It was the end of the day and the sky was overcast. Still fairly cold; the sun never really came out to warm the air or the soils. As a new "Father" I eagerly opened the gate to the pasture and started my trek up to the new calf. I was on the watch for all the other cows; when there is a newborn they tend to follow me closely as I approach the new addition. They also spot where the mother is, and if she is near the calf guarding it they tend to lay back and let her do her protective thing.
And that is where I found D44A, standing over the calf. Well, not exactly. She was easily 15 or 20 feet away, but quite aware of my approaching, moving her eyes from me to the calf, back to me and then the calf. I stopped short to try to make sure the mother didn't consider me a threat. I stood and watched. Mom did nothing.
But something was seriously wrong. The calf had not really moved from where I saw it this morning. It had been born in a pool of mud, with its head barely above the muck. By now the calf should have at least been on its wobbly legs to get some warm cow's milk, and I didn't see where that might have happened. The new mother didn't seem to have a clue as to what to do.....that is, nose the calf out of the mud and coerce it into grabbing a tit full of milk.
Just a month before I had an incident where I blamed myself for not acting fast enough to save an animal. It was a goat then that seemed out of sorts, and by the time I brought it to the vet it had passed. It was a sad day then and I took it personally. I wasn't going to let it happen this time. I knew if I walked away the calf would sink further into the mud and perish overnight. I had to take action even at the risk of the cow charging me.
So here I was, wearing my western barn jacket and a lined pair of work gloves, I slowly walked towards the calf. Mom watched me but didn't make a move. When a cow is pissed it may make a head drop, or maybe a hoof stomp. Sometimes they just charge. Ugh. But she didn't even step towards me.
I try to understand this in human behavior terms. It was very cold that day, and up until then eating hay was the primary decision to be made; store up some carbos to get through the night. Licking off mud just didn't seem like a better alternative. As a new mom she didn't have any past experiences to rely on for the proper procedure for nurturing a baby. The calf was an inconvenience, and I was there to resolve this indifference.
I reached in the glob of mud, put my arms around the calf who was too tired and too cold to even whine. I brought it up to my chest, not caring about how my jacket would look. I just wanted this calf to survive; it wasn't going to die on my watch.
I slowly walked down to the gate, opened it up, went on the other side and locked it back up. Mom never followed and the other cows basically said "if she doesn't care, neither do we". Back to eating hay......there is another cold night ahead of us. (TBC)
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