With Sadness

It is with great sadness that I say we lost a newborn cria yesterday.  We are not sure exactly when the cria passed, but it was sometime between Friday night when we saw fetal movement and Saturday afternoon when we had to help get the cria out of the mother.  It was a difficult dystocia, the position in the picture below:

J noticed the dam in labor early Saturday morning.  Mysteria was on day 350 gestation.  While she appeared in labor, after awhile it was clear she was not making any progression.  When the bag of waters broke the fluid was brown tinged which is never a good thing.  Two front legs were found but the head was so far back it was very difficult to get to.  It took 3 of us to hold the dam while J repositioned the cria.  By the time we got the cria out, he was already passed.  He was a pretty white boy.

We have corrected a few dystocia on our farm with great success, this one was just more difficult.  It was our first still birth.  While farming has great highs of seeing beautiful newborns, there are also loses.

The picture came from the book:

 Here are some other birth positions: