Calf Necropsy

This was a 4 day old calf that a cattle rancher gave me to try and doctor. When I got the calf she was very dehydrated, depressed with sunken eyes, weak and the skin stayed tented for a good 5 seconds. I needed to give her electrolytes through an esophagus feeder. The problem I had is that I could not get the tube into the stomach and the calf had a hard time swallowing. At this point getting electrolytes through an IV was needed but I was not set up to administer an IV (I am now). I'm not a veterinarian but I have tube fed lots of calves and this was the first time I could not get the tube down into the stomach. I wanted to find out why and I decided to cut into this calf and let my veterinarian look at what I found. His conclusion was that the esophagus was too small to let the feeder tube ball pass through. Even though this calf's weight was about 75 lbs., it still would not pass so that makes perfect sense. Sometimes the tube ball is just too large, not often, but in this case it was. Next time I will administer electrolytes through an IV and will only use a tube feeder for colostrum and/or milk.

Category:

Pets & Animals

[slapurmommaz]

How long was it from the calf expiring to you doing this experimental necropsy on it?

[AnywhereButHere09]

That turkey needs to be dissected....

[UrbanMediia]

did it live