Post by bonnie on Sept 4, 2010 12:55:37 GMT -5
Hi everyone, I am new to this list and fairly new to milking. I have had a horrible time with my cow (heifer I have owned since she was 5 months old) after she freshened. She had a chronic cough since she calved, we didn't know enough to put a magnet it (huge mistake) and she slowly went down hill. She dried almost completely up, wouldn't eat or drink and lost weight. We got a magnet in, had her on a lot of antibiotics and we got her turned around. About 3 weeks later, she got better and started drinking more than she had in weeks, within a day of that she got mastitis. We started her again on penicillin and 3 days of Today, then we gave her 3 days of Tomorrow, hoping that she would dry up again. We milked her out each day before treating her and then the last treatment (Wed) we decided to just leave her bag alone, but it is now smaller but kind of lumpy. Help! I have called my vet so much these past few weeks and I am not confident in what they have told me. Like, they never put the coughing with hardware, even after coming out and examining her, they said they don't really see it much and people just ship them to market if they get sick. I need some experienced small dairy farmers help. I really don't care if I ever get to milk this cow again, I would be fine keeping her as a pet, I just want to have her better! Do I leave her bag alone, or do I keep trying to get more stuff out of it? She freshened the very end of May. She was a pretty good milker, so I know her body is pushing her to keep making more, even though she is so run down. Any advice would be greatly appreciated if you have ever experienced this type of thing (although I really hope it is rare)