Farmers took in a freezing calf. Their kids cuddled up with her.
Snow and freezing rain were falling fast on Tanner Sorrell’s family farm in Mount Sterling, Kentucky. Tanner went out to check on a pregnant cow and saw that she had already given birth but was struggling to clean her newborn calf.
The family had lost a calf to frostbite the year before, so he didn’t want to take any chances when the situation didn’t improve. He and his wife, Macey, brought the freezing calf inside, with Macey driving their truck to the house and Tanner holding the calf in the truck bed.
They brought the calf into their utility room, and Macey did her best to dry her off using towels and a hair dryer on low heat. Tanner gave the calf a bottle of colostrum and then went out to the barn. When Tanner came back, he found the newborn calf inside cuddling with his children. Macey had brought her in and let her on the couch. “I wasn’t going to be the party pooper if they were having fun,” Tanner said. “They’re only kids one time.”
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After letting Sally warm up overnight, Tanner brought her back to her mother early Sunday morning. He worried the mother wouldn’t take her back because of his intervention, and that they would have to raise the calf by bottle — but as soon as the cow heard her calf mooing, she ran right over. Tanner set them up in the barn to keep warm until the bad weather passed, filling their space with hay, straw, sweet feed and fresh water. He even set up a camera so his family could keep a close watch on Sally. Both mother and baby are doing well.
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Tanner said he hopes that growing up with experiences like this will be good for his kids, who are already learning how to take care of the farm animals. “I just want my kids to have the best childhoods possible and learn where our food comes from, and that we do love those animals,” Tanner said. Many of the animals on the farm are raised and sold, but the Sorrells said that Sally is staying put. “She’s a permanent resident here,” Macey said, adding that she had already ordered a tag with Sally’s name on it.
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