Friday, September 28, 2007

nimue our cow is dying

nimue is on deaths door. we went to visit her where she was visiting her beau. she was lying down and got up very slowly. as she painfully walked across the field i could barely stand to watch her amble toward us. she was skin and bones. i gave her alfalfa pellets and she couldn't eat them. she was drooling heavily and it appeared that she couldn't eat hardly at all. tabitha and i freaked out. if you have been reading this blog you know what an important part of our lives she is.

we dashed to the monhallands and Lance was luckily home. he said "we have to save the family cow." he helped us load nimue and calf for a journey to the vet. the nearest large animal vet is close to fifty miles away. we sped there so quickly that tristan noticed how fast we were driving. i said that we don't normally drive this fast only in emergency situations.

at the vet they were swamped with emergencies. we waited forty minutes. when the vet got there he sized her up and had us load her in the stanchion. he basically told us that there is two things that could be wrong with her and that both of them were fatal.

what?
fatal?
the kind of fatal that nothing can be done for?

anyway after about an hour of crying we managed to convince him that we wanted to treat her or test her for every possible thing that could cause this and wasn't fatal. he was an insensitive jerk and made tabitha cry even further.

eventually we loaded her up and Lance and Darla took nimue home. we went in to pay the vet bill knowing that i had about thirty and change in the account. up until this point i was holding it all together fairly well. tristan said "mommy, i don't want nim to die." tears welled up in my eyes and i put my head down. feeing so vulnerable and having my son plea for our cows life was more than i could take.

i don't know how we'll recover from this one, emotionally or finacially. a new jersey will cost $2,400, if tabitha can convince herself to milk another cow. the kids know about death but not from this standpoint.

19 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ohhh....Karl, I'm so sorry. I hope your family can find some comfort in one another. What a tremendous loss.

Anonymous said...

I am sorry to hear about your cow. To loose her after all your emotional, physical and financial investment would be a difficult loss. I hope that the vet is wrong on his diagnosis. In either case, endeavor to persever knowing that others have you in their thoughts.

Anonymous said...

I am so very sorry to hear this. Know that we are thinking of you... I don't know how much that means, but maybe it helps a little.

Anonymous said...

Oh no!! I am so very sorry for all of you.

--Tamera

Moonwaves said...

So, so sorry to hear this news.

KnitMoka said...

So very sorry to hear your news. We've lost precious few animals, but none so close to us as your Nimue. Lighting a candle today for your family to have comfort and peace.

sugarcreekfarm said...

I'm so sorry to hear this, I know how hard these things are on the whole family. Prayers coming your way.

Christy said...

I'm sorry, I know how important she was to you.

Ed said...

I'm sorry to hear about Nimue. Hopefully some good will come from all this and as a result, you and your family will be stronger.

Anonymous said...

I'm so terribly, terribly sorry.

Anonymous said...

I know what a devastating loss this is to you all...my heart aches for all of you.

Woody said...

Karl...you know our prayers go out to you and your family.

Phoebe said...

so, so sorry. what empty words.

love you all, very much.

Jo said...

Oh no, Karl and Tabitha - I am in utter shock and terribly sorry. Is this for real? I mean, truly nothing could save her? I am so angry and sad for your family, and for her. My prayers to you all tonight. This is the part of life that seems unexplainable. (Hugs)

Robbyn said...

I'm so sorry...

what a loss. Sending your family a prayer for comfort... :(

rhea said...

I'm so sorry to hear this, Karl. So sad and unexpected. I am thinking good thoughts for you and your family... hoping for the best possible outcome.

Tossing Pebbles in the Stream said...

It is too bad about your cow which is obviously more than a farm animal.

You need to cut your losses. That is what the insensitive Vet was trying to tell you. His stall side manor is terrible.

If it is milk you want you don't need a pure bred Jersey, which is what you seem to think you have to buy.

I have a Mennonite farmer near me that for one reason or another he culls a cow a month from his herd. I got a cow, giving milk (4 gallon a day) from him when it failled to get pregnant after two artificial tries. I paid $350. I milked her for 10 months and now I am thinking of trying a bull to bred her before I cut my losses. I cerainly got more than $350 worth of milk out of her. If you need a high butter fat content cow try brown swiss if you cannot find a jersey.

I am surprised a large animal vet is so far away!

Good luck.

CG said...

I was thinking the same thing as pebbles in the stream -- that there is no reason for even a registered Jersey to cost so much, and there comes a point to cut losses. Around here they run $600-800 and that's with a fairly large calf at their side. And as much as I love our cow, one day she will be hamburger.

Of course, you also don't need to wean the calf before you milk. Just confine it. I usually confine at night, milk in the morning and then let them run together during the day, but a friend of ours confined all the time and let the calf nurse when he milked, but he milked the front two teats and the calf did the back two.

Glad she isn' so likely to die though.

Anonymous said...

I am sorry to hear about your cow. I was just looking online for articles concerning cow diseases. We just put down our cow today and she just gave birth 7 weeks ago. So we know how you feel. God Bless.

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