We have had 25 calves this year and 1 of those calves seems to be a midget. Weighed 50 lbs at birth ans is much smaller than the other calves. Does not seem to be growing like the others. Looks normal, but it's just allot smaller than everything else. Any comments ?
Midget calf
- Thread starter hargis69
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I had one like that almost two years ago. Never figured out what was wrong with him...he grew very little. Otherwise he seemed healthy. He ate fine, was at a decent weight for his size, but he never grew. When he was a year old he was about as big as a 3 or 4 month old. We did lose him when he was a little over a year old, he took off into the woods and we couldn't find him, probably yotes got him or something (he was a wild thing). Wasn't a big loss but I would have been curious to see what would have happened with him. Is the mother of yours normal and everything? ours died from what we guessed was hardware when the calf was a few months old. What breed?
jerry27150
Well-known member
you have oak trees? sounds like an acorn calf
This calf acts totally normal, not weak or anything like that. It's mother is out of a pathfinder cow and father is 036. The calf was out of a herd bull from a dispersal. It's mother is a first calf hefer and a beautiful cow. Calves younger are allot bigger than it. Just haven't had this before, maybe just going to be a small calf for no good reason.
novaman
Well-known member
Maybe it's some sort of genetic defect like dwarfism?
chippie
Well-known member
Can you post a picture?
Workinonit Farm
Well-known member
Every now and then a 'dink' shows up. I had one about 7 years ago, surprisingly enough it was a 6I6 calf. He was perfectly normal and healthy in every way, just a really handsome calf.....but he almost seemed like a perfect miniature black Angus. If you looked at him with no other animals around and nothing to give a size reference you would have thought he was a full sized animal. At nine months old he weighed 350 lb. He was probably the calmest, most gentle bovine I've ever had around here, and that includes the Jerseys I used to have.
Katherine
Katherine
Caustic Burno
Well-known member
hargis69":ej3bxet6 said:
Snorter''s and Dwarfism is common defect in English cattle this means your bull has the recessive gene as well as the cow.
http://www.iowabeefcenter.org/pdfs/bch/01900.pdf
I looked up dwarfism and it dose not have the characteristics of dwarfism. It is more like the person that had the 6I6 calf that didn't grow. It looks totally normal just real small. The only way a picture would tell anything is if I could get a picture of it standing next to another calf a month younger than it.
Santas and Duhram Reds
Well-known member
Looked at taht link. never seen any of those in my own herd but the multiple toes thing I have never even heard of.
i had a heifer a few years back and she was bred to her father, she had a dwarf calf. the next year out of my bull she had a normal looking healthy calf but she was tiny, petite. 1/2 holstien x 1/2 maine cow she was built like a holstien and the calf could stand under her.they went to town in a hurry.
AudieWyoming
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A little 6I6 calf that looks like a dwarf??? IMAGINE THAT!!! :lol2: :lol2: :lol2:
Workinonit Farm":3s2aoy56 said:
hargis-here are a couple pics I took of my "midget" when I had him. Is he anything like yours?
The first pic is him with other calves of normal size and similar age (I think he was about a week older), and the second photo is him just by himself. At the time the pic was taken he was about a month or two I believe. The third pic is him at eight months. He MIGHT have weighed 200 soaking wet. If he was nothing like yours than sorry to hijack your thread, just wanted to help illustrate your problem if it is similar.
The first pic is him with other calves of normal size and similar age (I think he was about a week older), and the second photo is him just by himself. At the time the pic was taken he was about a month or two I believe. The third pic is him at eight months. He MIGHT have weighed 200 soaking wet. If he was nothing like yours than sorry to hijack your thread, just wanted to help illustrate your problem if it is similar.
Lucky_P
Well-known member
Most folks, when you mention dwarfism, think of the brachycephalic 'snorter' dwarfs that were common in the Hereford & Angus breed back in the 50s & 60s. That form is still out there, but there are at least two more forms that have shown up in the Angus breed in recent years -
1) the dolicocephalic 'long-nose' dwarf, which has a short-legged compact body like the snorter dwarfs, but their head is normal in size. There is a DNA test available for the long-nose dwarf condition.
2) the proportional, or 'itty bitty' dwarf, as some are calling them - look completely proportional, they're just tiny and don't grow. Don't believe that the gene abnormality has yet been identified, and there's not a test for carrier status, so far as I know.
1) the dolicocephalic 'long-nose' dwarf, which has a short-legged compact body like the snorter dwarfs, but their head is normal in size. There is a DNA test available for the long-nose dwarf condition.
2) the proportional, or 'itty bitty' dwarf, as some are calling them - look completely proportional, they're just tiny and don't grow. Don't believe that the gene abnormality has yet been identified, and there's not a test for carrier status, so far as I know.
Several years ago I had a first calf heifer drop a 26 lb heifer calf. Looked normal, I still remember scooping her up with one arm like a little dog and carrying her into the bathroom scales. She did fine ate normal was just always small. I gave her to some friends at weaning time, they had her for 3 years then butchered her, at 3 + yrs she had a live weight of just over 800 lbs. She did not have any signs of being a drawf, she was just had a very small BW.
Alan
Alan
i wonder if it is caused by one parent having a dwarf gene and the other not. my heifers 1st calf was dwarf by her sire(inbred) but the other was normal out of a different bull just small. maybe a recessive gene, i read somewhere that both patrents have to have the dwarf gene for it to be a snorter, i don't know how true that is.
novaman
Well-known member
Everything I've been told is that each parent must be a carrier for the defect to be expressed by the offspring. Carriers appear normal and will produce normal offspring when bred to a non-carrier. By that logic, your heifer is a carrier as is her sire. The second bull is not a carrier but the calf from that mating could be a carrier depending on which gene it inherited from the cow.jcarkie":1tn6golp said:
