Twisty And Curly

#86, Twisty, had been a show heifer when she was about a year old. She was very pretty, had strong legs and well defined muscles that judges like to see and farmers like to have in their breeding stock. Twisty, however, had a bit of an attitude, she wasn’t particularly mean, but she did not care for women.
When a member of the fairer sex was around, she did not like being taught how to walk while wearing a halter, she would pull and tug to the point of pulling away from her handler. She did not like walking next to a female in a show ring, Mike could hold the halter and Twisty would act calm and placid, but if I or any other non-male would try the same thing, a near rodeo would break out.
Time passed and Twisty has calmed with age and with birthing her calves. She doesn’t act up when women are around her, but we watch out just in case the old habits show up unexpectedly.
This week, we knew that Twisty had calved and was down near the river. I had gone in search of the pair. Mike had been in the far field on the opposite side of the river to collect the solar electric fence and the barrel of mineral supplements to be moved over the where the herd was and where I needed to move Twisty and her calf.
I found the pair easily and was trying to move the two of them closer to the gate and out of the thick brush. Twisty had just calved shorty before and was still in the process of delivering the afterbirth when I came on the scene. Mike saw me from across the river and called out if I was doing ok.
As Twisty walked, the long mass of afterbirth that had been hanging from her backside, wrapped around her leg. Her instinct to check out what was coming out of her kicked into high gear and she whirled around to smell what could have been another baby. Just like a dog chasing his tail, Twisty spun around and around trying to catch up with the placenta and all.
Mike, seeing her frantically spinning in a circle assumed she had me pinned down and was pounding me into the ground. He could not have been able to get across the river so he did the next best thing. He hollered out to get a big stick, the ultimate weapon of use around here, but I was well out of the way holding onto the calf so it didn’t get tangled up in the hoopla.
Once she delivered her afterbirth, Twisty was back to calm and collected. I was able to move mother and baby across the field to the rest of the herd.
Welcome to the farm Curly, a sweet heifer, born 5/8/2018 weighing in at 66 lbs. I’m really glad that you were not part of a really frightening story.