A tiny, tiny wee one was born on the farm recently.
She was only the size of her mothers head. We guessed her weight to be about 25 pounds. Less than half of a normal newborn weight.
Her mom (Princess) jumped the fence and put herself in with the bull No one noticed one extra beige jersey running with the other ones.
At least not until she calved and we saw it was her! So youngish mother and early born baby.
It kept getting up but couldnt find the udder and Princess kept turning away from it. She seemed to feel her job was done.
I debated leaving it over night to see if they could work it out together but I knew that was probably not going to happen given the low birthweight and the mothers immaturity.
After going back and forth with myself all afternoon (It was born early afternoon) I ended up waiting too long to get any of the guys to help me, everyone was gone their various ways.I ended up climbing the fence at 8:30 that night with a flashlight and getting her (fortunately she was laying right beside the fence) and bringing her home with me.
I have an old playpen I keep just for this type of thing, so in she went with a pile of old sweaters and blankets.
Today is day 11.
We had a couple rocky days around day 5. Rapid breathing and a fever. I treated her and she came right out of it.
