Dead calf. Why?

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MRRherefords

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This is a long story so please bear with me. Two months ago we had one of our oldest cows have a vaginal prolapse. The vet stitched her up and told us to induce labor within one week of the due date. Earlier this week She had some discharge and udder buildup. (By the way, her due date was March 21st.) So we decided we would induce her on Friday so we would be around on Saturday to cut the stitches. Yesterday morning I checked on her and she was acting normal and up eating with the others. Yesterday evening I checked her and her plug was out and she was acting like she was about ready to calve. So we quickly cut the stitches and put her in an area in the calving pen where we could watch her. However she was more than uncomfortable with us being around, so we decided to leave her alone and check on her in the next hour. Before we left I noticed that the water bag was out and progress was being made. We came back an hour later to find her laying down and a calf just sliding out, still having the placenta covering the face. The calf was not breathing. We jumped in to see if maybe we could revive the calf, but it was already dead. Something that was strange about it though, is it had a rupture in its stomach and the intestines were out when it was born. The calf was normal size, but had no muscle on its back legs at all. Any ideas what could have caused this? This was our most productive cow and this was to be her sixth calf. It was not a tough labor as she was only in full labor for less than two hours. Needless to say she is going to be shipped, it will just be sooner than I expected.
 
just guessing here...regarding the stomach rupture and exposed intestines.
Is it possible the twins were conjoined (Siamese) in the uterus but forcefully became separated during birthing?
 
greybeard":3d3k9hyj said:
just guessing here...regarding the stomach rupture and exposed intestines.
Is it possible the twins were conjoined (Siamese) in the uterus but forcefully became separated during birthing?
Now that I saw the second one I think that its hoof punctured the first one as there was evidence on the hoof.
 

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