Udderly Surprised Farmers Find Triplets
Published: Friday, April 26, 2024
One in 400,000. Those are the chances of having same-sex triplet calves. The chances that all three would also survive and be accepted by the mother are far less. Yet three beef heifers trailed after their mother around a small pen on a farm in Monterey a week after their birth on April 12.
Paul and Anita Kline have been taking calving season in stride as 50 of their beef cows are expecting. Out of the 18 that have calved, they have 22 surviving calves.
Two weeks ago, Anita walked into the pasture to check one of their very pregnant cows, "Myrtle," only to find she had already given birth.
"She (Anita) called me up and said, 'You have twins,' and then she started yelling, 'No! There are triplets! There's three of them!'" Paul said as he recounted the birth of his rare Angus-Hereford cross heifer calves.
Paul had been in Warsaw to pick up a feeder. After receiving the call, he raced home to find Myrtle licking her calves clean.
The two were astonished that she had three calves at all, let alone without the help of a veterinarian.
"She had them up, licking them and they were drinking. And we walked them up out of the field and they followed her right out of the field into the shed out there," Paul said. "I was just shocked that they were all three alive and all three up."
"She's just a very laid-back cow," Anita said.
"She's very tame," Paul agreed.
Paul said the triplets like to find different hiding spots, so he put them and their mom in a smaller pen near the house.
"They're driving her crazy to a degree, because one's hiding over here, so she goes and checks on it, and there's another one here, so she goes and checks on that one," Paul said as he gestured in opposite directions. "Finding them and getting them all rounded up like that can be a challenge."
The smaller pen helps reduce stress for Myrtle because it keeps her calves in close proximity to her.
"I thought I'd have to bottle feed at least one of them," Anita said. But this isn't the case.
The beef operation is pasture-bred. The Klines have two bulls in their herd: an Angus and a Hereford. All three calves have bald faces, reflecting the Hereford influence.
The triplets come from a line leading back to one of the farm's first two beef heifers, which Paul bought as calves about 15 years ago for his dad after they began liquidating their dairy operation. He bought Herefords because they are known to have a very gentle disposition. After buying those first two, Paul bought his two bulls and two more heifers. All the rest have been homebred.
"It's amazing that I got triplets from one of the original two," he said.
He plans to watch how the three develop and possibly cycle their genetics back into the herd. Other possibilities include: freezer beef, selling to a packer, replacement heifers and selling them at auction in nearby Rochester.
The Klines also raise corn, soybeans and hay. Their farm has been in operation in Monterey for approximately 170 years.
Return to Top of Page