Today at the farm I started with feeding the calves and then went to the big cow barns to check on some sick cows. We had two cows to treat, one that had ketosis and another which had pink eye. Pink eye can be treated simply by spraying a small amount of penicillin into their eye and it will clear up within a day or two of treatment. Most of the time this will be caused by getting manure or pieces of dirty bedding stuck in their eye but it can be very contagious so we are sure to act fast before it spreads. As for the jersey cow that had ketosis I administered an IV of dextrose to surge her body with the sugars that she needs and pumped her with an alfalfa and propylene glycol mixture for additional hydration. In the picture below you can see the instrument that I use to pump the fluid into the cows rumen. Essentially it looks like a long hose that can be inserted into the cows esophagus and it has a smooth grey bit that will gently grasp the front of the nose to avoid the tube from being ejected. I will slowly stir and pump the handle to get all of the fluid into her stomach and this can be especially helpful for cows that are very dehydrated.
Today we shipped 5,607 gallons of milk and had no new calves.
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