A COW at a farm in Shotley is recovering after giving birth to triplets – an event believed to be a one in 100,000 occurrence.

The calves were born at Overhall Farm at 4am on Tuesday morning much to the surprise of farmer Michael Packard.

Mr Packard’s daughter, Naomi Colwill, who also works at the farm, said: “My father is 85 and in all that time he has never seen or head of this happening before.

“We couldn’t really believe what we were seeing. My brother reckons it’s a one in 100,000 occurrence so we’re all quite stunned.”

The five-year-old Charlet-cross cow is now recovering from her ordeal but Ms Colwill added that all four animals were doing well.

She added: “Two of the calves are normal size but one is very small and at first we worried the mother could reject them or having problems feeding.

“But that wasn’t the case thankfully. It’s strange seeing the mother go from being very large to really boney, I think she’s probably a little bit shell-shocked.

“For a cow to give birth to twins is pretty rare but triplets is unheard of. We would be interested to hear from anyone who has seen this happen before.”