The other night, as we were getting cows in, we noticed one cow did not come in. She is always one of the first ones in the barn every morning and night. Due in about 10 days, she had not shown much sign of looming birth. Usually their udders swell noticeably, and they may leak milk or get antsy. She had no symptoms, but the fact that she wasn’t in the barn as usual gave us pause to think something was definitely up.
My husband went back out to scout the pasture and, sure enough, there she was with her little calf, tucked away in the back corner, in the farthest spot she could be. Why do they always choose the hardest place to get to? It must be intuitive.
Years ago when our yellow lab, Diamond, gave birth to her puppies, she chose to hide in the crawl space under our laundry room floor. I remember we had looked the farm over high and low and finally discovering her, left her alone until the next day.
After she had given birth, our middle son crawled on his belly, eventually retrieving her puppies one-by-one, all nine of them. Diamond was not liking it, not at all. Our son scooched back out after trying in vain to get the first one. We fashioned a sort of cardboard shield that he used to guard against Diamond so she wouldn’t take a bite out of him. He tried again. It worked. She just cautioned him with a low growl that she was not happy, but was giving him permission to rescue her puppies. After they were out we thought she had given birth to a litter of chocolate labs until she licked them clean. They were all a sunny yellow! She was an excellent mother. That was about 10 years ago.
The other day, a fella stopped by our farm. He had a large, grey-muzzled yellow lab in the back of his car and wanted to let us know that this was one of Diamond’s puppies. He said it was the best dog he ever had. Oh, were we pleased!
Just lately, I was at a baby shower and afterward a woman came up to me with her cell phone. “You probably don’t remember me but we got one of your puppies a long time ago and I just wanted to let you know, he’s still alive and we just love him! Here’s a picture!” I was touched. We knew Diamond was a wonderful dog and a great momma and she has left, quite literally, living proof of that!
So that night before milking, my husband took the tractor and plunked the little calf right across his lap and hauled it up from the secluded place at the bottom of the hill to the back door of the barn. Because the mother had not followed, he had to go back and bring her up. Usually, as the little ones are being carted off, the mothers follow. That night, milking was put off for a good half an hour while husband was tending to the newborn and its mother.
I’ve noticed time and time again, mothers and their newborn calves have a special bond. It’s amazing because to me, they all look alike! We had a cow whose stanchion was at the end of the barn, close to the calf pens. She had just freshened and that first night she and her little one were having a conversation. She’d moo, low and momma-like, and her little one would answer back with a soft little beep of a moo. She’d moo, the baby would moo back. This went back and forth, back and forth. I laughed and then I thought, aw, this is too sweet! They were talking to each other.
A first-calf heifer had given birth and after she got done milking, every time she went by the calf pen, she’d stick her head over the gate and pause there, ears pointed forward. Then she’d spot her little one and moo softly. They all look alike in there, right down to the spots, yet she had this innate sense which one was her very own.
Newborns and their mothers are fashioned by God to interact with each other, even in the animal kingdom. Us humans just stand back in awe and watch it happen.
(“Call to Me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.” Jeremiah 33:3)
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