Why Cows are Called Dams

Drowning wasn’t a cause of death that I thought I’d ever have to deal with in beef cattle. I have had cows and calves go completely under water when sending the herd across the Salmon River at high water, but they all bobbed back up like corks, blowing snot out of their noses when they broke back to the surface (my horse I swam next to also went completely under, as did I). 

After all, it is really hard to plug your nose with hooves. We humans like to use our fingers for that. 

But one spring day, we were high and dry–away from any deep waters of any kind, and had a near drowning. Fact: Caryl and I are both certified by the Red Cross to be lifesavers. In our teenage years, we both went through the training to be lifeguards. We knew how to save people from drowning. 

But they didn’t cover cows in the workbook or the “in-water” practicums. But somehow, Caryl and I knew what to do. Like we learned in our trainings, the main thing was to keep the “victim’s” head above water and airway clear (they called them “victims” in the 70s. I think now there is a nicer term for a drowning case. Maybe I should take a refresher).

Our first ranch in Tendoy was a hardscrabble place–a sort of jigsaw network of flood irrigation ditches surrounding 5 to 15 acre fields. Keeping it wet and growing with meager water flows that rolled off snowmelt-fed springs on the Continental Divide in July and August was as much art as science. Either way, it took years of practice to master. Some people never get it. Split the water too much, you’d never have enough water to flood the 5 acre field. Split it too little, and you’d never get over the whole place. Sometimes flood sets were only an hour or so long before they watered where you needed to. If it was the middle of the night, I would just nap in the field, wake up after an hour or so, and move the next canvas dam flood set.

The soils and grass responded in spades when tended this way. Flood irrigation is all about relationship to the land–you get to know it like no other rancher. You knew where the rocky soils were–and where the light, arable soils were. You knew where the Nebraska sedge grew as well as the the tall stands of timothy and orchard. 

It was April when our situation happened, and the creek was full, a veritable cascade off the high divide. I sent all the water down the “lateral ditch,” as we called it, down the edge of our calving field. The ditch was only about 2 feet wide and 6 inches deep, but it was full and fast. A microcosm of frigid whitewater. 

We had about 50 cows in the 5 acre piece of ground. They were “heavies” I sorted off the main herd the day before: cows that were likely going to calve within the next day or so. With experience after several years of calving and tutelage by Ron Alder, the former owner of our small ranch, I was able to spot heavies fairly easily. 

Caryl and I were checking the cows to see if any needed assistance with calving. It took a few minutes to check every one, but Caryl spotted our problem cow first. “Glenn!” she yelled. “Come quick!”

I ran over to where she was along the lateral. On the way there, I noticed that water was flooding and spreading from the ditch, doing a nice job of irrigating the pasture, but I didn’t recall setting one of my portable canvas irrigation dams there. It turned out that a cow had set a dam for me. 

With her heavy-with-calf enlarged body. 

I don’t think she meant to do it. She simply had started labor near the whitewater ditch and on a contraction, she pushed, and thereby started rolling on to her back. She was making nice progress, after all. The calf’s head was out, and her “bag of waters” was broken. The calf in progress probably was looking around at his beautiful mountain meadow surroundings from his position part way out of her back end. 

The problem arose when the cow rolled back. It was just too far, and she kept rolling down the gentle hill until she was upside down, legs pointing wildly in the air, milk-leaking-from-the-teats, udder jiggling wildly to and fro. 

And her backend–her tailhead–was completely in the ditch. And her new baby was now not seeing any surroundings because he was completely under water. 

That’s when I showed up. Caryl was already struggling, trying to right the cow, kneeling in the ice cold torrent. I immediately jumped to her side in the flood, and we heaved away at the struggling twelve hundred pound cow. She wasn’t exactly happy in her upside down position and was quite aware that she was stuck. The ditch was nearly dry on her head’s end, because her butt was acting like the Hoover Dam in the torrent.

The calf was flailing–and failing. Head was fully submerged most of the time, and as he hadn’t progressed with shoulders out, he was pretty stuck there until mom would issue a laborious heave-to push. The problem was that in the middle of all the distress of being stuck upside down, she stopped pushing. Caryl immediately saw the need and lifesaving instinct kicked in. She stood with leather booted feet in the raging flood, facing the cow, hunched over her writhing form cradling the calf’s head above the rushing water so it could breathe. I rushed over and we tried to get the calf to progress, but couldn’t unlock shoulders from the grip of the upset mother’s rocking and rolling pelvis. 

I’m retrospect guessing the water was around 38 degrees. It was snowmelt, after all. It was only another few minutes before my wife and the cow both went numb from hypothermia.

“I’m getting the Allis!” I yelled.

Caryl yelled back, still hunched, still cradling the airway above water. “You better go FAST!”

I nodded and ran. 

Fast. 

The Allis was our old reliable. It had a 4-cylinder Perkins diesel that never died. My only hope was that it was plugged in. This morning was cold, and the oil would be thick. It would never start unless if plugged in. The normally built-in glow plugs were non-existent, normally an ace in the hole on diesels. But the tractor was too old. I could see the orange extension cord hanging from the block. It was plugged in! I yanked the plug on the way by the front of the tractor, and jumped on board. Fuel on, key on, clutch down, neutral tranny, press starter. The engine roared to life. I jumped off as it warmed for seconds, grabbed a log chain from the barn wall, wrapped it around the 3 point and drove at a speed akin to riding a rank bronc, with me gripping the steering wheel for dear life–to get back to my wife.

She was still there; they both were–her and the cow. I swung Allis around, backed in close, jumped and grabbed the log chain in singular motion. Clipping the grab hook around the farthest leg-hock, I climbed aboard and eased the clutch to start forward movement, trying for a full reversal of the ditch roll–outwards.

It worked. Caryl cradled calf through the rotation. Cow was on terra firma (but muddy from the flood), water was in the ditch, and calf head, muddy but wide-eyed was exposed for air intake. In just another moment, there was a tremendous push and heave as the cow remembered her labor, and calf was out in the mud, afterbirth and all.

As the cow managed miraculously to get up, the second she sniffed her newborn, I carefully dragged the baby to dry ground where she could lick it clean. Caryl looked tremendously relieved, and I was smiling. 

By the time the sun hit the meadows in the afternoon, I was ready for another calving check. Ditch-baby was happily sucking on the milk-bar, tail wagging. Proud mama was licking her calf as if none of that morning’s trauma had ever occurred. The only memory-nudging evidence I would have was a few days later. There, I spotted a brilliantly green patch of grass, growing tallest in the morning sun, where one particular cow chose to flood the meadow…instead of me. 

Happy Trails.