Mending what was Broken

I managed my first infliction of injury the other day.  One night late April we had 4 calves born in the night.  I went out to check genders and got numbers written down.  Then we go to the barn utility room and make out tags, yellow or white for bulls, and pink or orange for heifers. Then we give the calf the same number as the mother so its easy to match them up later.  We also band (castrate) the bulls within the first day or two. I was running the Safety Zone Calf Catcher, and I've probably caught between 100-200 of them this year while my dad did the rest.  This one poor bull calf I had to chase down a little while before getting him into the cage and slamming the gate on him, and from there work him.  He ran into the left side of the cage and went down, which is somewhat normal.  I jumped out and tagged and banded him, he was slow to get it which sometimes happens.  Upon finally getting him to stand up I see he has a back left hoof dangling...and my heart sinks...  I broke his leg. 


He tries to hobble away and never once let out a bawl.  Some calves yell and scream like you're skinning them alive just by grabbing them.  Not this one, he was a tough little guy. I quick try to catch him again, which wasn't easy... his mother was not happy with me.   But I call dad up to see what I should do, then called the vet.  


Got the calf loaded up in the pickup front seat, tried making a splint which didn't work, and got an emergency veterinary visit with a cast and got the calf home and back to his mother.  He didn't quite care for the cast and tried kicking it off upon setting him down, but he got used to it fairly quickly. 


Within a week he was running nearly full speed on it.  Vet said he could have the cast off in 4-6 weeks if all goes well.  His joint may fuse based on where it broke, but should recover.  Need to watch for any wounds or infection.  Vet told me if a break goes through the skin the recovery is so difficult it's better to put the calf down.  Thankfully that didn't happen this time. 



Edit:  At 6 weeks we got the calf shut in the head gate and using a grinder got the cast off.  His hide was a little beat up underneath and he was tender walking on it, but appears to be a successful cast!







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