not sure right or wrong

[BryanM]

Not sure if I should of helped or not- My second calve and heifers first, she had the calves hoofs hanging in and out for about 1 hour where it looked like she wasnt making progress. As she stood up and laid down the hoofs would go in and come out not a big deal makes sense so far, when she laid down and had contrations the front feet would come out 4 or 5 inches but she would get up and the calve seemed too slide in and then she would have to start over after an hour maybe a bit more I decided to pull just too help her out, no chains or straps just hands on a couple more pushes and he was out. Right or wrong?

I am new to this but I am figuring out or hoping that heifers are a pain in the rear, right or wrong meaning this is my second heifer my second calve and both heifers got extremely rough with the calves. As the calves stood up both heifers shoved the calves around preety good(rougher than I would think). We had too halter both heifers before they would stand still before they would nurse. (right or wrong)?

I am hoping its just heifers being first timers?
One more thing the second calve a white bull calve weighed 91lbs is that a lot for a heifer? The bull I used is well known for calve ease and the breed is shorthorn? I might have a couple more questions but will wait and see the respnse on these. thanks

 

[Galloways1]

If you were able to pull it out, just by hand, you certainly did not rush her at all. Helping heifers, after you have given her ample time, is no big deal. You got a live calf, and mom claims him. Good job.

91 lbs is big, but obviously not for your heifer. The cow is 1/2 the equation.

 

[dun]

You did right!

 

[randiliana]

Agreed! We generally give a heifer an hour to hour and a half and then we help them out. The longer you wait, the tireder the heifer, and the more problems you can end up with. As long as she is dilated enough, I'd rather be a little too quick to help than to wait too long.

But most heifers/cows aren't that rough with their calves, and they sure shouldn't need to be haltered to nurse. Of course, if you were to anxious (not saying you were) and kept bothering them, that might have had an effect on them standing still, too.

 

[BryanM]

ya I think I was on the anxious side without a doubt. And they both calved in the barn where I had them penned. So you might have something their.

1 more question, where does the color of the calve come from? the shorthorn cow is a roan and the bull is a roan! How did I end up with an all white calve? Grand pearents? or is that a crap shoot?

 

[randiliana]

Roan is an incompletely dominant gene. Which means that if they get one gene for roan they will be roan, 2 (homozygous) genes for roan makes them white. And of course if they don't get any genes for roan they will be solid color.

 

[SRBeef]

A couple years ago I had a cow that had hooves showing out the back for a couple hours on a Sunday morning. I was getting nervous and called a neighbor for advice. Went back up to the house called the vet for a second opinion. Looked at a couple books for what was an acceptable time before assistance. Spent a hour or two getting advice. Went back down to the pasture and there she was licking off a new calf. If I had jumped in I may have caused more problems than I solved.

My vet says we have a tendency to jump in too soon and should try to let nature take its course. He says he sees a lot of problems with folks new to cattle getting nervous and tending to pull too soon. He also said it's tough to know for sure but in general try to let nature handle it.

Jim

 

[cowmilker]

I went to a lecture several years back led by a lady vet from the University of Wisconsin. She does a lot of consulting work and researching for the dairy folks up there. In analyzing data gathered by her associates from farms in the state, she noticed that one farm had a significantly lower calf mortality rate than any other. Wanting to find out why, she went to the dairy to see for herself. She learned that on that farm, all the chains and equipment for pulling calves were locked up in the farm manager's office. No one could pull a calf without his knowledge and his visual inspection, including waking him up in the middle of the night. This vet's contention was that way too many calves get pulled for convenience (shift change for instance), and that the unneccessary pulls were killing calves.
While I do not disagree with the OP's actions in this case, I really found this knowledge eye opening. Craig

 

[MO_cows]

If you pulled it by hand, she probably would have had it on her own. But her job is just starting when she gets the calf delivered, so you probably helped her not to have to start her new job exhausted. Hopefully it is just the stress causing them to butt their calves around, but keep a good eye on that.

 

[Beefy]

i'd say you jumped the gun but it all worked out in the end. the calf going in and out and the heifer getting up and down is natural and helps to get her good and dilated. if you jump in and pull before she is good and ready you risk tearing her. also a lot of times when you do have to pull one they will be sort of aggressive with the calf until it clicks that the calf is her baby and not some painful alien you extracted from her. but the same can be said for heifers that calve unassisted. just inexperience of being a mom for the first time. if it was that easy to pull, she would have had it on her own more than likely. having said that 91 is a pretty good size calf for a heifer.

 

[JustSimmental]

Part of the rite of passage (at least here) is that a heifer has her first calf unassisted / no exceptions.
We will intervene if after a few hours she has not calved but like to give her every oportunity to make the production cow herd. If we assist --she is sold when she weans her calf.

I also think a 91 lb calf is unacceptable and sometimes caused by poor nutritional balance (over-feeding), poor breeding decisions or poor replacement heifer choices all of which is human error.
I'd get rid of the heifer and fire the cattle manager.

JS

 

[randiliana]

Hmm, JustSimmental, where are you located?

We've had issues with all 3 heifers that have calved so far. Same bull as we have used for the last 2 years with minimal problems. Haven't weighed the calves yet (all born yesterday afternoon or this morning), but I estimate between 80 and 90 lbs. Smallest calf, heifer just took too long, pulled it easily. It was up and about in 10 minutes, DH said next one, leave it for longer before we worry about her. 3 1/2 hours after we put her in the barn, I checked her out. Dead calf, both legs back....3rd heifer, we gave her about 2 hours, no calf, we pulled it, its alive but going to have to bottle feed it, it's pretty weak and slow.... The name of the game is to get a live, healthy calf, wait too long and you have problems. I'd rather intervene a little too early than end up with a dead or weak calf!

BTW, 2 of the 3 heifers will probably stick around, if they breed back. Decision is deferred on the 3rd, cause the calf was pretty small and we had a fairly hard pull to get it out, I'm inclined to cull her, but DH disagrees....

Over the years we rarely have culled a heifer because we had to assist her, only in extreme situations, where the calf was definitely small enough and she just wasn't big enough. In my current record book, we have had 19 head (that have had 2 or more calves), that we assisted when they were heifers. 3 of those have been assisted again, and one of them was with twins. Meanwhile, we do have other cows that were assisted for one reason or another after their 1st calf.

Do what works for you, but with the cost to replace a heifer/cow right now, it just doesn't make sense to me to cull her because she needed help calving as a heifer. As far as BW I think that 85 lbs really isn't asking too much out of a heifer. Over that I agree is a bit on the large side, but we've had numerous heifers have up to 90 lb calves without problems.

 

[dun]

Hmm, JustSimmental, where are you located?

We've had issues with all 3 heifers that have calved so far. Same bull as we have used for the last 2 years with minimal problems. Haven't weighed the calves yet (all born yesterday afternoon or this morning), but I estimate between 80 and 90 lbs. Smallest calf, heifer just took too long, pulled it easily. It was up and about in 10 minutes, DH said next one, leave it for longer before we worry about her. 3 1/2 hours after we put her in the barn, I checked her out. Dead calf, both legs back....3rd heifer, we gave her about 2 hours, no calf, we pulled it, its alive but going to have to bottle feed it, it's pretty weak and slow.... The name of the game is to get a live, healthy calf, wait too long and you have problems. I'd rather intervene a little too early than end up with a dead or weak calf!

BTW, 2 of the 3 heifers will probably stick around, if they breed back. Decision is deferred on the 3rd, cause the calf was pretty small and we had a fairly hard pull to get it out, I'm inclined to cull her, but DH disagrees....

Over the years we rarely have culled a heifer because we had to assist her, only in extreme situations, where the calf was definitely small enough and she just wasn't big enough. In my current record book, we have had 19 head (that have had 2 or more calves), that we assisted when they were heifers. 3 of those have been assisted again, and one of them was with twins. Meanwhile, we do have other cows that were assisted for one reason or another after their 1st calf.

Do what works for you, but with the cost to replace a heifer/cow right now, it just doesn't make sense to me to cull her because she needed help calving as a heifer. As far as BW I think that 85 lbs really isn't asking too much out of a heifer. Over that I agree is a bit on the large side, but we've had numerous heifers have up to 90 lb calves without problems.

Maybe there's a reason for the ROT of when they're in labor, no progress in a half hour from a cow or 1 hour from a heifer and you check things out.

 

[Kathie in Thorp]

You did right!

What Dun said. She didn't get all worn out before help arrived.

 

[randiliana]

Hmm, JustSimmental, where are you located?

We've had issues with all 3 heifers that have calved so far. Same bull as we have used for the last 2 years with minimal problems. Haven't weighed the calves yet (all born yesterday afternoon or this morning), but I estimate between 80 and 90 lbs. Smallest calf, heifer just took too long, pulled it easily. It was up and about in 10 minutes, DH said next one, leave it for longer before we worry about her. 3 1/2 hours after we put her in the barn, I checked her out. Dead calf, both legs back....3rd heifer, we gave her about 2 hours, no calf, we pulled it, its alive but going to have to bottle feed it, it's pretty weak and slow.... The name of the game is to get a live, healthy calf, wait too long and you have problems. I'd rather intervene a little too early than end up with a dead or weak calf!

BTW, 2 of the 3 heifers will probably stick around, if they breed back. Decision is deferred on the 3rd, cause the calf was pretty small and we had a fairly hard pull to get it out, I'm inclined to cull her, but DH disagrees....

Over the years we rarely have culled a heifer because we had to assist her, only in extreme situations, where the calf was definitely small enough and she just wasn't big enough. In my current record book, we have had 19 head (that have had 2 or more calves), that we assisted when they were heifers. 3 of those have been assisted again, and one of them was with twins. Meanwhile, we do have other cows that were assisted for one reason or another after their 1st calf.

Do what works for you, but with the cost to replace a heifer/cow right now, it just doesn't make sense to me to cull her because she needed help calving as a heifer. As far as BW I think that 85 lbs really isn't asking too much out of a heifer. Over that I agree is a bit on the large side, but we've had numerous heifers have up to 90 lb calves without problems.

Maybe there's a reason for the ROT of when they're in labor, no progress in a half hour from a cow or 1 hour from a heifer and you check things out.

Yeah, usually we follow that rule. But the 2nd heifer never had the water bag, never really acted like she was in full labour.

 

[dun]

Yeah, usually we follow that rule. But the 2nd heifer never had the water bag, never really acted like she was in full labour.

Those are the ones that will get you. 2 years in a row 10 years or so ago we had to heifers that pulled that stunt. By the time I realized there was soemthing going on (or should have been going on) both of the calves had died. Nothing wrong with the presentation or the calf size, they just never really started into real labor.
Our vet calls that "heifer disease"

 

[randiliana]

Yeah, this one had both front legs back. But the one other heifer, didn't really seem to want to 'get at it' either. Too busy running away from it I think. Hopefully we've got the bad stuff over with now ;~>

 

[Chris H]

I'd say the original poster did right. An hour of active labor, with the feet sticking out, and no further progress then get her caught and check out what's going on. I'd have pulled it at that point to keep the heifer from getting worn out.
Something to keep in mind about heifers, we had one 15 years ago that we called the vet for assistance. Doc said nothing was wrong, there's some kind of band around the vaginal/cervical area that is tighter/more sensitive on some heifers than others. As soon as the calf's feet hit that point the heifer got up and quit pushing. The calf didn't get far enough to trigger the 'got to push this thing out' reflex. It's a simple matter of getting the calf out that far, and then the cow settles down to push.

 

[jimohusker]

I would also say you did right. I usually let a heifer go through 1 to 2 hours of labor before I assist. So far this year, I have had 8 heifers calf, 6 unassisted, pulled 2. The 1st one I pulled, I waited 2 hours. She looked like everything was going as normal, feet were correct. Finally decided to pull the calf. End result was an easy pull but calf was born dead. Maybe shouldve done it quicker, who knows. 2nd one was today. Watched her for 1 hour with no progress. Got her in, pulled the calf. (hard pull 90 lb+ calf. Calf and mother doing very well). Glad I helped her as she probably wouldn't have had it by herself. Just a little insight of my scenarios.

Good luck calving to all.