Where Bonnie spends her time

During this awful heat wave we've had for the past couple of weeks, Bonnie spends all day every day beside my cabin in the woods.  It must be the coolest place around.  When the sun gets low in the west, she grazes her way toward the house, and when her belly is full, she lies down to chew her cud near Jody.  

That's where I see her each morning at sunup.  As I write this, it's 6:40 A.M. and Bonnie is headed back toward the cabin again, grabbing a bite of luscious pasture with every step.  
Flies torture cattle and horses this time of year.  Not just ordinary flies, but horseflies and face flies and horn flies that leave blood running where they've bitten.  I can use spray that gives about ten minutes of relief to the poor cows, but nothing really keeps the flies off for very long.  If Bonnie weren't providing us with milk for nine months of the year, we could use cattle ear tags that are effective in keeping flies away for about a month; but as it is, she suffers.  They do get relief during nighttime hours, because the flies go away when it's dark.  
I am so hoping Bonnie has a heifer this time; not just because I want a pet, but because if it's a heifer, it won't be such a big calf.  Also, cows tend not to carry a heifer calf as long, which would help with the size of the calf.  Ten days before her due date I'll be keeping Bonnie closer to the house, not allowing her to go to her daily cool spot by the cabin.  There are huge gullies and canyons back there, and a staggering newborn would likely end up tumbling to the lowest point on our forty-two acres.  
That's what happened with her first calf.

Breakfast with Jody

Last night when I went out to feed Jody her bottle, I saw she had diarrhea (scours).  I came back to the house, dumped the milk replacer down the sink, and filled the bottle with electrolyte solution... that's like Pedialite for calves.  She showed no other signs of being sick, and took the bottle eagerly.  I also gave her a scours pill.  Calves can go down fast when they have diarrhea; these precautions were probably unnecessary, but I like to be on the safe side.

This morning I watched Jody for quite awhile for any signs of sickness, and then gave her milk replacer in her bottle.  Often, right after calves get their bellies full is when their bowels move, so I hung around for a poop check.  Nothing happened, which is a good thing.  Then Jody headed toward her feeder and started eating sweet feed.  Another good sign.
I have an ongoing battle with sparrows.  They descend on the calf's feeder and eat like crazy, pooping and contaminating as they eat.  So for now, I've been covering the feed unless the calf is actually in eating mode, or unless I'm nearby.  Have I mentioned that I hate sparrows?
The more grain a calf eats, the less likely she is to get scours.





Jody is doing very well with eating grain, for her age... under two weeks old.

The new calf's name....

is Clyde.  I was going to have a fun little voting thing, but five different people have suggested Clyde as a name; so  I have a feeling that would be the winner anyhow.  Two people suggested Augie, because he was born in August.  
So now I have Bonnie and Clyde.

Things are looking up

Bonnie, of course, was unhappy at having her baby taken away from her overnight, so she did a lot of vocalizing.
Back when I was raising fifty or so "bobby" calves a year, the procedure with a scouring calf was to keep it off milk for at least twenty-four hours, giving it only the electrolyte solution during that time.  However, I needed help with the milking!
I knew it was a good sign when I found him bawling for his mom; he was feeling better.  I gave him a pill and watched him for a few minutes; I soon got the evidence I needed to show that his diarrhea was gone.
I put him on the off side of the cow, and he nursed on that side while I milked on the other.  Once we were finished I turned him out with Bonnie, but I will be keeping a close eye on him and giving him another pill tonight and one tomorrow morning.  
I made a video of him trotting and cavorting a little, not acting sick at all.  At one point you'll see his mom kick up her heels a little.


 

SCOURS!

One thing you do when there's a new calf around is watch his poop often.  Yesterday Bonnie's baby's stools were loose, but OK.  This morning I noticed the poop was looser.  A while ago I went out and stood around until baby pooped:  it was very watery.  This is very dangerous for a young calf; it can kill them.
I expected it, in a way, because Bonnie gives more milk that any calf was ever intended to ingest, and it's very rich milk.  Sir Loin got by fine last year, but I considered that to be pure luck.  
So, the first thing I had to do was get Baby away from mom, because he needs to be taken off milk while he has scours (that's what they call diarrhea in calves).  I shut him in the stall. 
Then I mixed up a half-gallon of electrolyte solution.  The calf no doubt has a tummy-ache.  I knew he wouldn't suck a bottle, so I tube-fed him the solution.  
I also gave him a pill for scours that I picked up last year before Bonnie had Sir Loin.  "Be prepared" is my motto when it comes to calves.  
I surely do not want to lose any calf, but I especially don't want to lose a calf of Bonnie's. I don't want to think about having to milk her every day.  Last year it wasn't so easy just getting my gallon of milk a couple times a week, and it would really be hard to have to milk her out all the way, daily.  I took a couple of Arthritis Tylenol to be prepared for this evening.  
So, keep me and the calf in your thoughts and prayers.  I need him to have a speedy recovery.  

We have a calf; it's a boy

When I went to the barn this morning, here's what Bonnie was doing.





Even though she's been doing this for a week, she seemed more serious about it today.

At one point she went to the gate, trying to indicate to me that she'd much rather have her baby in the pasture.  Yeah, we tried that last year and ended up with a calf at the bottom of a canyon.

Once the water balloon came out, I knew it wouldn't be long.

Then came the feet.


 Sister-in-law Rena joined me for the excitement about the time the feet showed up, and she got to see me sit down in a pool of cow amniotic fluids so I could grab the baby's feet and give a little pull to help Bonnie, each time she started pushing.   I handed Rena the camera, since I had fluids all over my hands, and she took the first pictures.

"Who turned on the lights?"  

Cute face, eh?

He thought this was the breakfast bar, so I guided him to the real source of his nourishment.

Now the only thing left for Bonnie to do is get rid of the afterbirth.  I don't think I'll take any pictures of that.  


Several have asked if there will be a naming contest like last year.  Since he's a boy, I think probably the answer is yes; but I will ask that the names have nothing to do with what the baby will become after he's butchered.  Not that I'm squeamish; I'd just rather have another kind of name.  I'm not sure my freezer will be ready for him in a year, so we may end up selling him at weaning.

Calf with laryngitis

Cliff's brother brought a little heifer over here; she will be company for Bonnie after we take Sir Loin to the butcher shop on June 29.  Unfortunately, she was nursing her mom right up to the time she came, and now she wants milk.  She wants her mommy.  She wants to go home.  


We turned her out with Bonnie and Sir Loin, but in her frenzied search for mom, she got out and wandered to a nearby farmer's place.  He kindly brought her home, and we're keeping her in this small pen until she gets over pining for her home.  She has bellowed and bawled so constantly that she now has laryngitis.  


Click HERE to witness this strange occurrence.  

Maybe I'll can just a few more things

My tomato vines are really showing the effects of blight, but there are still lots of tomatoes on them, both red and green. I've been wanting to make a batch of green tomato chow-chow, but with the cool weather we've had, my sweet peppers haven't been ripening fast enough. Finally, today, I was able to come up with ten peppers.

I might even get energetic enough to can a few more jars of ripe tomatoes, as much as I dread the mess that would make. But seeing those vines dying makes me realize the time is short.

This morning I milked Bonnie; later on after Cliff was awake, drinking his coffee, I saw Sir Loin prancing and dancing around the front yard with glee. I ran out looking for an open gate, but none was ajar. I managed to get him to a gate and open it so he could rejoin his mother.

There's a spot where one fence almost joins another; Cliff left a space big enough for a person to squeeze through, but not large enough for a horse to escape. Back then we didn't have a skinny calf to worry about. I knew that had to be where Little Sir escaped.

"We can't waste too much time closing that gap," I told Cliff. "Little Sir is smart, by cattle standards."

I'd hardly gotten the words out of my mouth when Little Sir (or you can call him Houdini) went prancing and dancing and bucking across my front yard again. This time it wasn't so easy tricking him into the barn, but I managed. He isn't scared of me, but he loves to play; and he assumes I'm playing when I approach him, so he'll kick up his heels and run.

I had to send Sadie to the house, because of chasing. Oh no, Sadie wasn't chasing the calf; the calf was chasing her, and she was running for dear life!

Cliff went straight out and mended the gap where our calf had escaped. I'd love to be watching when he is in that area again and thinks he knows an escape route. The joke is on him.

It's a shame he's a bull calf; he's one of the most lovable bovines I've ever had on the place.

learning

Little What's-his-name is running to mom for comfort, in this picture. He just discovered the electric fence.


We have the little lot, which is right outside our front door. That's where we put him and his mom at first. Then we propped the blue gate open a little so they can go on out in the bigger lot if they want.

This is the bigger lot, where we keep my horse Blue since he foundered. Cliff and his sister have their garden in the big lot, surrounded by electric fence.

There are several reasons I can't let Bonnie and What's-his-name out into the pasture with the other cows. First of all, I have to watch the calf closely for signs of scours (diarrhea). He's getting more very rich milk than he actually needs, and sometimes this can cause problems in a young calf. It isn't a huge problem as long as it's caught early; I have all the stuff on hand to correct the situation, should it happen.

Also, we have some areas of the pasture surrounded by electric fence. A young calf needs to be trained to this, and the wire around the garden in the big lot is a perfect training tool. A little calf, when he first encounters the shock of an electric fence, won't always know to back up and get away from it; often he'll just go under until it quits hurting. Soon-to-be-Clyde (I think) disappeared today, and I found him napping in the sweet corn. I unhooked the electric fence and pushed him back out into the wide-open spaces with his mom. He turned around and went right back in about as soon as I hooked it back up, getting shocked and bawling pitifully as he forced his way under the wire.

I think he's almost figured it out now; I saw him jump back when he got too close to the wire, later on.

Don't feel too sorry for the calf.

Yesterday I was push-mowing my own garden, which is electric-fenced because our neighbors can't keep their horses home. I had unplugged the fence and was mowing away fearlessly. I backed up into the fence, my butt connected, and I got the shock of my life. How could this be? I had just unplugged it! I turned off the mower and stomped over to the lean-to on Cliff's shop and saw the cord dangling, unplugged; but it was swinging as though it had just been disconnected. Going on in, there was Cliff looking all apologetic. "I knew when I heard the lawn mower shut off, I was in trouble," he said.

Hmph. I think he's still evening up the score, since I kept him from the Wing Ding.

The rest of the story, part 2

Be sure to scroll down and read part one before you read this segment.

Kevin and I pushed and prodded the calf to the top of the steep bank. Bonnie, however, remained rooted to the spot where she had last seen her calf.

Cows sometimes get confused about things, especially if it's their first calf.

I picked up a stick and gently drove Bonnie up the incredibly steep hill and straight to her baby. She ignored the baby and went to the spot where she'd given birth, smelling the birth smells and making that humming "moo" sound as though she were talking to her calf. She didn't recognize her baby.

I drug Baby over to where Bonnie was and plopped him down in the middle of all those bovine bodily fluids (I was so smeared with them myself, I could probably have convinced her to accept me as her baby). The ploy worked, and once again she realized she was this kid's mom.

Cliff had suggested we put the calf on the tailgate of Kevin's pickup and slowly drive up to the barn, hoping maybe the cow would follow. After the confusion that had just arisen, though, I didn't think that would work, and I sent Kevin home, promising I'd let him know if I needed him. I went back to the house and got a tube feeder and a bucket, because that poor calf had used up any energy he had fighting that hill and being pulled, carried, and tossed around.

Back with the cows, Bonnie had gotten rid of her afterbirth and was busy eating it (yes, that's what cows do, and they're not even carnivores). While she was thus occupied, I got on my knees in the grass and milked about a cup of milk out of her and poured it into the tube feeder; that's what you see in the bucket in the above picture; the jug beside the bucket is my water jug.

I could have gotten more milk quite easily, but I didn't want to fill the little guy's belly full; I simply wanted to give him an energy boost so he'd try harder to get on his feet and nurse. I moved him further back from the ditch he'd come out of and made a trip to the house for a lawn chair and a Reader's Digest, because it looked like it might be a long evening and I was tired of sitting in the grass.

He did eventually get up on his wobbly legs; I pondered my next move. I needed him and his mom back at the house, but I was fairly certain she wouldn't follow him in a pickup. So I got behind him and encouraged him in the direction of home; Bonnie followed.

Of course, he didn't make it six feet before he collapsed in a tired heap. I sat in my lawn chair and mulled things over.

Pretty soon I moved my lawn chair a few feet ahead, grabbed the poor calf around his chest, and dragged him up even with the chair. Then I sat down and caught my breath. At least this was taking place on level ground.

I made quite a bit of progress this way, but it was slow going. I can't say I was sorry to see my daughter, her husband, and their daughter walking toward me in the distance. Rachel suggested we take turns carrying the calf, and she picked him up and started off with him. Unfortunately, Bonnie didn't get it, and started in another direction.

We finally figured out that if we walked really slow so Bonnie didn't lose track of Baby, and if we kept his head where she could see it, she would follow; although we almost lost her a couple of times when she started to leave to get a drink. Poor girl had worked hard, and she was thirsty.

So, with plenty of help from my family, we got her settled in at the barn and fed and watered. Then I realized we had another problem with our first-time mom: Every time the still-very-weak calf tried to head for a teat, Bonnie would turn her body away from him. She wanted him right at her head at all times, which of course made it impossible for him to nurse.

I decided to leave them alone and let nature take its course; I went inside and took a much-needed shower and watched the most recent E.R. episode I had recorded on DVR.

I watched them closely out the window, and mom still wasn't allowing the calf to nurse; poor little guy hadn't had any food except for the cupful I'd tube-fed him.

In my nightgown, I went out and let Bonnie in the barn and put her in her stanchion so I could milk her. It was at this point I found out the stanchion isn't snug enough for her skinny head, because when she lost sight of her baby, she pulled out. Foiled again.

As luck would have it, she allowed me to get a cup or so of milk from her swollen udder, even though she was unrestrained. I hunted up a calf bottle Cliff had stored away long ago; the nipple that was with it was a sheep nipple, but it worked fine. Once the baby found out he was getting some good stuff for his efforts, he was ready to suck!

Funny thing here: While I was milking, Bonnie turned her head around and sniffed me, then sniffed at the bucket with milk in it, and it was like a light bulb turned on in her head. It's as though she thought, "Oh, so that's what those four hangy-down things on me are for!"

So with the bottle empty and the calf looking for more, this time when I directed him to the source, his mother cooperated.

This morning, all I had to do was intervene and help Baby find the back teats, because he had emptied the front ones and wanted more.

There is a slightly bitter-sweet post-script to this story that I'll be giving you next.

How a cow gets acquainted with her new calf

Be sure to turn your sound up; you'll hear a sound that cows only make when they have a new calf, sort of a hum.

Secret

That's my Jersey heifer, Secret. She's two months old, and I've been feeding her milk replacer from a bucket. I'm getting ready to wean her. I had been giving her "formula" twice a day, but last night she had to do without. I'll keep giving her some morning milk until this bag of milk replacer is gone, and then, assuming she's eating plenty of calf starter (grain), she'll be officially weaned.

Somehow, before I bought Secret, her ears had been frost-bitten, so she actually lost the ends of them within a couple weeks of our buying her. The damage was barely discernable the day we picked her up, and we didn't notice it until we got her home. I was disappointed, to say the least. Jerseys have a lovely, sweet face. Their ears are part of their beauty, and I had no way of knowing for sure just how much of her ears she'd lose.

I've seen cows go through sale barns with absolutely no ears (or tail), as a result of being born in zero weather. So I'm glad Secret kept over half of hers.

The former owners didn't know about the ears; the damage was barely evident when we picked her up, at the age of three weeks. I thought about contacting them, but we knew these were good people who wouldn't deliberately sell us a defective calf. In fact, when the lady found out about it last week, she offered to give us our money and take Secret back. And even reimburse us for whatever we had spent on milk replacer.

But I was already attached to the calf. Besides, it's next to impossible to find somebody who will sell you a baby Jersey.

And I'm used to the short ears now.

Secret is HOME!

Here she is. Cliff is guessing she weighs at least 85 pounds. The lady we bought her from thinks she was born February 6, which would make her three weeks old. She's a bit lonely for her mom and the other cows; it will take her awhile to get used to being the only cow on the place. I'll be giving her a bottle twice a day. Rest assured, there will be more pictures.