Well, I will try to explain the best I can. When my 10 yr old daughter came to me and said Red cow needed to come in the barn, she thought she was pushing to calve, I noticed something a bit wrong. (3 weeks early) She was trying to urinate, and not too much other then mucus was coming out. After a while we thought it was a breach and reached in to check the position. Dew claws up and a tail. The rump felt like a water balloon giving to pressure. I thought it was the water bag or placenta, but followed the leg up and knew it was her bum. I knew something was wrong from the get go. The cannon bones in our full term healthy calves measure 12-14 inches… This felt like a really small calf or dwarf. They later measured 6 inches. I figured breach calf, relatively small, get her out no trouble.
After trying to hook up the O.B. chains with no feet on the outs, my hubby and I knew it was still born after no movement. Thank goodness it was! We tried to almost an hour just to get the bum and tail out. It was by far the hardest pull we have ever done. When the back legs finally showed, the right hock was swollen to the size of football. We thought the only thing that could be making the pull this hard is 2 heads or some other major genetic freak. The cow had plenty of room, but the calf would not budge. Needless to say, after a friend showed up, yes the back bone broke and the calf split. You would not believe the amount of fluid that came out when she broke.
The mis-shaped back hooves were result of the pull, the hoof caps popped off, and we had to move the chains to above the hock. The bubbles or nodes around the flanks or udder area were from the water retention, these were full and swelled before it broke, making her look twice as big then she actually was. The weight of the calf was guessed to be about 70 if it was normal. The vet estimated with the fluid if she would not have broke, she would have been well over 150-175# PHA if you have not had a chance to read up on it is a genetic fault in the lymphatic system. Thus meaning a normal calf fetus will expel water or fluids in the cow… This one did not.
This is not a "Bulldog Calf" it has been confirmed PHA. The swelling or retention of fluids is what has disfigured the face and head to look like a bull dog. When we broke the calf, we reached in again, and the front ½ felt like a monster, but no reason to worry about a freak, just large. We decided to call the vet for a c-section. It took a little under 2 hours for him to get there. During this time the cow was pushing and the contractions helped compress what fluid was trapped in the front ½ of the calf to leak from the break. Dr. finally showed up, instructed us to pull the back ½ free so he could try to spin the calf to come out nose first. Avoiding a c-section at all costs if possible. The cow was able to get the calf shrunk down enough that it finally passed when we tried to get the back ½ broke lose. This is the second calf like this for this year our vet has seen, and the 5th that Dr. Beever has seen out of the same clubby bull.
When we took the calf to Dr. Steffins in Lincoln, he opened the chest cavity and explained a normal operating lymphatic system in a new born calf would have lungs the size of a grown mans hand… this calf's lungs were the size of my thumb. He knew right away it was PHA and not bulldog. I asked why the face was so mis shaped… he cut deep along the neck where the swelling was still prominent. Slight pressure and the fluid just poured out as if you were wringing out a sponge. The facial bones are normal in this calf, This is totally different form a bulldog calf, as this calf never had a chance, 99% of them are aborted or stillborn. If they do happen to be alive, the lack of development in the lungs is terminal. The tissue on the head is just swelled. Causing people to think it is a bulldog. As for the spots on the head, this is caused when the calf is in the womb and has died a few days before birth, the hair starts to slough off. The slit by the ear is in fact the eye, it just looks like it got in a fight with Mike Tyson.
Yes, Dr. Beever is licensed to do the testing as is Dr. Steffins. Dr Beever has developed a test for the TH gene, but to this date he has not come up with a test for PHA, This calf getting to them will help further the study as in the past they only have gotten organs and tissue. Hopefully soon we can look foreward to a test for this also!
I'm sorry for such a long post, I hope I answered a lot of questions. If I haven't, please feel free to ask! I'll do the best I can to answer them. I just hope to open some eyes and save others from having to go through this same thing.
