A Parkland cow has defied the odds multiple times now, giving birth to two sets of healthy triplets.
Barry and Sandy Sliworsky farm East of Winnipegosis, and one of their cows gave birth to triplets in February 2021. Now, just two years later, that same cow has given birth to a second set of triplets, Lily, Lucy, and Lenny.
This cow's history of multiples goes back even further than the two sets of triplets however, as she also had twins in 2020. She had the second set of triplets early last week, and Barry says they had an idea that it was multiples, but he wasn't convinced it would be triplets again.
"I suspected this cow was carrying more than one, probably 6 weeks ago, two months ago, and that was based on her history and based on her body condition. We saw that her condition was starting to fail like she was starting to lose fat and muscle mass, but her abdomen was getting larger. That's exactly sort of the path she took in '21 when she was carrying the triplets."
Barry says they decided to bring her up and make sure she was really well fed, so she'd be ready for whatever happens. The odds of having triplets once are low, and Barry says that drops even lower when it's three live calves.
"The info that we pulled up I think the incidents of triplets is one in 105 thousand births or something in cattle, but the odds of actually having all three born alive is maybe triple that, so you're looking at one in every three or four hundred thousand to have them all alive."
While only time will tell with the week-old calves, Barry says they were amazed at how well the first set of triplets did after they were born.
"The incredible part about this cow, is we actually left the triplets on the first time, we just didn't need any spares, and we just started feeding her quite well, and it went into spring and then summer and she stayed around the yard and raised all three. Incredibly, we have the weights of all the calves, and that first set of triplets, she weaned over 1,650 pounds, and this cow weighs probably 1,300 pounds."
He says the starting weight on the first set of triplets was 178 Lbs, and she outdid herself the second time around, giving birth to 203 Lbs between the three calves.