Dead bottle calf

[Dozer45]

On monday we purchased a bottle baby from a gal who had picked him up at the sale barn two weeks ago. He was an itty bitty little guy so we were shocked to hear that she believed him to be a month old. Once home we started looking at him, he had a pretty good set of teeth going but still had a dried chord on his belly. Long story short he went down hill really fast this morning and we lost him. My questions are

How old would you place him at?
and how long do calves last without colostrum without getting sick?
( had a colt not get colostrum once and the vet gave him 10 days or so. On day 11 she went down hill within hours and died)

 

[linnettejane]

i personally would never buy a calf from the sale barn...why is that calf there in the first place?  mother died giving birth? wouldnt accept the baby?  whatever the reason, you really have no idea whether or not the calf received colostrum w/in 6 hours of birth, which i believe is what is needed for it to survive...if they dont get it soon enough, they will die...which is probably what happened in your case, even though it was on the bottle, in my opinion...i think it usually happens within 2-3 weeks of birth...if im wrong, im sure someone will correct me

 

[kfacres]

7 days w/o colostrum around here it seems they live- unless you can get the 'fake' powdered stuff down them ASAP- then they can live, but still will not thrive. 

I doubt it was a month old- as it most likely would not have died so rapidly.. they are pretty tough at that stage- unless they scour.  most baby calves that are sold through the sale barn are less than a week old.  if someone is willing to put the time and money into getting them much older-- they'll keep them for their self. 

buying baby calves from the sale barn is a terrible choice- most end up with scours like crazy--


wait as I typed that someone else typed the same thing, but beat me to the punch.

 

[farmboy]

you've got 24 hours to get colostrum in there actually

 

[Angus2131]

I agree with Zach. You have about 24hr window and I would not go past that. Calves are born without immune systems so the sooner the better. Also to agree with others as well I would never buy one from a sale barn. Sorry that you had to go through that!

 

[cowcrazy]

I have probably bought over 50 calves from the sale barn, BUT I usually buy the ones that are brought in as cow/calf pairs and they are split up in the ring because the cow is either a cheater mouth or has a broken mouth and they can't sell them as a pair. Normally we give them Nursemate ASAP and put them on a milk cow. I have only lost one calf doing it this way. Sorry for your loss.....

 

[jaimiediamond]

The general rule of thumb for all calves is to get colostrum within the first 24 hours, I try and get the unwanted twins colostrum within the first 6 hours preferably from milk from a cow that also calved that day, or the less desirable scenario with the powder replacement.  I wouldn't ever pick up a bottle calf without knowing the producer it was coming from as it would be a quick way to spread scours, diphtheria and other calf ailments.  

 

[kfacres]

how did we get from talking about how long a calf will live without colostrum- to how soon a calf needs colostrum? 

I think it was about 2 under my first post...

 

[Dozer45]

We knew the risk we where taking with him to bad we were right  :'(

And yes we were asking how long will they live without it.

Thank you guys for your help

 

[farmboy]

for some reason I misread Janes post as "you've got 6 hours to get colostrum in the calf". My mistake.

Last year we had a calf who by all means looked like he was getting milk then died. We kept him alive for 3 weeks before we found out the the whole udder was plugged up.

 

[Angus2131]

I made the same mistake too  (lol). I do apologize. I have seen calves live for about 2 weeks then they died. We have been fortunate enough that we haven't had that issue "knock on wood" but I have friends that have had this happen. Again Dozer45 sorry it happened to you. You tried and we all live and learn. Sometimes it doesn't have the outcome we hoped for. 

 

[willow]

In the past we have had some trouble with our bucket calf ventures and then inevitably you have a broken hearted child.  This year we went about it a bit different we assumed the calf had, had nothing, no colostrum,  no injections of any kind and I will be the first to say we have had much better luck.  Better luck next time.  Don't forget in our area it is super important to give the C & D Antitoxin. 

 

[Dozer45]

Willow, I work at Murdochs and there is an indefinate run on the antitoxin nobody can get it!! Thank you guys for all your help, we have to just take this as a learning experience as sad as it may be. We learned to tube better while trying to save him so next time we can do more for our calves.