Calving chaos on the maternity suite

The maternity suite has been extremely busy this week with a grand total of 23 calves born in the last 7 days! There have been several days where we have had multiple cows labouring all at the same time.
Our beautiful ladies calve in our ‘maternity suite’ which in reality is a very large shed which we fill with straw. We bed them up with fresh straw daily to make sure they are as comfy as possible.
Once a cow has calved we will move her into a pen on her own with her calf which allows mumma and baby to bond in peace. This gives the calf plenty of time to take the all important first drink of colostrum.
It is essential that newborn calves drink colostrum (first milk) within 4 hours of birth but frankly the sooner the better. There is nothing better than seeing a brand new calf almost immediately trying to stand up. Colostrum is high in nutrients and antibodies. A new born calf lacks disease protection because antibodies do not pass across the cow’s placenta to the fetus. Antibodies in the colostrum provide the calf with their first protection and ensure the best start in life.
Once we are happy that we have seen the calf up and drinking and a strong bond has been established the cow and calf are moved into the nursery wing! This is another straw shed which leads out to our nursery paddock where they can choose to be inside or outside.
Cows and calves will stay in the nursery suite for around a week and once we are happy that everything is going well they are moved out to the fields where they will graze until the late autumn.
In the past we have always had quite a slow start to calving but this year they are just coming so thick and fast. Our bulls Logic and Ned must have been very busy when we first put them out with the cows last year!!
Luckily shorthorn cattle are wonderful mothers who are naturally very motherly and docile for us to handle. Occasionally you do get some that are very proud of their babies and don’t want you anywhere near them but this tends to wear off after a few days. This can make ear tagging quite a challenge.
Did you know it is a legal requirement for calves to have an eartag applied within 36 hours of birth? Then a second ear tag in the other ear must be applied within 20 days from birth. The eartag carries our ‘herd number’ and their individual ID number. This id number will be registered with the BCMS (British Cattle Movement Service). BCMS is a government database of all bovine animals in the UK. They then generate a passport for the calf which will stay with it throughout it’s lifetime. Then eventually at the abattoir the animals ear tag number is printed onto a carcass ticket which is attached to each hanging carcass. This gives full traceability and food security.
We love farming and whilst calving can be an exhausting time of night checks and round the clock monitoring it is the absolute highlight of the year. Watching new life arrive is truly magical each and every time. The cow and calf pictured are very special to us. So the cow’s mother was called ‘Triple Eight’ (you guessed it her tag number ended 888) she was one of the original calves we bought from Truro livestock market and reared on to become a founding cow in our herd. She was our favourite cow of all time, in her latter years she was called ‘Granny Cow’ and we sadly lost her last year to old age. Each year we pray that her last daughter will have a heifer (female) calf so that we can ensure her bloodline continues to flow in our herd. Last year she had a boy but this year we were thrilled that she had a heifer who will eventually join our breeding herd.