randiliana
Well-known member
When to induce a cow into calving?? We have done it a few times, up till now it has always been prolapsers that we have induced. With good results.
This time was a cow that had been having trouble getting around. She had a lot of trouble getting up after she laid down. In her case we were fairly certain that it was a set of twins causing the problem (could also have been a huge calf). She was putting so much to them that she didn't have enough energy to support herself. I have seen the same thing in sheep.
We also had a due date on her. She was due on April 6 so we weren't too concerned that the calf/calves would be born too early. So we gave her a shot Saturday evening. She went into labour this morning. We wanted her in the barn, but she was unable to get up at the time so we left her rather than stress her even more by trying to force her up. Finally though, we figured we better check her out, and there were 3 feet there, so now we knew it was twins. She also finally was able to struggle to her feet at the same time so we did get her into the barn. The first calf had his head back. Wasn't a great problem, and we quickly had him on the ground. Not a bad sized calf for a twin. #2 was coming correctly, but didn't really want to come out into the big world, he kept jerking his feet out of our grasp but finally we were able to get the chains on him, and he slid right on out too, this one is even bigger than #1. She was cooking quite a pair of calves ;-) . 2 healthy bull calves on the ground. She was in the process of cleaning them up when we last looked in on her, and they were both trying to get up. They are out of our Shorthorn bull. This is live set #2 here.
Wouldn't suggest inducing very often, but in this case I think it was the correct decision. She will only get to raise 1 of them. The other will join the ranks of our bottle calves (3 others)
This time was a cow that had been having trouble getting around. She had a lot of trouble getting up after she laid down. In her case we were fairly certain that it was a set of twins causing the problem (could also have been a huge calf). She was putting so much to them that she didn't have enough energy to support herself. I have seen the same thing in sheep.
We also had a due date on her. She was due on April 6 so we weren't too concerned that the calf/calves would be born too early. So we gave her a shot Saturday evening. She went into labour this morning. We wanted her in the barn, but she was unable to get up at the time so we left her rather than stress her even more by trying to force her up. Finally though, we figured we better check her out, and there were 3 feet there, so now we knew it was twins. She also finally was able to struggle to her feet at the same time so we did get her into the barn. The first calf had his head back. Wasn't a great problem, and we quickly had him on the ground. Not a bad sized calf for a twin. #2 was coming correctly, but didn't really want to come out into the big world, he kept jerking his feet out of our grasp but finally we were able to get the chains on him, and he slid right on out too, this one is even bigger than #1. She was cooking quite a pair of calves ;-) . 2 healthy bull calves on the ground. She was in the process of cleaning them up when we last looked in on her, and they were both trying to get up. They are out of our Shorthorn bull. This is live set #2 here.
Wouldn't suggest inducing very often, but in this case I think it was the correct decision. She will only get to raise 1 of them. The other will join the ranks of our bottle calves (3 others)