My cow is down (used to be "Red Cell for anemic cow") updated 1/15

[dragonmorgan]

Ugh I had it all typed out and ready to post and then just exited out like a dope. Here goes again.

I was mistaken when I called her a cow. It is a bad habit to call them all cows. She is a heifer. She has never even been around a bull and for the past 4 months or so she has been the only heifer in the yard. But the other one was younger than her. Anyway I just got in from checking this stuff out and here is what I found.

Her temp is 102.6 but I am not sure what to do to bring it down.

When I pinched her tail on the tip she felt it and tried to move her tail, when I pinched it in the middle she looked back at me and tried to move it and when I pinched the top she swung her head back at me and shifted around a bit.

I pinched her legs and although it took a min she did feel it and try and move them. She only seemed to notice when I pinched the ones she wasn't layin on tho. I don't think she noticed when I pinched the back leg she was layin on. It's been about 2 hrs since I rolled her over though so I will go back out in a few and shift her. I can recheck that leg if you think I need to.

Her anal region does not look swollen or discolored to me and there isn't anything draining from her vaginal area either. I took a pic of it if you would like me to post it though just in case I am wrong on this.

Her front knees and back ankles look a little swollen but it is hard to tell. I am not saying that she wasn't underweight because she was so I don't know if that is just how they look or if something is wrong. I felt of them and they felt warm but not super hot or anything. Again this is one area I have no clue what I am looking at though. Is the vet the only place I can get banamine from? Also her joints didn't feel squishy and her legs move alright but she is a bit stowed up from bein down so long.

I pushed on her hips although I wasn't sure what would be too hard. I didn't hear or feel anything and she didn't seem to notice really.

Front knee

Back ankle

I tried to take a video just so you can see her. Maybe you will see something about her behavior I am missing. Shes not really doin much though.


If I missed anything let me know.

 

[dragonmorgan]

O and as for her dosings. We give 5 ml of b12 every other day and gave her 10 gms of probios (the recommended dose for cows under 400 lbs). I am not sure about the wormer since DH gave it to her and I will have to ask him when he gets up. Any guesses on her weight would be appreciated. I have just been so afraid of overdosing her is all.

 

[WildRoseBeef]

Use your thumb and forefinger and pinch the skin at her neck to see if she's dehydrated. If it goes back right away she's not, if it doesn't, then there might be another symptom to the problem with this poor lil' gal...

 

[dragonmorgan]

It went back right away.

 

[WildRoseBeef]

It went back right away.

Good to hear!

 

[Cricket]

If it were mine, I'd try getting the vet out. Maybe you could e-mail him these photos?

 

[dragonmorgan]

I talked to her back when she had only been down a few days and she wouldn't even come take a look. I doubt if she will be interested in seeing her now that she has been down over a week. We are talking to a friend who knows a retired vet that he calls for advice and we are hoping that maybe he will help us out some with her. I have been searching for any other large animal vets in our area too. Maybe I will get lucky and find one willing to help. My budget isn't endless though so I have to be mindful of how much each new thing is costing. I wish we had more options that is for sure but this close to Christmas and us with only one income puts us having to be careful.

 

[redtailgal]

102.6 is a good temp, within normal and no reason to be concerned.

I showed the pics to hubby without giving him any information. He estimated her to be about 12 weeks old. This is a problem. She should be ALOT bigger than this.

To be blunt: Your heifer has a serious problem. She needs to be thoroughly vetted, a complete fecal and SOLID bloodwork done. I suspect that had some point in her youth she had severe coccidia, and her growth was severely stunted. Have you had her long enough to know her pediatric history? Did she ever scour really bad? A bad coccidia infection can hit a calf and even though they recover it can cause some nasty internal damage that stunts their growth, and at times will cause them to eventually lose weight, get weak and go down, only to starve to death, even though they are being fed exorbitant amounts of feed. The coccidia damages the digestive tract so that the proper nutrition cannot be absorbed into the body, thus causing starvation.

Another thing to consider here is her hooves. The hoof shown in one of the pics is in pretty rough shape. It needs to be properly trimmed, which is alarming as most cattle shouldnt need their hooves trimmed.

We would estimate her at about 400-450 pounds. A small sized two year old heifer should weigh about 1000 lbs.

`If you cannot see a vet:

Redose the Ivermectin at 500 lbs. (its a heavy dose but it wont hurt her) repeat it in 10 days. Use INJECTABLE and inject it.

Lay the probios to her.........you cannot overdose the stuff, so dont worry about it. I'd double the recommended dose.

Repeat the Redcell every 72 hours until you see her pinking up.

I would like to see the pic of her anal/vaginal area.

Check her hoof walls carefully for cracks or splits (look between the claws). Note any heat within the hooves.

When your hubby got her up as you described in post 7........did she fall back down or lay herself down? If you can remember, please describe how she fell or laid down.

 

[jhm47]

If this animal is truly 2 years old, she has MAJOR problems. In comparing her size with the 5 gallon bucket in the picture, I would estimate her weight at less than 300 lbs, probably closer to 250 or so. She has either been grossly underfed, or she has major digestive problems and/or severe parasite problems.

To begin with, what have you been feeding her? Is her hay good, green, not dusty, and sweet smelling? Grass hay or alfalfa? Have you given her any grain, and how much? Do you deworm her regularly, using different wormers with different modes of action? Ivomec is a great product, but many areas now have worms that are immune to it. I would suggest another wormer like Safeguard.

No matter what, I would never try to breed her. She's definitely not of breeding quality. Good luck!

 

[dragonmorgan]

I have always figured her growth to be stunted but we didn't raise her ourselves so I am really not sure of all the details of her while she was on the bottle. This is what I do know.

A neighbor friend of ours had some calves that needed to be bottle raised. I don't remember exactly why but I think her mom died. Not sure about the other calves. Anyway there were 4 calves all together I think and my sister in laws boyfriend ended up building a small pen beside his house and being the one to care for them. I don't know about any problems they may have run into with the calves but she was the only one to survive. The boyfriend knows nothing about cattle and has no desire to learn either. I don't even know why he agreed to take care of them all and I wouldn't be surpised if they had something like coccidia. Anyway after she was weaned she was moved to a pen where my FIL puts the calves he is fattening up to sell. I'm not sure what her diet was like there although I imagine it consisted mostly of grain with little to no hay and no grass. A few months after she was moved there we got another bottle baby from the same neighbor and this time me and DH said we would raise it. Once we got a pen ready at our house we moved the new bottle baby to our house and because I was worried about this cow at the time too we said we were taking her as a friend.

Once she got to our house she started getting hay and feed and I halter trained her so she could graze our yard. She always seemed small for her age though and was hard to get any real weight on. At the time we should have realized it was something. I can call the vet and see if she will at least run some blood work and fecal tests for me. Is there a way to tell from the tests if a history of coccidia is her problem. I certainly don't want to keep pulling her along if it is something that is only going to starve her to death in the end.

All I have of the Ivermectin is the pour on kind but I think that is all the store had. Not 100% sure. Would the pour on kind work ok for us or is the injectable what we really need to do?

Is hoof trimming something I can do. Is there some reason why the hooves aren't wearing themselves down?

We gave another dose of probios today (10gms again) should I just squirt her with the whole syringe or split it into a few big doses?

We have been giving iron shots to her instead of the red cell since I was told it would be better. She got one injection a few days ago and another today since it says you have to wait a few days between doses.

When DH got her up in that post he was holding up the majority of her weight on the back side. He lifts the back end and I pull her front end up and get her front legs under her. Usually she helps us out some and can keep her front up but only for a min or 2. Then she starts to lean and her front legs begin to buckle. At which point we lower her rear back down and shes back in the layin position. The day after she got her iron and b12 shot she really put some effort into getting up. DH said she was taking more of her weight than usual and I didn't have to help her lift her front or keep her balance. She managed that for about 3 or 4 mins and we encouraged her to try and take a step and stretch her legs but her strength ran out and she went back down. This was the first time she had ever not been lowered into a normal laying position, she just kind of layed to the side and we had to help her up like she was sposed to be but she kept herself up from there.

She has been mainly eating grass with some feed and hay. Not feed everyday and not free choice hay. She had never been wormed which I will be the first to admit was one of our biggest mistakes in all this (not the only mistake but the biggest). She has had one worming treatment since she has been down though and we used Ivermectin. It was all the store had and the guy helping me said it would work on the blood suckers. I would like to get some cydectin in her though because I heard it works better against the immune parasites. If she never breeds that will be fine with me. She was mostly to be a pet anyway.