I know this is probably an unusual post but I don't know where else to post this. I don't know if this makes sense but I'm worried and upset and can't stop wondering about this. Yesterday my grandfather went to feed my show cows while I went to finish Christmas shopping with my sister. I had both a steer and heifer, when I came home he told me we needed to go check on my heifer (we kept them at a different house about 5 minutes away from ours).
She was laying down fairly close to the road which is odd for her because she would always be standing and walking around when we pulled up to feed and care for them. The only time she would lay down she would be on her knees but yesterday she was on her side laying with her back legs underneath her. My grandpa told me that she was laying earlier when he brought feed over and he forced her to get up so he could look her over. His first thought was the same as mine and we both worried someone had shot her, which isn't uncommon where we live. He said he couldn't find a hole and she couldn't walk well.
His second thought was that my steer had jumped on her back while attempting to play with her. I'm still unsure what could have happened. She had a little bit of blood on her nose (not out of her nostrils). We tried to get my aunt over to check her out, she's a vet but cows happen to be the only animal she doesn't work on. She tried to recommend someone but everyone she knows is out of town or closed for the holidays. We ended up giving my heifer some b12, surrounded her with hay for comfort and to eat if she wanted, fed her, and gave her some water but we moved the bucket before leaving so she wouldn't knock it over and freeze overnight.
Well this morning we went to check on her and she was dead. I feel horrible about it. We had the steer locked in a pen so that he wouldn't try messing with her overnight because she was clearly in pain. This means she died alone. I wasn't with her and neither was her best bud. She had moved a little before dying, it looked like she had gotten up and turned to walk away then fell. We had my aunt over for an early Christmas dinner and I was talking with her about our speculations. She told me a bullet hole is hard to find, especially since my calf was mainly black and very fluffy so it would be hard to see any blood. She said that even if my steer had jumped on her it wouldn't have been enough to kill her or really even hurt her. She said that if she were sick and then he jumped on her an injury would have been more likely but not life threatening.
My heifer appeared to be in perfect health before so I can't stop thinking about what could have caused this. Show cows are very expensive along with the food prices and time you put into them, I need to know if I'm at fault for what happened to her or if someone or something else did it so I can avoid the same happening to my steer. But that's not even my main concern.
Cows love having friends and my cows bonded very well. They played together and were never apart, we got them from the same person so they've been together for a very long time. I'm not sure if my steer understands what happened, although I think he has an idea. When I went to feed him he was just standing in the same spot in his pen, he didn't move unless he thought he had a chance of getting out. His hay from the day before was almost completely untouched. Unfortunately from where his pen was he was able to see her and he just kept staring over at her. I don't know how he's going to deal with her just suddenly disappearing. I might be crazy but it already seems to be effecting him. How do I help my steer with this, is it even possible to help?
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from Pets https://www.reddit.com/r/Pets/comments/kjuoyb/my_heifer_died_and_i_dont_know_how_it_will_effect/
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