New Calves 2011

Veena calved two little bull calves in the field this morning. She was out in a corner with the twins when it was time for the cows to go inside. They were loaded into a wheelbarrow, and Veena followed them to the calving box in the barn. Twins are always a bit of a handful, but luckily they were happy to feed from the bottle, and she had just the 6 liters needed to give the calves 3 liters of colostrum within the first 6 hours, which is SOP (Standard Operating Procedure). The calves are healthy enough, even though they weren't up and about by noon. The 3 liters of colostrum will “last” for up to 24 hours. Feeding the twins with a bottle is a last resort. These two are very weak and cannot stand up. When they cannot stand up, they cannot suckle from the cow. Otherwise, we always try to get the calves to suckle from the cow, but this is not always successful at first, and they should preferably have the approx. 3 liters of colostrum while the antibodies in the mother's milk are active. They are active for 6 hours. So bottle feeding is sometimes necessary.

Twins are always weak and small calves, especially the one that has been inside the longest, and this time it is very small; but normally they can get up quite quickly. These two still cannot get up this evening, and I have been struggling to lift them and try to get them to stand up several times during the day. It is going better in the evening. The largest one stood for several seconds, and I think they will be up and staggering around tomorrow. They do not lack energy, as they want milk.