A Co Armagh farmer has described his “total shock” as his cow birthed a trio of calves — now the third set of triplets born here in less than two months.
Kyle McCall’s cow is the third to defy the odds of one in 100,000 this year as it gave birth to triplets at Glenview Cottage Farm.
After 35 years of delivering over 150 calves annually, Kyle said this is a first for him in his farming career.
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Due to his heavy workload, the Armagh man couldn’t pregnancy scan his cows at the correct time but began to take note of one being particularly large.
“By the time I got around then, it was too late,” he explained. “I did notice a couple of weeks before she calved. I said, ‘it must be twins.’ So I put her into an isolation pen and she’d been getting a bit of concentrates fed to her to keep her condition up.”
However, nerves began to creep in for the cattle farmer after his peers told him of larger cattle being forced to get operations due to being a similar size.
“I was very nervous because a lot of farmers had told me about these very big birth weights and calves this year and they were having to do caesarean sections.”
Maisy, Daisy and Crazy with their mother
On Tuesday evening last week, when his cow was looking exceptionally large, Kyle prepared for what he thought was twins but was stunned by a third calf that he discovered “by chance”.
He said: “It took over an hour to deliver them and when she went into labour she just presented four feet.
“My son arrived home and gave me a hand. I had one on a rope, but which two of the feet belonged to the head was the next problem.”
Kyle stressed how “confusing” the situation was as it was past 2am by the time he managed to birth the first two.
After taking a breath, he put on a clean glove, checking the cow for a final time and was stunned to find another foot — his cow sharing Kyle’s bewilderment.
“She was kind of looking around herself a wee bit in shock as much as I was to be honest,” Kyle explained.
“But she mothered them really well. She licked them and was mothering the three of them equally. When they first get to their feet and they’re staggering about a bit and trying to suckle, I was in helping them — it’s quite a job with three.”
It’s a once in a lifetime event for a cattle farmer and Kyle rushed to wake up his dad who has since retired from the industry.
“I went and knocked his window and woke him up at two in the morning to tell him. My father’s not that well but he was for getting up to see them.
“He kept cows all of his life and never had triplets.”
Kyle said the trio, affectionately named Maisy, Daisy and Crazy by his children, are “strong-willed and fit”.
He added: “It has never happened to me before and it’ll most likely never happen again.”