# Twin calf abadon



## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 9, 2020)

We have a cow who had twins who left on calf completely and hasn't returned for it. Now we have calf in a stall and needing her to take a bottle any tricks? And what can I feed her I have a small bag of colostrum that i am trying to get her to take but once thats gone i won't make feed store till tomorrow but i do have cow milk from store in fridge is that ok? We have goats but not getting enough milk for her the kids and the human kids as well.


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## frustratedearthmother (Feb 9, 2020)

Sure wish Farmer Jan was here to help you!  I've only bottle fed one calf and that was about a zillion years ago.  To get that calf started I straddled the calf and held his head up with one hand and got the bottle in his mouth with the other hand.  Once he figured out what it was - he had no problem starting sucking.  

The calf really needs that colostrum!  I did a quick Google search and read that you can use the milk from the grocery store.  I'm sorry I don't know more!  but, hopefully you can get the little critter going.  Good luck!


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## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 9, 2020)

So far she won't take it she doesn't even stand when i go into the stall... She about sixty pound i guessing. She seems health other wise i thinking she about a day or two old. She was able to run from us when we caught her so i know she can get up just not sure why she isn't. She even let's me rub all over her and put the bottle in and I spray some in her mouth bit so far no takers.


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## frustratedearthmother (Feb 9, 2020)

Oh no - that doesn't sound good.  Mine loved their warm bottle...     Is it normal colostrum or replacer?  Maybe it doesn't taste good?


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## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 9, 2020)

Replacer its all i had on hand...


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## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 9, 2020)

I can see if she takes warm cow milk instead of the replaced from what she looks like i would guess a day sold at least most likely born Friday evening or Saturday. We saw them nursing from half a foot ball field or mo re away so wasn't sure if she nursed allow with sibling or not before she got left.


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## frustratedearthmother (Feb 9, 2020)

Hopefully she got colostrum from mom and she'll do well after she starts talking the bottle.


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## YourRabbitGirl (Feb 9, 2020)

M


Jesusfreak101 said:


> We have a cow who had twins who left on calf completely and hasn't returned for it. Now we have calf in a stall and needing her to take a bottle any tricks? And what can I feed her I have a small bag of colostrum that i am trying to get her to take but once thats gone i won't make feed store till tomorrow but i do have cow milk from store in fridge is that ok? We have goats but not getting enough milk for her the kids and the human kids as well.


for now. milk still is the right food for them. for me any kind of milk will be great.. you still have options if you have other resources though..


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## promiseacres (Feb 10, 2020)

FYI as a twin she may be a free Martin which means she won't be a good breeding prospect/milking prospect. Free Martins generally aren't breedable, something to do with in utero development of a female in with a bull. That's why cattle people don't want twins. 

 Was the other calf a bull? 

Persistence to bottle feed an wild calf. Also you might try a bucket instead of a bottle.


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## Duckfarmerpa1 (Feb 10, 2020)

I read last night that you could dip the nipple in karo syrup.  My goat loves that stuff!!  Some got on my pants and the kid was sucking on my pants like crazy!  It also said to tickle the roof of the calf’s mouth to get the sucking reflex going, then slip the nipple in, like I said I am doing with my kids.  Perhaps you have a farmer friend who has some spare colostrum replacer on hand?  My farmer friend offered his up right away the other day, but that wasn’t my issue.  Good luck...I know how hard and frustrating it can be to get these new guys to have full tummies!!


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## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 10, 2020)

The herd came by stopped to check her out then walked on she been running around ever since my husband decide he had to let or six year old in there with the calf i am overly cranky about for more then one reason. I have to check on what her twin was. Husband trying with regular milk now  he forcing it some not sure that the best ideal.


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## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 10, 2020)

Score it took the bottle, however i refuse to eat crow on this he took a unnessacry risk with my baby... just saying anyways it likes the regular cows milk.


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## frustratedearthmother (Feb 10, 2020)

Great that she's taking the milk now.  True that she may be a freemartin - but only if her twin is a bull.  But, she'll still make good beef no matter what!


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## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 10, 2020)

The same cow either isnt feeding the other calf or lost it. Her udder is so full its reduclious i highly sought she fed the other calf hubby put looking for her. Well that calf took another bottle from me so total of one quart of milk in her


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## Baymule (Feb 10, 2020)

I see a cow headed for the sale barn. If you can get her to raise the other baby, great. If not, off she goes. You don't need lousy mommas dropping their calves and walking away.


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## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 10, 2020)

Thats no joke on that. Here the notty cow


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## YourRabbitGirl (Feb 18, 2020)

Duckfarmerpa1 said:


> I read last night that you could dip the nipple in karo syrup.  My goat loves that stuff!!  Some got on my pants and the kid was sucking on my pants like crazy!  It also said to tickle the roof of the calf’s mouth to get the sucking reflex going, then slip the nipple in, like I said I am doing with my kids.  Perhaps you have a farmer friend who has some spare colostrum replacer on hand?  My farmer friend offered his up right away the other day, but that wasn’t my issue.  Good luck...I know how hard and frustrating it can be to get these new guys to have full tummies!!


That good know-how... I hope it will do good for those goats... mine, they're doing great, I hope that they will be for a long time. Kudos to you!!


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## YourRabbitGirl (Feb 19, 2020)

Jesusfreak101 said:


> Score it took the bottle, however i refuse to eat crow on this he took a unnessacry risk with my baby... just saying anyways it likes the regular cows milk.


I think regular cow's milk will be just fine, That exactly what I did for my pet goats before, Kudos. I hope they will be in good condition asap. good luck.


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## farmerjan (Feb 19, 2020)

I  hadn't seen this thread until just now. I was somewhat otherwise occupied with the surgery and all that. 

It is too late to change what you did by interferring with the cow and her calves.  If I read the thread right, you found the cow and believed she had twins. You found one twin by its'self quietly laying in a spot.  You decided that the cow had 2 hours to come back to the calf.  Since I don't know the cow,  I am not saying she is or isn't a good mother.  Did you have any history on the cow? Unless you know for sure that she isn't a good mother, then you were totally off base to make that sort of decision not being well versed in cattle.  They are not like goats or sheep in the way they take care of their calves.
If you did not see the cow actually calve, and whether she allowed the calves to nurse her for colostrum, then making a random decision to remove one because it was by its'self, was not necessarily a wise or fair choice to the cow.   If the calf was dried and seemed perfectly content laying there, it is a very good chance the calf was licked off, nursed the cow for the colostrum, and the cow put that calf there and in her own way, told it so stay put.  Cows do that.  I have had cows leave calves for hours when they feel there is no predator threat.  It is no different than a deer will put her fawn in a spot, and that fawn will stay there because it was "told to say there". To the extent that we have actually ; sadly;  run over and killed a fawn with a bush hog and not realized it until the next round around and found the carcass.  That is the way nature ensures that the momma can lead off a predator if she feels there is a threat, or she can graze,  and go to a stream to drink, knowing that the baby will be right where she put it, when she goes back to get it.
What I am saying that I think you totally jumped the gun expecting the cow to come back on your time table.  She might have left the calf there for 12 hours tending to the other calf.  She might have "parked" the other calf, then come back for the first one.  She also might have just abandonded it and not come back.  But you did not give her a chance to "be a mother".   If this was her first time with twins, sometimes it takes then a little bit to figure it out.

A beef cow's udder will look  full and "swollen" for several weeks .  A Charolais, as she looks to be in the picture, will be a little more protective, and a little more apt to leave a calf  to come back to it later than some other breeds.  They are not a "warm and fuzzy " type of cow.   They do what nature has ingrained in them.  They are not dependent on humans.  Since you did  not start with her as a calf, she is not going to look to you for anything.
The cow will nurse her calf, or calves, and within an hour or two, will have a full looking udder again.  Until the calf is a month or 2 old, she will lose a little of the swelling  but will look full.  Once the calf gets some size on it, then it will nurse more frequently, and will then look empty most of the time but she will have more milk in reserve than you can realize.  It is nothing like a dairy animal.

Since the calf gave you trouble trying to get it to nurse at first, I think it more than likely had nursed her mother.  It would then not want something that did not smell or feel like the cows own udder. Homogenized milk from the  store won't hurt them, but it doesn't have the taste or texture of the cow's milk.  Beef cattle run an average 4.5 to 7 % butterfat and store milk that is homogenized is like water to them in texture.  So another reason why the calf would refuse unless it was very hungry.

Since it is all done and over with, I hope that you have sucess raising the calf/calves.  If you are buying milk replacer, buy an ALL MILK ,, milk replacer.  Do not use something that is soy based.  Their systems do not do well trying to absorb  the soy base and will  have a harder time getting a good start.  And do not over feed the calf.  No more than a 2 qt bottle a feeding for the first 2-3 weeks.... no more than  2-3 times a day to start.  So the calf can have 1 to 1  1/2 gal a day split in 2-3 feedings a day.  The calf should be a little hungry at feedings or it is getting too much.  If they get more than they really need, it will cause them to scour that much easier.  Once they scour, you will play havoc trying to get them "stopped up"


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## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 19, 2020)

Not my first but my first with twins. She had left it for all day and my husband's grandparents wanted us to pull it before nightfall (techcally their cattle but we now take care of them completely i am newer to cattle but have handled them and took care of but never had twins) since we were expecting bad weather if she hadn't come for it by then. We ended up only pulling one and closely watching the other. One of the problems we had with this herd is a gene that has caused a few cows to be unable to feed their calves they have plently of milk but it won't come out do to their udders. We watch one calf starve because they wouldn't let us pull it, this time they wanted us to.
 So we did. Now i have noticed they aren't like other cows i dealt with. However i watched and dealt with this herd for almost eight years and watch many of them grow and do great. I havent seen them leave their calves more the a few hours never all day. We estimated she was born on Friday or Saturday so one or two days old. She didn't have much energy and would not drink the formula we bought that was milk baised not soy(still smelled horrid nasty sweet smell i can't stand) same bottle and everything only difference was the store bought milk or goat milk which she downed without complaint. So far she doing much better then her sister. We discussing pulling her but depends on growth. I honestly debate about breeding this girl or not. Mostly because of the gene that they keep passing on.  So another debate there. She a pretty calf and very sweet. She happy with her goat family ironically they keep cuddling and loving on each other.


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## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 19, 2020)

@farmerjan  I forgot to type thank you, i also have another question i can't remember when to start feeding grain i thinking it was 1.5 months old? The other thing I was think about (didn't experience before) was whether it was ok for her to eat goat grain she recently started to nibble on the goats grain when i feed up.


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## farmerjan (Feb 19, 2020)

Well, that explains it better.  I was under the idea that she had just calved that day.  So it sounds like you did the right thing since you have been taking care of the cattle for awhile and have learned the herd.  

There are alot of different genes involved with cattle as far as the ability of any to feed their calves.  If a cow has a calf, and it seems to have milk and yet the calf gets weak, or sadly starves to death, that cow could have any of a half dozen problems.  We had a bought cow, that calved, beautiful udder.  Saw the calf nursing.  Several days later, the calf was missing.  There had been some coyotes in the area and a neighbor farmer lost 2 calves to the coyotes, so we figured they must have gotten the calf.  Cow bred right back, so the next year she again calved.  Saw the calf up and nursing.  2 days later the widow lady that owned the pasture, called and said the calf looked weak.  She called alot about trivial things, but was a nice person, so I went up to check on them.  The calf was weak.  So we got them both in a little corral pen of panels that was there and I got the cow cornered with some grain and I couldn't get any milk out of her udder.  So we moved the calf back to the barn with the cow.  Got her in the head catch chute and there was no  milk coming out of any of the 4 teats.  I put the calf on a bottle and it really just took off and nearly swallowed the bottle whole wanting the milk in it's poor little empty tummy.  Kept it on a bottle for about a week, then had a cow have a dead calf that I managed to get it grafted on.  The cow went to the stockyards. 

If you get a cow that has no milk, there is no reason to keep her.  Period.  No more chances or anything.  You cannot justify the time and effort to try to figure out the problem in a commercial herd.  Sounds like this cow is doing okay with her other twin so it just may be that she didn't want a 2nd calf.  Some just don't.  I wouldn't worry about the calf having problems in the future as a cow if the momma is raising the twin calf up now.  If the twins are mixed sex, one heifer and one bull calf, there is no sense in keeping the heifer as there is a 90% chance she is a non productive free martin.  
If the calf that the cow has kept,  isn't growing well, it could be due to lack of milk,  or problems with her udder as you have suspected.  You are obviously attached to the bottle calf as happens with most bottle calves. Keeping it as a possible future cow is a toss up.  But any cow that does not raise her calf now, in our cow herd, does not get a pass, unless there is a really good reason.  Lack of milk is not a good reason, that is the number one reason to get shipped.  Don't waste your money and time feeding that unproductive cow.  She could also not being producing much milk  due to her possibly being old too.  If there are certain "families" of the cows that seem to not have milk or very little milk, then you shouldn't keep any heifers out of those cows to keep as future cows. 

Knowing more details, I totally agree that you did the right thing.  And with a storm coming, the calf could have very well gotten sick or died being out in it.  Hope that all continues to go well.


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## farmerjan (Feb 19, 2020)

You can start feeding grain as soon as she shows interest in it.  Most dairies will start offering it at 1-2 weeks.  The sooner they get to eating grain, the faster they will grow as they will get the needed protein and all. The sooner they will be able to be weaned off milk too because they are consuming enough to continue to grow and not get stunted.  It will start to develop her rumen also.  The goat grain will be fine but if you can get her to eat out of her own bucket a 16-20% calf starter will supply more of her needs as it is formulated for just calves.  But any grain is better than none, and there is nothing in goat feed that I am aware of that will hurt her.  Encourage her to eat all she wants, they will seldom be able to overeat grain at that size since their 4 stomachs are not developed enough to contain too much in their gut tract.  Overeating usually occurs in animals are in the 500 lb range and bigger as they can eat and hold alot more grain and it can founder them. Being in with the goats is a plus because she will follow their lead to eat.  Calves learn alot by mimicing their mommas.


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## Jesusfreak101 (Feb 19, 2020)

I really need to get a picture of them together it so cute she go lay her head on panda(adult female goatl back and they both just stand there. 
Okay i go ahead and get some next time I go to the feed store. She been eating hay, grass and alfalfa as well. And her twin was another  female. His grandparents are giving us both of these calves out of the herd. 
I do like her she cute but all baby animals are. It would be hard to process her or sale her however if she unable to be productive or produce healthy offspring she pointless and as much as cows eat cant have a unproductive animal. This calf has six teats, we keep open minded about everything.


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## YourRabbitGirl (Feb 20, 2020)

Jesusfreak101 said:


> The herd came by stopped to check her out then walked on she been running around ever since my husband decide he had to let or six year old in there with the calf i am overly cranky about for more then one reason. I have to check on what her twin was. Husband trying with regular milk now  he forcing it some not sure that the best ideal.


It's such a difficult thing to do, I hope you can still keep the task, please continue on taking care of them, There is good karma in what you're doing. keep it up..


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## farmerjan (Feb 20, 2020)

One plus, both being female so no concern about one being a free martin.  I wouldn't be too concerned about keeping either as a future replacement.  It is a start for you, and if one or the other doesn't breed, you can make a decision then.  If your heifer stays friendly, when you wean the other calf , if you can keep them together the other will get calmer and quieter due to the having them together.  Then they will hopefully both become friendly and more able to handle them.  I don't know what your grandparents do as far as policy for keeping replacement heifers.

If the one still on the mother doesn't seem to be growing as well as the other calves her age, you can wean her off early ( 4 months or so) and pen her with your bottle baby, and although she will not be happy about it, she will learn to eat grain with your calf after a bit, and get to where she looks to you for her food. 

Be careful of too much alfalfa as they can get foundered on it due to the high protein content.  For some reason, young growing animals seem to have more problems than an animal that is more mature.  I feed alfalfa to my nurse cows, and we feed some to our ewes pre lambing, as well as early in their lactation in order to get them milking good. .  But we do restrict it so that they do not overeat it.  They like it, and will overdue it, just like someone that likes candy and would like to pig out on candy.   So, all I am saying is that you have to be a little careful of feeding alfalfa,  especially to younger growing animals. to not let them overindulge.  Alfalfa has caused founder in many horses, as has overeating grain. 

As to the extra teats.   It is no big deal.  In dairy cattle they will remove them early on. I have several cows with extra teats.  In most cases they don't even develop and seldom ever have any milk supply.  If they do have some milk, the calf will suck them but they often dry up in short order.  That is one of the least of your worries.  We don't even worry about removing them on the beef heifers.  Sure it is preferable to only have 4 teats but that is a minor thing.


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