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Cow fighting New Born Calf

T

tenbach79

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Dec 22, 2008
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Colorado
:mad: Had a cow this morning that just had a newborn calf and fought that poor calf all the way down the side of a hill. I seen the cow was calving and she had the feet out and everything was looking good so I left her alone and went and started to feed and put cake out. When I came out with the cake pickup I seen here fighting the calf. Got the calf in the pickup and in the barn and then went out with the 4 wheeler and got the cow in. I have had good luck with that O-No-Mo stuff so I put that on the calf so will see if it works this time. What do some of you guys do? One time when I was a kid my dad put the calf in the bucket of the tractor and tied the calf so he couldn't get out but the cow couldn't get him but still could smell him. It worked alright from what I remember.

It is so frustrating when you see something like that but I guess thats the joys of raising cattle.
 
If I can remember rightly you are to tie a leg back to a post, Make hobbles from baller twine and put them above the hocks. The sprinkle O NO MO on the calf and on the cows nose then spray them both with Florient. Then give the cow some drugs and grain while getting the calf to suck or while your milking her out after letting her get a real tight bag so she wants the calf.
I almost for got that you need to take the dog into the pen to get the cow a little more worked up before you try any on these.

But most important of all, Don't pull a Nicky and get your head in the way of hard swift moving objects. :wink: :lol: :lol: :lol:

Good Luck :D
 
After reading about it one time, I gave a heifer that wanted to grind on her calf a big dose of sugar in about 3 or 4 gallons of water. Actually, I had a jug of maple syrup that was getting kinda old so I used about 1 or two liters of it in the warm water.

She drank it down pronto and actually did calm down within the hour. Whether it was the sweetened drink or not, I don't know but I would certainly try it again if I had a nutcase cow do that again. But even after she calmed down, I still didn't trust her for a few weeks after the show she put on.

I don't remember where I read that remedy, it might have been on this site.
 
burnt said:
After reading about it one time, I gave a heifer that wanted to grind on her calf a big dose of sugar in about 3 or 4 gallons of water. Actually, I had a jug of maple syrup that was getting kinda old so I used about 1 or two liters of it in the warm water.

She drank it down pronto and actually did calm down within the hour. Whether it was the sweetened drink or not, I don't know but I would certainly try it again if I had a nutcase cow do that again. But even after she calmed down, I still didn't trust her for a few weeks after the show she put on.

I don't remember where I read that remedy, it might have been on this site.
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It could have been me Burnt, we have used 2 cups of brown sugar in 2 liters of water and drenched a couple of different heifers over the years. Most of them calm down if you leave them alone but the odd one seems to get worse. The person that told us about it likened the condition to a diabetic's mood swings when sugar levels get low.

It worked for us. :wink:
 
Big Muddy rancher said:
If I can remember rightly you are to tie a leg back to a post, Make hobbles from baller twine and put them above the hocks. The sprinkle O NO MO on the calf and on the cows nose then spray them both with Florient. Then give the cow some drugs and grain while getting the calf to suck or while your milking her out after letting her get a real tight bag so she wants the calf.
I almost for got that you need to take the dog into the pen to get the cow a little more worked up before you try any on these.

But most important of all, Don't pull a Nicky and get your head in the way of hard swift moving objects. :wink: :lol: :lol: :lol:

Good Luck :D
Click to expand...

:lol: :lol: :lol: That pretty much sums it up!

Here's your chance if you need a graft calf :wink: .

Actually, on the ones I've had, I just separate them side-by-side so she can still see and smell the calf, and just give her time to settle down... it might take a few hours. Or, catch her and get the calf started suckling, and that can help the light bulb turn on too. Probably a combination of both suggestions would work best.

Most importantly, I suggest you sell her. I gave a heifer from last year a second chance, and she managed to smear this year's calf... I should have known better, but gave her the "dumb heifer" excuse :roll: .
 
She was fine after I put that O-NO-MO on the calf. She was still a little pissy for about a 1hr after but she doesn't fight the calf anymore. The calf had sucked her and was jumping around the pen when I went out to check them. But now she wont let me over the fence to get in and tag the calf which I should have done before I got the cow in the same pen with the calf :roll:

The old O-NO-MO worked great, I think they had put blood in it but they dont anymore. I had a cow that was fighting its calf just like this one and I put that stuff on the calf and when I put the cow back in the pen she ran up to the calf like she was going to drive it in the ground and just stopped dead in its tracks smelled the calf and went right to licking him and and never tried to fight it and she was fine after that. This new stuff doesn't make them do that but it sure works for me if its gets old doesn't work as well.
 
We had one that would not stop trying to kill her calf for any reason.
tried the O-NO-MO, didn't work. Cow would butt the calf into the gate and try to get him even when you took the calf out of the pen.
Put her in the head catch and put my Kick Stop stick on her and the calf nursing her at least twice a day.
After doing this for 3 days enough was enough. Calf was sold as a bottle calf and cow hit the road.

Had a different situation. Cow would have her calf and walk away. Wouldn't claim it at all. kept her locked in for a week with the calf and she would tolerate it. That lasted twice. She went down the road too.
 
I just ace them and when they finally sober up their fine.
had one doing the same thing yesterday so I took the calfaway.
when I picked him up I noticed his front legs were both twisted and bent back at the ankles. His head was also turnedback and he couldn't hold it up. I have never had one like this.but I have heard about them. Doc says its from the cow eating a weed. Anyway had a twin to graft on her and she took it right away. Really frustrating to have that happen when they're worth so much!
 
Please take this the right way - - - Are your cattle on a good year round mineral program ( and yes the good minerals have small amounts of needed vitanims as well.)

I used to have these problems. Not often but once in a while.

I have been on a year round mineral program about 8 years now and so far I've either been very lucky or the problem has gone away.
 
I would never leave a calf in the same pen without constant supervision. If you leave a calf in with an unsupervised cow the calf can be weaned before you get to the house
 
All my cattle are on a good year long mineral program. If that was the problem wouldn't you have more than just one? This is the first one after 120 calves on the ground.

I put that calf right back in the same pen and watched her from the shed and she never once tried to fight the calf. Worked for me but might not work for everyone
 
Funny BMR :P But good advice.

We'd never had it happen til this year with the black cows. Our neighbors who have mostly black cows, and calve out a purebred herd for another breeder have it happen alot. We had two so far that we took the calf away til it could stand up well, then they were fine. For those of you who've had it happen...does it seem to be one bloodline?

With the ones we had, O NO Mo wouldn't have worked. It wasn't that they didn't like them, they liked them too much and wouldn't let them get up.
 
It can be in the gentics of the cow. I have a friend that bought some hefiers and all the heifers out of one bull tried to kill the calf. He took the calves away at birth and gave the heifers a shot of ACE and put the calves back in a couple hours. I don't know if he had problems after the first calf or not.
 
There's a fine line between good mothering ability and being just a little too agressive. It drives me crazy when a heifer won't let her calf past her head so he can go back and nurse. The next step is the heifer that will grind her calf into the ground or through the fence. Given a few hours most all of them will settle down and be just fine.

A little agressive is better than the ones that just walk away though. Those are the ones that don't get a second chance around here.
 
Andy said:
It can be in the gentics of the cow. I have a friend that bought some hefiers and all the heifers out of one bull tried to kill the calf. He took the calves away at birth and gave the heifers a shot of ACE and put the calves back in a couple hours. I don't know if he had problems after the first calf or not.
Click to expand...

EXT is a sire that carries this over aggressive mothering and it didn't just stop with him.
 
I bought some heifers last year that were very strong shoshone bred and they were really rough on their calves but wouldn't quite hit me. Very good mothers but guess we will see how they do calving out this year.
 

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