I am always planning for the worst case scenario. Be it the drive home from work, shopping at Wal-Mart, or expecting apocalyptic pestilence on the Snow Compound. This weekend found us having to pull a calf out of Rosy, the youngest heifer, and that took up most of Sunday afternoon.
While we were focused on that Tito, the smaller of the two Belted Galloways, managed to let her calf escape through the electric paddock. We realized around 6:00 PM that Smore, her calf wasn't doing too well. It was time to move the cattle back onto the main pasture anyway, so I started moving the Belties first, thinking that we could get Tito (so named for her Jerry Curled resemblance to Tito Jackson) and Smore into a pen together.
Tito wasn't having it. Regardless of what we did she wasn't going in the barn. At 6;35 Smore was limp and non-responsive so we made the decision to pull her into the house due to what looked like dehydration. I jetted into town beating Tractor Supply's closing time by a couple of minutes, picked up some colostrum, a dog bottle due to how small Beltie calves are, and a Mister Pibb because it was already a stressful day and having Dr. Pepper was too much to ask!
Andrea went to work getting fluid into the little girl. Strawful by strawful Andrea was getting water into the little calf. I got back and we did the same thing with the colostrum. She wouldn't swallow much, she was cold, and pretty much limp. We put her on the dog bed and wrapped her in a towel and blanket. I fed Smore every hour until she woke me up at 1:30 with a pile of pee and poo and her doing her best ice skater impression on the tile. She wouldn't go back to sleep, so I figured I'd take her out to the barn and see if I could entice her mom into a stall.
No dice on the stall. I begged, I pleaded, I put a bucketful of sweet feed inside the barn to trap her, but she was having none of it. Exasperated, and with Smore starting to fade, I pulled her out of the stall and placed her down by the feed. Momma went nuts, as did the neighbors dogs, and wouldn't stop mooing. Smore perked up, and Momma stood still long enough to let her nurse for a few minutes, before realizing she may not really like this mothering thing after all. They dance with one another for another 15 minutes, Smore trying to nurse, Momma moving every few minutes.
Then Momma just headed to the back 40 with Smore following behind. I left it to Providence to look after the calf. I told Andrea when she woke up that the calf probably wasn't going to make it (about the 10th time I'd predicted death for Smore or Meatloaf, she just hugged me, kissed me, and told me to stop being such a pessimist. I went out after sunrise this morning to find Smore chilling in the back of the pasture and Momma grazing contentedly not too far away.
Only time will tell if Smore is going to make it, but if she lives through the week, the odds increase dramatically.
No comments:
Post a Comment