Hate losing one....

[Fire Sweep Ranch]

Ugh, what a week! We had three calves born all on the same day; one on time (an Upgrade heifer calf, 89 pounds), one 8 days early (a Lock n Load x SS U Misti Nights embryo heifer calf, 69 pounds) and of course the early calf (266 days gestation, Angus cow sired by Chopper, bull calf, 51 pounds).
Anyway, we have a good recip that was due today with a Steel Force embryo calf. Out of three eggs, all three stuck but one aborted early (130 days gestation) so I was really looking forward to this last one, since the spring embryo heifer calf is super nice! The recip cow is the dam of Ronnie, a heifer I have pictured here before with Ron in KY at the junior nationals this year. This cow is a little spooky compared to the rest, and not halter broke (we bought her in a sale as a bred). So I brought her up to the pasture near the house last night, with another cow to keep her company, so we could keep a closer eye on her. We had some really bad storms last night, with high winds and over 2 inches of rain. The wind was bad enough to pitch our pool (48 inch deep, 16 feet wide), which was almost empty (draining it for winter storage) into the pasture where this cow was. I leave early on Tuesdays and Thursdays to teach at the college (before daylight), so hubby texted me to let me know the pool ended up in the pasture but her got it out before he left. So I get home at 4PM to find the cow hovering over a dead calf, and very distraught. She is super protective, so I walked out there with a big stick just to confirm what my gut told me, that it was dead. It was, of course, a heifer calf, and still warm and flexible. I left the two alone, since I was home alone and did not want to get hurt. I watched her over the next two hours never leave the calf, lay down and pass her placenta, eat it, and was obviously confused by the lack of the calf standing. When hubby got home, we chased the cow out of the pasture (she DID NOT want to leave her baby) and picked the calf up to weigh her and dispose. She was 62 pounds (small for a Simmi), and had a ton of clear thick goop that drained from her mouth. I bet she never took a breath, with the amount of fluid that came out. So, now I am second guessing myself, did the pool flying spook her enough to cause an abruption of the umbilicus? Could this have been prevented had we just left her out on pasture (which they are the furthest from the house, so hard to check on). I really hate seeing my cows like this. Last fall we lost a set of twins and listening to the cow call for her babies was heartbreaking. This is a part of the business I do not like, loosing one you had high hopes for and think you might have prevented....
On a lighter note, the little half angus bull calf seems to be doing well. I let him and his dam out of the barn tonight and into the small pasture next to the barn. Every time I see him lying around, I think he is dead because he is just so darn small! I sure hope he makes it! Here is a pic I took of him tonight, his dam MIGHT be 1000 pounds if she is lucky.... a very small Pioneer angus 3 year old:

Sorry to vent,.... I hate losing a calf. Heifers are the hardest, and embryos are even worse!

 

[Nesikep]

I think we got your storm coming through here now. it's been pretty miserable since noon.

I kinda doubt the flying pool would have caused her to slip it at that stage. We've all lost them, and none of us like it, but an embryo calf has the extra cost associated with it which makes it hurt just a little more. Was this one pretty close to full term? If you're having a lot born too early I'd look at other factors.. This time of year it would be unlikely mouldy feed would be the cause, perhaps viral? If not it's just crap luck, and not worth second guessing yourself over.

 

[branguscowgirl]

Sorry to hear this FSR. As Nesi said, "probably not the pool." But I do know that they can get really stressed being moved before calving. I try to do it several weeks ahead of time and let them settle in.
Don't know if you have ever tried this, but it works for me when I have lost a calf. Especially if the weather is cool and no buzzards around. I leave the calf there. Open the gate so that the cow can leave when she is ready. Eventually she understands that it is dead and calmly walks away on her own and re joins the herd. No more fuss. It has worked for all types of animals that I have had loose a baby.

 

[Nesikep]

That does work if they've had a chance to sniff and lick the calf. If you pull a dead calf from them though, best just hide it as fast as possible, they'll know there *should* be a calf around, but they seem to still be 'waiting for it'... Then they're usually pretty willing to accept an orphan too

 

[inyati13]

This is a mean vocation. When I lost Miley, I wondered why I do this. I thought if I had it to do over, I might not. Now I got a beautiful new calf and I am healed by the power of my passions.

FSR, you are a strong woman. You have so much knowledge of cattle. You are intelligent. A wonderful shepard. Your flock is loved and cared for. You have brought your whole family even your extended family into your enterprise. Your mom and dad watch. Poor Glenn, who would rather do anything but raise cattle labors for you because he loves you. He sees the passion you have. Don't be hurt when I say I see your selfish side. You have made this your life and others you love are sweep along like twigs in a mighty river. Maybe like Glenn when they would have chosen another path. But we are all selfish and selfish is not a bad word. You love this vocation and you would put it in front of any man. You may not have admitted that to yourself but I see it.

You will pass these bumps as you have many times before. The next time you see a calf raise its tail and run with legs that look like rubber and then wheel around to only run back where it started, you will know why you love this.

I have seen your motto. God, Family and Simmentals. You sure it ain't; Simmentals, God and Family?????

 

[cowgirl8]

So sorry, its the sad part of the business...

 

[Black and Good]

Sorry to hear bout your lost calf. :-( I always say "As long as these problems are in the barn and not the house I can deal with it" B&G

 

[Lucky_P]

Hate to hear it Kris.
Agree, probably not the pool. More likely a posterior presentation - back legs first; they can have 'em that way, but once the umbilicus gets compressed coming through the birth canal, they need to push 'em on out pretty quickly - if they don't, the calf doesn't make it.

Last heifer here calved uneventfully, on her own, yesterday.
Have lost 2 calves out of heifers to 'water hazards' this go-round; guess they're my fault, but the heifers will probably pay the price in the form of a trip to town. Had to have a late night C-section on one last week, and the next day I pulled one that probably would have come on its own if I'd waited, just 'cause I didn't want to be 10:00 pm calling the 'real' veterinarian out.
Glad to be done with them...

 

[Fire Sweep Ranch]

Thanks everyone...

Nesi,she was full term, due the day she calved (285 days).

Lucky, thank you for that perspective. I never thought backwards... but that does make more sense. The calf was small, so she could have pushed her out herself in that presentation. Sigh... Sadly, when I walked out to the back pasture this morning to check on the group (2 more to calve in the next two weeks), that cow came running up over the ridge like she expected me to bring her baby with her, and kept mooing looking up at the barn.
Now I am tossed at what to do with this cow. We bought her as a bred, and about 45 days before she was due we vaccinated the herd. She was the one we had abort because we use(d) a MLV vaccine (she was naive, and my vet and I failed to communicate with each other about the risks - I did not know about MLV's because we had always used it and he did not know she was new to our herd). Anyway, she bred right back (AI), raised a super calf last year, so I decided to put an embryo in her. So, now she has lost this calf. If we were doing this for profit only, she would be out of here......

 

[Nesikep]

For what it's worth, I found cows that had reverse presentations calves are more likely to do it again, this is what I've found in my relatively small herd.

Ron, your line should be "Simmental cattle, Everything else in the world, Family, and God..."

 

[Fire Sweep Ranch]

Ron, your line should be "Simmental cattle, Everything else in the world, Family, and God..."

:lol: :lol: :nod:

Thanks for the laugh Nesi, I doubt he would disagree! Well, maybe the middle two mixed around....

 

[Lucky_P]

Know what you mean, Kris...
I'm not dependent upon the cows to pay my bills...and I really like the two heifers that lost their calves (one's a ConnectionX6I6 granddaughter of one of the most productive cows we ever had, other is a nice SHxAN cross; but both are just commercial heifers) - and, truthfully, if I'd been more on top of things, they might not have lost them...
But, prices are HIGH right now...I've fed these girls through 2 winters, they'll have to go through 2 more winters before they have anything big enough to sell...the wise economic choice would be to ship 'em.
Still haven't made that decision final...but we're at the point that with all the heifers we have to choose from, we either have to sell heifers at weaning/yearling or cull some cows that are already producing. In the past, we'd have kept them, but we're now at or above carrying capacity, so...I'll probably bite the bullet and send 'em on.

 

[slick4591]

Sorry you lost her.

 

[inyati13]

Hate to hear it Kris.
Agree, probably not the pool. More likely a posterior presentation - back legs first; they can have 'em that way, but once the umbilicus gets compressed coming through the birth canal, they need to push 'em on out pretty quickly - if they don't, the calf doesn't make it.

Last heifer here calved uneventfully, on her own, yesterday.
Have lost 2 calves out of heifers to 'water hazards' this go-round; guess they're my fault, but the heifers will probably pay the price in the form of a trip to town. Had to have a late night C-section on one last week, and the next day I pulled one that probably would have come on its own if I'd waited, just 'cause I didn't want to be 10:00 pm calling the 'real' veterinarian out.
Glad to be done with them...

Lucky, Reading these reports on CT of calving problems, makes me wonder what additional steps one can take. I have two more heifers, both due in October. One is a registered simangus AI'd to Top Hand (SS 16860273) and the other is a mixed (mongrel) heifer I raised out of my big cow Panda Bear AI'd to Composure (SS 16496980). I selected both of these PB angus bulls for no other reason than calfing ease. Is there a bull out there that is a "lead pipe cinch" for calving ease????

 

[Lucky_P]

Ron,
There are some that you'd think would fit that 'lead-pipe cinch' category; LCC Above & Beyond (Red Angus) and N Bar Prime Time D806 (AN) are two that come to mind. But, think back to that old 'bell curve' diagram. There are gonna be outliers.

I've got a bit of experience with D806 - the calves come very small - like drowned rabbits - and jump up and nurse quickly. They'll also run a mile away, crossing fence after fence, if you spook them in the first day or two of life. And, there's not much 'grow' to them - but they get here alive. Daughters actually make decent cows by the time they get to be 5-6-7 years old- if you can stand to look at 'em in the interim. But, I know someone who had a bunch of Cherokee Canyon daughters bred to D806 who had to pull almost all of them - CC is noted for siring cows with the pelvic area of a hamster. Even with an extreme, proven calving ease bull, there were problems.
I've had one heifer, in the past, bred to D806, that couldn't have her measly little calf without assistance, so, even if you're using those high CED bulls with high accuracies, sometimes Nature will surprise you with something you hadn't counted on.

All you can do is try to make the best decision you can, based on the best information you have at hand. But sometimes you don't have ALL the info...

 

[cloud9cattle]

Just throwing this out there... but do you think calving problems are more common today than in the past of a ranchers history? Could this be caused from feed and silage improvement?, The use of AI? Does AI really improve calving ease? I just wonder if all the focus on genetic and show potential has actually created more problems. I remember as a youngster my Grandfather always used whatever bull he could afford and his cows were never anything special and we never pulled calves. Makes me wonder if its something weve done as breeders to create a more common occurance of these issues.

 

[Lucky_P]

cloud9,
There's still some of those folks who subscribe to the mantra: "If you never pull a calf, you'll never have to."
Several ways one could take that statement, but my interpretation is that if you don't assist a problem calving, you'll either have a dead calf, dead cow, or both - and if the cow doesn't raise a calf, she's gone. Problem solved.
I'm into minimal inputs, but won't take that much of a hands-off approach. I will not just let 'em die without giving it 'the old college try'. In planning my breeding decisions, calving ease is first and foremost - a dead calf has a distressingly low weaning weight; even on my mature cows, I'm not going with a hard-calving bull - I may not go for negative BW, but I'm not going far below breed average; I don't care if I never have to pull another calf - but I know that as long as I have 'em, that there's the possibility that I may have to from time to time.

Modern cattle breeding and feeding - including the use of AI and epds/ebvs, genomics, and all the other stuff probably have decreased the incidence of calving problems - with those tools you can have a better idea of what's coming your way - even if not in 100% of the cases.
Back in the day...grandpa probably had no idea what sort of birth weights or calf conformation a purchased bull was going to produce; yours may never had had any wrecks, but others did.
And there's no doubt in my mind that we're producing better cattle than in the past; yeah, you can make some money today on 'nothing special' calves with a 350-400 lb weaning weight - but I'd sure rather be producing 650 lb weaners that still have some growth potential about 'em, and will produce a quality carcass for the consumer - hopefully fostering greater demand for BEEF!

 

[Nesikep]

I think the showing genetics haven't done much for commercial cattle, Shorthorns are a good example of that, they're pretty to look at though.

I'm with Lucky_P on this, I have minimal inputs, I don't vaccinate for things I haven't heard of in the area, and I have a closed herd, so I'm not getting stuff in from who knows where. That said, I probably see 70% of my calves being born, I give light assistance to the heifers or something that isn't progressing as quickly as I'd like, just because I'm there, I haven't needed the calving chains for anything other than a malpresentation in 4 years, don't own and haven't needed a calf puller in 24 years. Same goes for getting them to nurse, I have docile cows for the most part, so I'll often give the calf a finger to suck on and slip the teat into it's mouth, that way I know it's had a drink, and I can get back to doing other things (like sleep), and not have to second guess myself in the morning if it's gotten something in it's belly.
We've selected for maternal calving ease for years, which has worked well for us as we don't need to be hung up on the bull's BW, which opens up doors in the bull market.

I also get great personal satisfaction from seeing a nice bunch of sassy fat steers in my pasture, My current star "Lazyboy" has gotta be well in the 600's and he's 5 1/2 months old.. Does nothing but eat and sleep, he doesn't have the best skeletal conformation (swayback), but he's sure going to be good eats!

 

[dun]

I din;t read through the whole thread so here goes. Several years ago there was a rash of newborn calves being found freshly delivered but cleaned off. It was sort of a mystery until we had a calf born and I happened to be standing there when it happened. Calf came out no problems and the cow started cleaning the AB from the rear to the front but she couldn;t tear the sack. I hopped the fence and tried to tear it and couldn;t so I had to use my knife to get a hole started at the head. The sack still didn;t tear so I slit it the full length. Turns out the sack was very thick and tough. Talked to vet and told him and he had discovered the same thing when he had to pull a calf for a client. We surmised that a possible reason for the dead calves was the inability of the cows or the calves to tear the sack and it would sufocate once the umbilical was broken. We watched a lot closer the rest of that calving season and had another one a week or so later the same way. All the others seemed to be ok. When I would see a new born I would hustle out and try (operative word) to get the sack away from the cow so I could check it. For us, none of the others were like that. Never had seen that before or since.

 

[inyati13]

I think the showing genetics haven't done much for commercial cattle, Shorthorns are a good example of that, they're pretty to look at though.

I'm with Lucky_P on this, I have minimal inputs, I don't vaccinate for things I haven't heard of in the area, and I have a closed herd, so I'm not getting stuff in from who knows where. That said, I probably see 70% of my calves being born, I give light assistance to the heifers or something that isn't progressing as quickly as I'd like, just because I'm there, I haven't needed the calving chains for anything other than a malpresentation in 4 years, don't own and haven't needed a calf puller in 24 years. Same goes for getting them to nurse, I have docile cows for the most part, so I'll often give the calf a finger to suck on and slip the teat into it's mouth, that way I know it's had a drink, and I can get back to doing other things (like sleep), and not have to second guess myself in the morning if it's gotten something in it's belly.
We've selected for maternal calving ease for years, which has worked well for us as we don't need to be hung up on the bull's BW, which opens up doors in the bull market.

I also get great personal satisfaction from seeing a nice bunch of sassy fat steers in my pasture, My current star "Lazyboy" has gotta be well in the 600's and he's 5 1/2 months old.. Does nothing but eat and sleep, he doesn't have the best skeletal conformation (swayback), but he's sure going to be good eats!

I do everything you can imagine to prevent disease. But remember, my neighbor and I share a long fence line, Nesi. He is a salt of the earth kinda guy but his cattle practices are not so great. He brings in a lot of risky cattle. I stay awake at nights wondering what kind of epidemics he is going to start. Plus, some of the water that falls on his land can runoff onto me. So you have a parasite pathway there.

I have no choice but to be proactive. I will never be able to say I have closed all possible pathways.