Oops!

willow_girl · #1 08/11/12, 12:02 AM

I broke one of my cardinal rules tonight and it came back to bite me in the butt!

The rule is that when a fresh or treated cow is ready to go back in the tank, I *always* go up and double-check her ear tag number before I take off her bands. Even if I'm positive I know it's the right cow, I still check.

Except for tonight. I *knew* that was #895 ...

Until the *real* #895 came in two groups later.

Luckily, I hadn't put the-cow-I-thought-was-#895 in the tank ... she was supposed to go in tomorrow morning, so I had removed her bands after milking her into the bucket.

But it was still bad, because I had to 'fess up to my boss, and we had to find the cow whose bands I had removed and run her back through the parlor to treat her and put her bands back on.

I won't make that mistake again!

(In my defense, we have no fewer than five fresh cows, one fresh heifer and two treated cows being milked into buckets right now. Aiiiiiieeeeeee!)

**gone-a-milkin** · #2 08/11/12, 08:25 AM

Whew! Glad you caught that mistake.
I have the very same cardinal rule.

Having a bunch of cows come fresh in a group and they always look a bit different when they first freshen and you havent seen them for awhile.

My very favorite girl freshened this week. She has really grown during this last dry period.
Unfortunately she managed to damage a heel yesterday somehow. Maybe caught her foot between some rocks or something.
The hoof is kind of chewed up looking and she is limping.

I spent some time cleaning it, hope it heals quick.

willow_girl · #3 08/11/12, 03:00 PM

Oh, I hope she is OK! I always hate it when one of my favorites goes lame.

We are up to our ears in calves right now; have 19 on the bottle including 7 from the latest round (one of the cows had twins). We usually grow the bull calves for a couple of weeks before sending them to the sale. My bosses' 84-year-old father does the calf feeding ... he's looking pretty tired these days.

tallpines · #4 08/11/12, 07:58 PM

ONCE when we were gone for a few days the neighbor kid did our milking.

Everything was written down for him.

But once we returned, the dairy was contacting us to say their whole batch was contaminated and the samples indicatated it came from our farm.

Neighbor kid insisted he did everything "right" but none-the-less the proof was in the sample.

Lots of sweating over the situation.

I don't remember the exact end results other than it all turned out better than the worst possible senario.

Could have cost us lots of $$$$$ if the dairy had needed to dump everything they took in that day.

It was a HUGE lesson for a bunch of people all through the system.

willow_girl · #5 08/11/12, 08:18 PM

There are a couple of ways you can mess up. Besides putting a treated cow into the tank, you can let a bucket overflow and backwash into the pipeline if you're not careful.

I have been lucky so far!

One other thing I do, to try to eliminate mistakes, is to always check the eartag number and put bands on BEFORE treating or drying off a cow. Little habits like that can save real hassles!

Another thing my old farm boss taught me was that as soon as the cows come into the parlor, to check for leg bands (treated cows) and pull the hoses off right away. That way, if you forget and start to put the milker on, the hose will suck air and alert you to the fact you need to hook up the bucket. That little trick has saved my biscuits a couple of times, too!

Sorry about your experience, Tallpines! I've been told insurance companies generally will cover the cost of one tanker load if you mess up ... but beyond that, you're on your own!

tinknal · #6 08/11/12, 08:30 PM

If I had a large Dairy I think I would have an entire separate parlor and pens for those cows, or at least separate pens

**gone-a-milkin** · #7 08/11/12, 08:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tinknal

If I had a large Dairy I think I would have an entire separate parlor and pens for those cows, or at least separate pens

A lot of dairies I have worked on do it that way, keeping a hospital pen.
It slows things down a bit,
but if you have 'forgetful' milkers then it is the only way to go.

willow_girl · #8 08/11/12, 09:21 PM

The first farm I worked on had a hospital pen for all its fresh, sick and lame cows. We milked them last. Usually there were less than 12 cows in that string, so they didn't have to stand for very long. Sometimes I'd run all the treated cows in last, and just pull the pipeline out of the tank! A lot easier than hooking up buckets.

The farm I work on now isn't configured in a way that would allow a hospital pen access to the feed bunk. We do have 2 box stalls for sick/lame cows, and sometimes if we have a third who needs TLC, we'll run the crowd gate forward and keep her in the back of the holding pen. Usually the 2 stalls are sufficient, though.

One herd I tested grouped all its first-calf heifers and saw fantastic results ... best production among heifers in all the herds I tested. Not unusual to see heifers making 90+ pounds there. It was a good herd, though ... it's regularly on the co-op's list of the top 100 on test. I do think segregating the heifers had a positive impact.

**gone-a-milkin** · #9 08/11/12, 09:43 PM

Segregating the FFs make sense to me too. I have never experienced that dynamic, but I bet it does help them.
Heck, they WANT to be seperated from the bigger, pushier cows.
I always feel a bit sorry for those little scaredy girls (even though the exasperate me to no end sometimes!).

Right now I have 2 dry cows lingering in the milkline. One is pretty thin and she is there for the extra ration, but the other one...
has no respect for fencing really.
She is FIRST for her grain~ At the head of the line, every night. Except tonight she wasnt...
At the very end I usually have to work a bit to get the stragglers to come through .
Tonight that dry cow was back there. Yep, straining away with a string of goo hanging out.
I tried to open the back gate and send her out w/o going through the barn.
She was having none of that. Literally waited until her contration was over and gunned it into the milkbarn.

Did you know that cows can be in labor and still eat every drop of their ration (in between pushes of course)?
Well they can.

willow_girl · #10 08/11/12, 10:24 PM

I'm not surprised! When my white cow Christine had Lil, I took her out a big bucket of sweet feed to celebrate.

She immediately stopped cleaning her calf and began gobbling ...