09/09/07, 05:51 AM
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Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 2,558
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It is called Congenital Flexed Pasterns. In the mild form, as Up North has said, recovery is fairly rapid and normally doesn't require any help. In the severe form nothing you do for it will help.
Which now leaves you in the position of deciding what to do if this calf isn't up and about, or at least showing signs of improvement, over the next few weeks. Some expert advice might be in order.
Some 25 years ago I was given a bull calf with CFP in one leg. I was the third person to have owned him in 1 month and he was given to me to kill for dog tucker as the vets had told the guy it would never come right - and it didn't. He went for dog tucker 13 years later!!! which is far longer than any normal bull will live. On our small farm he was fine, on a big farm he wouldn't have survived. However, there were physical issues involved with it. Because he couldn't stand straight, as he grew his shoulder and rib cage were pushed out of whack which meant that his lungs were compressed into an out-of-shape chest cavity. This gave him problems in the summer and was to eventually become the reason he was killed. With hindsight I would have been better to have steered him so he wasn't carrying quite the massive weight of a bull. However, he did live the life of Riley, he fathered some beautiful calves and he could run like the clappers if he had a mind to.
Cheers,
Ronnie
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