknesses they can get. Then I waited until they quit eating. Big no, no too little to late. I learned to take their temperature, you can find out a lot from doing something so easy. I learned to listen to people on this board, don't wait until tomorrow, and talk to a vet. Something so simple could have been treated along time ago.
A couple years ago my bull developed lump jaw. I past it off as an abscessed tooth and no big deal. It got worse and finally one day my wife was talking to a vet about horses and my wife asked her about the bull. With no way to restrain the bull and inject it with antibiotics the vet suggested to my wife to get some powder antibiotic and put one packet a day in his grain for 2 weeks, and if doesn’t get better then he probably won't because it worked it's way into the bone. Two weeks go by with little improvement. Finally the bull was getting pretty skinny so I shot it. I was heartbroke and it still bothers me. I learned from that mistake too. Now I have a facility that I built up and if I need to I can restrain these not so tame animals. The bull could have been saved if I would have done something about it sooner, and not waited to see if the problem fixes itself. It never does.
When I went to look at these calves I didn't like the way some of the other calves were looking. I bought them from a guy that buys all these different bottle calves from so many different dairies, so who knows what they were exposed to. I was under the impression that he was the dairy and these were his calves out of his own cows. I should have known better after I asked him if his cows were aied and he didn't know what I was talking about. There was a lot of things about cattle he didn't know. It turns out that he hasn't been doing this for very long. He told me " when a calf coughs I give it a shot of this" I didn't really know what all drugs he was giving these calves, because I couldn't keep up with all the jabbering and big words he was using. Then he told me all about this feeding program that he uses by Purina, and how it costs more money but the results were so much better. Well maybe so but it doesn't amount to a hill of beans if there dead. I think that’s all he new about cattle, when I asked him about the medications he told me that his wife takes care of that and he wasn't sure. So I felt sorry for the little calf and took that one too, pretty much as a companion for the bigger of the two. When I got to the original farm that I was going to that day to pick up a bred cow that I bought, that guy told me that he went over to that so called ranch earlier this summer to pick out a calf for his kids. He told me that it was worse yet, dead calves piled up and a lot of sick ones on there way out. He didn't buy any from him. He also told me that it was a surprise visit so maybe that had something to do with it. I know it's hard taking a calf a couple days old and getting it weaned and growing healthy, but there has to be some things this guy can do to make it better. It's not entirely his fault, I should have known better. I had a bad feeling about this little one in the first place. But I wonder how many times this has happened from other people that buy calves there or anywhere else. And other thing I was wondering. Should I call this guy and let him know what happened? Maybe it would prevent it from happening to someone else.
On a side note, the other one is doing pretty good. She drank 3 quarts of the soy milk replacer this morning and picked through the grain. I gave her 4 quarts this evening and she slurped that right down and looked at me like "where’s the rest" I gave her a little grain and she picked through that and I threw a little hay in there and she was eating that. She's not doing that chewing thing anymore, so she's feeling better. Her head is higher and she’s perky. When the vet comes around next week I'm going to ask him for some Draxxin like dyates and baxter and the rest says, so I can have some on hand in case anything like this happens again.
A couple years ago my bull developed lump jaw. I past it off as an abscessed tooth and no big deal. It got worse and finally one day my wife was talking to a vet about horses and my wife asked her about the bull. With no way to restrain the bull and inject it with antibiotics the vet suggested to my wife to get some powder antibiotic and put one packet a day in his grain for 2 weeks, and if doesn’t get better then he probably won't because it worked it's way into the bone. Two weeks go by with little improvement. Finally the bull was getting pretty skinny so I shot it. I was heartbroke and it still bothers me. I learned from that mistake too. Now I have a facility that I built up and if I need to I can restrain these not so tame animals. The bull could have been saved if I would have done something about it sooner, and not waited to see if the problem fixes itself. It never does.
When I went to look at these calves I didn't like the way some of the other calves were looking. I bought them from a guy that buys all these different bottle calves from so many different dairies, so who knows what they were exposed to. I was under the impression that he was the dairy and these were his calves out of his own cows. I should have known better after I asked him if his cows were aied and he didn't know what I was talking about. There was a lot of things about cattle he didn't know. It turns out that he hasn't been doing this for very long. He told me " when a calf coughs I give it a shot of this" I didn't really know what all drugs he was giving these calves, because I couldn't keep up with all the jabbering and big words he was using. Then he told me all about this feeding program that he uses by Purina, and how it costs more money but the results were so much better. Well maybe so but it doesn't amount to a hill of beans if there dead. I think that’s all he new about cattle, when I asked him about the medications he told me that his wife takes care of that and he wasn't sure. So I felt sorry for the little calf and took that one too, pretty much as a companion for the bigger of the two. When I got to the original farm that I was going to that day to pick up a bred cow that I bought, that guy told me that he went over to that so called ranch earlier this summer to pick out a calf for his kids. He told me that it was worse yet, dead calves piled up and a lot of sick ones on there way out. He didn't buy any from him. He also told me that it was a surprise visit so maybe that had something to do with it. I know it's hard taking a calf a couple days old and getting it weaned and growing healthy, but there has to be some things this guy can do to make it better. It's not entirely his fault, I should have known better. I had a bad feeling about this little one in the first place. But I wonder how many times this has happened from other people that buy calves there or anywhere else. And other thing I was wondering. Should I call this guy and let him know what happened? Maybe it would prevent it from happening to someone else.
On a side note, the other one is doing pretty good. She drank 3 quarts of the soy milk replacer this morning and picked through the grain. I gave her 4 quarts this evening and she slurped that right down and looked at me like "where’s the rest" I gave her a little grain and she picked through that and I threw a little hay in there and she was eating that. She's not doing that chewing thing anymore, so she's feeling better. Her head is higher and she’s perky. When the vet comes around next week I'm going to ask him for some Draxxin like dyates and baxter and the rest says, so I can have some on hand in case anything like this happens again.
