Ursula Updates
Ursula had severe calving complications. Here’s how she’s doing.
We are working closely with her vet to save her.
Fortunately her calf, Milagro Bean, is thriving.
Tuesday 3/31
Decrease in alertness and appetite until she got new medicine tonight, then she ate more
Despite the cooler weather, Ursula had a rough day until 8 pm. She barely ate all day, but drank more.
Things improved at 8 p.m. Her vet ordered more aggressive antibiotics to combat the bacterial pneumonia and a steroid to help open her airways. About 2 hours after we got those in her she ate more than she’s eaten in the last week. That’s encouraging. Apparently the steroid can be increase her appetite.
We have a better pain medication too.
Her vet will come out on Friday to assess her and will bring an ultrasound machine to scan her lungs.
Monday 3/30
Slight improvement - eating a bit, brighter eyes, calf is well
Calf is named “Milagro Bean”— Milagro for all the tiny miracles in his life, his mom’s, and ours this week; Bean for his coloring and bouncy, feisty demeanor. He gets the zoomies just before he eats then nurses well and curls up in a ball for a long nap.
Thank you for your prayers, well wishes and physical help, especially while my family was gone Wednesday - Saturday. That was huge. They are back home now and Ursula is well enough that I’m not out with her in the middle of the night for hours.
APPETITE: We got her to get up to graze a tiny bit (thank heaven we planted these micro-pastures), and she ate a bit of hay on her own. We hand fed her a whole loaf of whole wheat bread (easy to digest wheat), grain balls Viv made of molasses, her dairy minerals, and supplements for her rumen and immune system. Previously she’d only eat a bit here and there even if hand fed. So while she’s only eating 1/15 of what she needs to sustain life by volume or weight, this is a significant improvement. We want her appetite to return!
RUMEN FUNCTION: no sign of her rumen really moving- no cud chewing. We gave her a fecal transplant last night to get good rumen microbes into her. How- manure from Gerti whose gut works well + water + molasses —> syringe it into her mouth. Hoping that helps populate her rumen— but her rumen needs a constant supply of food, else the microbes die, so we might be doing this every day.
PNEUMONIA: Snot is still clear not green, and she is alert enough to clean her own nose sometimes. Still horribly labored breathing which one can hear from 30 feet away. Posture is straining to get more oxygen.
ENERGY/ATTITUDE: Brighter eyes, when it is cool she will look at you not just stare straight ahead unseeing.
HYPOCALCEMIA: Has not had a hypocalcemia relapse since Tuesday—we continue to force feed her via giant syringe her calcium, phosphorous, magnesium and potassium minerals since she isn’t eating enough to to replace these each time she makes milk (a huge calcium demand)
IMMUNE SYSTEM: we don’t have a way to measure that, but since she’s under crazy metabolic and bacterial stress it is clearly suppressed.
UDDER HEALTH: still no mastitis, miraculously. We massage her udder with research-backed oils (peppermint and oregano) to keep her milk ducts moving and reduce inflammation . Milk production is down to whatever the calf drinks and ½ to 1 gallon a day, which is good. If she was still making 3 gallons a day that’s part of the milking-themselves-to-death problem.
CALF HEALTH: excellent. He’s nursing, running around and was 92 pounds on Saturday. Much heavier than we anticipated. In this photo he’s mid-bounce!
Saturday 3/28
She is still alive and is slightly better. If it will cool down she might eat some.
She is standing and at night when it is cool nibbles at food a tiny bit.
Her calf is thriving. She is nursing him and he’s figured that out so no more bottle feeding (hooray!)
No mastitis yet.
She got more antibiotics for her pneumonia yesterday.
Her breathing is labored but this morning there was less nasal discharge (green goo) so she may be beating the lung infection caused by aspirating her rumen contents on Monday night/Tuesday morning.
Thursday 3/28
Thursday 3/36 - short version: Ursula is still gravely ill, but she is standing and trying to eat. She might make it. We are cautiously optimistic and encouraged that she is trying to live.
I didn’t think she’d make it beyond Tuesday night/ Wednesday am. The second emergency vet did all she could do. Now we were in a wait and see mode. I went to bed for 3 hours thinking I’d find her dead in the middle of the night and was shocked to see her miraculously alive.
Pneumonia, ketosis, threat of hypocalcemia relapse.
If she doesn’t eat, she’ll die.
We are force feeding her meds and fluids to address the ketosis. But you can’t give a ruminant enough to live via syringe for long.
Eating a little bit and moving around more — this is a huge step in the right direction for which we are deeply grateful (and relieved).
Today hasn’t had any signs of hypocalcemia relapse. But that will happen if she doesn’t eat. She needs to get the calcium from somewhere. Continuing to syringe it down her throat is only an option for so long and increases possibility of aspiration on already compromised lungs (she got rumen fluid in her lungs early Tuesday morning when she bloated when she had stage three hypocalcemia and was paralyzed).
Calf is well: She has also nursed her calf who is healthy - a little chocolate brown bull calf with some brindle stripes in the sunlight. He can do zoomies already. Name suggestions? We are temporarily calling him Baked Bean, but “miracle” in another language would be apt.
SUMMARY: if her appetite comes back, we get her minerals in balance, and her lungs heal then she could live. But she can’t go much longer without a lot more food. Her ketosis (no fuel in her rumen - glucose stored in her liver- so she burns fat and muscle) releases nasty chemicals into her blood which depresses her appetite and suppresses her immune system to fight infection in her lungs.
What happened after she calved on Monday night?
Ursula calved on Monday at 6:15 —Healthy bull calf
Metabolic crash in the night & domino effect— two emergency vet visits in 12 hours to keep her alive
Down cow — from severe hypocalcemia (“milk fever”) — cow pulls all the calcium out of her blood to make milk, leaving her with not enough for her muscles/nerves to work so she becomes paralyzed— this is fatal if not treated with IV calcium immediately. (We had designed a diet to prevent this and gave her supplemental calcium when she calved but it wasn’t enough to prevent this. This is common in older Jersey cows.)
Gut also paralyzed —> bloat: Paralysis affects gut too (it’s has smooth muscle tissue as well) leading to down cow- nearly dead (barely breathing, low heart rate, rumen bloat) This is despite a diet designed to prevent milk fever, and preventative supplemental calcium at calving) We were sprinting to treat the bloat immediately, roll her off her side onto her sternum so she could have a fighting chance of breathing.
Aspirated contents of rumen digesta during bloating — foam comes out of their mouth and they start to suffocate from bloat, she inhaled some of her digestive juices/rumen contents —> pneumonia
Emergency vet treated hypocalcemia with IV calcium, dextrose, pain meds, treated the bloat too
Second metabolic crash Tuesday night, second emergency vet visit that day. Now in ketosis — won’t eat, negative energy situation, which further suppresses appetite.