Cow Gives Birth to Four Calves.

PORTLAND — Lyn Haskins began farming four years ago and this year he almost doubled the size of his herd. His five-year-old Simmental-Hereford cross gave birth to four calves in the early afternoon of August 26. The odds of that happening are about one in 700,000 births. He now has 10 beef animals.

He figures more than 40,000 people have viewed the now four famous calves. Two are bulls. He showed them off at the International Plowing Match at Crosby last month and, prior to that, 600 people dropped in at his farm to see them.

At the plowing match "I had a bunch of people wanting to buy them," he said, but now that they’re famous, he doesn’t want to let them go or see them slaughtered down the road. Some farmers showed an interest in the semen from the bull Wulf’s Lowell. Haskins said he paid about $20 for the semen through artificial insemination at Eastern Breeders in Kemptville. "Did you read the specs on him,’ I was asked. No, I just like the colour of him."

The calves were born at about 35 to 40 lbs. each and are all doing well, up to at least 80 lbs. by the end of September, he said. They beat the odds, as multiple births often mean complications and often not all calves survive. Dairy cows have better odds of multiple births.

Haskins, 51, said he thought his cow only had one big calf in her even though she had twins two years ago. She was brought into the barn after he noticed a bag hanging from her for about two hours. After the first one came out, his neighbour, Barry Baker suddenly announced: "Twins again."

They were drinking beer when they noticed another ball of fluid sliding out of the mother. That’s when the third one arrived. Then the mother lay down and "the fourth one flew out on its own," he said. Baker helped pull out three of the four calves.