Episode 211 - How to help a calf immediately after an assisted calving - UMN Extension's The Moos Room
Welcome to The Moos Room, everybody. We are talking about all sorts of things related to Cavs today. Most of, most of the time before we started the show was spent making fun of Helga and, my opportunity to travel around the state and teach people with Helga, which somehow has put me in the doghouse with these 2.
Brad Heins:We're just jealous we don't have a huge Hereford in our room.
Emily Krekelberg:This run of the mill jealousy is what it is. We were also experiencing some technical issues, so that's why we're a little giggly right now because And
Dr. Joe Armstrong:the technical issues were, for once, not Emily's issue. They were mine.
Emily Krekelberg:Yeah. Like and just just to kind of put it into perspective, like, we are we were supposed to start this 30 minutes ago, but that's how long it took the tech issues to resolve. So we're a little, loosey goosey all over the place right now, I think.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Loosey goosey, angry, all sorts of things. Well, today, what we're talking about is something related to Helga because I've had an opportunity
Dr. Joe Armstrong:to have her out a couple times now, teach people about, how to correct dystocias and those kind of things. And what I've been most surprised about and what I've had the most arguments about is the protocol after the calf is out of the cow because that's you know, it's very important as well. If you have a calf that's struggling to get started or is not quite breathing right or is stressed and covered in meconium staining from having a difficult calving, we need to know what to do after that calf hits the ground. So that's the subject today. We're gonna talk about what do you do with this calf after you get it out of the cow.
Emily Krekelberg:I'm just thinking of, like, growing up on my family's dairy and the little, like, trick my dad taught me that I thought was so cool. And so what we would do after the calf hit the ground is we would, you know, tickle the inside of its nose with some straw, you know, to kinda get that inhale response started. So so when you were saying that, Jo, I was just like picturing little Emily in her little pigtails on the farm with my dad when we'd have a new calf. And, yes, he would let me tickle their noses to he would he would say tickle their noses to wake them up. So Absolutely.
Emily Krekelberg:That's, you know, and I think that's a trick a lot of people know of. I think a lot of people do something like that to, you know, make sure breathing gets started. But I guess I've never really thought super far, like, beyond that. Like, what if that trick doesn't work, or what if there are other issues at hand?
Dr. Joe Armstrong:The biggest thing that we're trying to do, like you said, is we're just trying to get them to take a big inhale. We want them to gasp, basically. So, you just need to go, like, walk through all the things that would make you do that. Right? So one of the things that I tell people, and it seems really counterintuitive, is you don't catch the calf.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:When the calf comes out of the cow, you know, even if you're on concrete, you know, that might seem a little harsh. I try to, like, yes. I don't want their head slamming into the concrete. So I'll catch the head, but I'll let everything else hit the ground pretty hard because that shock of hitting the ground will cause them
Dr. Joe Armstrong:to take a big breath.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:So that's one thing and it seems strange. Right? But you don't wanna, like, gently lay this calf on the ground. You want them to hit the ground and know that they're they've arrived.
Emily Krekelberg:And I have seen Joe teaching with Helga and explaining this to people 20 times in a row at least. So yes, I I know that that part too is, yeah, letting those calves fall. And we had held at the women and egg conference, and so I think, specifically, the farm women were a little, you know, nurturing, like, well, you wanna just drop a newborn baby on the ground. Right? But yeah.
Emily Krekelberg:And so it was interesting to hear Joe really talk through of, like, why we do this. And it's a matter of still doing it gently, you know, we aren't trying to cause harm, but we need to let gravity do some of its work to help us get that calf breathing too.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Exactly. So that that's what the first step is. Just let them hit the ground. You know, after that, the straw is a really big piece of what we're trying to do. And and really, you know, I don't I like talking in positives.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:I don't I don't like telling people what not to do. But at the same time, you know, what we commonly see, especially on the beef side for whatever reason, is the immediate response is to hang that calf upside down. Grab them by the ankles and hang them upside down or put them over a gate or something. And that that's really the wrong thing to do, and we wanna avoid that as much as possible. So the the traditional view of why we do that is that when you do that, something comes out of their liquid, comes out of their mouth and their nose.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Now that's not coming from their lungs. All that liquid that comes out of their mouth and their nose comes from their stomach, comes from their abomasum. So we're not clearing the lungs by hanging them upside down. We're actually making it more difficult for them to breathe by make hanging them upside down because everything in their stomach, all of their contents of their abdomen is now forced by gravity into the diaphragm, and they can't take a deep breath, which is what we need them to do. The one thing I'm gonna tell you not to do for the most part is do not hang them upside down.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Do not swing them around. Don't put them over the gate. All you're doing is making it more difficult for that calf to breathe.
Emily Krekelberg:I would imagine too, since that's stomach fluid or wherever it's coming from, there's probably a risk of then the calf aspirating that if it does take a breath upside down like that too. Right?
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Absolutely. It it definitely could cause some aspiration, especially because they are not ready to protect their airway yet. I mean, they just hit they just hit the ground. So, they they want to take a big gasping breath. And so if there is liquid there present that you don't want or excessive amounts, yeah, they could aspirate right away with their first breath.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:So the straw is probably a good piece to start with too, but I like to before I do anything with that calf, this will this will make Emily happy. There's some safety considerations in mind. Right? You especially if you have a calf jack in place. Right?
Dr. Joe Armstrong:You you cannot leave that attached to the cow, because now she starts swinging around. You've got a calf and a calf jack attached to the cow, and she can flail things around, and that's not good for anyone. But we also need to not ignore the cow when we're talking about trying to re revitalize or or bring this calf back. Right? If you bring the calf on the ground and you immediately bend over it and you're working right there on trying to get this calf woke up, you are at the perfect height to just get kicked in the head by the cow.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:So the first step is actually to get that calf away from the back end of the cow where you can work safely without having to worry about the cow. Now, we can't do that when we're working with Helga because I don't want to create a giant trail of lube across the floor of wherever we're we're working, but just leave the chains on that calf that are already there, grab them and drag that calf somewhere else. That's the first step so you can be safe and concentrate on the calf without having to worry about getting kicked. Then we put that calf in a recovery position, which means we can sit up sternally on its chest. That allows both sides to be able to expand.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:If we're laying flat, then only really one side of the chest can expand, so we need both, and that's why we put them in that recovery position. Then we're back to tickling that nose with a piece of straw, clean straw, and jamming your fingers in the septum, whatever you can to make that calf want to, like, snort because after you sneeze or snort, your first reaction is to take that big breath. So that's what we're looking for. After that, you can also take your knuckles and think if you have a younger sibling or an older sibling, if they've ever held you down and dug their knuckles into your chest. That's what we're doing to this calf as well, but we're doing it in those last few ribs on the sides, and there's a nerve there that can help that calf recognize that it needs to take a big breath.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:So we're doing that as well. There's not a whole lot left after that, but if you think about what makes you take a big breath, jumping into cold water is one of those things. So we can take some cold water and splash it on the back of the calf's neck a little bit and sometimes just over their ears. I don't like to get it on their face. I think that's just, it's just mean, really, honestly.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:And you just need the cold sensation to make them take that big deep breath. So that that's kind of our set of things that we do right away to get that calf ready to go. If they're breathing, if they're kinda borderline, it does help to get mom on that calf and let mom really get to town licking that calf. So that's kind of the the things I would do, and I would never hang a calf upside down or swing it around. After that, we're down to drugs, really.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:You know, we're talking about some things that veterinarians carry to to kinda stimulate breathing and stuff like that, but not something that that farmers are gonna have on hand usually.
Brad Heins:Can, Brad play devil's advocate today?
Emily Krekelberg:What do you mean today? Like, it's just a special occasion today?
Brad Heins:Exactly. So here's my my dilemmas. What why do we even have to touch the calf after it's born? I get that there are circumstances where if it's if you've assisted the birth or had to use a calf jack to get it out, you might need it help to start breathing. But if a calf is born without assistance and it's there, why not just leave it alone?
Brad Heins:That's what, you know, it it seems intuitive. I know we wanna go in and help and make sure that it's alright and make sure that it's breathing, but shouldn't isn't the cow supposed to take care of that by helping lick it and do everything? And, you know, here in Morris, at our dairy, a lot of animals are born without assistance. They have to be born from 5 o'clock at night till 5 o'clock next morning without really anybody watching outside of a camera. So and, yes, we have some stillbirth, but not anything out of the ordinary.
Brad Heins:So shouldn't we just leave them alone?
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Yeah. And I should have been more clear. This is only when we have assisted calvings. So, like, when we are we're assisting and we need to help and it's a tough pull, this that's what I'm talking about in this situation. Otherwise, yeah, absolutely.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:We should be interfering as little as possible in the entire process. Every time, especially when that cow has already started calving and she's in stage 2, especially of labor, just the every time you interrupt you're delaying everything that much further because these cows are programmed evolutionarily to stop calving if they feel stressed so that they can run or get away or do something. Right? So they need to be in a quiet space where they feel very comfortable and they're not bothered at all. That is the goal.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Let them handle everything and stay out of the process as much as possible. What we're talking about today is really just if this is a tough pull and assisted calving. And even if it is a tough pull with an assisted calving where we're really having to work at it, If I get that calf on the ground, I drag it away from mom real quick, I sit it up, and I notice it's breathing and shaking its head and snorting and doing all that, I'm done. Take the chains off and walk away. Now we've missed a key step in all of this.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Right? Once there's a calf on the ground and you just had a tough pull, what's what's the next step? And the calf's fine. We've taken care of the calf. The calf is doing okay.
Emily Krekelberg:Gotta check mom.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:You gotta check mom. There might be another calf in there. A lot of times when we have malpositioned calves, especially breaches, it's because there's twins. So we gotta go in and see if there's another calf. So we gotta get that calf out if there's one.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:If that calf comes out, hits the ground doing fine, you go back in and check for another one. So you just keep going back until there's no more calves. So if you've delivered twins, don't assume there's not a third. If you delivered a 3rd, don't assume there's not a 4th or something else going on that you need to find out. Then we can check mom for tears once we've got all the calves out, make sure we don't have any sowing to do and or antibiotics that need to be given for partial tears and things that are going on there.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:And then we can let mom go because we want to have access to all that, get all that stress for her out of the way. Let's get the treatments done. Let's get the sewing done. Let's get everything done so that she can just focus on her calf, and we don't have to bother that bonding that she's going to to have at that point. We don't wanna interfere with that.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:So there's a lot to think about, but I I mean, Brad, I totally agree. If we can be as uninvolved as possible, that's the goal. That is absolutely the goal.
Emily Krekelberg:And I think you kinda brought up an important point, Joe, of like and then, Brad, you were saying, you know, from 5 PM to 5 AM, you know, your cows are kinda on their own. Right. And, you know, we're humans, so we like to fiddle and futz and be involved. And I think that's an important point, Joe, of, like, most cows should be fine. You know, I think we've all maybe been to different operations or seen some places where decisions are made of, like, if if we're there and the calf's coming out, we're gonna pull it, even if there's not indications that assistance is needed.
Emily Krekelberg:And so, you know, I kinda wanna roll that message into this too that, you know, we're really talking, you know, these are cases where assistance is needed. If it's not needed, you know, keep your distance, of course, do some observation, make sure everything looks okay. You know, but like Joe said, if you get that calf out on an assisted birth and it's fine right away, your assistance is no longer needed
Dr. Joe Armstrong:at that point.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Just leave it alone. Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, this whole process and even the even the process of calving itself, I I'm of the mind that I don't mind if it's a little stressful for that calf. I want it to be.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:You know? They they need they're coming into the world. They need a
Dr. Joe Armstrong:little bit of stress to stimulate, to get them going. So if you pull that calf out before it's truly ready to be on the ground and it hasn't had the opportunity to to come through that birth canal at its own pace and everything. I don't I'm not convinced that that's a good thing in any way. You know, obviously, backwards calves or malposition calves are different, but if they're coming normal and the timeline is working, which we did an episode about calving and when to intervene. You know, if the timeline works and they're making progress, just stay stay out of the stay out of it.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Just stay out of the process. You know, beef guys, there's lots of cameras now. I don't know if Brad uses cameras to check on calvings, but you don't even have to get out of bed to check anymore. So that's an option. And then binoculars.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:If you're gonna check cows and you wanna see what's going on, then just binoculars. Like, stay away from the cow so she can just get on with what she's doing.
Brad Heins:We are putting cameras in the barn where where we calve. I think it's just essential for us. You know, sometimes it's always difficult to you know, I don't necessarily like that we CAV unassisted for a long period of time, but even if we just look on the on, you know, online or on a app and go, oh, well, maybe we should go check out that calf. She seems to be in labor for, extended period of time. What's going on?
Brad Heins:So we we I am putting cameras in just because I think it's another insurance policy, even though we've probably gone a long time without them, but I just think it's it's kind of one of those things that anything to help management, like, we always go back to.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Yeah. And I I think, you know, even with cameras, it is difficult sometimes to then you know, it feels like a long time if you're just sitting there watching this cow. Right? But you you need to give her some time. Right?
Dr. Joe Armstrong:If everything looks normal, you've got 2 front feet and a nose. Stage 2 starts with the appearance of a water bag or the calf, and you start the timer. K? So you start a 30 minute timer whenever you notice, Doesn't you don't have to try to figure out when they actually started or whatever it is. Whenever you notice water, bag, or calf, 30 minute timer on a cow.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:And if they haven't made progress in that 30 minutes, then you it's time to go. I mean, it's just 30 minutes to wait, and that is totally reasonable. On a heifer, we just change that to an hour, and then I'd like to not sit and stare at the camera. Right? It's like watching the water boil.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:You have to come back every 10 or 15 minutes and check, and then it's easy to see has there been progress or not. And if there has, you're golden. If not, then we can jump in at 30 minutes. So it's not long to wait, but don't sit there and stare at the camera. You're just gonna stress yourself out.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:But it's better than going in and checking the cow in person at least.
Emily Krekelberg:Yeah. You know, and it makes me think of other conversations we've had too. Right? Of, like, every cow is gonna be a little different. Right?
Emily Krekelberg:Like, just like people. Like, some births happen very fast, and some take a lot of time. You know? And I think part of it too is just trusting your gut. That's what I try to remind a lot of farmers of, like, you're the experts in this already.
Emily Krekelberg:You've already done it. And I think that, yeah, you're keeping an eye on a cow, and maybe the progress is slow, but there's progress, you know, when you check every half an hour. So so don't let your impatience, you know, get in the way of of, you know, that cow having a healthy birth for that calf. It's also just a little bit of tempering our own expectations and kind of reining ourselves in a little bit too because I know, like, wait 2 more hours for this calf to get on the ground, or I can just pull it out now and it's done and I don't have to worry. But are you making the best decision for you and your convenience or the best decision for that cow and calf?
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Agreed. Agreed. And I think the other thing that surprises people when we talk about it so far when I've had Helga out is we talk about what happens in a normal calving and when that cow usually takes a break. So if you watch a cow calve and it's a normal calving and she's laying down, once that chest of the calf is out completely, she usually stops pushing, and that's totally fine. That's absolutely fine.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:The calf is out. It can breathe. The chest can expand. There's no rush at this point for the cow. So she takes a break usually for a couple minutes, and that's totally fine.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Don't freak out at that point. There's a couple of things that are happening. There's no rush, so she gets to take a break. She's tired. She just went through this whole process.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:So she wants to take a break, and that's what she should do. And it allows everything to kind of adjust. Right? Because remember, the pelvis is not a circle. The pelvis is an oval and it's taller than it is wide.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:So that calf, when it's coming out, needs to kinda twist and fit its different body parts to the shape of the pelvis. So when we have our widest part, the hips, the hips need to come through basically up and down with the calf. The calf cannot come out upright or sternal. It has to come out on its side because that pelvis is an oval, And those hips then match the shape of the pelvis if that calf is on its side. So another thing that's happening while that cow is taking a break and pausing is that calf gets a chance to shift around and try to get everything matched up to the pelvis.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:And usually what you see is after that 2 minutes, especially with a cow, one more big push and the calf comes flying out the back. That's another thing that we've talked about a lot is is, again, there's a lot more time that you have, than you think a lot of the time. And just take that time to step back and slow down and make sure you're making the right decision for the cow and the calf. Start the timer like we've talked about before, when you see certain stages and look for progress. And then, like Brad said, just stay out of the cow's way as much as you can because they can handle it on their own.
Emily Krekelberg:Yeah. And I just wanna back up what you were saying a little bit with with the biology too. You know, we know when a female mammal is giving birth, their uterus is contracting. Right? And so, like, in humans, you push when there's a contraction.
Emily Krekelberg:And the cow knows that, you know, so if the cow is taking a break, because it's probably not having any contractions also. So if you're trying to yank a calf out when the cow is not contracting, that can also, you know, make it harder for you, the calf, the cow, the everybody. So it's just kind of that, like, remember the way the natural cycle works as well, is that, yeah, there's not always a problem, but she's maybe, yeah, between contractions. So she's taking a break. Things are shifting, catching her breath.
Emily Krekelberg:So, yes, not a sign that something is wrong.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Trust that 1000000 of years of evolution have led to this cow knowing what to do, and you gotta give her some credit and trust her, and trust what you're seeing. And a lot of times, going slower and smoother is actually better for everybody. And in the long run, it ends up being faster rather than trying to yank things around and move things without the help of her. I mean, it's very humbling if you've never done a calving before, if you've never worked on a cow, her uterus is stronger than your whole body. And you just gotta come to grips with that that she's stronger than you, and even just a small part of her body is stronger than all of you and you you need you need her help most of the time.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:So let let her help. Okay. I think that covers what we needed to talk about today. We've got plenty on tape, and it's all stuff that I've noticed just the last few weeks having Helga out and about, and questions that repeatedly come up. And I think this whole what to do with the calf when it's on the ground is is huge.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Don't forget to prioritize your own safety. Get that calf away from mom just so you can focus without having to worry about getting kicked or stepped on or anything like that. And then follow the steps and don't hang them upside down. Straightforward, I think. Stay out of the way when possible.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Let mom do things on her own if if at all possible. Alright. Wrap us up.
Emily Krekelberg:Alright. Well, if you have any questions, comments, or scathing rebuttals about today's episode, you can email us at themoosroom@umn.edu. You can also call and leave us a voice mail at 612-624-3610. Find us on the web, extension.umn.edu and on Twitter @UMNmoosroom, @UMNFarmSafety and, of course, find Bradley on Instagram. Check out all of his cool magic toys that he has at @UMNwcrocdairy.
Emily Krekelberg:And that's a wrap. Bye.
Brad Heins:Bye.
Dr. Joe Armstrong:Bye.
