calf not nursing

[JMHayes]

I have a 2 to 4 year old cow that had a calf within the last 24 hours. Her utters maybe to large for the new born calf to nurse. Is she producing to much milk or is this caused be disease? I've never had this happen before, so if anyone has suggestions please post them.

 

[Farminlund]

Do you mean her teats are too large for the calf to negotiate? If so, get her up immediately & get them into the calf's mouth. Usually that's all it takes. Once the calf nurses, it'll reduce the size of the teats & he/she knows where & how to get the milk. Unfortunately, if past 24 hrs, the benefits of the mom's colostrum is nearly non-existant but better to get it nursing than let it die. It may be more likely to have health issues - so watch it closely once it gets going.

 

[JMHayes]

Thanks for the advice. The cow is showing intrest in the calf, so do you think I would disrupt anything if I tryed to bottle feed some colostrum to the calf? Is this a problem that I can look to see in the cow with future calves?

 

[Farminlund]

What you really need is for the calf to nurse the ma. She has colostrum in her as well. If you can't get the ma up to help the calf nurse, then by all means to save the calf, give it the bottle. Unless it it an unusally small or weak calf (or just a bit brain damaged), it is likely the problem will be repeat itself on the next calf. The issue is likely to be the size of the teats. But w/o seeing the situation, I can only go on your inputs.

 

[Farmhand]

Had a easy cow with big teats that raised niiiice calves. Every year they got a little bigger. Had to help every calf with the first nursing. It finally ruined the bag and she grew wheels.

 

[Kelly]

I had the same thing. She was one of my very favorite cows & an excellent mother. Every year her udders got worse & I had to help each of the calves more & more. It can turn into mastitis pretty quick if the calves aren't nursing them down completely. I believe it is hereditary most of the time.

 

[JMHayes]

I had another cow w/ cancer eye, so I broke down and got the vet out to check them out. He told me it is hereditary and her calf hefers will have the same problem. She's a young cow, but I'm still going to sell her when the calf is weening age. I did get 2.5 gallons of colostrum milk out of the deal!

 

[Salicylic]

What breeds of cattle are all of you running have never seen a cow with more than one udder.

 

[JMHayes]

excuse me *udder is, utter is, udder's, utter's* I put a parental block on my computer and forgot the password. It seems that this thing does not understand when you're talking about cows or humans, so I have to becareful with my wording. I run a comerical cow/calf operation. Two registered Angus bulls and one registered Herford on about 80 cows(Herford, Angus, Charoliois, Holestein, you name it it's probally in at least one of them).