Donald

Here I am Saturday morning on my way to the farm.

Two bottles for one calf you ask?  Well….no.  Two bottles for two calves.

First there was Daisy:

And now we have Donald too:

Friday evening when we were doing chores, Harland noticed a cow having a calf. We kept an eye on her as we went about our business and when she was done we watched to see if everything was ok, if the calf nursed, if she accepted it, etc. As we watched, we saw not one calf, but two.

Twins.

Again.

Sigh… Knowing she wouldn’t be able to take care of both of them we watched for a while to see which of them was the stronger of the two. One of them seemed more aggressive and was up and nursing, while the other lay there, not moving much. Harland picked up the weak one and brought it into the pen with Daisy. She was thrilled! A roomie!  She hopped about and sniffed with much excitement.  I got some colostrum into him (first milk that has antibodies) and we tucked them in for the night.

The next morning, he seemed sluggish, but drank most of his bottle. The next day, yesterday, he was much the same…sluggish, not standing much at all except to eat, and not interested at all in the world around him.

When he does stand, he’s wobbly and kinda dopey looking.

We expected him to be a slow starter – being born as a twin can be prolonged and rough – but by now he should be hopping around, playing with Daisy, and eagerly drinking his bottle.

But he’s still alive, not getting any worse, and so we’ll see what happens. Everyone deserves a chance.

You suggested we name him Donald, and so we did.

Here he is with his roomie, Daisy.