Had a fr heifer calf born this morning in cubicle shed. Cow due 15th January. I served a few in early April as I was penalised for not supplying enough milk last January. A sexed mo salah calf. All good. Best of luck for calving 2022
Little Hamlet heifer out of an On Dit 2nd calver a week old,was hoping for a bull
^Quality animal.
Had a bunch of calves yesterday. Nothing else happening so collapsed into bed for a few hours at 3. Woke up at half 7 to find a calf had smothered in the waterbag. You can't get a break this time of year!
That's cruel to hear, and even if you were there you need something very sharp to cut it, it is fairly slippy tough membrane
I always carry a knife for cutting silage bales with me and have a spare stanley in the calving supply box for just that purpose.
I think if it is a very easy calving, the cow doesn't put enough pressure on the bag to burst it. Saw it happen here once when the cow suddenly popped out the calf. Small calf and cow with big hips.
Thats an interesting observation. The calf was bigger than most of the others but I do recall her grandmother having waterbag problems and having to rescue calves several years in a row.
Had a second calver calf to Claragh Neymar (LM5413) during the night at just 281 days. Found the calf covered in sh1te in the yard this morning. Cold and shivering. I checked the cow's pins at midnight and only the slightest sign of dropping. Fuming as I checked Neymar on ICBF and he's 286 days, so I was expecting her to calf a bit early. She drank the cow dry when I got her in the calving gate and she stopped shivering after 15 mins or so under the infrared lamp.
Funny thing is the cow's mother before her did the exact same thing twice to me. never dropped the pins and always calved in the sh1te. Wouldn't even lay on the cubicles.
A few of the rare breed calves, an amazing variety in them this year. Mostly bulls, but all alive and healthy so that's the main thing. Rare breeds should be embraced in this country rather than questioned. Can thrive on minimal inputs and therefore leave a much smaller carbon footprint.
Is there an exemption from tagging the rare breed calves. The rest of us have to do them when they are born.
Don't you have 21 days or something normally
My understanding was you had 20 day's to tag and a further 7 day's to register, that being 27 day's from birth to have tagged and registered irrespective of breed.
The rest of us don't have to do them when they are born. Calves can be tagged up until 20 days old or before leaving the premises which ever is soonest. I understand that from July the requirement is to have newborn calves tagged with a eid set. I imagine that this requirement is as soon as reasonably practicable.
None of the ones pictured are more than a week old. No need for snide comments either.
I'd be tagging them anyway for identification purposes. No rush in registering them.
Register every Sunday night here, tag as soon as born and write it down as I'd forget
The only calves that have to be tagged straight away are those using DNA tags as you have to have the DNA results before registering at 37 days old, otherwise is each farmer to their own
Nice calves, what all breeds are you using
Thanks, all out of Droimeann stock bull out of mostly continental cows. Have two Droimeann cows that just had their second calves out of him and couldnt get over the massive dug they have this year. Apparently the were used as dairy animals way back in the day and you'd well believe it seeing those two. Rest of the cows are LMX, CHX, SHX. All calved quite easily and unassisted which is always nice.
We’ll done, hopefully all works out.
Could be an option here in the future
What are DNA tags? Are they tags for pedigree stock?
For sure, there's also talk of a premium for rare breeds in the new eco scheme coming in CAP 2023 next year.
It started with about 100 Pedigree herds, now there 4000 herds of all types
You tag all calves with both DNA and BVD send the dna for Weatherbys to confirm parents. For extra you can get the myostatin results from the same sample at a later time
I think someday all calves will be dna registered
I think in GLAS you has to be registered with the rear breeds to count, having rare breed cattle wasn’t enough. If you’re not registered it could be worthwhile doing it this year
Droimeanns only got recognized as a breed in 2018 but not included in GLAS as rare breed. The hope is that the new scheme will include them. The society is in contact with the department over it.
Registered wrong A.i sire to one of the calves here, is there an option to be able to alter mistake on the website?
If you did it this morning on Agfood, there is a facility to fix it before midday
Half way through calving this morning. Of 10 cows that were AI'd to high replacement index bulls I got...........2 heifers. But the 8 bulls are looking great anyway.
Heifers are 2-3 weeks away from calving. They were set to leave the slats this morning for straw bedding and some later calving ones going out to grass for 2 weeks. One last night just seemed to far ahead with her udder and behaviour so moved her off before going to bed. Woke up to find her calf up and suckling. That could have been disastrous!
Update...still no calf's!!
Although the first 2 cows will spend tonight in the maternity ward even though i don't think they'll calf tonight.
I’ve a SIX cow in calf to a CH that’s gonna be 300 days in calf tomorrow. She’s fairly big to be fair. Should I be worried? Anyone else have something similar before? I thought if it was twins it should be here by now.
Keep a spreadsheet record of how each one presens before birth. You will find they will do much the same every year.
