Heifer to Cow whats the difference?
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If you know what I mean when I say 'I had to pull a calf today', you need not read further in this post. If you have no idea what I mean by that statement then read on because you are about to get insight to events here on the Ranch.
Last summer we bred 6 Angus heifers to our fullblood wagyu bull. A heifer is a female bovine that has never birthed a calf. After they have successfully birthed a calf they graduate to Cow status.
All but 1 heifer easily achieved cow status this last month except for 506 (thats her ear tag #). She was almost a month over due and we had been watching her closely for a few weeks wondering when the big event would finally happen.
Then it happened. We could tell she was in labor but something was wrong. She was not progressing. The hours ticked by and by the afternoon I knew I had to do something. So to google I went...
Just kidding, but I did call a friend to ask if I could borrow his calf puller. Wagyu rarely need their calf pulled so thankfully I do not have a lot of practice. What is a calf puller you say? and what am I about to do? yes my friends I helped that soon to be mama get her calf out using a calf puller.
I wont go into too many details here but lets just say I had to hook the front heels of the calve onto the mechanism and there is only one way to do that.
When we saw the little thing on the ground we were concerned he was stillborn but after a few motions he let out some little coughs. The graduated Cow turned
right around and got to work cleaning the little guy up. Soon he was nuzzling and sucking down good mamas milk.