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Magpie Issues. Not Pretty.

N

North Ridge Ranching

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 8, 2011
Messages
309
Location
Northwest Saskatchewan
We have had this happen before. It was a herd bull last time. Could of dropped a softball in the hole between his shoulder blades. We managed to heal him up. Hope the same for this cow, we caught her quicker.

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Has anybody else ever had trouble with this?
 
I had a cow this summer who was in poor condition after a case of pneumonia. The darn magpies had opened up a horrible cavity next to her business end. I'm afraid the story doesn't have a happy ending.
 
The bull we had a couple years ago was due to grain on his neck and when they started, they just kept going. We cleaned the wound and then put pine tar in it and covered it with a piece of Carhartt. Worked great. We are trying the same thing with this one.

We curently Ivomec every year but are considering starting to do it spring and fall.
 
Yes, we've had this happen in the past and had nothing to do with parasites. Its always been a wound or sore that got the magpies going on it. I guess northern magpies are just meaner than those southern ones. :wink:
 
Had a buddy lose a bull a couple weeks ago. Saw a magpie sitting on the bull's poll, went to kick him up the next morning and the bull was dead as pork. Softball sized hole behind his ears.
 
I actually have a nieghbor who is treating a bull for a hole about as big around as a pop can and an inch deep. He said the bull is otherwise very healthy. He is just happy to have seen it from the tractor cab before it was to late.
 
magpie's are #1 winter target around here :lol: use some bait, just about anything will work but something that they have to work at, sit back as far as you can so they can't tell where the shot is coming from, use a blind if you can, camo if you can,t face paint is a must, they have very good eyes. have got up to 14 in one sitting,if you can hit and kill a magpie your gun is sighted in :lol:
 
Interesting that you Canadians have so many magpies... 50+ years ago when I was a kid we had a major problem here- and Dad would pay us to trap them and shoot them or kill them any way we could...We had both a feedlot and a dairy then- and they were into all the bunks...

Then they almost completely disappeared... I was told it was because of some of the differing chemicals in spray- and especially DDT that made their eggs so the shells wouldn't harden...
Now off and on you see or hear a magpie- but in some ways thankfully they definitely haven't made much of a comeback here....
 
Oldtimer said:
Interesting that you Canadians have so many magpies... 50+ years ago when I was a kid we had a major problem here- and Dad would pay us to trap them and shoot them or kill them any way we could...We had both a feedlot and a dairy then- and they were into all the bunks...

Then they almost completely disappeared... I was told it was because of some of the differing chemicals in spray- and especially DDT that made their eggs so the shells wouldn't harden...
Now off and on you see or hear a magpie- but in some ways thankfully they definitely haven't made much of a comeback here....
Click to expand...

DDT & Eggshell Thinning A Myth

http://junkscience.com/1999/07/26/100-things-you-should-know-about-ddt/#ref10
 
Have any of you fella's heard of sweet clover bloat[a thining of the blood due to moldy sweet clover hay]? Back in the late 50's we fed a loose stack of hay that was butted with a couple of buck loads of green clover and it spoiled. We fed this butt to a bunch of yearlings on their way to grass. BOOM the next day 20+ dead and another25--30 in awfull shape. Lost a lot of them before we could even find a vet[not many vet's in this country in those day's]!! Anyway to make a long story short we did save 75-80 head of them and in deed sent them to grass. You talk about magpies they opened them poor steers up inall those dryed blood spots.Oh golly what a mess. Astrong and awful expeirence that you will never forget. I like to think that my old Dad used to tell me never to hate any of God's creatures,and I am sorry I can't help it ,the magpie, is one thing we can live without on this earth. Poison,trap,shoot eliminate them anyway you can!!!!!
 
Mike said:
Oldtimer said:
Interesting that you Canadians have so many magpies... 50+ years ago when I was a kid we had a major problem here- and Dad would pay us to trap them and shoot them or kill them any way we could...We had both a feedlot and a dairy then- and they were into all the bunks...

Then they almost completely disappeared... I was told it was because of some of the differing chemicals in spray- and especially DDT that made their eggs so the shells wouldn't harden...
Now off and on you see or hear a magpie- but in some ways thankfully they definitely haven't made much of a comeback here....
Click to expand...

DDT & Eggshell Thinning A Myth

http://junkscience.com/1999/07/26/100-things-you-should-know-about-ddt/#ref10
Click to expand...

Another theory I've heard thrown out was the migration of the coons to the area... When I was a kid we never had raccoons in the area- and now they are everywhere on the river- and keep broadening their territory every year... Some have said that when they moved in they ate all the eggs and/or killed the hatchlings...
 
One thing that helped here was grasshopper spry,deildren,heptaclor and one or two others really worked.[ ofcoarse all illagal now! A magpie is like some of our fellow human beings[smart but greedy] can't resist a free lunch no matter what the cost .
 

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