What am I going to do with this calf? - Cranky heifer

jeanthomas · Post by **jeanthomas** » Fri May 09, 2008 6:32 pm

For once I am stumped!

Never in 28 years has a dexter got the better of me and this one is certainly not going to!!

However it is 11 weeks old and crazy. Born in a stable alone with its mum back in February, I have haltered, handled and played with it. It was a real sweetie until Sunday, when I turned it out. Turned out it just seems to have a need to climb, jump and do anything to escape. (electric fence didn't stop it). Having got it back into a stable it is now haltered, mum is not too fussed about it so she goes out every day and comes in at night.

I have tried leading it out into our stable yard but as soon as it leaves its stable environment it goes mad. It struggles so much that it nearly got out of its halter several times. I am considering trying to teather it but it will need some kind of harness that it cannot get out of, or hobbles!! (probably illegal now!!?).

Any ideas?? Seriously, what age can you do veal?? Does anyone know?? Not a route I have ever gone down before but am seriously considering it now. It is only 11 weeks old and I know this sounds ridiculous (even I think so) but I just do not know what I am going to do with this??? Help! (Do calves get phobias??, I wonder) What worries me is the older this gets the more of a problem it will become if I do not sort it.

Jean

TonyH · Post by **TonyH** » Fri May 09, 2008 7:45 pm

Hobbles are still widely available if you think tht amight help. Dairy farmers use them on cows that kick

Saffy · Post by **Saffy** » Fri May 09, 2008 7:52 pm

I have had this problem with young equines but not calves!

With the equines they calmed down once they had got some excercise but this seems to be an impossible thing for your calf to get anyway with its behaviour.

Do you think it can see OK in the daylight? Is there bright light in the stable?

What about if it was with a bunch but then there is of course the danger of them all going bonkers.

Hobbles do come in many sizes!

I look forward to an update.

Stephanie

ann · Post by **ann** » Mon May 12, 2008 10:24 pm

Hopefully you have solved your problem by now, if not have you thought about building a pen round the stable door with some gates and leaving the door open so that the calf can get use to the open space in its own time. I have found the occasional calf born in a box can have a fear of coming out. I now get the winter calves out into an open pen around a month old, but still had problems with one who didn't want to go out with the rest. fortunetly although I don't show much I do try to halter train my females so let mum out and them took her back in the evening and made the calf come out of the pen to suckle once out i shut the gate and fortunetly she then followed mum, as all her friends where already outside once she got into the paddock she was safe as I always turn them out into a well fenced paddock first before they go into the fields with the electric fences.

good luck anyway

Rutherford · Post by **Rutherford** » Tue May 13, 2008 8:14 am

Because of your long experience with Dexters I hesitated to jump in on this one. If she has been confined to a stable for eleven weeks she has a lot of energy to use up. My calves have access to a yard from birth, and I felt Ann hit the nail on the head, when she talks of a secure paddock before asking her to respect an electric fence. As she suggests a small area fenced with hurdles and allowing the calf to find it in her own time is probably a good approach. Once she is acclimatised, if it is then possible to put an electric wire along one side close to a wooden hurdle, so that the calf cannot go through it, she can learn.
I have a small half-acre paddock
securely fenced round with netting, and an electric fence wire a foot high and six inches from the fence in one corner, they can experience a shock but cannot dive through it. When a calf is borne in the wild it will be hidden away for several days with mum going back to feed it, and then it will gradually find its feet and realise it cant walk through barriers.
I always derive pleasure in watching my calves when they first find their freedom, they show such excitement and zest for life racing around, I certainly wouldn’t expect respect for an electric fence in their first excitement.
Beryl (Woodmagic)

jeanthomas · Post by **jeanthomas** » Tue May 13, 2008 9:30 am

Hi everyone,

Thanks for your ideas. I guess I have just been lucky up till now! I tried the hurdle theory, tall cattle ones which loop together at the ends, attached to the open stable door. I sat there with her for ages and she came out and wandered about. Then for no apparent reason she just launched herself at the hurdles, got her leg through a rail and had to be quickly rescued. Luckily she appears unhurt, as opposed to me who now has some amazingly coloured bruises.

So I am back to holding her on a halter and trying to get her used to standing in the door way, hopefully, slowly but surely I will get her out in the stable area with mum. One of my problems is the only halters which fit her are those rope calf halters which she has nearly managed to slip on several occasions. I have ordered a nylon fully adjustable goat halter which looks like it might work better?

Vet is due to make an appearance early next week so I will get him to look her over. I think you are all right and this is just a bad case of pent up energy, in the past they have just gone out and run around the field with mum. Never have I come across this need to favour the fences rather than the space of the field, if you see what I mean.

I guess you live and learn, will not get myself into this unnecessary muddle again!!

Will keep you posted.

Jean in sunny Suffolk, now hand shearing sheep!

Saffy · Post by **Saffy** » Tue May 13, 2008 10:35 am

Actually Jean our calf - which went out every day from 4 days old ran into the fence/hedge when 5 days old, I was watching.

If it hadn't been pig wire backed by hedge he would have gone straight through, as it was he looked a bit shocked and learnt to turn corners!

The pic below was 4 days old and he had been in the field 20 seconds - he "ran off the edge" and landed in a bramble bush.

Below to my horror, now 5 days old he is going flat out towards the hedge/fence.

Below again, 3 seconds after the last pic, he has just picked himself up having run headlong into the fence and bounced off it.

You don't have the only mad calf this Spring!!!

Stephanie

Edited By Saffy on 1210685521

Inger · Post by **Inger** » Tue May 13, 2008 11:30 am

You learn things about completely different ways of farming on this forum. Things i would never have thought about. Hope the calf comes right. I would give tethering a go - once you've got the right halter that is. Jumping through fences doesn't sound healthy. Hope the bruises are healing.

ann · Post by **ann** » Tue May 13, 2008 10:26 pm

Just another suggestion: I actually put strong dog collars on my calves when they are quite young, but I hesitated to suggest this as an 11 week old calf will be very strong, however if you where going to try to tether the calf or just tieing it up to say a gate the collar would be extra security. I get my local rope maker to make me halters for my calves as so many you buy are either to large or if you use sheep ones probably not as strong as you might like, plus if you get them made you can have a longer lead on them. Maybe there is a market for them as I know he is now struggling to make a living.