should I ship a breech birth cow?

[jcgoldie]

Hello I've been reading this board off and on for several years but this is the 1st time I have posted a question.

I have a 5 year old polled hereford cow that weighs about 1300 lbs. On Saturday 4 days ago she started calving. After watching her for 3 or 4 hours with no progress I went up to check it out and found the calf was full breech... what I had thought was a mucus string hanging out of her was actually the tail Well I pushed it back in and tried to turn it for quite sometime unsuccessfully. Finally I was able to get both back feet up and out and pull the calf with a come-along. To my surprise the calf was alive and he's healthy as can be. The cow, however, was very weak and in pain. I pulled the placenta out of her on Monday morning hoping that would help her feel better. She just started eating a bit after 3 days. I gave her the vet recommended doses of penicillin (40 cc) for 3 days, some banamine, and uterine boluses. She bled a little but not a great amount over the next day after the birth.

My question is has anyone had experience with this type of situation and should I just ship the cow when she recovers or what are the odds that she will breed back and not have calving problems next time? Shes a good cow and very docile (I did all this in the woods without her being even tied) so I dont want to get rid of her if I dont have to but I cannot afford to keep an unproductive cow and I don't want to create a worse problem if she does breed back then have calving issues again next time.

What I specifically fear is that in all the jostling and trying to get the calf out her uterus was torn and thats why she has taken 4 days to recover. I dont know if this is the case if her insides can heal and she can rebreed or worse yet she could conceive and then not push the calf out next time.

I know a vet examination would be best but I have an odd situation where the only large animal vet within 30 miles of me has dropped large animals from their practice and will not do farm calls so I don't believe I can get anyone qualified out here for less than a few hundred dollars. If the odds are very high that she will have to be shipped anyway then I don't want to spend that money.

Any advice is appreciated.

Thanks,
JC

 

[turklilley]

I've had 2 breech's that I had to pull with a come-a-long. It was very rough on the cows, but it had to come out. They both bred back within 3 months. Probably 8-10 years ago. Have her pregnancy checked
in 3 months, and if she's open, sell her.

 

[M-5]

My advise is still the same

 

[A.J.]

I wouldn't cull her solely based off of that. If you really like her, I would give her a chance to breed back. If she doesn't breed back in 3 months you could send her on. I had a heifer in a similar situation as yours a few years ago, and she bred back on time and has calved on a regular interval without issue since then.

 

[Muddy]

Yes but she asked same question on another forum and this particular cow did prolapsed when she was a first time mother. I would cull her.

 

[Supa Dexta]

A live calf is always goal #1, if all cows have that then get choosier with the culling reasons in order of combined aggravation and necessity.

 

[John SD]

A live calf is always goal #1, if all cows have that then get choosier with the culling reasons in order of combined aggravation and necessity.

+1. The top 3 methods to herd improvement are:

1. Cull
2. Cull
3. Cull

Seriously, I would not keep a prolapse, or any daughter from a prolapse. Life is too short to keep cattle that have a significant genetic chance of problem births. Or a cow that has possibly been damaged permanently internally from a difficult breech birth.

You could get lucky, or it could be a real train wreck next time. There are enough variables in this business as is. Gambling on a prolapse is not a roll of the dice I'm willing to make.

I would let this cow raise this calf, then send her down the road after weaning :idea:

 

[jcgoldie]

Well its been 5 days now and she's still barely eating and laying around grunting a lot so I think its pretty likely she's tore pretty bad. Still have been giving her 40 cc penicillin each day. She went crazy for a mineral block like she was depleted in salt or something and she ate a bit of grain and hay yesterday morning then when I got home she was bloated up with gas. I didn't really understand that since she's barely eaten unless it was the protein in the block? She does get up every so often to let the calf nurse but of course has no milk due to not eating so I'm bottle feeding him.

At this point I'm sort of just hoping she recovers enough so I can ship her... :frowns:

 

[Supa Dexta]

Have to wait out the penicillin now,

 

[regolith]

She's still feeling bad from the uterine infection, most likely, and that can take time to recover from.
I'd be inclined to say your antibiotic dose is plenty high enough, but too short in duration. Talk to your vet or call your vet out to see her, especially if she doesn't pick up within the next day or two.

I wouldn't ship a cow for having a breech calf. At this point, her chances of breeding back are much lower than an average cow (because of the retained placenta/sickness) and as others have suggested, if she's doing her job I'd give her a chance to breed back and ship her when she weans the calf if she doesn't.
If she can't feed the calf, just wait out the drug withholding and then ship her.

 

[Supa Dexta]

A live calf is always goal #1, if all cows have that then get choosier with the culling reasons in order of combined aggravation and necessity.

+1. The top 3 methods to herd improvement are:

1. Cull
2. Cull
3. Cull

Ive always thought #7 was odd in leachmans list

http://www.leachman.com/Newsletter/Prof ... stakes.pdf

I see their angle, But its poorly labeled. As culling does improve the herd.