This is Katniss.
She was born 40 days early. The guys found her mama in the
dry cow pen presenting and moved her to the maternity pen. When she was born
she was so small they expected her to be born dead. She was moved to the
warming pen and taken care of.
She was so tiny. Here’s a picture of her in the warming pen with
the bottle we use to feed calves next to her to show her size proportion.
Knowing she would need extra care, Son #2 and
daughter-in-law, Holly, brought her home the next morning and settled her into
their laundry room. They made a pallet of blankets and wrapped the calf in
large towels, blankets and had a heat lamp that was on periodically.
Katniss was extremely weak. She was too weak to suck on a
bottle. My daughter-in-law used a syringe with milk replacer to feed her.
I stopped in after work the first evening and helped. She was
all tucked in towels and blankets. Holly prepared the milk replacer and I
rubbed the calf, petted and talked to her trying to stimulate her as her mother
would have. The towel was thrown into the dryer to warm up while we fed her.
Holly would dribble the milk into her mouth and I rubbed her throat. She
started to swallow it and then she actually started to act like she wanted to
suck. So, Holly got a lamb’s bottle and fed her. We were so excited because she
was drinking on her own. She didn’t last long and became exhausted and quit. She
went completely limp and we feared she had died. Apparently she had done that
before during the day. Holly said the first time it happened it scared her
silly. We moved her around, turned her over to her other side and arranged her
little legs. The hot towel from the dryer was wrapped around her and blankets
were added. We sat, petted, prayed over her and talked to her for a bit and then
left her to sleep.
Holly had been doing this all day long every couple of hours
and I have to say she looked beat.
A little later in the evening my Wiggliette – granddaughter
- settled into the corner and read out loud to her to keep her company. The
Wiggliette named her Katniss – from the Hunger Games because she thought the
calf was a strong fighter just like the character Katniss.
Every few hours – through the night too, Holly and Son# 2
kept vigilant in taking care of Katniss.
I stopped in early in the morning and Holly who hadn’t had
much sleep had just finished feeding her.
The previous evening Son #2 and she had switched to bagging – or feeding
her with a tube because Katniss was too exhausted. I loved on the calf a little
but didn’t unwrap or disturb her too much.
All through the day she was fed, stroked, petted, talked to,
read to, prayed over every few hours.
When I was there later that afternoon we were all very
hopeful. The vet had said if she made it the first night she had a fair chance
of making it.
Around 10:00 PM Son#2 sent me a picture of Katniss with this
text. “She didn’t make it. We did absolutely everything we could have done.”
It sounds stupid but my heart constricted and I burst into
tears. I knew they would be torn up and an emotional mess. A lot of tears were
shed over a calf that had only been in our lives 2 days. But it was
heartbreaking.
I hope you see the effort, the love given this calf and
ultimately the sorrow and pain.
I hope my words have painted the picture as strong and as
emotional as this event became.
Why do I want you to see and feel? Because there is another
message here to be told.
We are a CAFO farm – what some people call a Factory Farm
and have been painted as evil, money grubbing, corporate farms.
There are groups of people who ignorantly believe that to be
true and there are groups who purpose to lie and fabricate events to support
their lies.
A CAFO farm simply and basically is a farm of a certain size
that chooses to shelter their animals instead of turning them out to pasture.
Our CAFO is 4th generation family farm that
supports 15 other families and other part time employees. We put the health and
well-being of our animals at the fore front. Abuse of any kind is never a part
of our business. And, yes, this is a business. Dairy farming is a business that
bleeds into our daily life and becomes part of who we are.
Like I previously mentioned there are a lot of lies around
and my goal is to bring truth to light. I hope the next time you see a video or
read a horror story about farming you remember little Katniss and all the love
and care that went into her two days here with us. And, realize this happens
over and over again at this farm and many many other farms.
Have any questions? Ask me. Or ask other farmers. A great
place to ask questions is at www.askthefarmers.com
or Ask The Farmers facebook page. There are over 150 of us farmers from different
sizes and kinds of farms to answer questions. The more you know about us and
how your food is produced the better it is for you and us. We’re in this
together and we pledge to do the best we can for you and for our animals.
