With another calving season here, Manitoba producers can benefit from some key techniques and advice for dealing with difficult labour.
The first two important steps in working with calving dystocia are figuring out why the calf isn’t coming and knowing when to intervene, said Dr. Shania Jack, who works out of the Morden Vet Clinic.
“There’s ‘three P’s’ to calving – presentation, position, and posture,” Jack said at a Manitoba Agriculture Stock Talk webinar held on March 13.
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WHY IT MATTERS: Managing a hard birth during calving properly reduces risks of injury or death, ensuring healthier cows and calves, and improving overall herd productivity and welfare.
Presentation refers to the position the calf is coming out of the birth canal in, such as headfirst or rear-first. Position refers to the calf’s alignment relative to the cow — upright, upside down, or sideways. Posture is about how the calf’s limbs and head are positioned.
That doesn’t count other complicating factors, such as calf size in comparison to the mother.
Veterinary experts compartmentalize birth into three stages, cervical dilation and nesting, active birth and the expulsion of the placenta.
“Intervention is needed when there’s signs that stage one has been going on for longer than six hours,” Jack said.
If a cow has been restless for over six hours – often showing telltale signs like their tail being raised – and hasn’t started pushing, or if the cow exhibits continuous cycling of laying down, standing up, and spinning, it’s time to step in, she added.
When performing vaginal exams, one should be able to feel all the way around the calf, Jack said.
“Between the cow’s pelvis and the calf…if you’re wedged in there and can’t move, typically that requires a c-section.”
Pulling calves properly
When assisting with a birth, it’s always important to double loop chains, Jack said. The first loop goes above the fetlock, and the second goes just above the hoop. This ensures pressure is distributed properly, which can prevent injuries to the calf.
“We’ve seen some broken legs from just a single loop on our chains,” Jack said. “And these are really, really bad breaks, because they damage the blood supply, as well as some of the nerve supply.”
Farmer calving fixes
A farmer facing a calf with a foot back can try manually correcting it into the correct posture, the vet said. Producers should gently push the calf back into the uterus to allow more room. However, trying to work in that narrow pelvic canal is quite difficult, Jack added.
“You’re going to grasp the limb near the elbow, pull it up and push back, and then once it’s in a flex position…you want to cup the foot in the palm of your hand – that’s really important to protect our uterine wall…because they can be sharp – and then pull that foot upwards (and) a little bit inwards toward the calf and then straight back towards yourself.”
When calves have both feet back, they can sometimes present with their head sticking out of the vulva. This is corrected in the same way, Jack added.
“It can be a little trickier, because when the head is sticking out there, there’s lots of pressure, and they often get emphysema really quickly, so they can get stuck in that position.”
If the calf has their head back, producers can grab them by the muzzle or corner of the mouth to help get them in the right place. If it’s a case of a stillbirth, and the calf is no longer alive, the eye socket is another option.
“You may need to push the calf back into the uterus in order to reach the muzzle. Sometimes you feel in there, and you can’t feel anything with that head back. So, pushing them back a little bit sometimes allows that muzzle to come up just a little bit.”
The muzzle should be gently lifted while turning the calf’s head. When using head snares, a calf’s head is pulled into the pelvis after it’s been repositioned manually. It’s important not to hook onto it to pull it around. That can damage the calf and even leave it with a broken jaw.
Head-back malpresentations sometimes shows up in big calves where, when they enter the birth canal their nose gets pushed back due to lack of room, Jack noted.
Getting big calves through the birth canal can be tricky, and may require the calf to be rotated to give more room, since the gap in the mother’s pelvis has more room vertically than horizontally.
Backwards calf births
Backwards calves are a common intervention-worthy malpresentation.
If the calf is coming hind legs first, it’s important to ensure their tails stay down during birth, Jack said. If they’re standing up, there’s a risk on injury to the tail.
A backwards presentation is often recognized when the producer notices the sole of the calf’s feet are facing upwards.
“The fetlock and the hock of a back leg are going to bend in the opposite direction (as the forelegs),” she said.
There’s also more rush with a backwards calf, “because of where the umbilical cord is, and their head’s not outside the birth canal,” Jack said.
The umbilical is pinched once the calf is in the birth canal, and the calf can’t draw oxygen themselves with the head not yet exposed to air.
“You need to move a little bit quicker, but you do want to spend a little bit of time trying to dilate, just so that it’s easier to deliver that calf, because there’s not that normal pressure there, so they often don’t dilate properly.”
Backwards births may not show signs of a problem until the second stage of labour, Jack added.
“That’s why we need to check them if they’ve been going in on in stage one for a while or have been quite restless for a while,” Jack said. “There’s no forceful straining, as there’s not enough stimulation of the cervix for this.”
Beware breech births
For breech births, where the calf is coming rump first, the producer’s first order of business if they’re going to pull rather than opt for a c-section should be to get the back legs out from under the calf’s body and into the birth canal.
It’s helpful to place a chain at the level of the hock and have a partner to help put a little bit of traction on it to help get the hoof in the farmer’s hand. From there, cupping the hoof to protect the mother, the calf’s foot and leg can be pulled inwards, upwards, and back, while at the same time pushing the hock forward to give more room.
“It’s a little bit tricky, and it takes some time,” Jack said. “You want to try and protect that uterus with your hand over the foot as much as possible.”
Forward-facing problems
If a calf is coming out forwards, but gets hip locked or stifle locked, it’s best to stop pulling and give it a chance to breathe with the head out of the birth canal. Pulling the calf out too quickly can result in broken legs and pelvises.
“You can stimulate it to breathe a little bit, and then kind of reposition and keep pulling,” Jack said.
Again, rotating the calf 45 to 90 degrees to take advantage of the bigger vertical gap in the mother’s pelvis can help troubleshoot the program. The producer achieves this by crossing the front legs before pulling. A downwards direction can also help unlock a stifle locked calf who is caught on the rim of the mother’s pelvis.
Upside down
Forward-facing upside-down calves can often be mistaken for backwards calves, Jack said. These calves need to be corrected, or risk being seriously injured during delivery.
“If we try pulling them this way, we can cause some pretty serious spinal damage. The pelvis arch can create a lot of issues there.”
In this case, chains should be placed on the feet, and the calf should be pushed back into the canal so that the farmer has more space. Cross the legs to encourage rotation during the pull.
“You can use…your opposite arm to help kind of scoop the calf over,” Jack said.
It’s much easier to do when the cow is straining, she added.
Sideways calves
Transverse or dog-sitting calves will present with all four feet, or just the back.
“You can try and push these guys in and get a set of feet into the canal, but this typically results in puncturing the uterus, because you don’t have control over that set of feet,” Jack said.
This is considered a vet-worthy emergency and typically requires a c-section.
Sometimes veterinarians may be able to get a detorsion rod on the calf’s feet and be able to flip it that way, but it isn’t an intervention that a non-veterinarian should try, she warned.
“You need to call the vet for this.”
Other issues
To diagnose a uterine torsion, when reaching into the vaginal canal, it’s likely that you won’t be able to reach through the cervix.
“You won’t know what you’re feeling. It just feels a little bit off. It feels like you can’t get anywhere,” Jack said. “You know she’s calving, but it doesn’t feel like she’s opened up.”
When going in rectally, a tight band can be felt either going to the left or to the right, and that’s from the band of the uterus going in a clockwise or counterclockwise rotation. Sometimes, they can be positioned at 90 degrees, or a complete 180.
“That’s when you can’t feel anything when you go in there,” Jack said.
Other important things to remember when calving are to provide the cow and calf with enough breaks so that the calf doesn’t die from asphyxiation due to chest compression.
“Guys will pull, pull, pull, the calf comes out quick, and then all of a sudden it’s not lively and it dies. They can’t stimulate it to breathe, and that’s because of the asphyxiation from the chest being compressed,” Jack said.
If calving isn’t progressing, take a moment to reassess the situation, since using excessive force can cause harm. Allow time for dilation, and, when necessary, call a veterinarian for assistance.
“Take a moment,” Jack said. “It’s really easy to get worked up … just breathe.”
Pain management is also important, since pained cows aren’t good mothers.
Colostrum should be available to calves as soon as possible, especially by the six-hour point, but preferably within the first two hours. Frozen colostrum can be stored for up to a year.
