Welcome JoJo!

We were rather anxious this past Wednesday morning because we knew our Jersey cow "Jilly" (who we cross-bred with our Highland bull "Gunner") was due to have a calf at any time. TA DA! A ball of slightly damp fuzziness was parked in a bunch of hay and mom was cleaning up. The fuzziness has thus far served it well because it was a cold and windy day when "JoJo" was born.



This is JoJo in mid-baby moo!

We were very concerned that it was too windy in the open pasture where Jilly gave birth so we prepared a stall in the barn with plenty of straw for bedding and hay and water for Jilly and proceeded to "coax" this cow down the driveway to the barn. Easier said than done! My husband picked up this shivery, leggy fuzz ball and held her as I drove us slowly in the mule, hoping that Jilly would follow her calf.

Jilly had other plans. After getting her through the gate, Jilly decided that she had found grass nirvana and wouldn't budge while JoJo baby moo'd and pooped on my husband's coat. After 15 minutes of trying to get Jilly to follow, we took the baby down to the barn, settled her in the hay and drove back up to get Jilly to move along. Once she rounded the corner of the house and saw the other cows, she remembered being down there before and headed straight into the barn where she found her calf in the warm straw and plenty of fresh hay to munch.

This morning I had a feeling that JoJo wasn't nursing--she seemed too hungry and a bit too bony. She needed the fat in her mama's milk to bulk her up and keep her warm as her fuzzy coat won't do the job alone. We got out the old stand by calf bottle, prepped milk replacer and tried to get her to suckle first with my finger and then with the nipple. She didn't seem to know how to suckle and I also think something is off with her lower jaw so this had me very concerned. Thank goodness my husband grew up on a dairy farm...he poured some of the milk replacer in a bowl and JoJo started to drink it! Yes!!! He said we may have to milk Jilly and feed JoJo from a pail.

However, this little exercise in "hey, this is what I've been missing" with JoJo seemed to get her appetite rev'd up because she got up and started to actively search for mom's teats. We were the quietest cheerleaders on earth with all our encouraging words spoken in whispers as if JoJo were able to process any of the instructions! "No JoJo, go to the left", "don't let go of the teat", "that's mama's leg, not the udder, keep searching", "now hang on and suck and you'll get the good stuff". Maybe it helped, maybe it didn't, but when we headed back to the house JoJo seemed to have finally figured it out. Whew!