Post by tripleh on Dec 6, 2007 20:20:55 GMT -5
Well I have a real dilemma on my hands! I was wondering if anyone may have input or have run across a situation such as this before as any suggestions would be welcome! Two weeks ago we had to put down our old cow Mabel. She was terribly arthritic and was getting to the point of just barely being able to get up or move around. I had planned on letting her just "retire"... but it was bothering me too much the way she obviously was in distress and pain with the colder weather coming on.
We brought her out of the milk cow paddock and away from Taz our other Jersey, before putting her down and taking her away out the back. I am convinced Taz became depressed! The next day, for the first time since I have been milking her with the machine, she kicked like a banshee and was just in a fit! The next day it was a little better but she still wanted to kick at the milker (and tried once again at me but got a jolly good wallop to remind her that is unacceptable!) I saw that her calf had chewed pretty good on her two back teats... I pen the calf up at night so as to take our milk in the morning then usually let the calf run with her all day. So I started keeping the calf in her pen, letting Taz in with her twice a day so the calf could nurse... which allowed me to put bag balm on Taz's teats right after the calf had nursed her udder down.
This is helping heal the teats, and Taz has not aggressively kicked at the milker in a few days although she is very fidgety, but I am seeing she is kicking quite a lot at her calf when it nurses... which may be due still to sore teats... and her milk production has dropped from around 3 gallons per milking to just barely a gallon and a half! I am really wondering if she is down in the dumps! Since this is the first calf she has had with us I am wondering if this is behaviour some cows may have as it is almost like she is wanting to wean herself of milking! In all the milk cows I have had I have never run across this sort of situation hence my turning to you lot out there! Any ideas? Any suggestions on getting her milk back up? All thoughts would be greatly appreciated!
Sorry this is so long
Rose
We brought her out of the milk cow paddock and away from Taz our other Jersey, before putting her down and taking her away out the back. I am convinced Taz became depressed! The next day, for the first time since I have been milking her with the machine, she kicked like a banshee and was just in a fit! The next day it was a little better but she still wanted to kick at the milker (and tried once again at me but got a jolly good wallop to remind her that is unacceptable!) I saw that her calf had chewed pretty good on her two back teats... I pen the calf up at night so as to take our milk in the morning then usually let the calf run with her all day. So I started keeping the calf in her pen, letting Taz in with her twice a day so the calf could nurse... which allowed me to put bag balm on Taz's teats right after the calf had nursed her udder down.
This is helping heal the teats, and Taz has not aggressively kicked at the milker in a few days although she is very fidgety, but I am seeing she is kicking quite a lot at her calf when it nurses... which may be due still to sore teats... and her milk production has dropped from around 3 gallons per milking to just barely a gallon and a half! I am really wondering if she is down in the dumps! Since this is the first calf she has had with us I am wondering if this is behaviour some cows may have as it is almost like she is wanting to wean herself of milking! In all the milk cows I have had I have never run across this sort of situation hence my turning to you lot out there! Any ideas? Any suggestions on getting her milk back up? All thoughts would be greatly appreciated!
Sorry this is so long
Rose