question

How long do you keep your newborns and mothers in before letting them go to pasture. Do you even keep them in while calving. I ask because we recently calved a heifer out. We normally say no to calving heifers just because we have had some rotten luck but she was a keeper. She calved friday and we kept her and her calf in until sunday when we decided that he was strong enough to go to pasture and they both were acting like they knew what to do. They go out and it wasn't an hour and the calf was gone. We looked everywhere and finally found it just outside the line of the fence. For the past two days all I have done has been chasing and looing for this calf. So today I went out and looked for three hours for the the calf and finally found it and when I did, I  threw it in the wheelbarrow and away we went back to the barn. The other thing that made this whole scenario difficult was that the heifer was paying no attention to the calf unless I brought the calf out of hiding I really don't think that she would have went looking for it. I guess what I'm asking is, is this a normal thing that should be happening?

We had a calf this year out of a heiferthat hardly nursed for 2 days because he wouldn't stay inside the fence.  Everytime we checked (multiple times per day) he had walked through the electric fence and was laying beside a tool shed.  The heifer hardly looked for him either.  We finally put him and his mama in a pen for a few days until they both realized what to do.  We calve all of our heifers in a pasture and only put them up if they have problems like this.  Most do fine on pasture though.  I think the few that have problems just don't have as strong a maternal instinct.

My SIL lives next door (45 acres over) and she has just plain "junk" cattle (no breeding, she borrows whatever bull she can every year and runs it with cows 10 months a year....). Each year her cows hide the calves! The first year we moved out here, I got tired of looking for a "lost" calf (only lost to us not the cow) and used to brush hog the large pasture so I could see the calves (she has tall weeds and lots of pink eye). I almost chopped one up! It did not move, even when I almost drove over it! One calved a week ago and she has it hidden where I can see a brown blob. It stays there all day and she comes and finds it several times a day. At times she is 40 acres away! Just amazes me how they just leave them for hours on end. But they know right where they are at and will try to kill you if you get near them enough to startle them 

I like to calve my first calf heifers out in a small trap where I can get them in the chute easily if help is needed.  Usually let them out with the herd in 2 to 3 days if the calf is healthy and nursing well.  Some are less protective than others, a plus when you are weighing and tagging calves, but a negative when a coyote or buzzard is after the calf.

90% of my cows calve in the pasture. The others calve in a barn during bad weather and I push them out as soon as possible, usually within days.
Heifers calve in a lot/barn and then are out within days.

Reason: Much less chance of disease/scours.
              Much less chance of  "mix and matching" cows and calves on their own.
              Much less chance of injury due to crowded conditions.
              Much less crap to clean out of barn.
              Did I mention less chance of disease/scours?

Most of the time, "lost calves" are only "not found by humans".  That doesn't bother me as long as when I do find them, they get up and stretch and look happy. I don't even care if the cow/heifer pays no attention while I am there.

I had no problem with the cow leaving the calf on its own, but I went up to the barn at around 9 to check on things and I could tell by her udder that the calf had not drank since last night so that's when I statred looking a little. I couldn't find him so I left them for an hour and a half and went back up. I still couldn't find them and that's when I stated to get a little worried. Is the cow telling the calf to hide or is the calf just leaving its mother?

The cow is hiding the calf.