calf with white eyes a day after being born

[franseen]

We still have a colostrum bagger from our dairy days. We have some fake colostrum mix we mix with mildy hot water and give this to the calf even if we think it didn't have some colostrum within first hour. Maybe you could find one of those bags to use. Just a thought and better luck next time with the calf. If farming was easy everyone would have and 80 and some cattle.

 

[Beefy]

I'm not afraid of any member of the ridiculous Acid family. At least Caustic actually contributes something a little useful every once in a while in addition to the "comic relief." You others just make fun of people and insult new posters and then get offended when someone comments on your dumb post. thats right, i said they were D..U..M..B, dumb. Thats the main thing about you three that chaps my ass, that you run off and insult new posters. i really couldnt care less if you insult me personally since i always skip what you say unless its unavoidable, like when your crap interrupts a post i'm involved in. I cant believe Macon didnt give y'all the boot months ago. Talk about wasted space and now youve got me sucked in it. Anyway, bring on whatever y'all got. If we all four get banned from cattletoday it will be a blessing for the boards.

As far as the avatar goes, gee i wonder who all comes up with unique avatars like that.

At least i have the balls to post under my real moniker. Beefy


For anyone interested, the calf is thriving and the eye has completely cleared up.

 

[Beefy]

I guess the problem some of us have is this work thing kinda gets in the way of calving time. I'd love to just take a month or so off and sit around and watch my cows calve and time them to make sure that they get up and suck within three hours. Unfortunately, my employer frowns on that sort of thing. The time I'm at work sucks about eleven hours out of my day, five days a week. I still get up and do my twice nightly cattle checks and check them before bed and in the morning before work. If a cow starts calving in the morning I usually stick around long enough to make sure its healthy and that the cow is working on getting it on its feet but if I have a cow that starts having problems while I'm at work, there's not really much I can do about it until I get home. my solution is just to keep my cattle as healthy as possible. Feed them good feed, give them what they need for vaccinations etc and trust them to do what they are supposed to do which is be good at being a cow.

Amen to that, exept the part about twice nightly cattle checks. screw that.

 

[Beefy]

Sounds like you had quite a time of it.
As a side note, if the calf does not receive colostrom within 12 hours, it is almost worthless. If not before 24 hours, it is totally worthless. Colostrom IN THE COW loses antibodies each hour after calving. Plus, the calf's stomach is designed to be able to process the colostrom immediately after birth. Each hour the stomach changes and is less & less capable of utilizing colostrom. So each hour after birth, not only is the cows colostrom getting less potent, the calf's stomach is getting less able to utilize what you give it.
That's why, it is imperitive to get colostrom in a newborn as quickly as possible. Ideally, we like the calf to suck within 15-30 minutes. But, we all know this is not an ideal world, and s---t happens. We intervene after about 1.5 to 2 hours - offer bottle of colostrom, if won't suck - tube it.

In your case, cow probably would have been less than willing to let you help. That is why, it is important to have cattle up close during calving season, but like I said, this isn't a perfect world, and some places just can't get that done because of facilities or land. We do what we have to.

Jeanne, as usual your post is very informative. I'm aware of all you said regarding colostrum. Thanks for sharing that with me just in case though, i'm sure a lot of other posters will benefit from that. Still, i dont have time to wait around for all 140-160 calves to figure it out. just say for instance you have 5 calves a day, and it takes them 10 minutes (minimum here obviously) to nurse, thats an hour right there. i have too many other things to do. heck, it may be 12 hours before i find a calf if teh cow calves after dark. Our cows run on 500 acres during the majority of the year and 1000 during this part of the year. it can take me an hour and a half or more to check on cows, but it works for us. we always have well over 90% calf crop, havent had to assist any births this year (one last year-breech) and i dont sit around playing nurse maid or whatever the male version of a maid is (butler?). I'll intervene if i absolutely have to, otherwise they have to figure it out on their own. we rarely have a problem other than a dummy or the very occasional heifer that wont let a calf nurse or some cow that has mastitis. For the most part, until the monsoons this year, we dont have to deal with bad weather so the cows are expected to do their jobs by themselves. true, they would do better if they got colostrum immediately but the ones i've had to help over the years havent done bad by any means, and good is good enough for me. if we all did things exactly by the book one of two things would happen. we'd either have all sold all of our cows at some point for some reason or we'd all be completely broke. and like you said, sometimes s+uff happens. thanks for the great posts!

 

[Beefy]

Beefy- Thanks for sharing your story! I totally understand your situation. The way our pasture is layed out and the fact they have free run of 125 acres it is next to impossible for us to move a cow in the right direction that doesn't want to be moved. Even on horseback and 4-wheelers, those cows can dodge and run through stuff at full speed that I would bounce off of. I hope the little bugger turns out ok for you!

Sid, i absolutely HATE running a cow on a fourwheeler. cow stops, you stop. cow turns around, you down the gears, put in reverse, speed up. too late, cow turns sharp, 4-wheeler doesnt do "sharp" etc. still it beats the heck out of a truck though. best luck for us tends to be a truck on the side of the cow and the fourwheeler behind the cow. luckily we havent had to do that in a LONG time.

uh oh-this reminds me of the other day when a neighbors calf was out on the road and we went to look to see if it was ours or not and when i told dad it wasnt he said "good fences make good neighbors" and i said " i suuuuuuuure wish you hadnt just said that." next day 3 of our cows were out on the highway and the day after another cow was out in the back on the road and the neighbor back there (different one) thought the cow was his. We had a disagreement and i basically told him what i thought of him and where he could go after i ran the cow in my gate and her heifer came to nurse on her. nature and timing can be quite a combo sometimes.

 

[Ryder]

Sounds like you had quite a time of it.
As a side note, if the calf does not receive colostrom within 12 hours, it is almost worthless. If not before 24 hours, it is totally worthless. Colostrom IN THE COW loses antibodies each hour after calving. Plus, the calf's stomach is designed to be able to process the colostrom immediately after birth. Each hour the stomach changes and is less & less capable of utilizing colostrom. So each hour after birth, not only is the cows colostrom getting less potent, the calf's stomach is getting less able to utilize what you give it.
That's why, it is imperitive to get colostrom in a newborn as quickly as possible. Ideally, we like the calf to suck within 15-30 minutes. But, we all know this is not an ideal world, and s---t happens. We intervene after about 1.5 to 2 hours - offer bottle of colostrom, if won't suck - tube it.

In your case, cow probably would have been less than willing to let you help. That is why, it is important to have cattle up close during calving season, but like I said, this isn't a perfect world, and some places just can't get that done because of facilities or land. We do what we have to.

Jeanne, as usual your post is very informative. I'm aware of all you said regarding colostrum. Thanks for sharing that with me just in case though, i'm sure a lot of other posters will benefit from that. Still, i dont have time to wait around for all 140-160 calves to figure it out. just say for instance you have 5 calves a day, and it takes them 10 minutes (minimum here obviously) to nurse, thats an hour right there. i have too many other things to do. heck, it may be 12 hours before i find a calf if teh cow calves after dark. Our cows run on 500 acres during the majority of the year and 1000 during this part of the year. it can take me an hour and a half or more to check on cows, but it works for us. we always have well over 90% calf crop, havent had to assist any births this year (one last year-breech) and i dont sit around playing nurse maid or whatever the male version of a maid is (butler?). I'll intervene if i absolutely have to, otherwise they have to figure it out on their own. we rarely have a problem other than a dummy or the very occasional heifer that wont let a calf nurse or some cow that has mastitis. For the most part, until the monsoons this year, we dont have to deal with bad weather so the cows are expected to do their jobs by themselves. true, they would do better if they got colostrum immediately but the ones i've had to help over the years havent done bad by any means, and good is good enough for me. if we all did things exactly by the book one of two things would happen. we'd either have all sold all of our cows at some point for some reason or we'd all be completely broke. and like you said, sometimes s+uff happens. thanks for the great posts!

Beefy,
Excellent post.

 

[Workinonit Farm]

Beefy, glad to hear the calf is doing well. Hopefully things will dry out a little soon.

Katherine

 

[franseen]

Beefy,
Nice to hear the calf came around. Mud, I hate it too. Seems like some cows wait for dry weather to end then calve.

 

[Wren]

havent had to assist any births this year (one last year-breech) and i dont sit around playing nurse maid or whatever the male version of a maid is (butler?). I'll intervene if i absolutely have to, otherwise they have to figure it out on their own. we rarely have a problem other than a dummy or the very occasional heifer that wont let a calf nurse or some cow that has mastitis. For the most part, until the monsoons this year, we dont have to deal with bad weather so the cows are expected to do their jobs by themselves.

Amen to that. In my opinion a brood cow has one job to do. Have calves unassited and raise them with out help. They don't do that and they get shipped.

Good luck with your calf

 

[msscamp]

We just finished calving for this year. I'm in charge of checking the mama's, and I'm the walking dead, but I have NEVER gone to bed without making sure the baby nursed, even if that means jump-starting with milk replacer, store-bought colostrum, or thawed-out colostrum. Anyone that lets a calf go for more than 12 hours without nursing needs to find another job. Sorry, but it's as simple as that.

 

[Beefy]

oh ok. i think i have a better grasp on the new cattle industry now. so what you are saying is not only should i do the cow's job for her but i also should do the calf's job as well. i see. my how things change over the years. i think tomorrow i'll go set out some lounge chairs and start mowing the grass so i can put it on a tray and take it to the cows. oh and i better irrigate the grass. that way we can just get rid of mother nature altogether.

 

[Wewild]

Beefy

Let that just slide. It don't mean a thing.

 

[Bama]

I kindy have to agree with Beefy. If the cow can't do her job, shes gone. I have had a calve 2 or 3 days old before I even see it. If the cow has been nursed, I don't go running around looking for a calf somewhere. If I happen to find it great. If I don't no big deal, its just another calf somewhere. I don't babysit my cows or act as nursemaid to the calves. Sure if one has problems I interven but heck cows have been having calves long before I came along. I recon they still know how. The best prevention for calving problems is culling.

 

[Ryder]

Beefy and Bama,
Excellent posts.
I'm gonna drink to that.

 

[Marian]

day 3 we had 4 inches of rain and with that much rain it gets boggy here. It was lightning bad and starting monsooning again so we said we'd try again tomorrow. (got the fourwheeler stuck too. bad week. tornadoes . and rained again today, wont be harrowing for a while now!). day 4-windy as all get out, .................

Hey Beef!! Have you thought of living in North Dakota?? ;-)

 

[Marian]

Letting a calf go more than three hours without colostrum is crazy! I prefer to get that cow and calf up and give the calf milk from it's mother. I do sometimes keep colostrum frozen and will give that calf a bottle and hope that it will suck the cow later. If not within a five or six hours I will then get them up. MY advice when getting a cow up, is park the ATV and the horse. THe one person that feeds and cares for these cattle daily will have more luck by themselves. The cow should follow the new calf, if not she will probably follow some grain or real good hay.

ever had a cow that ... as caustic would put it... try to blow snot in your britches..?? getting them up is not always possible.. especially by yourself..

jt

Oh Ya!! :shock: Then she rolls you in the crap a few rolls.....lol

 

[Beefy]

day 3 we had 4 inches of rain and with that much rain it gets boggy here. It was lightning bad and starting monsooning again so we said we'd try again tomorrow. (got the fourwheeler stuck too. bad week. tornadoes . and rained again today, wont be harrowing for a while now!). day 4-windy as all get out, .................

Hey Beef!! Have you thought of living in North Dakota?? ;-)

Every summer! keep in mind if it gets below 65 i have my coveralls on...

 

[msscamp]

I would like to offer my sincerest apologies for my post on this subject. I was way out of line and I apologize.

 

[Bama]

As far as I'm concerned no apologies are nessessary. We all raise our cows differantly. I come from the old school. I don't pamper my cows. I don't neglect them either. Some people take care of their cows every need. If I did that I couldn't make any money. I have cows for one reason only. Thats to make a profit. If I did everything exactly by the book the fertilizer folks, medical supplier, feed stores, vets, and everone else with a better idea would be making the money on my cows. I do take care of them and keep them healthy. A real fat cow is not a healthy cow. Like I said I don't pamper nor neglect. Where that line is drawn is at a differant location for everbody in the business.

 

[msscamp]

I appreciate that Bama. Our cows are not pets, but during calving they are watched and every precaution is taken to insure a live, healthy calf. If that means bottling or assisting that is what is done. Day old calves are bringing close to 400.00 up here. Why lose them if you can help it? We haven't had to assist a 3-yr olds and up with calving in many years. The two-year olds are a different story.