When I Cry for the Cow

Early yesterday morning, just at daybreak and before we were out and about, one of our cows gave birth to a little bull calf.

Watching, unbeknownst to us, were a flock of vultures.

My husband first saw the vultures when he went to feed, and then he found the calf.

The vultures had killed it. It was still warm when my husband picked up the little body to bury it. That's how we know the calf was born yesterday morning. Had it been born earlier, it wouldn't have been warm. 

The ground all around the calf was stomped down and trampled. The cow, having just given birth, was then forced to try to defend her baby, and she ran around and around him, trying in vain to keep a flock of vultures from eating her child.

I imagine she finally could fight no longer, and the birds swarmed in.

The thought of it makes me cry. Cows are very good mothers, incredibly protective and nurturing.

We are what may be called a "natural" farm. We don't use artificial insemination, nor do we keep the bull from the cows and try to time the births so that they all fall in April or some other time. We let nature do her thing. Generally, the cows have calves in the spring and fall, but some are off cycle. We let the bull do his thing when the cows are ready, whenever that is. A cow gestation is about 280-285 days, so they only give birth once a year, but they do not all give birth at the same time.

Baby calves are not born walking. It takes them a bit to find the strength to stand up, though they are up on all fours usually within 15 minutes or so. Then they take a drink from their mother, maybe wobble around a while, and rest some more. Being born is hard work. So, there is down time when the calf is vulnerable to predators like vultures and coyotes. Once the calf is stronger, the mother cow takes her baby and hides the bull or heifer in what she considers to be a safe place.

The cattle are checked every day, and this is not the first calf we've lost to vultures (I think it's the second), but it's the first we've lost when we haven't been there to make an effort to stop it. The first time we arrived just a little too late. Other times, we have shown up just in the nick of time. 

It makes for a tense stand-off, us trying to stay far enough from a mad momma cow that she doesn't come after us, while keeping the vultures away.

Vultures are a protected migratory species, which means we can't do anything to them except try to scare them and make the farm unwelcoming. This morning my husband drove to where the vultures were roosting in the rain. They didn't like his presence, so they flew away. He will do this now every time he sees them, so that they don't hang around.

Last night, I could not fall asleep for thinking about that poor cow. We are watching her now; we have to make sure she doesn't develop mastitis from not having the calf around to remove her milk. They also grieve for their babies when they lose them. My husband says I imagine that, but I don't think so. I think it makes them very sad indeed. So, I feel very badly for this poor cow. Mostly, I am frustrated that it happened on the other side of the farm, where we couldn't hear the noise, and had no idea this was going on until it was too late.

I am very sorry that we failed our cow, but we can't be everywhere at once.

You learn a lot of stuff about life on a farm.

Sometimes you even cry for the cows.