The post I wrote yesterday was double the length a post on the internet is supposed to be so I decided to put this part in a separate post.
If you recall, #44 showed signs of bloat. But when we treated him for bloat, we got this instead.
Instead of blowing off a bunch of air as is normal, he blew out breakfast and foam. Even thought we treated him with all we and the vet knew to do, the swelling in his rumen never really went down even after he seemingly returned to normal. The vet said there really wasn’t much we could do for him other than what we’d done. Now that we’d decided to process him we could take our time and look around to try to find the source of the problem. I’m not a doctor or a vet but I’ve seen healthy and normal organs enough times so I know what they look like. So what to look for? Maybe a twisted gut? Maybe some sort of infection? (which would mean tossing the meat.)
When I got inside, I found that his rumen had grown into the wall of his abdominal cavity and attached itself. It appeared to have been that way for a long time, possibly a birth defect? There was no redness or internal swelling visible. The attached rumen appeared to be causing digestive problems and probably some pain. There certainly didn’t appear to be any fix for the problem so it validated our decision to put him down which was a relief. Life and death decisions are hard enough without also being wrong.
Just another day on the farm.