Twins in Cattle- A Blessing or a Curse??? 

About 30 years ago, I went to the local livestock auction to pick up a couple of feeder calves to put in our freezer later. There was a Holstein cow with triplets in a pen by themselves. Triplets in dairy cows is not a desirable trait, so she and her calves were being culled. Calves looked to be about 2 weeks old. Farmer was heartbroken, knowing they would all go into someone's freezer, he had raised the cow from a bottle. The killer buyer had offered them $100 cash for all 4 and the farmer said no way. He and I talked about the cow for a bit, this was her second set of calves, the first set were twins. I offered him $150 and told him I would keep her as a nurse cow for the bottle calves we had. He was delighted and even offered to deliver them to our farm for me. Every year we would breed her to the black Angus bull next door and she happily raised 1 or 2 of her own calves plus a couple of bottle babies. She loved them all equally and would take them all out to pasture every morning, then bring them all back in each night to the barn. We kept her for quite a few years, until she got too old to get around well. Best nurse cow we ever had. Farmer would ask about her whenever we saw him in town, I made sure to send him a pic of her with her calves every year. RIP Daisy!

That was a cool moment. Calf got up to nurse and a flock of birds flew over Glad both calves are nursing.

You are a good farmer, a good teacher and present good information in an intelligent way.

Had a bull/heifer set of twins 3 years ago in the middle of a blizzard. Momma wanted nothing to do with the heifer and my daughter bottle fed her around the clock. Still holding out hope that she is in that small minority, but no matter what she's not going anywhere after all the work my daughter put in to keep her alive. She's our "introduce non-ag folks" cow.

Dear Farmer Tyler. I am an older person who never learned anything about farming and fixing tractors. I have enjoyed watching your videos for several years. I love the way you take the time to explain everything! You talk more slowly so that I can follow what you are saying more easily. Thank you so much for educating me about everything from twins, feeding cattle. making new spaces for cattle to eat, getting cattle water to drink, taking care of tractors, and so forth. Even your mechanical ability is fascinating to me! You can easily fix an antique tractor and keep it running! I love the way you do everything carefully. I love the way you explain every step. I wish you would have been one of my teachers at school. Keep up the good work! I look forward to seeing the next video.😄

Oh so interesting and educational. Thank you Tyler!! Moo

That's nice farmer tyler ranch that's two more thanks for sharing again.

great explanation, for us non ranchers

Thank you for sharing and explaining about twins, sure stuff I didn't know. A neighbor had two cows last year that twinned, thought it pretty unusual. Have a great week! Frosty

Congratulations on the twins. Very informative information. They're so beautiful.

what cute babies!

Well the cow seems like a good mama and the calfs seem healthy so I think they will be fine

Had a first calf heifer drop a set of twins and she didn't know what to do regarding letting the calves nurse. She kept kicking them away when they tried. Finally I had to run the heifer into the crush (what a squeeze is called here in Australia), tied the heifers legs back so she could kick and just held the calves to the mother. Finally the mother saw what was going on. Had to repeat this for nearly a week until the mother's mothering instinct kicked in and she let the calves nurse. I imagine the discomfort of a full udder helped her to learn that the calves nursing alleviated that. I've even brought rejected calves into my own bathroom to help a calve have a bottle and stay warm in cold rainy winters nights. The things I do. We don't have dry enclosed barns like you guys have.

Most of the times when we have twins with a girl normally she is a free Martin. (Sterile)Not able to have calves. Have a good one buddy.

I love how you educate about ranch life

Its great to see you working so hard following your grandpa's footsteps.

So interesting! Thank you!

Very informative. Good to see that Mom accepted both of them.

What a cool video with twins. White face again so cute.

Thank you for the 'free martin' explanation. Having never had twins in our herd at first I was thinking 'Free martin? What the heck is he talking about?' I love learning something new every day.

Good story and hopefully both calves will continue to do well. Thanks for the video.

Good deal! Based on the size of that bag it looks like the cow makes plenty of milk also!

Congratulations, you should count your blessings. You’re taking the right approach. In my experience you can turn that cow out with the other cows morning and night while keeping the calves penned. She’ll return morning and night for them to nurse and they’ll both be hungry and chomping at the bit to nurse so you can observe. You can also grain the cow a bit to help her milk production and it will ensure she wants to come into the pen. Also when the calves are ready you can supplement them with sweet feed. All cows basically go off and leave their calves sleeping in the same spot all day anyway as do most herd animals. The reason it’s a blessing is in case you have a still born calf, immediately get cow, stillborn and afterbirth into your pen and switch one twin with the stillborn and cover it in the afterbirth. I’ve heard some people even skin the stillborn and put the skin on the surrogate. The surrogate will be an aggressive nurser so you can often fool the new momma into adopting it as her own. Takes a bit of work, and persistence but most of us have pens of special needs animals anyway. Good luck

Thank you, this is very interesting to learn, and you explained it extremely well for even a non farmer can understand.

I'm an educated feller (NOT farming or Ag) but I had never heard of "free martin twins". I've learned a little something today!

Thank you for explaining about free Martin. Always wondered why twins were called that.

Hello to Farmer Tyler Ranch and all others too. Awe so sweet about the twins. It be looking easy ,just like you said they are not easy to deal with. Sending prayers everything workout with them from getting harm. Happy Valentine's Day to everyone😄😀

As usual, that was a very interesting video. You sure packed a lot of calving info into 14 minutes. Thanks for the education on twins.

Thank you for free- Martin explanation . Always enjoy your cattle videos.🐂🐂🐂

Glad you are a common sense kind of person. I think that is the number one thing I like about you and how you get things done. Common sense and abilities equals my kind of Farmer. Thank you for sharing your farm with us. I appreciate this everyday. In these times it is nice to see that family farms are still around......😊🙏😊

Man, I can’t even imagine five sets of twins in a calving season, nor would want to experience that conundrum! Having one or two sets of twins is difficult enough to deal with, and worrying about, as to whether momma is caring for and feeding both calves. Unfortunately, bottle feeding does occur, and takes time, to ensure that the abandoned calf is cared for properly. Great job getting momma to take care of her two calves! Nicely done!

Twins... always a conundrum. Great Cliff Notes explanation FTR! They both look healthy. Good post.

Good video! I thought you did a great job discussing freemartins. Glad momma took to both of them!

That was very interesting

Thank you Tyler for sharing this video. It is both educational and touching. Loved it when you were getting the little heifer up on her feet and momma is telling you that YES that is my baby and I don’t want her hurt…you big old human. Now, this is a purely female statement; that little heifer is so blasted cute with her white eyelashes!!😛. Thanks again for this video.

Awesome video!!

The issue with the female calf, we found, they will be female, look female and have male parts inside . Not with all, but how would you know. He is right on that 10%.

I learn something everyday

Very good gene of twins , report those ciws and keep heifers from them ...You have plenty of space , even for 5 cows with twins , may God bless your family and your lovely cows

That was a good one Tyler! Love the new babies! Thank you for sharing :-)

Thanks for the free martin explanation. Very interesting.

Good job, FT and Mama Cow!

Congrats 🙂

So with a heifer, could you put her with steers before she would come into heat. Then you could raise her for freezer camp. Mixed gender twins sound like a real complication for the rancher. Thanks for the explanation!

Hey Tyler, the twins are looking great and mom looks ready to feed them. I am glad you caught them early! Great vid sir!

Great video. Thank you.

Great info. We are getting ready to have our first calves on our farm. Your videos are great!

Love the babies, so cute! Very informative vid! God bless!

Good looking calf.

Great information! Thank you.😀

Great and very interesting thanks

Thank you for going into a little bit more detail on Free Martin twins, besides just saying "the heifer is most likely infertile", which is the most common answer I have seen. You explained everything in your video quite well, and easy to relate and understand. Keep up the good work!

Beautiful calf's n Mom is so protective. Yes, I would keep them pinned up for a bit. Well, I guess your off to a good calving season!! So darn cute.😍

We had a cow that raised 3 sets of Twins in 4 calving seasons. She never orphaned any of them and was a very profitable cow in our herd. Many times they do orphan a calf, and it has to be bottle fed. We were just lucky I guess

in 2019 i had a cow calv a set of twins , she was quite allowed me to tag both calves with no problem i left the calves on her for around 4 weeks, The cow is branded B25 an angus cross cow The reason i took a calf away at 4 week is that another cow calved a still born calf and we fosterd a calf from B25 on to a recipant cow, It was a success in keeping the recipant cow working for us, How ever this made B25 very agresive at calving , now i have to bring her in the pens and split her off from her calf at around 3 weeks after calving to tag her calf. Twin calves are a mixed blessing can be very usefull to cover a loss , but a pain in the A if you have agood calving season I hope your calving season is a sucsessfull one for you

Few years back I had a BWF cow that gave birth to heifer twins 2yrs in a row .I kept all 4 of them and made momma cows out of them .I thought that was kinda special because she gave birth to all 4 with no assistance at all.She was a good Milker and I fed her special away from other cows , did a great job with them!Most beef cows are doing really good to raise 1 calf to weaning age ,but most of them can get both calves to 4 to 8 weeks in great shape, then you pick out best calf to keep and take other one to sale barn or someone you might know,at that age they they usually bring good dough!Hope this might help a little Great Video🐄🐖🐂🐕‍🦺

Great explanation again I learned something new

Good info. I didn't know about Free Msrtin calves.

Great vid!!!!

I had a Hertford cow that would give me a set of twins every year

🙌💕💕💕💕👍👍thanks for the great explanation

Congraulation ! Twin Of 2022 to Farmer Tyler Ranch

Great video Tyler

Really interesting once again. Always eager for a new episode Tyler. Thanks.

Great video. Like the explanation of free martin twins.

Great video

Cool video, likes the explanation about Free Marten twins.

Thanks for explaining FTR....!!!

Free Martin Twins.... Interesting............🤔 Thanks for the knowledge.

Great video today, Tyler. I love it when you talk the talk using professional lingo. As an RNP, I am able understand everything you said, and I appreciate your using the correct vocabulary. By the way, I am wearing my gray FTR t-shirt 😊

Well I have learned something new. I had never heard of free Martin. Thanks for the explanation

You said you don’t have all day to sit there and see that both calves are being fed if you have internet which I’m pretty sure you have but a cheap outdoor video camera and set it wide angle and you can have sent to your phone and then you would know for sure if both are getting fed

Great video!! I had twins born a few months ago ended up with a heifer bottle calf. Really hoping she's fertile but she was born with a bull so well see

We had a donkey who was due to foal so we had been watching her, so she lays down and we see her pushing, she stands up and the foal is born, she starts licking him and doing all the right things and the foal stands and all is fantastic, we we’re keeping an eye and the foal was going in for a feed and then mum starts turning in circles and lays down, this never happens with a new foal at foot so we were like no way! She can’t be!!! And sure enough foal number 2 is born 😮 we have no experience with this so we just watched and she licked him off and all seemed fine until foal number 2 goes in for a drink, foal 1 was already suckling so she got a fright when there was a second going in the other side so she did kick him, we thought this can go wrong fast! So we locked her in a small pen, as long as only 1 was feeding at a time in the first few hours things were fine, she loved them both so someone was always with her to make sure only 1 was feeding at a time, after a few hours she was more at ease and she allowed them both to feed, she was an excellent mum and we had no idea that horses and donkeys rarely raise 2 foals, one usually need to be lifted and bottle fed but she raised them with no further intervention, she’s an amazing mum!! Some animals do well with twins and others don’t, it’s so true that you have to lock them up,

Thx

Nice mother cow, nice when the twin thing works out. Good video Tyler.

Thank you for sharing your knowledge and real world experience. This is very good to know as we are getting closer to our 1st calving season.

Great explanation that a city boy can understand. You, sir, have gained a new subscriber.

That was a really good episode and you explained it easy enough that a city-slicker understood! Although I don't live in a city ... I live in a town.

Thanks for the interesting information. God Bless FTR.👍

they are so cute glad mom is a good mother hugssssssss

Too much knowledge to absorbs into my brain at this time ! WoW ! Thank you. FTR.

Good job.

Excellent!

Excellent,,,so good to see and know how you did this for a video...nice...and I love that whiteface baby....

Sorry about the twins, hoping doesn't create extra work for you. I sell off everything, (as in animals), always that had anything to do with twinning, that is my number one culling point. Good luck with the calving season Tyler ! Say hi to the family !

Tyler, thank you for trimming up your face nice to see lips when you talk. Enjoyed your explanation on free martins, we had a set when I was younger and I remember Dad saying that she was a free martin but had no idea what he was truly telling me.

10% i have had 9 twins (heifer bull pair) and i have brought ever heifer to breeding age and every one of them have bean a free martin. On a different note Goats, i isolate every pair for 24-48 hours especially closer to the end of kidding season because of the confusion of are you my kid? The kids always come over to check out the new play friends and every time my mothers try to adopt them... then there is a fight because the actual mom wants her kid back. Its a pain but so much easier to isolate for a day or 2. In case this sound like I am correcting you, be assured I am not.

Great video and information. I always heard you had to bottle feed one the calves.

So cute!

If cow can handle twins with enough milk then all is good. I've been raising cattle since I was old enough to walk and we've only ever had 3 twins and I'm 58 now and still with my red angus.

How bout that big group of geese though!!

I believe in giving this calf a chance no matter on the statistics but I'm not a farmer either. I just go by gut feeling. 👍

Love it 😊

Yes twins calves are kinda of a curse right from the get go see more stress right from the beginning

Awesome! 👍👍🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🤘🏻🤘🏻

good video good content

Another cattleman told me that when a calf gets up and stretches, that is a sign of good health. We make a note of it when diagnosing a situation.

It all depends on the cow or heifer.

Nice looking calves. That cow does look like she has a pretty good size udder. But like you said will it be enough as they get older.