Post by darkwater1929 on Feb 20, 2015 13:35:57 GMT -5
Greetings y'all!
I have lived on my gentleman's ranch for just a year. He manages 90+ (at the moment) black angus cattle, plus three bulls, and at least 50 calves, under the age of a year. They run, divided into three groups, on 120 acres of decent grass, and during the winter months, they are fed alfalfa/grass hay once a day. With the exception of 10 replacement heifers, which are calving for the first time this year, all of the cows have been here, and have calved here before.
One of the bulls has been here for many years. The other two are new, and the calves being born this year are their first crop of babies. I am sorry to say that no record was kept of which cows were exposed to which bull.
Honey says that last year, there were no twin births. However, he has had years, says he, where he has had as many as 12 sets of twins. (He adds that these were the twins born alive. He always has some twins born stillborn, which he does not recall the incidence of.)
I have read, online, that "normal" incidence of twins in beef cattle is about .5%, or one set per 200 cows. This year, so far, of our roughly 90 head of cattle, perhaps 80 of which have calved, or will do so soon, there have been 6 sets of twins. In one case, the cow was able to deliver them, but they were stillborn. Four pair had to be delivered by the vet. (Hubby virtually always is able to do this chore himself, but in each case, the calves were very large, even had they been single births, and had begun to bloat and decay.) One pair were born alive, by C-section, but the mother did not survive. I am their mother, and I love the job, but I miss the cow, because she was a sweetie, and had always been a great mom.
He has never kept a heifer born as a twin as a replacement heifer.
Finally, my question: .5% is "normal." We are at 6.5% this year, which is seven times the "normal" rate. And, they are big, which has reduced hubby's prior 50% twin survival rate to nearly 0. My research gives me no insight, but I may be entering the wrong search terms. Can anyone enlighten me? What is up with this consistently high twin rate on this ranch, and more particularly, what is up with the huge twins this year, that cannot be born by their moms? I should mention that none of the twin moms this year were first time calvers. These were all mid-life cows.
What can cause high twin-birth rates?
What causes the malfunction of the mechanism in the cow that keeps the babies from getting too big for her to bear?
I will be grateful for your wisdom! Hubby takes it all with a shrug, and a "well, that's how it goes" attitude. But, it breaks my heart, every time I see the sad mama cows, and the orphaned babies. I like happy cows!
Thank you!
But thanks for the warning. I'll get measurements and photos of both my girls and post them on the Dexter forum for opinions.
