cows

It is really the middle of the night

Steve Hardin1 Comment

Here are some pictures of the Bull Corral. I still need to get in there and use a harrow to tear it up and smooth it out. Everything is so dry and loose that I don’t want to get in there with discs I think they will go too deep. We are going to keep the horses in there for another five weeks. At that time we will have three of the cows slaughtered and they can then have the entire barn lot. The cows have free access to the upper prime lot so they can eat their fill. The horses were getting fat on that same all you can eat menu. They are quite vocal about being on rations. Mika would not come over to the fence and let me rub on her. I did not give her food until she acquiesced and let me rub on her face and side. I have learned that the horses are just like the dogs with that group mentality. You have to be the leader or they just won’t do what you want. Once you are the established leader they are much happier.

Annmarie woke me up at 0200 Thursday night, actually Friday morning to tell me a cow was mooing. Now in her defense at 0200 I am not thinking straight so she prefaces this with the following statement “Before you say anything that will speed up your ability to go to sleep when was the last time you heard the cows pitching a fit in the middle of the night?” I did actually pause before talking and I also heard the cow let out a moo. The moon was incredibly bright and it was very light outside so I went with that excuse first. It didn’t work. She got up to go outside and check on the cows. As she was getting dressed I rolled out of bed ready to go outside. She asked me about clothes. Again, this is simply an impediment to getting back in bed quickly and its 0200!! She made some statement about us maybe needing to go down to her Mother’s house and she didn’t want to see me in my newborn glory. I capitulated and put on pants, slippers and grabbed my Walther P22. I headed for the front of the barn as I was pretty sure it was the pesky annoying bull hollering. Annmarie was on the back hillside flashing a light around looking for cows. I spotted the bull laying down and all four cows just chilling. Mission accomplished, time for bed. We met at the bridge so I could report off on my findings when she states maybe the other cows, all the way down by the schoolhouse, are causing the ruckus. Normally, this could be discounted as no normal human can hear this far, but Annmarie’s hearing is not normal. Not by a long shot, she can hear as well as most owls. I am truly amazed at times by what she can make out or hear, her students can attest to this also. We headed back out to the pickup when I was saved by the annoying bull, he hollered thereby convincing Annmarie that was what she had heard. Once at the bedside I was back in bed in under 15 seconds. She had to get up early but I decadently slept in till 0830! It was amazing.

This is the moon on the ill fated early wake up. I took this just before dark over the back hillside. Who knew I was documenting proof for the blog in advance?

Two men = no balls

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It has been another long week. Annmarie kept telling me to slow down or I was going to make myself sick. I spent all day on the couch today sleeping cause I am sick. I am not sure if her words were prophetic or a curse, lets just poll all married men to get a final answer.

I did take it easy one night! I have started to work on cleaning my dog tag maker! I only used water, cotton rag and some 320 grit wet/dry sand paper to clean it up. There are some very precise rails, tracks and flat stops that need to be polished. I spent two hours working on it and barely touched it. I also realized some tools are required. I really need to take each piece off and clean it then reattach it. Luckily, it is so old I only need a standard screw driver, and an open end wrench. The trouble is I need a stubby screwdriver or an angled one and the same on the open end wrench. So I ordered special tools on Amazon and they are here except for my special open end wrenches. Those should be here next week. I will attack it again when I have all the tools. I am going to try and add up all the hours it takes me to just clean it up and get it functional. At this point I am going to estimate a 100 hours and I already have 2 hours into it.

The Expert came out to look at our predator problem. We had a very good discussion and I will call him after the wheat has been harvested. He is going to set up some traps and get a predator contract resigned. The farm used to have one so we will get a new one signed. So our farm will be added to the arial shooting plan. All in all I was very happy with the interaction. He remembered Ted and Tom and all their sheep. He also loves lamb, states it is the best meat of any animal. I agree with this statement.

The momma cow and baby stayed in the corral and milk barn area for three days. We fed them and used our 35 gallon water trough. It was incredibly hot but the cow would go in the barn if she wanted shade. I had to wait for help to get that calf tagged and banded. I went over and took out some alfalfa hay for them and fed 1/3 bale and set the other outside the corral so she could not get at it. I also moved the last of the hay from winter into the barn lot for the soon to be food cows to eat extra on. This was what the lazy alpaca were eating on instead of foraging. So the slugs found my stash of hay for the cow and started eating on it! You know they are lazy when they have to lay down to eat.

My nephew came over on Tuesday and we went out to deal with the calf. Annmarie was going to film us but we didn’t really give her time and had the calf pinned pretty fast. The nephew went for the all hands on deck approach and just jumped in and tried to grab a front and back leg and drop it on its side. He ended up on the ground and holding one back leg with the calf near a gate and a corner. I jumped on it and pinned it down then he climbed on top of it. We were right next to the gate hinges. This is important because I had a hard time finding two testicles. So I kept asking him to move the calf around a little bit to ease the abdominal muscle tension. There was a yellow jacket nest in the end of the gate. He got stung twice in the ear before we finally just grabbed the calf and slid him three feet away from the gate. It took me about five minutes to find both testicles and get them into a rubber band. The calf is a little old and you have to pull the scrotum through then kinda pop each testicle past the rubber band. I got them both so in a few weeks the calf will have no testicles. We tagged him in the right ear also. I did verify i had the right color tag this time but just in case all our cull animals will be tagged in the right ear if we are selling them. So even if I mess up gender the ear will tell us which ones to get rid of. I need to look but I think its number 13 or 14.

We then had to chase them out onto the back hillside and out with the other cows. Our no nutter bull has torn up our fence in front of the barn to get near her so he needs to be two fences away from her. She ran to the top of the hill so our nephew went up and chased her down while I opened all the gates ahead of her to get her out with everyone else. I really like the picture that Annmarie took below.

We then went over and finished working on the bull corral. We got the last four posts set in gravel and put up all the used feeder panels. The panels are heavy so we used the tractor to drag them over to the post line. We also had to use the tractor to lift sections of the panels so we could hook in the next section. The only thing left to do is to add the cow panels and chain everything to the wooden posts. I do need to finish filling the last rock crib and put up four wooden boards. After that I need to clean out the old wood scraps and all the old fence materials. I also have about four fence holes to fill in. I also need to drag the ground and level the area out. Once that is done I need to install the water trough. I may need to put In a couple of gold fish in the tank to keep it clean. I am at 85% completion! In three hours I could have the fence done the rest is to make it safe and provide a spot for water. The water trough will hold 235 gallons of water and we are not going to use a pump. I will be hand dipping water from the spring into the trough. I just thought up a bucket arrangement I can attach to a railroad tie that has a hose attached to the bottom that I can just bucket into it and then the water will flow into the trough so I don’t have to try and throw the water through the fence. That will make a mess.

Cowboy breakfast

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The animal experience ended well, we made homemade biscuits and milk gravy! I even fried the sausage in leftover bacon grease, do not knock it until you have tried it! The sausage was really lean and you need some fat to get the flour to brown. The biscuits are always made from Bisquick, which isn’t really from scratch but they are still made at home and they are amazing. It was a great ending to a long morning. We started moving animals at 0530 this morning. It has been very hot and the animals don’t do well in the heat, they get stressed easily. Annmarie doesn’t like the heat either, one could say she gets stressed also, if one dared. So we were out the door by 0534 to begin our adventure. It’s hard to explain to people why we have worked so hard to subdivide the property and why we have so many different gates and enclosures throughout the farm. It all comes down to moving and sorting animals, this task is much easier if you can place animals in pens or re-sort them when needed. This was especially true today as we had two separate groups of cows and two separate groups of sheep.

The sheep and horses were in with the first group of six cows. We used the border collies to push the sheep into our front yard. This was Annmarie’s idea as it gets them out of the way and I agreed but as an added bonus the lawn needs mowed. Dual purpose is the name of the game. The dogs did very well and it took less than a minute to get them out of the barn lot and into the yard with no swearing. This is a near miraculous event and not very common. Our dogs are trained to respond to swearing and yelling. This is totally our fault, but we realize that the dogs need to practice on the animals to learn but it can be trying at times. We got the first six cows into the corral and dusted them down for flies. We had them in 2 of the 3 pens then went to get the other cows. The other cows were way down by the schoolhouse. Actually, half were up by the irrigation pump but they ran down to see the bull and ended up at the end of the property by the school house. Annmarie took both dogs and Mouse was being a spicy pickle with tons of extra hot and a dash of horseradish. Sarah asked me why she kept using him if he kept running and doing the wrong thing. I told her that she was teaching him, he won’t learn without mistakes and since she could call him back every time with the animals visible he just needed fine tuning. Getting him to return to us with the animals in his sight is the hardest trick of all to teach and that one we have done. The rest is just repetition. He wants to go in a straight line and pretends that the command “right” or “left” means run directly at whatever animal it is we are currently working. She got them out of the trees and headed back toward the house. We pushed them through the first fence and I closed the gate and worked the dogs as Annmarie’s voice was wearing thin as well as her patience. The cows don’t want to work easily as there is a calf in their midst. The reason we want them is so we can tag and band the calf and let the bull at the sequestered cows and yearling heifer.

The above picture is where the cows were the first time, the below picture is where the cows are after they got around the dogs and Annmarie because the dogs failed to turn them when they broke. They ran for the dry creek bed and went under the fence. I had not locked down the panels in the creek area yet. I usually do this later in the summer when we are trying to control access to certain areas of the pasture. I did shut the gate, even though it didn’t help. Sarah had to go to work so Annmarie and I and the dogs pushed them up the hill this time so we could run them across the top of the hill away from obstacles. This worked well and we got them into the barn lot fairly easily. We locked them in behind the barn and attempted to push them into the corral. Now it should be noted that before we went out to get these cows Annmarie asked me if we should not use the horse corral panels to build a funnel for the cows to go directly to the corral. I was opposed to this option as it meant more work. Well, this came back to haunt me as the cows would not go into the corral. The mean cow with the green ear tag would not go, she kept coming back at us and eventually ran past us. Annmarie is a huge proponent of gentle steady pressure when moving the animals. I am more of a holler and dog kind of guy. She got me to agree to make hamburger out of the green tag cow and to add her to the butchers list but even more importantly she agreed to go into the barn while I worked the cows with the dogs. The dogs did great and we pushed everyone right into the corral. She wanted to know why I didn’t do that every time. I stated that my method is only quicker part of the time and the animals tend to break away more as I use the dogs and shaker sticks aggressively. I just got lucky.

We powdered and sorted cows, the green tag cow went into the to be eaten in six weeks pen. We have a no scrotum bull that was wreaking havoc in the pens. He is in the to be eaten pen. He is is about 100# heavier than everyone else. We had a one nutter last time we killed and he was great eating. This one never had any testicles descend stupid problem number 15.

We managed to get the calf isolated to one pen and I went and got a tag and bander pliers. I like the calves to be under 30 days old but this one is more like 2+ months old. I am here to tell you that there is a world of difference when you are grabbing and catching one by yourself. I couldn’t get it by the neck but managed to snag a back leg. Have you ever seen those vibrating dumbbells advertised on infomercials that go back and forth and you are supposed to hold onto them? It was exactly like that trying to hold onto a back leg and getting drug around the pen. I knew that I needed to grab the opposite front and back leg and then flop him onto his side. But the execution of this was not happening. I could not get to the head of the animal. So I grabbed the other back leg! Now I have two of these pumping pulling weights attempting to jerk me off my feet. I got kicked in the chest and belly several times before it finally started bawling at the top of its lungs. I couldn’t take the physical, auditory and mental abuse any more. I let it go and we concocted a plan to get this stuff done. We decided to keep the calf and mother in the corral until I can get some help. We will feed them, let them into the old milking portion of the barn and fill the 35 gallon water trough. I realize that the cure for this is to learn to rope. I had rope to tie up legs on the calf but I could not get it to ground. Annmarie tweaked her back 3 days ago so she was forbidden to help wrestle the calf. On a good day I end up with bruises and sore for a couple of days.

After all of that Annmarie decided to give the green tag cow a butcher reprieve and she was put back in with our bull.

The bull and his 8 ladies needed to be pushed back out to get a double fence between them and the market cows. So the dogs and I stopped at the spring to get our fill of water before moving on. Zeke went upstream and made the water muddy for me to drink. This is part of the annual water quality check I perform. I have never gotten sick yet. As far as we know no one has over the course of the farm’s life. The spring head is only about 60 feet away.

The sheep just did not want to leave the shade or the front yard. We tried twice with the dogs but everyone was tired after 4 hours working animals and the lawn still needs to be mowed so we are going to leave them in for at least a day.

We called the state trapper on Friday and he returned our call today. He is coming out to evaluate our predator problem on Monday. We will get this sheep depredation problem under control. Someone suggested guard dogs and they do work, but they cost about $75/month per dog to maintain. We are not about to go into this yet as it costs us about $120/month for the two border collies by the time you add in food and all the vet bills. This is cheap help and saves us from having to pay a human being to help so it is totally needed but it is an ongoing cost and we like to keep those as low as possible.

Annmarie and the dogs were all tuckered out after the running around and a hearty breakfast.

50% complete

Steve HardinLeave a comment

The bull enclosure is progressing faster than I anticipated but not fast enough. Annmarie walked into the old house yesterday to look for some string and just about could not get around. I have tools, boxes and various buckets full of tools and items laying all over the floor. It’s quite the maze. She feels like this is unacceptable and needs to be neater. I make a point to do it 1-2 times a year. The more projects I do the worse it gets. An alternate solution is for me to do no projects and it would stay clean. I am pretty sure that option is not on the table. I need to get the bull enclosure done and the barn dug out then I can take a solid day and dig out the old house. When I dig it out I can cut the shelves for the coat closet inside the house at the same time. This will make the day feel more productive. The bull enclosure is done all the way down to the water. I have the gate hung and woven wire behind the wooden rails and cow panels over the powder river panels. If I don’t do this the sheep will get in and out of the enclosure and we want to put the ram in there occasionally also.
This will give us a dual purpose area and it will make sorting animals easier. We are going to fix a fence on the back side and install another gate making it impossible to run around the barn lot in a circle. This is a favorite move of the sheep and cows when we are trying to get them into the barn or the corral. We may even add one more small segregation fence next year depending on how the animals sort this year. We are doing everything we can to make an easy sorting and handling process. We are not getting any younger and if it is not easy we won’t be able to keep doing it after we retire.

I will have to take the tractor and dig down about four inches on the barn side of the new gate. It won’t swing both ways and I need it to swing over to the other gate so that they can be latched together to allow access to the sheep barn. This may have to wait until we get a few days of rain which could be a while.

I found out that Bubba is looking forward to digging out the barn and not moving rocks for cribs. Trumping his fear of snakes is an even bigger scare of spiders. There are far more spiders under the rocks then snakes. I wonder sometimes how the next generation will survive.

Sarah and I spotted our very first grasshopper of the year this week. It really looks like a stick. I know there is a special name for this type of grasshopper but I cannot remember what it is. So I will call it a “twighopper”. It was very patient and let me get right next to it with the camera. Its the only one we have seen all summer. I did end up with a baby prying mantis on my hand while weeding the elevated garden beds. It was less than one inch long. This one did not bite me! Usually the adult mantis try and take a chunk out of my hand.

We scoped out the orchard yesterday and looked at the fruit trees. This is their third year and they are looking good. I will have to trim them this winter and try and get them raised up off the ground further and to bush out higher off the ground. Otherwise the sheep are going to be eating all the leaves when we remove the surrounding protective fence. Each tree has a cow panel wrapped around it with a 2 foot extension on top to keep the alpaca and horse from going over the top. We thinned out the Asian pears and there is a bumper crop of them for such a little tree. The tree ripened pears are so much better than the ones in the store. Next year we want to get another five fruit trees. We would like to get a couple more plum trees and a couple of apricot trees. Another apple or two and I would love to grow a couple of nut trees and some Nanking cherries and a few other things, maybe even some cranberry bushes!

The nephew spotted a honey bee hive in our walnut tree this year. They have had a hive here once before and died out a few years ago. We spotted several bees going in and out and you can see the wax and honey glaze to the wood here. For some reason the bees did not winter in this location well. I hope they do better this year. We really want to get a bee hive but we have to create a little more bee friendly atmosphere. I am working on 2-3 locations to grow wildflowers in for the bees. The real problem is they need water and it needs to be fenced off so the sheep cannot get in and eat the flowers. I have a couple of locations picked out now and just need to build some more fence for it.

We have looked into alfalfa and yep it’s going to cost us. To plant dryland Round Up ready alfalfa I am told it is $400/50#bag and you need to plant 20#/acre. I went up yesterday with my cell phone and used a cool app called AGRIplot that lets you put in boundaries and way points and it uses your phone GPS to calculate acreage. We have 20 acres that we need to plant. I had thought it was 22 acres. This $4 app just saved me $400! So basically, the seed alone will cost us $3200. This does seem steep but we only have to plant every 7 years minimum if we seed correctly. Plus, our chemical expenses will be minimal. In the long run we will come out ahead, everyone I talk to who planted alfalfa and chose not to use Round Up ready due to expenses has said that it would have been cheaper and easier to maintain in the long run if they had just paid the money up front.

I went up there and the weeds are coming back so in the evenings this week I will be spraying. I kept chasing a pair of twin whitetail fawns all over the field. They would not run very far and their mom just kept wandering around the field. I did have to let the upper prime pasture cattle have access to the barn lot yesterday. The water coming up from those two springs has dried up and is no longer running. the only water coming up from the ground now is the main spring in the barn lot and a few little springs down by the schoolhouse that dump into Stewart creek. Those springs are not enough to make Stewart creek run just enough to make pools here and there. I found a dead sheep in the upper prime pasture. It had been torn apart and was probably only about four months old. The carcass is dried and it was in the tall grass but it is from this year. Most likely a coyote as we have not seen any stray dogs this year. We are getting ready to sort the cows and sheep again to make two herds. We are going to put the ram in with the sheep so will have to pull off the female lambs we don’t want impregnated and put them with the heifer we don’t want impregnated. We will toss in one of the steers to be with the heifer so she is not alone. The sheep and cows don’t like to be alone.

Desire

Steve HardinLeave a comment

On Friday I had to go fix fence again. On Thursday the neighbor moved his cows into the pen directly across the road from our property. This means our bull can see a hundred plus cows across the road and starts to immediately think like a teenage boy. I noticed the cows on my way home and vowed to not work on our window trim but to instead fix the fence. Usually, the bull gets out every year at this time. We had noticed a weak spot in the fence a couple of months ago and I had vowed to Annmarie that I would fix it before the bull got out this year. Its in an awkward spot and there is a huge wild rose bush that has enveloped the fence in the way. The only real way to fix this section is to cut out the rosebush and rebuild this entire section. I don’t want to do that, so I plugged the hole with a 16 foot cow panel. I had brought a few more tools but no T post driver. I needed the driver. I ended up having to fix the entire fence all the way up to the gate on top. I put in new staples and Tpost clips where the bull had popped them loose. I added about 8 new wooden stays from scrap on the ground and my scrap pile. Eventually, there will be no more scrap piles laying around. I keep bringing the junk together and throwing it away, recycling it or burning it to clean up areas. This took me all morning long and put me way behind on the trim plan.

Before I could get started on the trim I had to install a couple of extenders onto my radial arm saw stand. When I went to cut the sill pieces I realized I only needed to cut a corner out of them and they would have to be way put away from the saw blade for that to happen. To make that possible I had to add extenders to each side. Its not permanent but I am going to leave it in place until all the trim is installed.

I managed to get all three large windows bottom sill plates installed on Friday. My goal is to use silicone to seal the boards against the window and then fill all the air gap behind the boards with more caulk to make them 100% sealed. This will stop the cold air but more importantly we are hoping it will stop the bugs! There are certain times in the year that they get out of control. This happens to be one of them. It is highly annoying to have bugs everywhere. Annmarie was very happy with the progress.