We named the little calf "Rosebud" and she seems to be very healthy. It has been fun watching her prance around playfully as her leg strength improved during these past couple days. She has had plenty of energy!
Dandelion, the proud mama, has some trouble, though. Her back two teats are not working and we are afraid she has mastitus in them. Her front ones have been overly full and have been too large for Rosebud to nurse off them. That's not related to the mastitus, but since Rosebud was not nursing, we have been taking the milk from Dandelion's front teats and bottle feeding Rosebud, and we are afraid Rosebud might not nurse even after Dandelion gets straightened out. Dandelion has been cooperating wonderfully, but we would much rather Rosebud nurse naturally.
We got some mastitis medicine for Dandelion yesterday from Tractor Supply, but was unsuccessful getting the syringe into the back teats. We are very concerned that this will mess her up as a family milk cow for the future. Today the vet is supposed to come and look at her and see what he thinks. As soon as he gets finished at the office he is going to call and meet us at the barn.
I'll post again with an update after we know more of what is going on with Dandelion.
Update After The Vet's Visit:
I am very happy that Mark Ratliff is such a fantastic veterenarian and doesn't mind making house calls! He knows his stuff, charges what I consider a very fair rate, and is rather personable as well. I guess we visited for about an hour in the barn after he had examined Dandelion and looked at Rosebud! He's a good Christian fellow and it seems that we have a lot in common. If he had more time I think we could have found many more things to talk about, but he had another call to make at a farm in Blaine.
Concerning Dandelion, Mark had some good news and some bad news for us. The good news is that she does not have mastitis! She is perfectly healthy as far as any bacterial infection or anything! The bad news, however, is that she has what he called a couple of "blind teats", which means that she was born without any milk canals in those two back teats. That is why we could not get any milk out back there even though her udder was so swollen!
Dandelion's two front teats are producing plenty of milk for Rosebud and we saw more good news today: we got Rosebud to actually nurse off Dandelion on her own! I had to guide Rosebud's face to the teat, but when she found the teat, she latched right on and drank! We did this several times on both teats until Rosebud got full and laid down for a nap!
Hopefully we got enough colostrum milk into Rosebud within her first 12 hours of life. Mark said if she did not get the colostrum needed, then she will be sick by the time she is a week old and would likely then die. She is very playful and energetic right now, but we really won't know if she will make it until she passes that one week mark, which won't be until this Friday. But she did drink over a half gallon of her mama's milk from the bottle that first evening, so I think she should be fine.
The two front teats will be enough to raise just one calf, and we will still be able to get a large quantity of milk for the family over the next year. Mark recommends that we do not breed her back, however, because it is too risky to have those back milk glands fill up so full with no place for the milk to go, which he said would happen every time.
So the bottom line is that we should be able to raise Rosebud and milk Dandelion for as long as we want, or until she starts to dry up, and then we will probably need to sell her. Mark said that this condition is not necessarily hereditary, so Rosebud could likely grow up to be a good milk cow.
We are thankful for God blessing us with this adorable little calf, and for the fact that both mamma and baby are basically healthy! We'll feel much better after we know that she is nursing on her own whenever she wants to, and after she is a week old. I'll try to get back for an update, especially after she passes that one week mark if I've not checked back in by then.
It's time now for us to go back to the barn to make sure that Rosebud has nursed again and that everything else is ok.
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