About 1:30 yesterday I decided to sit down and write my daily blog. At that time we had, had a very successful day, that morning we had a first calf heifer have a 75lb heifer calf by herself and it was up and nursing in 10 minutes, those are the type we like! As normal I went over and cleaned the pen, let the cow out for some water, weighed the calf, you know the normal things you do. As I was wrapping it up I decided to go out and opening the back porch of the barn so the cows that haven't calved could get back in out of the weather when I noticed one of our heavy springers was missing. As i search the lot and field looking for her I found her up in the woods. Ok, now if your a farmer you would understand what this is a tell-tale sign for. But for the non-farmers out there I'll explain; when you have a cow that is heavily sprung to calve you watch for any signs of early labor. These signs include pacing, tail swinging, kicking themselves, if you know the cow real well she'll even get that far off look in her eye, but the winner for this cow was, we're in the middle of a winter storm it's 20 degrees outside the rest of the cows are headed for cover and this old gal is headed out on her own to the woods ( not normal cow behavior). So I trudge out thru the snow after her praying that she'll cooperate because there is nothing worse then chasing a scared cow in bad weather. Sure enough she was a good girl as soon as she saw me coming she knew I would put her back in the warm barn in her own stall. I didn't even have to go all the way up in the woods after her ( I love my girls)! I knew it'd be a couple of hours so I headed back to the house to make some lunch and blog about my wonderful morning. This is the part where I love my CAMERAS!!! I sat down and was watching a good western movie with my grandfather and above that screen was the screen for our barn cameras. I could tell the cow was uncomfortable but no obvious labor signals quite yet. So I came in the office and sat down at the computer to start typing, about 15 mins into the blog my grandfather runs in and says her water broke! I went into the living room and sat down to watch her progress Her water broke at 1:45, at about 2 the feet were out but she was still in the sack filled with fluid so at this point I decide to head on over to make sure I get the bag off it's face. Needless to say she was born at 2:15 and it was a good thing I was there because yes she was still in the bag! I pulled it off and picked her up by her hind legs to make sure any fluid in her lungs would drain out. Momma was good as always cleaned her up and she got to nursing. Quite a successful day for me! Now I can go home and watch the Superbowl in Peace!! I have such considerate cows :p!!
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