Bunny's Baby

I'm re-reading James Herriot's books and am in the middle of "Every Living Thing."  He's talking about lambing season and going out in the countryside in the cold, windy weather to help ewes deliver in problem pregnancies.  Most of the farmers didn't have any enclosures and he delivered lambs out in the cold.  He said his hands and arms would get so raw from washing his hands so much and the wind whipping on his skin, chapping them thoroughly.  

It makes me happy for us in kidding season for goats, for when we begin to see their bags 'bloom,' we bring them inside the barn.  Even though it's not cold, it isolates the expectant mothers from nosy cows and chickens who won't give them a moment's peace.  Bunny is named bunny because she has a pink nose and a white stripe down her face, giving her the appearance, somewhat, of a bunny.  Bunny's bag has bloomed.  It is tight.  She is close.

She delivered twins Sunday afternoon, right before church.  Here is the smallest kid, a doeling, that Tricia is making sure that she gets a belly full of colostrum.  It's very important that they get this.  The baby is very weak and frail.  We worked with her for a while until her sucking reflex or instinct kicked in.

Unfortunately, her twin, also a doeling died during birth.  Tricia said that she was still in the sack and thinks she may have suffocated.  She was bigger than her twin sister by a long shot.  So yes, we buried yet another goat once we got back from Evening Worship services.

Bunny's baby girl is solid black with a white spot on her head and on her left foot.  We're working hard with her to try to get her to get up and get active and nurse on her own.  So far, it's slow going.  Hopefully, things will get better day by day.

Little goats are the cutest thing!

Here is Bunny and her baby, yet unnamed - we're still thinking.  Any ideas?

Agnes, another goat of ours, is now on the clock.  Her bag is growing, but I don't think she'll kid in the next day or so.  I'm watching her closely.  Tonight I milked out the rest of Bunny's colostrum that her baby didn't drink, and we'll freeze that for later use, should we ever need it.

Welcome Nicky, LuLu's Baby Calf

The days are hot,

The temperatures rise,

Tongues hang out with exhausted sighs,

The ground is parched,

The grass is chaff.

But lo!  LuLu has birthed a calf!

This is the sight that greeted us on this Lord's Day as we did chores before Worship Service.  Although we were expected it about a week from now, this was a little early.  LuLu wasn't huge and her bag wasn't in "bloom" until this morning.  It's her first calf.  She's very nervous and high-strung.  When we discovered the baby, LuLu was just in the process of licking him to clean him up.  He tried, unsuccessfully, to stand up.  His long, wobbly legs gave way and he clumsily fell back in the dust.

We've had many chicks hatch out and some goats that have kidded lately, but it has been a couple of years since the last calf was born on the homestead.  It's an exciting time!  More on that later.  You look into the eyes of the calf and wonder what they're thinking.  Just last night they were secure in a dark, climate-controlled, safe location.  Now, strange creatures are looking at you, chickens are pecking at your soft hooves, the bright sun hurts your eyes.  What an awakening!

The first thing we check is the sex.  It's a... bull calf.  We always hope for heifers.  However, we're happy to get a healthy little calf.  This little guy's dad was a registered Jersey named Nick.  Tricia suggested that we name him in honor of his father.  So, we welcome NICKY to Our Maker's Acres Family Farm.  LuLu's sister, Elsie, came to see her new nephew.  Sniff, sniff.  They always smell them.

Could there be a worse time to calve?  I suppose so, but this heat does stress the animals.  We decided to move Nicky and LuLu to the shade on the south side of the barn.  It will be oppressively hot by the time we get back from church and eat and have time to come out and check on things.  LuLu still needs to deliver the placenta, finish cleaning up Nicky, nudge Nicky so that he stands up and begins to drink colostrum.  That's a lot of items on the agenda!  We hayed LuLu and headed off to church.

After worship and a big plate of chicken stew over rice, sliced beets, cranberry sauce, and coffee and chocolate persimmon cake for dessert, we changed and headed out to the barn/nursery to check on the situation.  I've got to tell you not much had happened in our absence.  They were both sitting down.  They're not in a rush like we are.  LuLu had delivered the placenta, but Nicky had not stood up.  He was taking in a Sunday afternoon nap.

Tricia and Russ got him up on wobbly legs and in three shakes of a billy goat's tail, he was walking around and falling an awful lot.  Practice makes perfect, though.  He'll get it.  We got an extension cord and rigged up a fan for LuLu to cool the new momma down.  She wasn't interested much in having all this attention.  Nicky would try to find the teats, but LuLu wasn't being cooperative.

We tried to put LuLu in the head gate so that we could work with her and Nicky.  Wouldn't you know it, a bunch of wasps had built a nest in the head gate.  As I started getting her head in there, wasps came flying out.  I went back to the garage and got some gas and ended the wasps' rebellion with the quickness.  

After some time, we were able to get Nicky to nurse.  I am positive that he got some colostrum.  We'll work with him more after evening services.  I want to get his little belly full so that he gets more energy and antibodies to strengthen his immune system.  We've got to get the little fellow to stand on his own!  Right now, we're having to help him get his feet under him.

In church this morning, we sang the old hymn, "How Firm a Foundation."  This was President Theodore Roosevelt's favorite hymn.  The lyrics and music are poignant and worshipful.  Coincidentally, part of the lyrics mention 'causing thee to stand.'  (Very appropriate for little Nicky!)

How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,

Is laid for your faith in His excellent word!

What more can He say than to you He hath said—

To you who for refuge to Jesus have fled?

“Fear not, I am with thee, oh, be not dismayed,

For I am thy God, and will still give thee aid;

I’ll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,

Upheld by My gracious, omnipotent hand.

We'll continue to stand by to offer LuLu assistance.  We'll try to get plenty of colostrum into Nicky.  It's thick, yellow, oily, and nutritious. Then we'll milk the remainder out and freeze it.  That's a good insurance policy to have tucked away in the freezer.  Pretty soon we'll be back to daily milking - in this sweltering sauna in the south.  Not quite ready for that after a long reprieve from milking, but here we go again!  LuLu will require some working with as it's her first calf and she's never been milked before and she's as wild as a March hare.  We might have a rodeo on our hands, but that's okay.  It's always an adventure!

Welcoming Luna! Our New Baby Heifer

Our alarm clock went off early Tuesday morning, and we went out to the barn to do the morning milking and chores.  The entire area was lit up brightly due to a full moon.  Tricia remarked to me how big and beautiful the moon was, surrounded by clouds like a halo, casting everything in a brilliant glow.  It immediately came to my mind that this full moon might induce an early delivery! Daisy's due date was November 3rd, but we've always heard the old wives tale that, even in humans, the full moon causes babies to be born.  We both wondered if this would be the case...

Full Moon on October 27, 2015

I received a call from Tricia as I was leaving work later that afternoon that Daisy had indeed had her baby!  Does that prove the full moon theory?  I'm not sure. Daisy's delivery is just anecdotal evidence, and if you search on the Internet, you can find studies that show some correlation, but many university studies say that the moon's stage doesn't have anything to do with the date of birth.  I don't know, but the moon affects the tide and many other things.  The body is made of 80% water. I'm not convinced that the moon doesn't have some effect on labor and delivery.  

When I got home, I walked out to the pasture and saw Daisy being very protective and mooing lowly. What do you have there, Daisy girl?

Moooo!

Well, looky here.  It's a baby.  A cute little brown calf, still wet, laying in the grass!

Daisy's Baby

First things first.  Is it a little heifer or a little bull?  I curiously lifted the back leg as Daisy comes close, mooing and telling me to leave her baby alone.  Immediately I see four little teats, proving that Daisy's baby is a HEIFER!  Daisy's previous babies were all bulls - Romeo, Stryker, and Bully.  It's high time for a little girl from ol' Daisy Lou.  So far this year, Rosie gave us Clarabelle - a heifer, Daisy gave us this little heifer and Amy will be calving around December 31.  We're 2 out of 3 so far, and we're hoping for all girls from our 3 Jersey milk cows.

It's a GIRL

Daisy continued to lick on her little calf, cleaning her up.  She was being very motherly.  We think that she was born around 2 pm that afternoon, and from what I could tell, I don't think she's been up yet.  It looked like she wanted to just lay in the grass and sleep.

The spit bath

I always get involved when maybe I shouldn't, but I lifted her up and she wobbled on spindly legs, very weakly...

A Shaky Start

And then she plopped back down.  The curious hens came to welcome her to the neighborhood and hopefully convince her to stand.  She appeared to ignore their encouragement as well as mine.  For some reason she just appeared a little weak.

Welcome to the Barnyard, little one

We were prepared for this from past experience, especially with Clarabelle, and had a product called Nursemate ASAP.  It is concentrated colostrum and is supposed to get the calves up and nursing faster.

Red Bull for the heifer

I unscrewed the cap, opened her mouth and pressed the plunger down slowly while it was on her tongue.  She immediately began sucking and licking and swallowing - all good signs.

Let's get you started, little girl

It started misting, so I moved some fresh hay bedding into the stall in the barn where Clarabelle usually stays.  I didn't want Daisy and her little calf out in the weather, so I evicted Clarabelle from her stall and went to get the new inhabitants. As she wasn't up to walking yet, I had to carry the heifer to the barn, and I was followed very closely by a big protective momma!  I sat the calf in the hay, closed the gate and left them alone for a while.

Daisy is not real happy with me

Tricia and I went back to the barn after we ate supper and noticed that Daisy had delivered the placenta/afterbirth in the stall. 

Delivery of the placenta

As the cows always do, they promptly eat it, chewing and slurping loudly.  Many think it is done in order to get rid of it so it doesn't attract predators who would endanger the newborn calf.  The placenta is also full of nutrients/antibodies, so it could be for health reasons as well.  In fact, people at my office told me that they are marketing placenta in pill form for humans to take as a supplement for this very reason.

To see the cow chowing down on the placenta is not a pretty sight.  Daisy actually started choking on it, and we thought we were going to have to do the Heimlich maneuver on her, if we could figure out how to do that on a cow.  Fortunately, she eventually dislodged it and then started the process all over again. 

Lovely

Now back to prettier sights!  Daisy's little girl is a beautiful light brown, honey color with big ears, big brown eyes and long eyelashes.  She is cute.  Still kind of weak, though, even after taking the Nursemate ASAP.  We tried to help her get up, but she's a lazy little thing and was content to just sit there in the hay.

Pretty little heifer

There's no time to sit, though.  The clock is ticking.  It is very important that the calf gets colostrum within the first 6 -12 hours.  The colostrum gives the calf nutrients as well as passive immunity from the antibodies contained within.  The gut closes after 12 hours and disables the calf from absorbing the antibodies in the colostrum.  We went to work encouraging her, but we were having little success. 

Where is it?

She did have a strong sucking reflex on my finger, though, and so we went and retrieved the big bottle/nipple.  I milked out some colostrum into the bottle.  A cow that has just delivered doesn't make a whole lot of colostrum.  Her milk hasn't come in yet. While her bag is swollen, it is not full of milk yet.  I filled the bottle about half full with everything I could get out of Daisy's teats, put the nipple on the bottle, and offered it to the little heifer.  BINGO!  She took to it immediately, sucking the bottle dry.

Drinking the colostrum from her momma!

She perked up immediately, wagging her little tail as she drank the colostrum. Happy and satisfied, we put them back in the stall and turned off the lights in the barn.  As Tricia and I walked back to the house, we realized that we hadn't named her yet, so we went inside and, along with Benjamin, started brainstorming good names.  Blue Belle?  Hazel?  Bessie?  Lulu?  Then Tricia came up with the perfect name:

LUNA, appropriate since she was born on the full moon.  Welcome to Our Maker's Acres Family Farm, Luna!

It's a Boy!

If you've been following the blog, you know that Daisy, our Jersey milk cow, is expecting and her due date is May 9th.  Cows have a gestation period of 285 days or a little over 9 months - roughly around the same time frame as a woman.  In anticipation of her calving, we stopped milking her 2 months ago so that she could divert the energy to growing her calf.

This morning when we woke up, we could tell that Daisy's bag had 'bloomed' and knew that today would likely be the day.  Daisy has given us two little bull calves and we were hoping for a heifer, but as the title suggests, it was not to be.  Tricia was home and photographed the birth for your viewing pleasure (Ha!)  Tricia first knew things were happening when she saw Daisy in the pasture with her tail cocked in the air, so she and Benjamin ran to where she was located.  Cows will generally go off to an isolated spot to give birth.

When Tricia got to her Daisy was sitting down.  At 12:57 pm I got a text at work that said "I see hooves."


See the hooves poking out?

No epidurals were administered for this labor and delivery.  Daisy did it all on her own the natural way.  The calf's presentation was good.  When Maggie was born, I got a little excited and impatient and pulled Maggie and shouldn't have, so it was probably a good thing I was at work.

You can see little hooves from the calf.  When Maggie was born the chickens crowded around and started pecking at the hooves at this stage and I had to shoo them away.  This is probably one of the reasons Daisy tried to get away from everyone.

Two hooves appear

Daisy stood up and hunched her back up and started to push.  Part of the placenta is starting to show.  You can also see how Daisy's bag is full.  This looks very uncomfortable.


Hooves and part of the placenta so far

Daisy kept backing up and hunching over and pushing with each contraction.  Her delivery was much slower than Rosie's, but progress was being made.


1,2,3 push!

Whoa!  We have a head out now.  The shoulders are the next bottleneck.  Go, Daisy, Go!



Head & Shoulders

The shoulders are out.  Now the back end...


Just hanging out, guys.

Then... PLOP!  Daisy's little calf makes its entry (an ungracious one, at that) onto Our Maker's Acres Family farm.  When humans are born, a doctor is there to catch them.  No such thing for calves.  They fall right down on the ground.


I'm a little slimy, Ma!

Tricia had to move the little calf since Daisy delivered and dropped the calf right next to a fire ant mound.  Welcome to the cold, cruel world, buddy. 

Is that a fire ant mound I see?

Right on cue, Mama Daisy starts giving the little calf a bath.  She'll lick the calf all over.  At 1:32 pm I got a text at work that said, "It's a boy."  We were so hoping for a girl.  Oh well.  Rosie and Maggie are pregnant.  Hopefully we'll get two heifers from them.  If you look closely, you can see the little hooves.  They are soft. 


Scrub a dub, dub

Daisy continues to lick and clean her little boy up.  The calf seems pretty strong, lifting his head, looking around.

The spit bath continues...

Nellie, our Nubian Goat, was the first to visit the nursery, welcoming the newest addition to the pasture and perhaps giving Daisy some motherly advice.

Baaa - Baaaa (Goatese Translation: What a cute baby, Daisy!)

After labor, the placenta has been completely delivered and falls to the ground.  It is sort of interesting to look at.  

The placenta

Daisy's tail is still up and she's a mess back there.  Tomorrow we'll hose her off.

Here is the first acceptable baby picture after Daisy's cleaned him up and he's dried off.  He is a solid light brown colored little fella.  We're going to probably just call him 'Bully' and not get attached to him as we're going to sell him.  Dairy cows are in demand for their milk production.  Dairy bulls?  Not so much.


Cute

In an instinctive reaction, Daisy eats the placenta.  I know, this is gross, but cows do it.  No one really knows why, although one theory is that they do it to keep predators away who would be attracted by the smell and endanger the new baby. 

Over the lips and through the gums, look out stomach(s), here it comes.

Now we've got more well wishers to the nursery as Stryker and Maggie show up to see the new arrival.

Stryker and Maggie

It was around 5:30 pm at this point.  Daisy was still eating on the placenta and the calf was making some feeble attempts to stand up, but no success so far.  He's so awkward and clumsy.  Daisy was so fat before giving birth.  We haven't seen her ribs in a while.  Now they're evident.

Here we see the calf try, on wobbly legs, to stand, but he can't get his front legs to cooperate.


C'mon front legs.  Work for me!

When it got dark, I picked up the little guy and carried him into the barn.  Daisy followed closely.  We tied Daisy up and picked up little Bully and held him up and helped him find the teats.  He began to suckle and we were confident that he got the colostrum (first milk) that he needs.

Colostrum is full of amino acids, minerals, and immunoglobulins that give the calf a kick start on life.  It is through colostrum that a cow passes along immunity to infections and disease and is why it is so important they get this.  If they don't, the calf often dies.  We helped little Bully get his colostrum and soon - for the first time all day - he was standing on his own with renewed energy.  Sometimes we all need a little helping hand.