Wild Jerseys

[bricned]

I just purchased two jersey heifers app. 20 mo. old they are very wild as
they have had very little human contact. I was wondering if anyone has any
suggestions on how to gentle them. One is making a beautiful udder and will have to be milked some how.

[topside1]

Tranquillizer darts, (kidding) then pen them for as long as it takes for you and them to bond. Not much point in owning If they are presently unmanageable. I assume they are in your pasture. They need to be lured into a secure setting....If they are penned right now then be prepared the spend many hours calming their ways. Not many other choices.

[a1cowmilker]

I don't know if this would help or not. I made the mistake of letting my jersey heifer run with the beef cattle after her mother died. She became totally unmanageabel. I started feeding her sweet feed in a separate pen, always with the gate open, then I started shutting the gate ( had to because the beef cattle would come in and get her feed. I put a t-post on the inside of the gate so she could push the gate out and leave but the beef cattle couldn't push the gate in.

Today she will stand and eat while I pet her, rub her, and gently push her around. She will freshen any day now so I make it a point to rub her udder and get her used to that. The only thing she has done was to move her leg a bit and kind of brush her side.

Perhaps this will do for you as well. If not, you might consider getting another calf to put your jersey when she freshens to releive her of some of that abundance of milk she will be making and if she has a heifer make sure that the calf gets tamed and used to being around people. Thats probably not what you wanted to hear.

If you don't mind me asking, where did you get these cows? And why do you think they are wild?

[JeffNY]

This is how you make wild animals friendly. You catch them, then get really close to them (avoid their back legs), so work around their head etc. What your doing is showing them your not going to hurt them. After a month of this, they will become friendly, and in time they wont seem as wild. I have done this to beef calves, I roped them, tackled them, and after a while they became friendly. Because I didn't hurt them.


Jerseys are suckers for this, they act wild, but tame down faster.. Mainly because they dont have that strong will to fight, and resist.


Jeff

[Teacupliz]

Most of all the cows I bought this year were wild pasture cows. I have a tie stall barn- so I put them in the first spots where they get the most attention- at firsts they hate it but after time they are the biggest babies. I leave them tied for at least a few wks before I let them out to pasture. they learn where the goodies are real fast!

liz

[linn]

Keep your Jerseys in a pen, preferrably with a tame steer or heifer. Feed them grain. If they are not used to grain, the tame steer or heifer will eat and they will get nosey and try a bite. Pretty soon they will have their head stuck in the grain trough also. As they are eating their grain, gradually work your way up to their side. For the first few times, just talk quietly to them. From then on it is a progression of getting them to let you touch them. Once they will stand while you touch them, you can begin to brush them, all the while talking to them. It may take a while; but this is how we worked with our three Dexter cows.

[Jcran]

We used to show cattle in college as part of a "class" that concluded at a huge open house for the public called Poly Royal. Anyhow, we had to catch the wild heifers in the pasture and then halter them, and haul them up to the tie barn. Then we kept them tied in the tie barn, fed them every day, bedded and cleaned, and walked them to water daily. They got handled a lot, had a lot of others moving around them constantly, and were exposed to sounds they'd never been around. They tamed down quickly.