Well, same result, different path... he went back the next day and never found that second baby mentioned in my original post
DH and my oldest were out squirrel hunting and his dog started growling - DH went to check it out and found this poor girl curled up in the leaves. A couple days old the best we can tell - still has a cord, about 75% dry. The color of it's poop leads me to believe she's had at least a little of her mom's milk. DH's gpa thinks she might have pneumonia - I thought her breathing wasn't quite right, but I know next to nothing as far as calves go. She had been up and walking at some point - her hooves are pretty torn up on the bottoms, and she had briars in her fur with no sign of them around where she was laying. There was a cow with milk and no baby bellowing out in the pasture, but no where near where we found the baby. She doesn't have any energy to put her back out there anyway. I had some PennG in the fridge so she got a shot of it and some Tylenol (DH's gpa's suggestion). Had to force her to drink some milk - no interest in suckling at all
, but at least she's had a little something.
Any thoughts? I am mentally prepared for her to not make it, and we are making sure the kids are aware of that as well (no naming her yet!!). Trying to figure this out as we go... DH's gpa has had cows for years, but I don't think he does much for actually taking care of them. Pretty hands off in that sense.
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DH's gpa came back with another antibiotic and Pepto Bismol :lol: . He told me to get some Ensure for her, just to try and get some energy for her. He thinks more than anything she's just weak. She got up and walked around a little, checking out her area, sniffing at the walls and hay. Very very wobbly... but still, she was up! <br /><br /> __________ Sun Jan 29, 2017 9:17 am __________ <br /><br /> Good news!! This morning she was up, prancing around, bellowing all the way... mama cow was answering from the back. She also (mostly) willingly drank a bottle - I went out with .5 liters since yesterday we were lucky to dribble some down her throat. I tried a new position (thank you youtube!) and she fought me a little, then drained it. Made another liter or so, gone! 2 more liters? Drained. Then she chased my girls around with her tongues out making sucking noises :lol: then she found my boot and was sucking on it. Her and mama were calling back and forth and I could tell she had made her way around form the barn to just behind us. I tried carrying her out to mama, but my body collapsed so the kids got DH and he got her the rest of the way there. Same cow I saw out toward us yesterday, so my suspicions were correct. She seemed to accept her just fine so we watched as they went through the pasture together. Jury is still out as to whether or not she'll let her nurse - we saw her latch on once, then mama moved away. Maybe she's too full and it hurts? We'll go track them down this afternoon and see how she's doing. At least she had 3+ liters in her belly to get her through. If mama won't feed her, we'lll bring her back and keep up with the bottles.