Post by Tamara on Feb 12, 2013 6:31:02 GMT -5
Hello there 
Today I went out to inspect a cow and her calf that my family are buying. This will be our first ever cow so please excuse me if I sound a bit naive.
The cow is a lovely jersey who is very friendly and cuddly, we are buying her as a house cow to milk for our family of 5.
After visiting and thinking back on what happened and looking through the photos I took, some issues have popped up that we are a little concerned about.
The story is that the cow, called Rose, is a pure bred jersey born in October 2011.
The owner says she was accidentally impregnated at 7 months old to a pure bred red Dexter bull.
The calf, called Daisy, was born on the 23rd of December 2012. She resembles a jersey a lot in her colouring and face.
My first questions are regarding Rose. Firstly, her udder is pretty small compared to the giant ones I have often seen in photos. Is this normal for a young cow such as her?
Secondly, she looks very fat and round. Is it at all possible that she could be pregnant? She has milk, as the owner squirted some out in demonstration. But she looks unusually round in the stomach.
This leads me to my next question. The whole time we were visiting, over an hour, at not one time did Daisy go to her mother, have a drink, or anything. Rose paid no attention to the calf. For half the time Daisy was lying some distance away dozing, and when we left the small yard they were in to check out the father, Daisy followed us and yet her mother Rose never came over. Is this normal behaviour for a calf and mother? None of us have ever had experience with cows in person, however we have had foals and goat kids. They have always stuck to their mothers closely, and the mother certainly always followed her baby around whenever it wandered off more than a few feet.
Rose let her calf wander off all the way across a house yard and behind the house where they couldn't even see each other.
The calf was far more interested in the red Dexter bull and cow that were together in another paddock. The cow called out sometimes and so did the bull, and the calf called back to them yet Rose never called out.
We are questioning whether Daisy is even Rose's calf. The owner kept slipping up and calling Rose Daisy, and at one point she said "let's go look at the mum and dad.... er I mean dad" referring to the bull and the dexter cow he is with.
These could simply be honest mistakes but we're a bit wary because the disinterest between mother and calf is weird.
And also, we were told Daisy the calf is a girl. We never actually got to look closely at Daisy, and none of us really thought to inspect her as we simply believed she was a girl.
However upon looking at the photos we took, she has a saggy part right in the middle of her belly, and we're not sure if this is a 'male bit' or if it's just floppy skin. I have looked at photos and all the jersey heifers I've seen have flat stomachs and the bull calves have the saggy part where their penis is. Unfortunately we didn't get a photo of her behind so we're not able to tell if she has 'girly bits'.
At this point we are worried about two main things - is Daisy even Rose's calf, and is Daisy actually a female or not?
We think possibly due to the slips in the name and other factors, our possible deduction could be that 'Rose' is in fact a cow named 'Daisy' who is maybe pregnant and the original 'Rose' died birthing the calf that we saw, who is supposedly 'Daisy'. Hopefully that makes sense!
And possibly the calf 'Daisy' is being bottle fed as she appears to have no interest in Rose, who could have fostered her, but if Rose is her foster mother shouldn't they still care about each other a bit more?
If anyone could please share their opinions on these issues and perhaps shed some light on the above questions, I would be really appreciative!
We have already given the owner a cheque and the cow and calf should be delivered in a few days, so we hope to have these things figured out before they arrive.
Thanks very much if you've read through all this!
Regards,
Tamara
Today I went out to inspect a cow and her calf that my family are buying. This will be our first ever cow so please excuse me if I sound a bit naive.
The cow is a lovely jersey who is very friendly and cuddly, we are buying her as a house cow to milk for our family of 5.
After visiting and thinking back on what happened and looking through the photos I took, some issues have popped up that we are a little concerned about.
The story is that the cow, called Rose, is a pure bred jersey born in October 2011.
The owner says she was accidentally impregnated at 7 months old to a pure bred red Dexter bull.
The calf, called Daisy, was born on the 23rd of December 2012. She resembles a jersey a lot in her colouring and face.
My first questions are regarding Rose. Firstly, her udder is pretty small compared to the giant ones I have often seen in photos. Is this normal for a young cow such as her?
Secondly, she looks very fat and round. Is it at all possible that she could be pregnant? She has milk, as the owner squirted some out in demonstration. But she looks unusually round in the stomach.
This leads me to my next question. The whole time we were visiting, over an hour, at not one time did Daisy go to her mother, have a drink, or anything. Rose paid no attention to the calf. For half the time Daisy was lying some distance away dozing, and when we left the small yard they were in to check out the father, Daisy followed us and yet her mother Rose never came over. Is this normal behaviour for a calf and mother? None of us have ever had experience with cows in person, however we have had foals and goat kids. They have always stuck to their mothers closely, and the mother certainly always followed her baby around whenever it wandered off more than a few feet.
Rose let her calf wander off all the way across a house yard and behind the house where they couldn't even see each other.
The calf was far more interested in the red Dexter bull and cow that were together in another paddock. The cow called out sometimes and so did the bull, and the calf called back to them yet Rose never called out.
We are questioning whether Daisy is even Rose's calf. The owner kept slipping up and calling Rose Daisy, and at one point she said "let's go look at the mum and dad.... er I mean dad" referring to the bull and the dexter cow he is with.
These could simply be honest mistakes but we're a bit wary because the disinterest between mother and calf is weird.
And also, we were told Daisy the calf is a girl. We never actually got to look closely at Daisy, and none of us really thought to inspect her as we simply believed she was a girl.
However upon looking at the photos we took, she has a saggy part right in the middle of her belly, and we're not sure if this is a 'male bit' or if it's just floppy skin. I have looked at photos and all the jersey heifers I've seen have flat stomachs and the bull calves have the saggy part where their penis is. Unfortunately we didn't get a photo of her behind so we're not able to tell if she has 'girly bits'.
At this point we are worried about two main things - is Daisy even Rose's calf, and is Daisy actually a female or not?
We think possibly due to the slips in the name and other factors, our possible deduction could be that 'Rose' is in fact a cow named 'Daisy' who is maybe pregnant and the original 'Rose' died birthing the calf that we saw, who is supposedly 'Daisy'. Hopefully that makes sense!
And possibly the calf 'Daisy' is being bottle fed as she appears to have no interest in Rose, who could have fostered her, but if Rose is her foster mother shouldn't they still care about each other a bit more?
If anyone could please share their opinions on these issues and perhaps shed some light on the above questions, I would be really appreciative!
We have already given the owner a cheque and the cow and calf should be delivered in a few days, so we hope to have these things figured out before they arrive.
Thanks very much if you've read through all this!
Regards,
Tamara
