Maggie May was born at the end of September but we didn’t get her until November. Her last owners had construction going on at their house and they think the construction workers left one of the gates open, which let all of the cows out. Maggie May’s mom got out and they think she swallowed a screw or a nail because her and a couple of other cows died. This obviously left Maggie May without a mom, so she was nursing off of another cow. However, the cow was nursing two other calves and the owner needed to find her a home, which is where we come into the picture!
Originally, Andrew wanted to surprise me with Maggie, but if you know Andrew then you know he hates surprises. He cannot stand surprises and always ends up telling me lol. I will give it to him though, I didn’t know until the day of. He called me and said, “I’m going to get a bottle calf today. I was going to just show up with it tonight, but I couldn’t wait to tell you.” Typical Andrew lol. I think he also thought I would notice that one of our dog crates was missing.
That night he brought Maggie home in the back of his truck in Abigail and Colt’s dog crates. That ended up not being the smartest idea because she kicked a hole in it, but how would we have known. It took her about 3 days before she realized she liked the bottle and we both started to get a little panicky. By the third or fourth day, she was taking the bottle no problem and would suck it right out of your hands if you weren’t careful. Now, Maggie is still a little hesitant when people come up to her and she has no idea what to think about Oakley’s stroller haha. She sure does love her bottles and will continue to suck even after it’s gone if you let her. The chickens always go in her pen and try to eat her grain but she doesn’t seem to mind them at all.
The number one question people ask us about Maggie is, “What are you going to do with her?” I think we are both on the same page that if we raise a bottle fed animal, we will not harvest it. We think you get too attached, so we plan on breeding Maggie when she’s old enough. If the calf is a heifer, we’ll keep it. If the calf is a steer, we’ll raise it until selling weight. Can’t wait to see what else is in store for our Maggie May!
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