Ooohhh... I'm sore! The other day, my big pony mare, Bella was in heat and acting out a bit. We had to bring the milk cow into the barnyard to be closer to us, as she was due to calve on the 15th. Bella wanted to get out to get some of the lush, green clover shes been eyeing hungrily. I decided to put both horses into their stall, rather than have them escape... Bella is usually well mannered, but Spring and hormones are a bad combination!
So we out some hay down, and the mini went right in. Bella went in, but then spun around... I was reaching to unlatch the door so I could shut it, and she apparently saw a tiny opening she could get through without trampling me. Almost...
She came down on my left Achilles tendon... scraping the top layers of skin off and bruising the heck out of it. Combined with my fibromylagia, which can make me scream from a fairly light bump, this felt awful!
I iced it, and used arnica and Ouch! Liniment, and it surprised me by not being much more than sore, although it looked awful.
Fast forward to this morning... We've been watching Charcoal (the milk cow) closely because hubby bred her to an Angus. Hubby checked her several tines last night, and at 5 am, decided something was wrong. He ran her into a stall and checked her, and sure enough... a big calf, coming breech. Damn!
He woke me, and I threw clothes on and rand downstairs to the barn. I was sure the calf would be dead, especially ax we started to pull it, and I realized it had an Angus rump on it... no wonder she hadn't had it on her own! Every minute of what seemed like forever as we inched it out, my mind was screaming, "faster!", but it took almost 15 minutes before it was on the floor. I automatically started stimulating it, although it looked limp... and it immediately gasped for breath! Tough little bugger... her heart rate was only about 20 bpm (should be 100-160 bpm!), but once she started breathing, it came back fast.
Mama cow immediately started cleaning her off, and we left them alone to bond.
This afternoon, after the calf got her fill, we hand mllked a couple quarts of colostrum for the freezer... we used up our previous supply on the calf from too young a heifer, before grafting her on to Blondie, to be sure she got the immunity.
Boy, do my shoulders ache! It wasn't THAT bad of a calving... sort of awkward angles because she kept trying to stick her rump against the gate in the corner, but we've had much worse. I know I'm out of shape, but this is ridiculous!
Spring is here! We've had our last calf for the year. There are chicks and ducklings under lights, and the chickens are laying like crazy. I can't wait for fresh milk again! Just a few days, now.
Summerthyme