A Difficult Delivery

D. E. Larsen, DVM

It was early when the phone rang. I had just stepped out of the shower and hurried to answer it, so Sandy could get a few more minutes of sleep.

“Doc, this is Bob Wilson. You have been out here a couple of times before,” Bob said. “I have a heifer down in the field, and I have to get to work. Do you think you get out here and take care of her this morning?”

“Sure, Bob, I remember your place,” I said. “Is the ground firm enough that I can drive out to where she is located?”

“Yes, it is dry as a bone out here this spring,” Bob said. “I really don’t know what is going on with her. She was fine last night. I haven’t been down there to check her out, but looking at her, she might be calving.”

“The problem, Bob, is sometimes when you think a cow is down, and the vet shows up, she is up and running,” I said. “You don’t want to have to pay for me to chase a cow.”

“Yes, I know that, but this morning I don’t have any choice,” Bob said. “The wife and kids are away visiting her folks, and I can’t miss work this morning. So I am just going to have to risk it.”

“Just so you understand,” I said. “I will get out there as soon as I can this morning. Then, I will either give you a call at work or leave a note for you when I am done.”

•••

I could see the heifer as I drove along the field below the road on the way to Wilson’s house. She definitely looked like she was in labor. And she looked way too young to be delivering a calf.

I got out and opened the gate to the lower pasture, and closed it behind me. I could never bring myself to leave a gate open. My grandfather’s words always rang in my ears. “It is better to close the gate than to wish that you had,” he always said.

I pulled the truck up beside the heifer. She struggled slightly but flopped her head back down when it is evident that she couldn’t get up. 

I got out of the truck and got a rope around her neck, just in case she did get up. Of course, I knew better than to tie a cow to the truck, but I had no other choice in the case.

Once I had her tied, I got a look at the problem. And what a mess we had. She was in labor. The calf’s head and feet were present at the vulva, but obviously, the calf was oversized for this young heifer. But there was more to the story.

The and feet and most of the muzzle on the calf had been eaten away, likely by one or more coyotes. “

I hope that the calf was dead when that happened,” I thought to myself. It must have been gruesome for the heifer to endure the feast and be unable to do anything about it.

I surveyed the far edge of the pasture. There, at the far corner, stood a lone coyote. He was watching the heifer and me, probably hoping for a little more of a breakfast.

I carefully examined her tail and vulva. A couple of bite wounds on her vulva, and the end of her tail were damaged beyond repair.

I scrubbed her up and explored the birth canal. Everything seemed okay. I hooked up my calf puller to the foot legs of the calf and applied a moderate amount of traction. They came along well until the hips contacted the pelvis, and then it was all stop.

According to my training and opinion, a fetotomy was the only acceptable option with a dead calf in hip lock. Using a fetatome, it was a simple chore for me to divide the calf in front of its pelvis with a right-angle cut. Then, stringing the OB wire over the calf’s rump and bringing it out between his legs, the fetal pelvis could be easily divided. Once the cut was accomplished, the hindquarters were pulled out by hand, one quarter at a time. Her membranes followed in a gush. 

I cleaned up the tail wound and injected a little lidocaine for local anesthesia. There was not much tissue left to cut to amputate the tail several inches above the switch. I left the wound open.

I medicated her with some tetracycline powder in her uterus and gave her some long-acting sulfa boluses. Then I gave her a hefty dose of dexamethasone to reduce the inflammation around the nerves in her birth canal and hind legs.

I set her up on her sternum, and she looked much better. I gave her a good slap on the butt, and she tried to get up. Her efforts were not successful, but it showed that she had some function in her hind legs. Hopefully, she would be up by this afternoon.

I was concerned that the coyotes would be back with the calf parts lying next to the heifer. I had never heard of a near-adult loss to coyotes, but if she could not get up, the coyotes might be temped to attack her.

I drug the calf parts about twenty yards off to the side of the field. I wasn’t going to do that to the membranes. 

•••

“Bob, I took care of your heifer,” I said when I called Bob at his office. “It was a real mess. She was down, unable to get up with the calf stuck in the birth canal. Coyotes had eaten the nose and feet off the calf and most of the end of her tail. The calf was dead, and I had to cut him into a few pieces to get him out. She was looking better when I left, but she was not quite able to stand. I am hopeful that by the time you get home, she will be on her feet.”

“Thanks, Doc,” Bob said. “Sounds like a real mess. I will try to get out of here a little early and get home to check on her.”

“I moved the calf parts away from her, just in case the coyotes returned. But I would be best if you disposed of them if she is not up when you get home. Give me a call, and I will run by this evening and check her if she is not on her feet.”

“Do you think she is going to be okay?” Bob asked.

“I think so, Bob,” I said. “When a calf is stuck in the birth canal, the heifer gets some nerve damage. That is often temporary, especially when it is not complicated with a lot of traction. I think that she will be up by the time you are home.”

•••

The heifer was on her feet when Bob got home in the early afternoon, and Bob could get the calf parts buried.

Bob called the county trapper, and they were able to eliminate some coyotes from the farm. It was probably not enough to solve the coyote problem, but enough to make Bob and his wife feel that they had got some justice for the calf.

Photo by Dylan Ferreira on Unsplash

From the Archives, one year ago

A Hasty Exam

You Can’t Make a Cow Dog out of a Hound Dog

D. E. Larsen, DVM

Dr. Jensen carefully placed Blue on the exam table. Blue was a growing Bluetick Coonhound. He was about 5 months old. Dr. Jensen had acquired him to replace one of his border collies that he had lost a few months ago.

“Good morning, Mark,” I said as I entered the exam room. “What’s up with Blue this morning?”

“I was driving out to the cows in the far pasture with the dogs in the back of the pickup,” Mark said. “I wasn’t going very fast, and this damn little cottontail darts across the road and into the grass. Blue makes a dive for the bunny and does about three cartwheels when he hits the ground. So he comes up carrying a hind leg. My guess is he either blew out a knee or injured his hip.”

“Did you get any x-rays?” I asked with a smile.

“I know. All you need is someone coming in with all the answers before you even get a look at the patient.”

“Let’s get at this guy. It looks like he has been growing since his last visit,” I said. Which leg is he carrying?”

“It’s his right hind leg,” Mark said. “I haven’t seen him touch it down, so it must hurt.”

“You have to watch it with those observations,” I said. “Someone might think you are a real doctor.”

Starting at Blue’s toes, I went over every bone in his foot and hock. Then, after palpating the lower leg bones, I came to his stifle.

I carefully slipped my left hand under Blue’s stifle and elevated it slightly. Blue didn’t say anything, but he lifted his head off the table and looked at me. I took his stifle in both hands and tested for a ligament tear.

“His knee is pretty stable,” I said. “It must be his hip.”

With my left hand on his hip, I moved his leg forward and back. I could feel some grinding deep in the hip joint.

“There is some crepitus in his hip,” I said. “We need to get an x-ray, but my guess is he fractured his femoral head. Most likely at the growth plate.”

“Let’s get a picture, then there will be something concrete we can discuss. I need to sedate to get a good x-ray. Do you have something to do in town, or do you want to just check back later?”

“I will run over to Mollie’s and get a cup of coffee and read the newspaper,” Mark said. “How much time do you need?”

“A half an hour should be fine,” I said. “In the off chance that you get lucky, and this is just a luxated hip, I will go ahead and replace the hip while he is sedated.”

“But you seem pretty sure this is a fracture,” Mark said.

“Blue is five months old. The growth plate in the femoral head doesn’t close until 6 months. It takes less force to fracture the grown plate than to luxate the hip. So at this age, it is almost always a fracture.”

•••

“Well, that is quite a picture, and it makes it pretty obvious,” Mark said as I put the x-ray on the viewer. “What are my options?”

“Some will say that a surgical repair is the best option, but I am not sure that I agree with that opinion,” I said. “Actually, it is a simple repair. You just reduce the misalignment and place a couple of small pins to hold in place.”

“Why the hesitancy then?” Mark asked.

“That little piece of bone that is knocked off the femoral head has a precarious blood supply. It is an easy repair, and it heals well, then in a year or two, you end up with avascular necrosis. Sort of like Bo Jackson.”

“That doesn’t sound good. Then you are looking at a new hip, I guess.”

“At this point in time, nobody that I am aware of is hip replacements in the dog,” I said. “What you end up with is a femoral head ostectomy. So I am beginning to think that we should just be doing the ostectomy from the get-go.”

“An ostectomy! You just take the femoral head off and throw it away? That sounds pretty drastic.”

“The dog has four legs. The ostectomy removes the bone to bone contact and actually works pretty good. Not perfect, but pretty good. You will always see a difference, but your neighbor never will notice.”

“What about a duck cast?” Mark asked. “That is what they do with kids.”

I gave some thought to that possibility. However, I had no idea if it would work, and I had no idea how the pup would tolerate it.

“To be honest, I doubt that it is written up anywhere,” I said.

“I don’t want to get a lot of money into this pup,” Mark said. “He might not work out well for me on the ranch. I would like to try a duck cast.”

“One problem is Blue is his rapid growth phase. Six weeks might not be a big deal in growth in a five-year-old kid, but it is a big deal in a five-month-old hound, and a cast will become constrictive. But with a little thought, I could probably fashion a spica splint that holds that right hind leg up. We might be able to make it work. And the good thing is that if it fails, we can always resort to the ostectomy.”

“Do you want me to leave Blue here now?” Mark asked.

“Yes, I should be able to get this done and have ready to go home this afternoon,” I said. “You can plan to pick him up around four or five.”

•••

It took a couple of tries, but I could get the hip in place and fashion a splint to hold his right hind leg up at a near ninety-degree angle and still be able to poop and pee. He looked a little funny, but I think it might just work.

Dr. Jensen was in the office right at four to pick up Blue.

“He looks a little funny, but this might just work,” I said. “You need to keep him restricted, and this splint needs to be clean and dry at all times.”

“I think his buddies are going to laugh at him,” Mark said.

“I want to check him every week to make sure we don’t have to adjust this for his growth,” I said. “I am really interested to see what kind of results we get.”

•••

Six weeks passed rapidly, and Blue was on the x-ray table with the splint removed. The hip had healed beautifully, and Blue was happy to have four legs under him as I lead him out front to see Mark, who was waiting anxiously.

“The x-ray looks great,” I said. “Blue should be good to go. Just take it easy for a few weeks until he has all the strength back in that leg.”

“My only problem will be keeping him in the back of the pickup when the rabbits are scurrying around in the pasture,” Mark said.

“I can tell you the real problem that you have,” I said. “You can’t make a cow dog out of a hound dog. These dogs have memories from their grandfathers buried deep in their DNA, and when that rabbit ran across the road in front of him, Blue knew he was a hound, and he gave chase.”

“Well, you might right, Doc,” Mark said. “But he is just going to have to learn his place. And thanks, Doc. Blue thanks you also.”

I followed Blue’s status for a couple of years before Dr. Jensen decided to change his status and concentrate more on his doctoring and less on the cattle market. Blue was perfectly normal on his hip as long I knew him.

Photo by Cynthia Smith on Unsplash