A Bad Day

    "You can't save them all", I was told as tears welled up in my eyes. The Cowboy couldn't even see me, but he knew I was about to cry over the calf that lay dead on the barn floor. "We did our best to help her, that's all anyone can ask." It was true, we did do everything, it's still heart-breaking.

    The Cowboy called me and told me to get everything ready, we were going to pull "that" heifer. 226 I knew who "that" was. We'd been watching her for several days now. I was relieved that the call was coming in the day and not 3am. I rounded up all the gear and the munchkin and we were soon out the door and headed for the barn.

    The Cowboy and I have pulled too many calves to count and too many heifers to remember. A lack of a "heifer bull" (a smaller bull or a bull that sires lower birth-weight calves for first time mommas) was the problem way back when. Mother nature was the problem with this one. She looked like an alright heifer, not too tiny, not to small of hips, just an average heifer.

    We had her in the head-catch in no time and went to work on pulling the calf. She wasn't pushing at first, but with a little encouragement, started to help a little. It was soon clear that there wasn't any progress made. We then went "fishing", in other words, we went in to feel the position of the calf. My smaller hands were no help this time as my arms weren't long enough. By this time, the Boss Man had arrived. He too went fishing and could barely touch the head.

    The calf had a head turned back. This means that the usual front feet first with head in the middle, didn't apply. The front feet were pointed out (with a bit of a twist) and the head was pointing towards the groundand up and over his shoulder. It didn't help that every time someone had a hand on calf's head to get it straightened out, the calf would pull back. It was a mess on every level you could imagine.

    Once we finally got the calf straightened out, the momma laid down while we were pulling. So we started pulling from the ground. She was too small. Boss Man had to do the bovine equivalent of an episiotomy, he had to cut to make room for the calf. Finally, finally we got the calf out.

    Momma just laid there, not really knowing what just happened. Calf just laid there, never knowing what just happened. The heifer calf never took a breath. Momma still laid there, relieved of her burden and pain, not wanting to get up. She was a good Momma, she never bellowed, never tried to fight us, never freaked out like some heifers do, it just wasn't meant to be.

    Losing a calf is never easy, but losing one that you've tried so hard to save is worse. When you step out of a barn covered in baby goo and blood and there's a live calf on the ground, it's a great day and worth a high-five. When you step out of a barn covered in baby goo and too much blood, to see the clouds have rolled in and it's raining, and knowing there's a dead calf, it just makes you want to cry. And I did.

    To all those people out there that think ranchers and farmers are mindless and we don't care about our animals because we raise them for meat.......I'll show you a grown man that sucks gunk out of a calf's nose to try to clear his airways, I'll show you a tough Cowboy that tries CPR on a dead calf to try to get them to breath, and I'll show you buckets of tears shed for the lose of animals from a ranch wife.......and that was just yesterday.

Comments

[Carol]

Been there, done that and feeling your pain.

[Tanna]

Wonderful post! Sorry about the loss yesterday, but i'm sure another miracle is just around the corner on the ranch to brighten your mood!

[Roberta Moellenberg]

It happens to all of us in anmial agriculture, but it never makes a loss easy. The other side of the coin is the ones who survive against all odds because of our care. I credit a lot of these successes to my dad's "cold calf recipe"--lukewarm milk with a raw egg, a dash of white Karo syrup, and a Tbsp. of whiskey whipped in. (Cheapest whiskey works as well as the fancy stuff.)

[Jency]

Thank you for this post! If you don't mind I would like to use it on my blog www.arancherswife.com!

Jency

[Jan Carbone]

I LOVE reading about your daily life...Sorry for your loss, although you handle it quite well. YOU are so blessed in many ways...To those that are looking at your prints...I sent out your card for Christmas and most everyone that was fortunate to get one is NOW framing them....They are BEAUTIFUL.....

[Weekend Cowgirl]

It's very hard and I cry every time it happens. Hopefully, we will not have any this year... They may be farm animals, but when we lose any amimal my heart breaks...