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Kaukauna WI | Three calves got to be almost three weeks old without incident after losing ten in a row. Then we had a calf born on Feb 16 and three more on Feb 17. We were nervous about them as you can imagine. We even thought about selling them before they died but then we are just not that kind of people. We want to be able to man up and face this beast head-on.
None of the newer calves drank on the morning of Feb 22, but they didn't look sick at all. So hubby just kept an eye on them throughout the day. By 2:00 pm, the oldest one was lying flat, eyes sunk in so you couldn't hardly see them. The vet happened to be there for herd health. He veined it with lactated ringers and gave it gentocin. After he left, hubby sub'qd 4 more bottles of lactated ringers before 8 pm and gave it 5cc Baytril. He got it to stay propped up anyhow but couldn't hold it's head up and at 9 he gave it another bottle of lactated ringers. The eyes didn't look the greatest, the mouth was cold both inside and out and it clamped down on my hand like crazy. That usually means imminent death. It was scouring like mad. But there was no more that could be done. I checked it at midnite and it looked the same. I was sure it would be dead in the morning. But in the morning it looked a little better, and by 10 a.m. it drank 1 qt electrolytes. By 2 in the afternoon it got up. It's been doing good. The other three never got sick. They were normal the evening of the 22nd.
These calves got Calf-Guard instead of First Defense. None of these calves were put in a hut, they all stayed in the barn.
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Scours update
