Well, it's quarter to one in the morning and my theory of Dexters only calving in the daytime is blown. The other cow calved just before dark so I still included her in my "daytime" theory.
I was just beginning to dream when I heard all this mooing and realized it was coming from the paddock next to the house. Both cows were yelling which I thought was kind of wierd as the one has already calved. I have learned through the years to always check the cows if the yelling persists as it usually means something is amiss. Don't remember hearing them yell about calving though. Just one more thing to file away under the "calving experience" file.
I also noticed this year how thorough the cows are in cleaning up any birthing fluids on the grass. They are spending quite a long time on it before cleaning the calf and I don't recall such behaviour either. Memory going? I have noticed that the local ravens seem to be bolder and the eagles seem to be around more. I have really had it with the ravens as I just found 3 dead partially-eaten pullet carcases RIGHT INSIDE THE HEN HOUSE. That raven would have had to have flown down through crisscrossed baler twine (while avoiding the netting) and squeezed itself through the pop hole. It had already flown into the brooder room last week (door was open as it was hot outside but there was a 2' barrier across) and killed about 8 meat chicks. This behaviour has never been seen around here before and we have lots of ravens.
The gloves are off now, the shot gun sits waiting......
Glad we haven't got Ravens or Eagles. We've got foxes, the odd rat, crows, badgers (who ate a cast sheep's backside last night, hopefully after it had died! and the crows had it's eyes) and lots of Buzzards (like a small eagle). The buzzards are a protected species, which is a pity because I'd like take a shotgun to them. I had to watch them picking off helpless leverets (baby Hares) in my fields this year.
A few of our Dexters have given birth at night. Actually, in the first two years, I never saw any of our Dexters calving. It always happened before I woke up or when I was busy doing something else.
In the last couple of years, most of them are calving during the day and I actually get to see some of them being born. Which is nice. :D
Like others I have found most calvings to be during daylight, though no figures to back it up. Though our very first Dexter calf born on 14th February 1986 arrived as we returned from a St Valentine's disco run by Round Table at 1 am, and our latest was born three days or so ago at 3 am.
Duncan
Duncan MacIntyre
Burnside Dexters 00316
Burnside
Ascog
Isle of Bute
Hi clive
no doubt the buzzards have young to feed, I guess you wouldn't have minded if they had been catching rabbits or rats, I to hate to see young animals or birds die, but nature is sometime hard and I think its quite a privalidge to be able to watch buzzards, we have young fox cubs around, lovely to watch, but sadly we can no longer let our hens roam, we also have a pair of barn owls very busy hunting to feed their young
The majority of my dexters do calve around daybreak, so I have just been up this morning to see one of my favourite heifers give birth to a little red heifer at 4.30am.
Having said that, when I used to have to go out to work, my girls did seem to have perfected the art of calving at 8 am on a Monday morning!!
Here's an interesting study concerning calving time of day from Kansas State University:
Scientists recorded data on 5 consecutive years in a herd of spring calving crossbred cows at the Kansas State University Agricultural Research Center at Hays, Kansas. They recorded the time of calving (to within the nearest one-half hour). Births that could not be estimated within an hour of occurrence were excluded. Cows were fed forage sorghum hay daily between 4:00 and 6:00 pm. For statistical purposes, the day was divided into four-hour periods.
Between 6:00 and 10:00 am, 34.23% of the calves were born;
Between 10:00 am and 2:00 pm, 21.23% of the calves were born;
Between 2:00 and 6:00 pm 29.83% of the calves were born;
Between 6:00 and 10:00 pm, 8.41% of the calves were born;
Between 10:00 pm and 2:00 am, 4.4% of the calves were born; and
Between 2:00 am and 6 am, 1.91% of the calves were born.
It is interesting to note that 85.28% of the calves were born between 6:00 am. and 6:00 pm.
These data also revealed that for a majority of a animals in the herd, the time of calving was within 3 hours of the average time of day that cow had previously given birth. Feeding the forage in early evening hours undoubtedly influenced the percentage of cows calving in daylight hours. Source: Jaeger and co-workers. Abstracts 2002 Western Section of Americanthe Society of Animal Science.
In addition to mothers having calves near the same time each year, I've found studies stating that daughters often give birth near the same typical time range as their dam.
Well our cows are going against the trend then. More calves are being born in the daytime now than they used to. Mind you, the original cows are nearly all gone, either sold or eaten.
Kirk, our few hundred calvings would fit neatly into the Kansas time frames, but in my former life with horses, the foalings would have been the exact reverse of the cows calvings.
Do you think it could have something to do with the fight-or-flight response?
Margaret.
Out of 72 calvings, my busy period is usually between 4:30 - 8 a.m, almost never at night, and sometimes during the day any time.
Ann - Understand what you say about buzzards, but we counted 7 on a ten acre field last year. It's getting out of balance where we are. Mind you, we had a Red Kite visit last year and all the buzzards disappeared for days. The hares have actually made it through and we have more than I would have expected to survive. We're trying to encourage them.
wagra dexters wrote:Kirk, our few hundred calvings would fit neatly into the Kansas time frames, but in my former life with horses, the foalings would have been the exact reverse of the cows calvings.
Do you think it could have something to do with the fight-or-flight response?
Margaret.
I would guess that if horses, as a rule, foal at night (I don't know if they do), it might indeed be due to the types of predators and the environment that ruled the areas where the ancestors of horses and cattle lived. Perhaps horses were in more open areas where a predator would rely heavily upon their eyes in the daytime to find a newborn dinner miles off in the distance, so nighttime foaling would be safer. In cattle, perhaps they lived on the edge of wooded areas and tall grass areas with mostly night prowling predators, so daylight calving under the cover of brush and trees was safe from any eyesight predators, while most nighttime bush predators were sleeping.
Our farm is 40 acres (Northwest US) with pastures on the edge of the woods. Our biggest clue that calving is coming is when our cows look out towards the woods hoping they can go there to calve to escape the eyes of predators.
Inger wrote:Well our cows are going against the trend then. More calves are being born in the daytime now than they used to. Mind you, the original cows are nearly all gone, either sold or eaten.
I've seen studies stating that feeding time (depending on what time of day you feed) can shift the normal calving times by a couple of hours. I'll have to re-find that study to see if I can find any details .
Yes, I've seen that study as well. With sheep also to alter lambing time. My cows always go off on their own when they are about to calve, usually with one friend nearby "keeping guard".
