The Highland Vet by Guy Gordon

Author:Guy Gordon [Gordon, Guy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781473599581
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 2022-04-28T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWELVE

To Be Frank

The veterinary practice in Caithness has always enjoyed a good reputation and has been progressive in its approach to providing veterinary services – a legacy from the ‘old boys’, which I sense is still running in the veins of the younger generation now at the helm. Change can often come quickly, but at other times it filters in slowly and is apparent only when one reflects back to a former epoque.

‘Cleaning cows’ would fit this latter category. To be clear, I am not referring to putting a showerhead on the end of a hose and grabbing a bottle of bovine shampoo. When I was in other parts of the country as a student, it was also known by the similar term ‘cleansing’ a cow. Whatever the terminology, we are referring to the removal of the afterbirth – the placenta – which has been retained after calving.

Cows normally pass the afterbirth within minutes, hours, or at worse, a day or two after giving birth, but occasionally the placenta can literally ‘hang around’ for several days, even beyond a week. For this period, it dangles from the birth canal, frequently tickling the ground and soiling the cow’s legs. Apart from being unsightly, it starts to decompose, and it stinks – really stinks!

The placentae of cows and sheep are not diffusely attached across the whole interior surface of the womb; they attach at multiple discrete sites resembling large buttons, called ‘cotyledons’. Removing the afterbirth manually involves a full-length arm into the birth canal whereby we ‘unbutton’ these placental attachments and apply gentle traction until the whole rotting mess tumbles to the ground.

The passing of the afterbirth is known as the third stage of labour in all common mammals. Our second daughter, Cara, was born in the hospital in Wick. The labour was protracted and utterly exhausting. Indeed, I believe my wife found it quite tiring too. Ridiculous as it may sound, considering I dealt with obstetrics as part of my job and I’d already experienced the birth of our other daughter, I hadn’t anticipated the sheer frustration and tedium of this third stage.

Just when we thought it was all over and we could both rest and enjoy the new bundle of joy lying beside us, the midwife got all excited about Jennifer relieving herself of the afterbirth. It was just hanging around. Get on with it! I thought. Could it not just come away and let us all relax? The midwife was not at all impressed with my suggestion of applying traction. Just as well I hadn’t offered to attach ropes to my daughter’s legs to speed up her entrance into the world!

In cows, there had been a general rule passed from generation to generation that after three days, if an afterbirth was still tenaciously trailing at the cow’s back end, a vet should attend and remove it. Indeed, a common feature of the profession’s day work would be calls, on day three, to visit a farm to do ‘the necessary’.

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