Cow down need help

[Gate Opener]

I noticed cow walking a little different today but thought maybe her feet were sore from all the mud we have had lately. It is fairly dry now. Anyway she is down and off feed. I noticed her shivering slightly took temperature and it is 103.4 . What should I do? Would Nuflor be good in this case? Her calf is almost 3 weeks old. What could it be? Her nose looks normal and haven't heard her cough. Could it be mastitis or milk fever?

 

[Carnivore]

I wish I knew how to help. Good luck, hope somebody comes through for you...

 

[milkmaid]

How about some more information?

How heavy a milker is she?
Did she clean after calving?
What's she eating?
What breed is she?
How old is she?
What's her manure consistency?

 

[Gate Opener]

oh I am so glad to hear from you.

She is not like a dairy cow but she has plenty of milk more than a normal cow. She did clean up. She has her choice of cow hay or corn stalk hay and she found the horse hay and was in that this morning. It is good quality coastal bermuda. People on here thought she was beefmaster X. She is 6 years. Her picture is on the post "She got in my eye should have paid better attention."

She got up when my husband went out. I went out and looked at her bag and it looks pretty normal except from the back where one quarter looks swollen. I can't tell a whole lot about the color with a flash light but looks to have a little more color than normal.

I haven't noticed her pooping so don't know about the manure. I'll try to look around.

She was shaking pretty bad when she was standing up.

 

[Roadapple]

Have you felt the quarter to see if it feels hot? Broad- spectrum antibiotic may help for mastitis. If you think she's shivering from cold, fill some plastic jugs with warm water and place around her, then cover with blanket, tarp or whatever.

 

[Gate Opener]

Thanks everybody

We got her in the chute and gave her penicillin G. Her baby nursed her beforehand. I noticed when the baby was nursing on that particular bottle the cow was uncomfortable so it probably is mastitis.

I got the post about feeling of it after we treated her so I'm not sure if it is hot. I'll check on her in the am.

I don't have banamine on hand. I'll have to get some.

She got a bite of hay before we came in the house so maybe she is feeling a little better.

The temp outside is in the 50's.

Thanks again

 

[dun]

If it is mastitis, you might want to use one of the intermammary infusions. The trick will be tring to keep the calf from sucking the stuff out. In the past we did it by seperating the cow and calf so that the calf couldn;t nurse, infused the quarter and 12 hours later stripped it out, and let the calf nurse. Then we infused it again and seperated them again. Only treated the quarter twice.

dun

 

[Gate Opener]

Vet called this morning and he said La200 would be a better choice. We are to give her 75cc. The cow has the diarrhea today. She is still not feeling good. Dun he brought up the medicine that you put in that quarter. He said that we would need to milk out that quarter then put the medicine in. He said we do not need to take the calf off though so I don't know if it is the same medicine. I told him I don't know how sucessful we would be doing that the way our chute is. He thought the LA would clear it up.

I forgot to put one of my posts that we have been giving her around 3-4 Lbs of cubes a day. He said we should increase that and feed up to 10 lbs a day.

 

[mnmtranching]

I'm not a vet. You already gave it a shot of penicillin. LA 200 is very good but two different antibiotics will fight each other giving you nothing.

Anyone else on this?

 

[dun]

Dun he brought up the medicine that you put in that quarter. He said that we would need to milk out that quarter then put the medicine in. He said we do not need to take the calf off though so I don't know if it is the same medicine.

We probably didn;t have to take the calf off either, but I figured it would do more good in the udder then in the calfs belly. Old people have old ways

dun

 

[Beefy]

has she been getting plenty of minerals?

 

[TheBullLady]

It may be that the vet is reluctant to offer anything besides LA200 without seeing the cow first.

Unless you have a good working relationship with a large animal vet, they don't like to give you prescription meds without an exam.

I had a cow with mastitis last year.. but I don't recall her shivering. She did go off feed for a day or two. I took her to A & M and she spent a week there recovering

 

[farmerjohn]

I am not a vet either but 75cc would be an off label application. Pfizer only recommends 54 cc for a 1200 lb cow.
Does your cow weigh more than that?

Also if you give her that much inject it in several locations. Beef Quality Assurance says no more than 10 cc in any one spot but personally I give a mature cow 50 cc (25cc in each side of the neck)

 

[tryinhard]

Could she have gotten in some planted grass/Rye, Oats etc? Is she staggering, I've been hearing some people talkin grass tetnany kinda jumpin on them. Neighbors bout 8 miles up the road lost a couple or three bout 2 weeks ago. Good luck.


tryinhard

 

[Gate Opener]

Well I was about to leave the house to go run errands and thought I would check her again. She was laying down and had a slimy discharge the color of muddy water. So, she must not have cleaned completely up. I went to the vet and he gave me Lutalyse(he called it something else)to give her and said to still give the LA200. This is the first discharge I have seen. I see this cow twice a day sometimes more. Why no symptoms until yesterday? Also, did this infection travel to that quarter?

To answer some questions: I have been going to this vet clinic for a long time. We use a mineral block and have salt and Crystalyx tub. I tried loose minerals once and the minerals just sat there. (from Tractor Supply so maybe that is why ??)
She is in the same pastures she has been in so nothing has changed there.
She weighs somewhere around #1500.

What you are saying Dun makes more sense to me. What if you put it in and the calf decided it was supper time right then. Looks to me like you would loose it.

 

[Workinonit Farm]

This is the first discharge I have seen. I see this cow twice a day sometimes more. Why no symptoms until yesterday?

However much placental tissue that was retained, will not necessarily cause infection within the first few days. But the longer the "stuff" remains inside of her, the nasty little bacteria has that much more time to grow and develop, until it has "rotted" enough to form an infection and nasty, stinky, ugly-looking mess. once it has reached that point, it is then that the outward signs (nasty discharge, sickly-looking animal, fever etc.) of infection will be noticiced. In other words, it takes time for the infection to develop and cause the cow to become ill.

Katherine

 

[GMN]

I'd go with acute mastitis over a retained partial placenta as being the main cause. If she gets worse I sure would have the vet out to give IV anitibiotics, and definetely put something up that quarter. She may lose that quarter anyways, but at least with a strong antibiotic, she will recover and won't get sicker.

GMN

 

[milkmaid]

Without seeing her, I'd suspect a severe intramammary infection (mastitis) that is indirectly or directly related to her not completely cleaning after calving. Often times problems like that come together. Most of the time a cow with mastitis will only have a local infection (within the quarter), but sometimes it will go systemic (an infection throughout the body), especially if you're dealing with ecoli.

That's my thoughts. I've had more success with long-lasting pennicillin than LA200 when it comes to ecoli. (For that matter, I've had more success with penn than oxytet when it comes to any type of mastitis.) Often times goes by the brand name "Twin Penn"; I think it's from AgriLabs. I'd use 60cc's, twice 24 hours apart, then go 48 hours and retreat again.

Strip that quarter and see what color the fluid is in it - if it's clear, off white, hot, or watery with flecks, it's very probably ecoli and I've seen it kill cows, directly or indirectly.

Did you check her temperature?

Best of luck with her.

 

[Gate Opener]

She is a little better today. She has moved about in the pasture and ate a little feed. She must have eaten hay because she has been chewing her cud. The penicillin knocked out the shivering. Do you think we should give her that Twin Penn(if I can find it) tomorrow night? She was going to be due for another dose of La200 on Saturday night. I haven't taken her temp since that 1st night when she was down.

Would she be getting better if it is the e-coli? We will check that quarter when we get her up.

 

[milkmaid]

She is a little better today. She has moved about in the pasture and ate a little feed. She must have eaten hay because she has been chewing her cud. The penicillin knocked out the shivering. Do you think we should give her that Twin Penn(if I can find it) tomorrow night? She was going to be due for another dose of La200 on Saturday night. I haven't taken her temp since that 1st night when she was down.

It's a good sign if she's on feed. Generally those severe infections move in fast, and the cow's immune system kicks in and she either conquers it and recovers, or succumbs and she doesn't. It's one of those things that's usually has hourly changes in condition - if she looks like she's on the upswing now she may be back to perfectly normal by Saturday. If it was mastitis, she may be only a 3-quarter cow now though, but it shouldn't cause problems - severe ecoli infections either kill the quarter or they don't, and regardless, the infection will be gone. No worries about the calf transferring it to another quarter via nursing.

If she's the same tomorrow, I'd go ahead and give the penicillin. If she's remarkably better, save your money and take the benign neglect approach.