Why is my calf pooping blood

My bottle calf is pooping blood

Having a calf that is spotting blood or having blood in the stool or poop is common. Does not mean that you should not be concerned.

What is causing the bloody poop in the calf

It has damage in the lower intestines by either parasites or bacteria. Understanding which one is causing the problem is important to how you would want to treat the calf and repair the intestines.

Age of calf as a determining factor

Under calves under 250 pounds are less likely to have coccidia (parasites) the blood in the poop is caused by bacteria. 

In newborn to under three weeks old, it will be caused by bacteria infection damage.

Eight to nine months old the calf most likely has bloody discharge from coccidia. 

Treatment of bloody poop in calves 

For older calves with coccidia there is a product called Corid that is very effective in treatment.

For those calves under three weeks old a simple over the counter antibiotic will restore the intestines by killing the bacteria. 

For calves older than three weeks with bacteria infection especially with scours, I have found using antibiotics with scour treatment to be effective in treating the calves.

Click Here for my Guidelines for Raising Calves with my Scour Treatment included 

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Bring Out the Ranch Jackets

The first frost of the year has brought out the ranch jackets

It was a lite frost but the weather has been cool enough for the ranch jackets. The temperature only dipped down below freezing for a few early morning hours, so the grass wasn’t damaged. What little grass there is. Recently a few showers during the last few weeks has popped up some of the cooler weather grasses. But we’re still stuck in the worst drought in Texas of all time.

Saturday morning I did put on the rain jacket and wet gear for a little while. It was nice to know my rubber boots didn’t dry rot from lack of use. I’m hoping and praying that wearing those rubber boots becomes a common occurrence soon.

Not looking forward to putting on the ranch jacket on for full day, I can do without the colder weather. Just hoping that I don’t see that really cold spell until late January and it only last but a day or two. The weather has been nice with temperature around 70’s during the day with colder mornings. That’s normal November temperature for south Texas.

The calves have their ranch jackets on

We’re pretty much set with this group of calves. May pick up a calf or two but we’re fine for now with ten calves being fed on the bottle. I don’t like to go over twelve. It starts to be work then. The break down of the ten calves are seven Holstein steers, red with white face baldy steer, and two heifers one red with white spot in the forehead and yellow white face baldy. 

There has been a few run of the mill scour cases, but nothing that has blown out of control. So far. Two of the Holsteins steers came down with a respiratory problems. Droopy head, coughing, and feeling icky. It has been a tough case for the both of them. I gave them a shot of Draxxin to start with which normally cures about 85% of most cases but it didn’t help much with these two. Four days later I followed up with Micotil and an anti-inflammatory shot but it still didn’t knock it out. About 5 days later they started to turn for the worst again so they got some more anti-inflammatory and Baytril. One snapped out of it and looks like he is going to recover nicely. The other still is battling with it some. I probably should have tried Nuflor  instead of the Micotil but I have had go success with this follow up combo lately. The others all look good and everyone is nursing the bottle well.

Black Diamond and Rudolph

left to right

Dean, Clay, Roman and Charlie Joe.

Charlie Joe being nosey.

Dean and Roman

Blaze he’s only a week old here.

The two new kids.

Black Diamond and Rudolph

 

Clay

Rudolph taking a mid day nap.

Rudolph woke up when the others started making noise.

Lucas also taking a mid day nap. He’s loves going to the calf pen when it’s feeding time.

Livestock Supplies for Treating Worms, Ticks, Lice, and Fleas

Treating cattle for common parasites like worms, ticks, lice, and fleas can be easily done with just a few livestock supplies. I like to use pour on livestock supplies like Brute or Ivomec.

One of the ways I like to apply pour on livestock supplies to calves is to place the pour on in a spray bottle and then squirt it on the back of the calves as they nurse their milk bottles. I will start at the back of the neck and go down to their tails making sure the cattle supplies are even placed down the back of the calf.

I will first fill the spray bottle with water and then squirt the water into a 20 mL syringe to find out how much liquid comes out when the trigger is pulled.

The dosage amount of many pour on cattle supplies dewormers  is 1 mL to 22 lb of body weight of a calf.

A 100 lb calf will need roughly 4.5 mL of cattle dewormer

A 130 lb calf will need roughly 6 mL of cattle dewormer

A 150 lb calf will need roughly 7 mL of cattle dewormer

A 170 lb calf will need roughly 8 mL of cattle dewormer

Most of the squeeze bottles that I have used have squirted 4 mL of pour on livestock supplies with each pull of the trigger.

With a little practice I can squeeze the bottle half way of 2 mL.of pour on livestock supplies,

A 100 lb calf will need 1 squeeze of cattle dewormer

A 130 lb calf will need 1 ½ squeezes of cattle dewormer

A 150 lb calf will need just about 2 squeezes of cattle dewormer

A 170 lb calf will need 2 full squeezes of cattle dewormer

Most of time a measuring cup will come with the  livestock supplies of our choice and you can just pour it on the calf with that.

Most pour on cattle supplies will also treat roundworms and other internal parasites and external parasites like ticks, flies, flees, and lice, so you get both the outside and inside parasites at the same time.

So at what age can you deworm a calf? Most cattle pour on livestock supplies are labeled for both beef and dairy cattle of all ages.

 

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Giving a Calf a Bolus Pill

The first time I attempted to give a calf a bolus pill didn’t go quite to way I had seen it done. My father made it look so easy. Just place the pill in the tip of the applicator, and then place it in the back of the calf’s mouth push the ring on the applicator applying the pill down the little bovine’s throat.

Not thinking of all the practice my father had, I started getting pissed off when this calf kept spitting up the bolus. No lie that calf spit up that pill about thirty times on my first try.

Then a father said “Stand on the side of the calf, reach your arm around the neck and hold its lower jaw prying the mouth open with that hand, then place the pill in the mouth with the other go down to the back of the tongue.” Well, it worked on the third try.

Many years and many calves have passed since that first time, now giving cattle a bolus pill is like second nature to me. Every once in awhile a still get a pill spit out, but normally it goes down pretty easy.

I have had to administer a pill without the applicator. It can be done, but I recommend with an applicator. Much easier and a lot less chance of getting your fingers bit down on.

I like to run the cattle up a chute giving them little room to move around in to apply the bolus. You got to be careful when working this close to bovines they can fight back. Clam and slow, taking time to get it right is the approach I use. With a cow I like to stand on the outside of the chute up on the side boards at a safe distance giving myself room to get out of the away when they rear back.

I find much easier to give adult cattle injections than oral medication, thus I rarely administer bolus pills to adult cattle. Now calves are a different story, I prefer to give calf oral medications over injections. Most bolus work faster and longer than injections also is easier to apply in calves. I think because I have so much control over the calf when holding it by the lower jaw and placing the pill goes quickly.

Standing on the side, reaching around, and holding the lower jaw of a calf works well for administering all types of oral medication, drench, paste dewormers, bolus pills, and liquid antibiotics, you will have to pen or trap the calf to do so. If no chute is available you will have to restrain it in a corner of a pen or with a rope, sometimes you can get lucky and sneak up and grab it by a hind leg.

How to give a Shot Under the Skin to a Calf

Subcutaneous or Sub-Q Injection is an injection placed under the skin, between the muscle and the skin. The most common injection given by ranchers for vaccines or antibiotic for cattle, because it does very little damage to the muscle of the calf.

Use a 18 gauge needle either 1” or 1 1/2” long and syringe size large enough for the dosage amount needed, refer to product label of the inject able cattle medicine that you will be administering to the calf. Example, if the dosage amount for a calf weighting 300 lbs is 5 cc or ml, then use a syringe size 6 cc or ml or larger depending on what is available to you. You always want to limit the number of injection sites to as few as possible, so avoid unnecessary injections do to syringes not holding the dosage amount. Some antibiotics function better when applied in multiple injection areas, and the manufacture will place instructions on the recommended number of injection sites per dosage on the product label.

Load the vaccine or antibiotic for cattle by turning the bottle upside down, placing the needle into the bottle of medicine and pull the stopper of the syringe filling the syringe just a little pass the mark of the amount of dosage you will be administering to the calf. Then pull the needle out of the cattle medicine bottle, shake the air to the top of the syringe by flicking the syringe with your finger. Once the air bubbles are at the top of the syringe squeeze the stopper to get the air out and leaving only the cattle medicine in the syringe.

To administer to the calf, once the calf is restrained, grab the calf’s skin above the front shoulder with your thumb and forefinger, lift up pulling the skin away from the muscle, making a tent, then place the needle under the skin and injection the cattle vaccine or antibiotic in to calf between the skin and the muscle.

Click Here for Proper Cattle Injection Video