It’s definitely my favorite time of year, around the farm! Our cows have started calving! But it’s also a time to be extra vigilant. We bring our cows home this time of year, so we can easily check on them regularly & often. But what do you watch for & how do you know when a cow is about ready to calve?! Here is what we mentally check for, when we check our mamas!
Gestation. A cow’s gestation is 9 months. So, we keep records of when we put our bulls in & go from there! We do not AI & we don’t typically ultrasound. Those would give us more accurate estimates but we rely mostly on Mother Nature.
Milk production. It is easy to visually inspect a cow’s udder, to tell if milk production has started. You could also feel the udder & it would be hard, due to its fullness.
Backend. No delicate way to word it but we visually inspect the cow’s backend. The vulva will swell & start to loosen up. This will indicate that labor is close.
Isolation. The cow will go off by herself, to an area away from the herd. Each cow is different as to how far in advance she will start to isolate but this helps to give us an idea that calving is close.
Synchronization. Our cows cycle together naturally each month. Our goal is a 60 day calving window. If a cow falls outside of this window, we would then look at reevaluating the need to possibly cull her.
Comfort. We can tell if a cow is progressing by her comfort level. She will lay down, stand up, move to another area & lay down again. She will repeat this again & again, trying to get comfortable.
Watchful eye. We try to check them 3 times daily throughout our calving season. But we also try not to disturb them, as this can delay progress. Some outfits use calving sensors, which are temperature sensitive or triggered by labor contractions or tail movement. We use none of these but they are commercially available.
A caveat to the above is when you’re dealing with heifers. Since they’ve never calved before, their systems take a little longer to prime for labor. They tend to give less warning, before calving. And they may need assistance during the calving process. So, we just keep an extra close eye on them. All in all, calving season is a joyous time for us. But it is definitely more work & can be stressful at times but overall, very, very worth it. Especially seeing those adorable faces-smitten doesn’t even begin to describe the feeling!!
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