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Ruthven farmer Abram Knelsen has been keeping cows for many years — but he’d never witnessed the birth of quadruplet calves before. The small rural community is in southwestern Ontario.
That’s why he can’t stop marveling that one of his Aberdeen Angus females birthed four healthy offspring over the course of one recent afternoon.
“To me, it is a miracle. Yes, it is,” said Knelsen, a Mennonite whose first language is Low German.
“It was a surprise to me. I was the happiest guy on Earth.”
The highly unlikely births happened on Tuesday. As of Wednesday afternoon, the four newborns were capable of mooing for milk and wandering around Knelsen’s property.
According to the BBC, who reported on a similar situation in the United Kingdom last year, the odds of quadruplets occurring in cows are about one in 700,000.
But the odds of all four quadruplets being born alive and well are only one in 11 million.
“This is a thing that doesn’t happen too often,” said Knelsen, who describes himself as a godly man. “Especially with four healthy calves.”
Knelsen said there was absolutely no medical intervention in the processes of the mother cow — or Charlie, the bull that sired the quadruplets. “There was nothing involved,” he emphasized. “This was the natural breeding. Like Nature would give it.”
The birth group is composed of three baby bulls and one baby heifer.
Knelsen’s daughter-in-law Christine Knelsen said her family was made aware of the quadruplets by increasingly excited updates from Abram in a group chat.
“He said, ‘Look, we have twins.’ And we were like, that’s amazing. That’s never happened on the farm before,” Christine said.
“Half an hour later, he says, ‘I lied to you guys: There’s three.’ Everybody was just like, that’s insane. And then, 10 minutes later, he was over the moon. He says, ‘There’s four.'”
The unexpected arrival of the quadruplets brings Abram Knelsen’s stock of cows up to seven — but he said he’s not too worried about suddenly having four more mouths to feed.
Besides, Knelsen considers them a good investment: He raises his cows as beef cattle. An Aberdeen Angus bull at a year old is worth several thousand dollars on the open market.
“Oh yes, four at a time — it is a windfall,” Knelsen said.
