Question re: Cows vs. Horses

[SED]

I have a place in the country. Our neighbors run their cattle on our property. In 8 years, they have had at least 50+ babies -- all unasisted and with no problems. Lots of healthy, happy calves. They had one foal, which died at birth. And I read about all the issues with horse labor/delivery on this BB.

So my question is this -- are cattle better able to have calves "unassisted" than horses? If we didn't have foal watches, and mare cams, etc., would there be a higher mortality rate than cattle?

Or -- being human and caring more about our horses -- do we just like to worry and plan and therefore it SEEMS as if horses are more fragile?

[Hillside H Ranch]

No, horses do truly have a higher rate of dystocias and foaling problems. Cattle have been bred for a very long time to be reproductively sound. After milk production and meat production the #1 trait selected for in cattle is calving ease, meaning they aim for low-birthweight calves. In beef cattle cows are also selected for their mothering ability as well. In addition, any cow/heifer that does not conceive easily is usually culled from the herd pretty quickly. Very, very few cattle farmers go to extremes to get a cow pregnant, vs. the equine world where we probably perpetuate some infertility by using all sorts of assistance to get mares pregnant. Any cow that repeatedly didn't settle/doesn't produce healthy calves or doesn't raise good calves is usually eaten.

[Seven-up]

I will preface this by saying I know nothing about cows, but...

I hear all the time about how calves have to be pulled out with chains. That always made me think that it was cows that had more trouble.


Maybe some horsey births would end up fine if left alone, but human intervention just makes it easier. Why take a chance that something might go wrong if you leave it alone, when you can just fix it, since you're right there anyway?

And I wonder, if you have a ton of cows, like 50-100, maybe it's easier to count wrong. I'm sure it's hard to get the right number when you have a bunch of identical black cows milling about while you're trying not to count one twice. If one died in the back 40 while giving birth, it might go unnoticed unless you find the body.

[baywithchrome2]

I was just having this conversation the other day with a fellow horse breeder. I think, at least in part, the answer lies in Darwin's "survival of the fittest." I am friends with two cattle ranchers nearby... Rancher A's cows live as natural a life as a cow can live. Rancher B's cows also live a very natural life but she attends the births of virtually all of her cows. Rancher A has a much lower calf/cow death rate than does Rancher B who does intervene when a calf needs to be pulled, etc. Same breed. Same environment. Same grazing lands. In fact, Rancher A buys his bulls from Rancher B so same bloodlines. And Rancher A is less tolerant of open cows than Rancher B.

It does make me wonder how we are impacting nature (even more than we already are) and what the repercussions of that interference is when we breed "difficult to breed" mares (or stallions) or breed mares who are less than ideal mother candidates in terms of reproductive conformation and/or maternal instinct. By definition, these mares would be culled by nature so...

Food for thought and hopefully, discussion.

I should say that I attend my mare's foalings :)

[Daydream Believer]

I know ranchers that let their horses live as naturally as possible on a couple 1000 acres of pasture. They run the studs and mares together, they get thin in winter, never get fed more than hay, and they foal unattended and have very low losses. They have 100% conception rates and lost one foal in 20 years one rancher told me. That is a group of about 20 mares a year. They all think I'm nuts attending births like I do and sometimes I wonder also at 3 a.m! I'm not planning to stop though as I know very well how fast a foaling can turn into a tragedy...and my girls are too precious to me to lay in bed and be lazy.

I do think however that certain horse breeds are a bit hardier and easier breeders...like my own...and some other hardy types. They've been left alone for several centuries and these ranchers who have had them the last few decades don't try hard to get them in foal either so the less fertile mares did not reproduce.

[eyesontheground]

I think this leads to all sorts of interesting questions.

Top of my list is:

Should you select to breed a horse that you know can not maintain a pregnancy without Regumate or that has to have assistance at foaling or can't maintain weight during preg and lact, etc?

And maybe more important:

Do we really care about fertility in horses? Because performance is the endpoint right? But at what point have we allowed so many reproductively unsound mares to breed through our intervention that we a undermining our system.

And:

How many breeders that are trying to create 'lines' of their own breeding actually select at all for fertility?

[dr j]

Actually cattle do have an higher actual "dystocia" rate. At least in my professional experience. You will pull many more calves than foals in a balanced mixed practice. BUT here is the big difference, a cow can labor for quite awhile, the calf will have to be pulled etc and you still have live calf, healthy momma cow. Their partuition is much slower and less violent. Horses have fewer presentation issues and fewer overall problems but when they have them they are often devastating esp to the foal due to the very quick Stage II of labor in the horse. If not attended the foal is almost always lost.

A cattle dystocia you usually have time to get there, with a cup of coffee on the way. A horse, you better fly and still most likely you are going to pull a dead foal.

As much as I disliked cattle work over the years, all those calves I have pulled gave me lots of real world training for equine dystocias.

Your neighbors' cows probably have had the same issues as the mare that lost the foal... it just wasn't fatal for the calf like it was for the foal.

[Sithly]

It does make me wonder how we are impacting nature (even more than we already are) and what the repercussions of that interference is when we breed "difficult to breed" mares (or stallions) or breed mares who are less than ideal mother candidates in terms of reproductive conformation and/or maternal instinct. By definition, these mares would be culled by nature so...

Food for thought and hopefully, discussion.

Interesting question, especially seeing as we do the exact same thing to ourselves.

[eyesontheground]

Daydream,

I would assume that your horses could foal on their own. They are not all that removed from a situation where survival of the fittest is very very real.

I wonder how much role nutrition plays in this as well. I would assume that your mares are maintained on a higher plain of nutrition than say there cousins still in the wild. Does this contribute to more of a problem? I know you can't starve a horse to prevent dystocia but I wonder if taking away the pressure to be efficient metabolically changes the reproduction side of it as well.

[eyesontheground]

Actually cattle do have an higher actual "dystocia" rate. At least in my professional experience. You will pull many more calves than foals in a balanced mixed practice. BUT here is the big difference, a cow can labor for quite awhile, the calf will have to be pulled etc and you still have live calf, healthy momma cow. Their partuition is much slower and less violent. Horses have fewer presentation issues and fewer overall problems but when they have them they are often devastating esp to the foal due to the very quick Stage II of labor in the horse. If not attended the foal is almost always lost.

A cattle dystocia you usually have time to get there, with a cup of coffee on the way. A horse, you better fly and still most likely you are going to pull a dead foal.

As much as I disliked cattle work over the years, all those calves I have pulled gave me lots of real world training for equine dystocias.

Your neighbors' cows probably have had the same issues as the mare that lost the foal... it just wasn't fatal for the calf like it was for the foal.

This is an excellent point.

I am curious however, what percentage of the cow herd and what percentage of the mare base requires pulling or assistance of some kind. Even though you saw many cow dystocias is it possible that it was a smaller percentage of the actual population? I only say this because I would assume there are alot more cows calving than horses foaling.

[eyesontheground]

Ok, last post for a while :D can you tell this is a topic I like?

In cattle, fertility is generally thought to include the ability to get pregnant. With the advent of AI it has expanded to include the ability to get pregnant within a time constraint. The individual must be able to respond to synchronization, show a good heat (depending on your system), conceive, and maintain the pregnancy.

So, in DB's rancher example, yes, he gets 100% conception rate but how long and late is his 'foaling season'? Maybe some of the problems in horses in achieving and maintaining pregnancies are related to trying to make the horse fit on our schedule. And also, how much is due to human error (prob just as much as in a cow :lol:).

[Hillside H Ranch]

I should re-state, that in my own experience, horses have a higher rate of dystocia than cows. We raise cattle in addition to horses and I have had more foals presented incorrectly, leading to dystocia, than I have had calves. However, although we do know the breeding dates for all of our cows, not all of the calvings are attended. Perhaps they do have problems, but the calves can survive a prolonged birthing process while foals usually cannot. I can say that in the 5 years we have been at this location, we have only had to pull one of our calves (we only run a couple of dozen cows, so not a large operation at all). It was basically dead (no breathing, barely a hearbeat) but with a little stimulation "woke up" and today is a healthy 7 month old heifer. In contrast, I have had 10 foals, total, for the same time period and have had 1 abortion, a red-bag/upside down foal to pull and a bad hip-lock.

[dr j]

I should re-state, that in my own experience, horses have a higher rate of dystocia than cows. We raise cattle in addition to horses and I have had more foals presented incorrectly, leading to dystocia, than I have had calves. However, although we do know the breeding dates for all of our cows, not all of the calvings are attended. Perhaps they do have problems, but the calves can survive a prolonged birthing process while foals usually cannot. I can say that in the 5 years we have been at this location, we have only had to pull one of our calves (we only run a couple of dozen cows, so not a large operation at all). It was basically dead (no breathing, barely a hearbeat) but with a little stimulation "woke up" and today is a healthy 7 month old heifer. In contrast, I have had 10 foals, total, for the same time period and have had 1 abortion, a red-bag/upside down foal to pull and a bad hip-lock.

As pointed out above, cattle ( for the most part) are selected for calving ease. At least the smart cattle breeders are doing that! I do think we watch horses much more closely and therefore do "see" complications more frequently vs cattle pushing on through what we would assist in a horse- just because we are there. Ease of foaling is almost never a consideration in an equine breeding.

I agree with the posters above making the points about all the things we do select for - fertility/foaling factors are usually not considered. That subfertile mare that is so hard to get/keep in foal should probably be culled from the gene pool, not subjected to assisted reproductive technologies to continue her influence.

I used to joke with my clients "I have never watched a foal be born! It was true, I have never stood by and just watched ! IF I was there, it was to be involved!

And although I hated pulling all those calves, pulling a live healthy baby of any species is still a great feeling- and worth falling on your arse in a pile of cow manure/the water trough/the mud etc!

[FriesianX]

We had cattle for several years - PITA! We did lose a few cows (and calves) in labor, and a few calves due to mastitis issues with the cows. AND I live in beef cattle country, and can tell you, I've seen plenty of them dead in the fields over the years around here. Most people in this area raise "market cattle", which means they aren't anything fancy - they are generally Angus cross that are raised for, you guessed it, the meat market. They sell by the pound at auction, a yearling steer is worth a few hundred $. A breeding cow in her prime is not worth much more. As a result, if something happens, it is not economically feasible to have a vet out. And if a cow dies, the coyotes and buzzards dispose of the remains pretty quickly. A harsh world:eek: We joke that there are far more CATTLE in this county than there are PEOPLE - but there are no vets that treat cattle. Ranchers stick with the basics, and otherwise the cattle are on their own. And it does encourage survival of the fittest.

Some of the ranchers think I'm crazy to monitor my mares the way I do - they come in to foal, I've got cameras in the barn, etc. But my mares are worth far more than the market cow.

Cattle do seem tougher than horses - but I suspect it has to do with the survival of the fittest natural selection rules. Now - does anyone know a rancher who has very expensive prize cattle? I wonder if things are different in that breeding situation?

Yes, I do believe we have domesticated the horses to the point where reproduction strenght is not as strong as it was in the wild. We've selectively bred for the biggest, fastest, highest jumping, fanciest moving, we are SO FAR away from the natural horse. The more selective breeding and even inbreeding that occurs to emphasize traits we look for in a competition horse, the further we go from what nature intended the horse to be. We have one Mustang (my husband's pet), and I can tell you he is SO physically different from my sport horses - and I'd be willing to bet his dam never had any repro issues;)

[denny]

With the mention of lower birth weight (in cattle) being desireable, is there a correlation between size of horse and ease, safety of foaling, do you think?

Wild horses are small, but we`ve often "bred big" for the FEI disciplines. So maybe we`ve gone against nature too much?

My former neighbor`s Morgans used to foal outdoors, in the rain and mud, sometimes, and they seemed to just thrive. They were also small.

[camohn]

I have a place in the country. Our neighbors run their cattle on our property. In 8 years, they have had at least 50+ babies -- all unasisted and with no problems. Lots of healthy, happy calves. They had one foal, which died at birth. And I read about all the issues with horse labor/delivery on this BB.

So my question is this -- are cattle better able to have calves "unassisted" than horses? If we didn't have foal watches, and mare cams, etc., would there be a higher mortality rate than cattle?

Or -- being human and caring more about our horses -- do we just like to worry and plan and therefore it SEEMS as if horses are more fragile?

Actually from what I have seen living near pots of dairy farms.........horses generally do a better job of it than the cows. I have had one stuck foal that needed assistance with delivery in 10 years. The dairy people are pulling stuck calves out all the time.

[Bluey]

Whoever thought all black cows look the same, that is like saying all sorrel or bay or gray horses look the same.
Of course they don't.;)
When you look after cattle, you better know your cows and you can match them with their calves, even if all are the same color.

Those talking about cows forget that, if we are talking beef cows, practically all problems are in heifers, that is those cows giving birth to their first calf.
After that, the heifer becomes a cow and they very rarely have a problem.
We calved 300 cows, watched them once a day at feeding time and very rarely we had a cow, maybe every few years, having any kind of trouble.
We noted if one was close and looked for her the next day at feeding and here she would come, with her calf and if not, or any other was missing, we would go look for her, no mean feat in our mile long canyons.
It was always a treat to find them somewhere, the calf bedded down, the cow watching over it and give them a little treat of cottonseed cowcake, dropped where she could see it and come get it when we backed off.
In over 30 years, only once I found a cow down, way up in a canyon, that had a hard time calving and pinched a nerve.
The calf was dead.:cry:
I took some portable panels, put them around her and took water and feed to her twice a day and in ten days she was back up and doing fine.

Now, heifers we had to keep in a small trap and watch and we did pull, I would say, a good 10% of them.
We looked at them last time at 11 pm with a spotlight and again at first light and several times a day.
As we felt some were close, we may put them up so we could see her all along.

When a cow has a problem, it is at times because the calf died first, for whatever reason, before being born.
I have seen a heifer give birth to a calf being born backwards, as we were there ready to assist, but didn't need to.:cool:

One problem is that heifers are bred to calve before they are fully mature, so they have their first calf very young.
Most ranchers I know use heifer bulls on them, known for easy calving offspring.

Now, with broodmares, we were there for every birth, every time, even if they also rarely had any trouble.
I checked them every hour and if one was acting close, didn't keep my eyes off her.

[MikeP]

.....
And I wonder, if you have a ton of cows, like 50-100, maybe it's easier to count wrong. I'm sure it's hard to get the right number when you have a bunch of identical black cows milling about while you're trying not to count one twice. If one died in the back 40 while giving birth, it might go unnoticed unless you find the body.

As a cattle farmer, I'd say a firm "NO" to this. On any even marginally managed cattle operation, calves are identified with an ear tag, males castrated, and several other things may be done soon after birth. Every calf is clearly tied to his mother. That's one way that we know if or when to cull a cow. Poor performing calf=Mama's gone and replaced with a cow that might do better.

In calving season, pastures are patrolled twice daily and new calves tagged, navels are treated with iodine, and so forth.

A one percent (1%) rate of dystocia in a cattle operation would be about normal. I have no idea what a normal dystocia rate would be in a horse herd. I don't raise horses, I buy one when I need one. One mare I purchased turned out to be pregnant. She surprised us with a healthy, happy foal that was up and running around one winter morning. :)

[pintopiaffe]

I think the nutrition comment is an interesting one. We do our best... but are we creating problems?

I also have always said I wonder if we are doing the right thing by using AI so prevalently, timing them in, etc.

Sometimes a mare won't stand for a particular stallion (LC) Sometimes she won't take despite everything going well. Maybe there was a REASON. I think, in a way, when we take away Nature's choice, we are probably *sometimes* contributing to less fertility or more issues overall.

With older mares (I'm talking 16+, some as old as 22) we never used to go to extraordinary measures. The most we might do if the season was getting late, was a short course of regumate and shot of prosti to bring them in. We just always felt that if they didn't take easily, they weren't going to carry well/easily.

Now look at me, even with an 8yo in her prime, I'm timing them in, honestly, for convinience--so I can breed AI without boarding, with fewer ultrasounds, on weekdays when semen is shipped... <shrugs>

I also take mild offense that cattle aren't watched/known... we had anywhere between 2-400 head of cattle depending on the year/season etc. We knew who they were. Ear tags for a reason... Some were only known my number, but many had names. Probably 20 of those were our best cows. Easily calving, plenty of milk, good mothering. Yes, we pulled a few, but no, not many, and most survived even a come-along. To me, that was the biggest difference... you sometimes really, really had to PULL, and both generally still lived. Do that to a mare or foal, both would be gone for sure.

[EquusMagnificus]

I totally believe veterinary techniques are good and devastating at the same time for the equine species.

While it has allowed to save our most precious pets, it has also allowed us to let the weak live. The weak wouldn't have survived in nature.

Horses that have broken down in sport due to their poor conformation were allowed to join the breeding band. Mares of questionable reproductive history/capacity were allowed to breed and carry on a live foal. If a filly, this filly without any doubt, has chances of joining the broodmare band and carrying on her dam's flaws.

By this, I do not mean carreer broodmares who at the end may need a bit of support to carry to term, I mean young healthy mares needed considerable efforts to get (and stay) in foal. Those ones should be culled from the breeding population.

Athleticism is great, even essential, but without some fertility, we are going to loose those bloodlines.

Personally, I have set up my limits as far as fertility is concerned and as far as how much will I try to get a mare pregnant. I always think, would I want to keep a filly (as a broodmare prospect) out of a mare with some reproductive issues? Of course not! I have one mare right now who is on the line of going back to being a riding horse. Two tries last year, some misfortunes and bad management and she didn't take. This year, she has another two tries and after that, she's becoming a riding horse. I really really hope she'll catch this year because she is one damn nice mare! But it doesn't make any sense for me in the big scheme of things to make extraordinary efforts to breed her (she's has loads of qualities, but she's not an Olympic winner either!) both from an ethical point of view but also from an economic point of view. :no:

Especially not when I have two other great mares who get pregnant by knowing the semen is coming! :yes:

Anyways, kind of a disorganized post but it is something that I am concerned about. Medicine allowing genes that should not be transmitted to be replicated and reinforced in the species.

[Daydream Believer]

With the mention of lower birth weight (in cattle) being desireable, is there a correlation between size of horse and ease, safety of foaling, do you think?

Wild horses are small, but we`ve often "bred big" for the FEI disciplines. So maybe we`ve gone against nature too much?

My former neighbor`s Morgans used to foal outdoors, in the rain and mud, sometimes, and they seemed to just thrive. They were also small.

denny,

I have wondered the same thing....and it does seem that way at times. Do the very large and very small (minis) have more difficulty foaling and more dystocias proportionately than the smaller more "normal by nature" sized horses? I remember reading Deb Bennett who commented that in nature, the horse never exceeded 16 hands and typically was much smaller. Quite clearly selective breeding for human purposes must have had some effect on their reproductive health over the centuries.

[Daydream Believer]

Daydream,

I would assume that your horses could foal on their own. They are not all that removed from a situation where survival of the fittest is very very real.

I wonder how much role nutrition plays in this as well. I would assume that your mares are maintained on a higher plain of nutrition than say there cousins still in the wild. Does this contribute to more of a problem? I know you can't starve a horse to prevent dystocia but I wonder if taking away the pressure to be efficient metabolically changes the reproduction side of it as well.

Yes, certainly my mares are in much better condition/weight than the range mares. I manage their nutrition carefully. So far (knocking madly on wood) I have not had any major foaling issues with my Col. Spanish mares but I can't help but being paranoid. A major difference though from how I keep my mares and those range mares is that I am forced to pull them off the pasture, put them in small dry paddocks (for fescue) and limit their ability to move and exercise. I truly believe the lifestyle is a large part of the problems with our girls...they go from the stall to the paddock and back to the stall and are not moving 20 miles a day like their wild cousins...they are not in fit condition typically either...just standing around not moving any more than necessary.

[hansiska]

As one old vet I knew once said, "women and cows are tough; mares are delicate."

Having worked on a dairy farm for a spell, I pulled a lot of calves. I was always amazed at what the cows -- and calves -- could take and still live. Twins happen with some frequency, usually with both calves' survival (although female twin calves are sterile, if I recall correctly). You can reach into a cow and turn the calf. I've done it. I barely touched a calf once and it did a summersault! I turned it and it lived, but I tried to turn another and it died (the cow had been in labor for some time). I've helped pull them out backward and they've lived.

Foals seem more streamlined to me. They don't have the big, square heads calves have, but they have such long legs! I think it's not just the size of warmblood foals, but the length of leg. Add that to mares' innate delicacy and you've got big potential for foaling trouble.

[Thomas_1]

No there's not a lot of difference.

[Indy-lou]

Cows don't compare well to horses as in comparing apples to oranges. I raise both. My vet and I were just talking this morning about how cows can survive things no horse ever would. They are entirely different species: cows are ruminants and chew cud and horses aren't/don't. Cows have an entirely different placental attachment configuration than horses do. A cow could be in labor for a long time and still deliver a live calf, we know horses have about 30 minutes to get the job done, or odds increase dramatically for mortality of the foal. Cows cycle and can be bred throughout the year, horses are seasonally anestrus. Cows and horses don't share the same spectrum of disease vulnerability. As far as birth weight and size go, we now know that the BULL predominately determines the size of the calf and also the gestation period of the calf! That is why some bulls are known as "calving ease sires", they will reliably throw smaller calves, and along with this, will influence a shorter gestation period of the offspring inutero.With modern knowledge, artificial insemination and the abundant amount of information available to cattle breeders about a particular sire (in cattle, a bull's offspring number in the hundreds or thousands sometimes and there is a LOT of data compiled by the breed organizations) , there is really very little reason for informed breeders to have to deal with pulling calves even with "first-calf heifers" when using "proven" bulls. There are statistics available that predict with great accuracy which bloodlines will produce not only smaller calves, but those that contribute to smaller/problem hips in the cows. And yes, cows and bulls with less than desirable reproductive traits are culled in the majority of herds. MOST people do not consider cows to have value as pets, though I can tell you there are many charming aspects to them, and they have plenty of intelligence about being cows, raising their calves and doing cow things...Comparing horses to cows though just isn't a very workable model.

[county]

I've had 100's of foals and 1000's of calfs. Its been many years since I had to assist a mare foaling with one exception I had a mare a few years ago with a foal that had a leg back. I've had to assist a few cows almost all were 1st calf heifers but the ratio cow to mare is pretty much the same and very rare with both. Both species birth outside on grass I've never found the need to lock them up.

[eyesontheground]

No there's not a lot of difference.

Comparing horses to cows though just isn't a very workable model.

Two very different view points obviously. I think what we are really comparing is what humans have created hardiness wise in the two species. I believe that Thomas would prob agree that horses do have the potential to be hardy similar to cows. While Indy-lou points out that cows have been selected to be hardy while horses have not. Daydream Believer's horses are a perfect example of this.

I think (and have been told) that you could just as easily select cows to need more assistance. For example, if you pull every calf born for a certain period of time over generations, you end up with a greater precentage of your herd needing assistance. Essentially this has happened in horses (I suspect). And I believe it is due to what one poster pointed out...a mare is more valuable than a cow. So, we wait for 11 months and worry about our delicate flowers and watch and wait and obsess some more and then provide assistance when the time comes. Maybe 1/5 (purely guessing on a number for example) of all the mares we help foal would not have had a live foal or a thrifty foal. Maybe half of those foals are fillys. And some percentage of those end up in the mare herd. So over time you end up with more mares needing help. I think in a breeding program you could select for higher fertility without making it your number one selection criteria. And potentially make your life much easier.

Interestingly, someone has already pointed out the role the bull plays in this equation in the cow. I am curious if there are already lines of horses that are more prone to needing assistance and we don't know if because it is not something that breeders focus on.

Maybe a little off topic, but I am curious about the heredity of double ovulation. These are mares that would be 'culled' from the wild herd. We are pinching and allowing those genetics to pass on. It is hard to separate the causes of double ovulation however. Is it the mare or is it the snychronization protocol?

Great discussion, btw!!

[Bluey]

---"MOST people do not consider cows to have value as pets, though I can tell you there are many charming aspects to them, and they have plenty of intelligence about being cows, raising their calves and doing cow things..."---

That was a rather funny way to describe cows. :D :lol: :winkgrin:

[Thomas_1]

I've had cattle and horses in number all my life.

Currently got 800 head of cattle and 60 horses. I used to own a sizeable stud farm. I've got bulls and rear cattle still.

Reared both all my life. The chances of things going wrong, or right are in my experience absolutely no different. Manage it: have stock in good condition, fit to breed, in good environment, chosen for their good qualities etc etc etc and you reduce the risks.

Rely on chance and good luck and the risk increases.

There's some obvious things like cows more likely to have live birth twins successfully but trust me, cattle can have problems calving just the same as horses and in my experience in no different number at all.

[Indy-lou]

I re-read the OPs particular question, and I have to agree with Thomas about the percentages of "assisted vs non-assisted" births in the general sense if you take away all the selective breeding factors and management differences.

[FLIPPED HER HALO]

I think part of it is that we horse people don't tend to view horses as livestock but as pets etc. Does that make sense? So we get all excited, plan the breeding, anticipate the foaling, make ourselves crazy etc.

Most cattle and bulls are just thrown into pastures and nature takes its course from what I've seen. They aren't generally checked to see if they are pregnant etc. You just look out and go, "oh there's a new baby."

My boyfriends parents have angus cattle and a bull in their pasture. There are a few calves each year. In the past several years there was 1 cow that died giving birth with the calf half way out.

[jej]

I had beef cattle for many years. My motto was "Either you produce meat, or you are meat".

I had a remarkably fertile herd of cows with few calving problems.

I'm not prepared to apply this way of thinking to my horses.

[Bluey]

I think part of it is that we horse people don't tend to view horses as livestock but as pets etc. Does that make sense? So we get all excited, plan the breeding, anticipate the foaling, make ourselves crazy etc.

Most cattle and bulls are just thrown into pastures and nature takes its course from what I've seen. They aren't generally checked to see if they are pregnant etc. You just look out and go, "oh there's a new baby."

My boyfriends parents have angus cattle and a bull in their pasture. There are a few calves each year. In the past several years there was 1 cow that died giving birth with the calf half way out.

I don't like those hobby farmers, that don't know animals and don't take proper care of them.

As has been already said, cows give you plenty of signs that they are close and time when they start calving.
You then watch them, that is what good animal husbandry demands.
To let a cow out there having trouble until they die is animal abuse, no other words for it.:cry:

We have been at times pulling a calf in a blizzard, in the lights of a pickup, when a young cow fell backwards into a cowtrail and could not right itself up and started in labor.
Both were fine, except she was a little bit mad at the whole thing and ran us off once we got her back on her feet and the calf bawled as we pulled it to the side.
Ungrateful, that cows can be at times.:yes:

We put the heifers in small traps, so we can watch them extra close and so they are close to the barn and chute, in case they need assitence.
The cows very rarely need help, so they are ok with being watched out in their calving pastures.

Mares, we were putting them in pens when they were close and they foaled in foaling pens, then were taken to pens with stalls for three weeks, before being turned out back to pasture with their now large enough foals to stay out of trouble.

I really can't imagine people just letting them fend for themselves to the point of dying out there, without care or supervision.:no:

[Jaegermonster]

Your post, EquusMagnificus was great. The same could be said of humans. I think there is too much intervention (AI, fertility shots, treatments, implanting embryos, on and on and on) leading to the increase in illnesses, allergies, orthopedic problems and so on in many species. When something is telling you it isn't meant to be, you should probably listen.

[Kinney]

As one old vet I knew once said, "women and cows are tough; mares are delicate."

Having worked on a dairy farm for a spell, I pulled a lot of calves. I was always amazed at what the cows -- and calves -- could take and still live. Twins happen with some frequency, usually with both calves' survival (although female twin calves are sterile, if I recall correctly). .


If you have two female calves or two male calves you will have no reproductive problems. The problems come with having a male and female calf together. The male hormones affect the completion of the female reproductive tract in the womb and many times you will have a perfectly looking set of twins but the female will be sterile. The male will not be affected.

Back in the 80's there was a hereford at a nearby farm that they thought never got pregnant since everybody had had theirs but she was really really large. She ended up having triplets! one did pass away after a week but the other two lived!

[dr j]

denny,

I have wondered the same thing....and it does seem that way at times. Do the very large and very small (minis) have more difficulty foaling and more dystocias proportionately than the smaller more "normal by nature" sized horses? I remember reading Deb Bennett who commented that in nature, the horse never exceeded 16 hands and typically was much smaller. Quite clearly selective breeding for human purposes must have had some effect on their reproductive health over the centuries.

Completely "unscientific" study but in my practice, draughts and minis both appear to have higher dystocia rates than "normal" sized horses.