Your question at this point is probably, “You said a cow prolapsed?   What exactly is that?”  As you can see from the facial expression on my horse Newt, (a gelding or a male horse) he is a bit embarrased by your question and would rather not be present as I explain the answer.  On the other hand, July who is a mare, is quite practical and would be quite forthright if she were doing the responding.

Let me begin as delicately as I can.  It has something to do with the behind end of this poor cow.  After Laramie and Joe had caught and saddled Newt and July, they all took a ride in the truck and trailer up to the cornstalks about 30 miles away.  Laramie then roped the cow around the horns.  He made sure he was the one who made the catch so that he didn’t have to be the fella doing the ground work at the behind end of the cow.

The lucky guy for that job was Joe.  Some of the inards of the cow had forced their way out the cows back side.  This happens rarely, but when it does the cow often feels the urge to keep pushing her insides to the outside.  Even though she is uncomfortable, she will continue to strain.  I suppose it is like having an itch that you can’t resist from scratching.  Since a cow can’t be reasoned with and asked to stop the behavior for her own sake, the tissues are manually put back where they belong. 

Most times the animal contines to strain and will automatically prolapse after your rope is off the cow and you ride away.  To prevent this, Joe used special suture tape and a special stitch to hold everthing in place. 

The whole event was a success.  The cow was not very pleased afterwards.  The report was that there was much tripping over cornstalks to get out of the cows way after the rope was removed.  The prognosis in this case looks very good.  Outpatient surgery successful.