Post by Kerri on Aug 7, 2010 9:03:11 GMT -5
What a week this has been!!!! Cloverbud came down with ketosis on Wednesday night.
This is a going to be a looooong story, so just bare with me while I get it all down . For my own sanity, I need to put all this in print (a therapeutic tool!).
My son is showing beefers and a dairy yearling at the county fair this week. The deal is if you show animals, you have to move into the fairgrounds for the entire week. So we have our camper there and have been staying in that. My husband has been working a CRAZY schedule and couldn't be with us very much. I have to come home every morning and evening to do the chores here at home (milk Cloverbud, feed the beefers, pigs, chickens, cats, dogs, rabbits, horse and donkey) and then drive back down to the fair. Of course while I'm here I have to do laundry and make more food to take down for us to eat.
Wednesday evening was the only day this week that my DH was here to do the evening chores. I was relieved to not have to come all the way home to do that just for one night. When I came home at 6:30 on Thursday morning he left me a note saying that Cloverbud was acting "off" . He said her balance seemed to be way off and she didn't eat much of her feed. I instantly thought milk fever (even though it's been 3 weeks since she calved.) I quickly went out and brought her in the barn. She was stumbling all over the place and could hardly get into her stantion. When she made it to her stantion, it was like she couldn't see the headgate. I finally managed to get her head in and lock her up. Her back end was swaying all over and she kept kicking her left, back leg (almost like a twitch). She was keeping her head down so far that her nose was touching the manger.
She looked absolutely awful It looked like she wasted away to nothing in 24 hours time. She was gaunt and oh so skinny looking. I could not believe what I was looking at . She did not look like that when I milked her the morning before. I entered panic mode!
The vet had left me a tube of CMPK paste when he was here a few weeks ago, though I wasn't sure how to get it in her. I put the halter on her and tied her head up...shoved the tube down her throat and used a metal rod to push the paste out of the tube. I managed to get almost the whole tube in her (I had about 1/4 cup in the palm of my hand when I was done). Then I came in and called the vet. Of course, they weren't in yet and the answering service said to call back at 8:00.
In the meantime, I have to try and get a message to my son who is at the fairgrounds getting ready to show a holstein yearling (we don't own her, he just leased her from a friend of ours for the fair). The show starts at 9:30 that morning and I know that I'm gonna miss it. I managed to get in touch with a friend of ours who got the message to him. Big pangs of mother guilt at that moment
I finally talk to the vet and he's thinking milk fever and/or ketosis. He wanted me to get a urine sample and bring it to his office. He talked me through how to do it and I was successful at getting her to pee. He wanted me to milk her out, so I did. I had waited because I wasn't sure if I should (she only gave 1/2 of what she usually does). He also wanted me to put her in a box stall in case she went down...it would be safer than in the stantion. When I tried to get her out of the stantion, she was swaying and stumbling so bad that I knew she was gonna go down if I moved her. I was here by myself...if this cow went down in the driveway of the barn (or worse yet, in the drop) there would be nooooo way I could get her up on my own. I decided to leave her where she was and pray that she didn't fall down before I got back.
I raced like a maniac to the vets office with my jar of cow pee ( 30 minutes away). Yes indeed, it was ketosis. He showed me the test strip he used and it was black....he said that was the darkest it could get. So he explains the whole ketosis diagnosis to me...my eyes start to glaze over and I'm thinking...just give me the damn medicine and let me get home!!! I was so tired and stressed at that point I didn't even absorb half of what he was saying. He said that the animal was virtually drunk. He gave me 2 syringes with 10 cc of something (one of the details that I could not absorb...the name of the medication ) ..I have to administer 5 cc now, and then 5 ccs every fourth milking. He also wanted me to give her another tube of CMPK paste.
Back in the car...race home again praying that she is still standing up. Thank God, she was. I gave her the injection and just sat with her the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon. I felt so bad for her, bad for my kids ( I had also promised my 9 year old that he could go on the rides at the fair with his friend that day....more pangs of mother guilt!!!) After 2 hours or so, I noticed her perking up a bit. She wasn't swaying quite as much and she was nibbling at her grain. As more time passed, she kept improving eating hay and drinking lots of water. Whew....we were out of the woods.
She is much better today. She gave her usual amount of milk this morning, but it does have a nasty odor. Hopefully this will work its way out soon. We have made some adjustments to her feed (type and quantity), so hopefully this won't be an issue anymore. I am a big proponent of learning by doing, but I wish I had learned everything I have in the last few days by reading a book (or all the posts on here)..
So, it's off to fair again today (it ends tomorrow, thank goodness). The positive news is my son did win Reserve Master Showman (2 years in a row) and his hereford took Champion of Breed. There's the silver lining I guess!!!
I warned you this would be a long post
This is a going to be a looooong story, so just bare with me while I get it all down . For my own sanity, I need to put all this in print (a therapeutic tool!).
My son is showing beefers and a dairy yearling at the county fair this week. The deal is if you show animals, you have to move into the fairgrounds for the entire week. So we have our camper there and have been staying in that. My husband has been working a CRAZY schedule and couldn't be with us very much. I have to come home every morning and evening to do the chores here at home (milk Cloverbud, feed the beefers, pigs, chickens, cats, dogs, rabbits, horse and donkey) and then drive back down to the fair. Of course while I'm here I have to do laundry and make more food to take down for us to eat.
Wednesday evening was the only day this week that my DH was here to do the evening chores. I was relieved to not have to come all the way home to do that just for one night. When I came home at 6:30 on Thursday morning he left me a note saying that Cloverbud was acting "off" . He said her balance seemed to be way off and she didn't eat much of her feed. I instantly thought milk fever (even though it's been 3 weeks since she calved.) I quickly went out and brought her in the barn. She was stumbling all over the place and could hardly get into her stantion. When she made it to her stantion, it was like she couldn't see the headgate. I finally managed to get her head in and lock her up. Her back end was swaying all over and she kept kicking her left, back leg (almost like a twitch). She was keeping her head down so far that her nose was touching the manger.
She looked absolutely awful It looked like she wasted away to nothing in 24 hours time. She was gaunt and oh so skinny looking. I could not believe what I was looking at . She did not look like that when I milked her the morning before. I entered panic mode!
The vet had left me a tube of CMPK paste when he was here a few weeks ago, though I wasn't sure how to get it in her. I put the halter on her and tied her head up...shoved the tube down her throat and used a metal rod to push the paste out of the tube. I managed to get almost the whole tube in her (I had about 1/4 cup in the palm of my hand when I was done). Then I came in and called the vet. Of course, they weren't in yet and the answering service said to call back at 8:00.
In the meantime, I have to try and get a message to my son who is at the fairgrounds getting ready to show a holstein yearling (we don't own her, he just leased her from a friend of ours for the fair). The show starts at 9:30 that morning and I know that I'm gonna miss it. I managed to get in touch with a friend of ours who got the message to him. Big pangs of mother guilt at that moment
I finally talk to the vet and he's thinking milk fever and/or ketosis. He wanted me to get a urine sample and bring it to his office. He talked me through how to do it and I was successful at getting her to pee. He wanted me to milk her out, so I did. I had waited because I wasn't sure if I should (she only gave 1/2 of what she usually does). He also wanted me to put her in a box stall in case she went down...it would be safer than in the stantion. When I tried to get her out of the stantion, she was swaying and stumbling so bad that I knew she was gonna go down if I moved her. I was here by myself...if this cow went down in the driveway of the barn (or worse yet, in the drop) there would be nooooo way I could get her up on my own. I decided to leave her where she was and pray that she didn't fall down before I got back.
I raced like a maniac to the vets office with my jar of cow pee ( 30 minutes away). Yes indeed, it was ketosis. He showed me the test strip he used and it was black....he said that was the darkest it could get. So he explains the whole ketosis diagnosis to me...my eyes start to glaze over and I'm thinking...just give me the damn medicine and let me get home!!! I was so tired and stressed at that point I didn't even absorb half of what he was saying. He said that the animal was virtually drunk. He gave me 2 syringes with 10 cc of something (one of the details that I could not absorb...the name of the medication ) ..I have to administer 5 cc now, and then 5 ccs every fourth milking. He also wanted me to give her another tube of CMPK paste.
Back in the car...race home again praying that she is still standing up. Thank God, she was. I gave her the injection and just sat with her the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon. I felt so bad for her, bad for my kids ( I had also promised my 9 year old that he could go on the rides at the fair with his friend that day....more pangs of mother guilt!!!) After 2 hours or so, I noticed her perking up a bit. She wasn't swaying quite as much and she was nibbling at her grain. As more time passed, she kept improving eating hay and drinking lots of water. Whew....we were out of the woods.
She is much better today. She gave her usual amount of milk this morning, but it does have a nasty odor. Hopefully this will work its way out soon. We have made some adjustments to her feed (type and quantity), so hopefully this won't be an issue anymore. I am a big proponent of learning by doing, but I wish I had learned everything I have in the last few days by reading a book (or all the posts on here)..
So, it's off to fair again today (it ends tomorrow, thank goodness). The positive news is my son did win Reserve Master Showman (2 years in a row) and his hereford took Champion of Breed. There's the silver lining I guess!!!
I warned you this would be a long post