Rain and lust

I got rain on Thursday! Not much, but something. .10 inch. I didn't expect it. The clouds were building dark blue to the west for a long time. That doesn't mean much as it usually goes around else goes overhead without dropping rain. It looked like it was going to go overhead again without raining. The wind picked up and the temperature dropped. But, surprise, it began to rain. It was enough that I decided to go inside the house and have lunch as it rained. Still, it is a drop in the bucket for what I need. That evening when I filled in a few holes where tree stumps were the dust flew.

Otherwise I worked in the pasture on small chores. I took to the pasture tree branches I had trimmed from around the house to make painting easier. Once in the pasture I decided to trim the branches from a tree that had fallen this Spring. Not many branches so it shouldn't take long. Once I cleaned up these branches I decided to trim the branches from a tree that had fallen into another tree. My chainsaw bar's end is bent so I couldn't cut the tree to the ground but I worried it could fall when my cattle are nearby. At least I could trim the branches from the trunk so it wouldn't spear anything if the tree fell to the ground.

I then chopped two small tree stumps from the ground in the middle pasture. Okay... I might as well chop the large tree stump from the ground in the north pasture and be done with it. This was one of the first tree stumps I had dug around this Spring but never got around to finish removing. After some chopping and some more digging I was able to pull the stump out of the ground.

I filled the dirt back into this hole then decided to fill in the hole from the other two burnt out stumps in the north pasture. For the small stump I discovered another part of the stump when I dug around the hole's edge for smoothing the edge of the ground. *sigh* Another hidden trunk. It was small enough that I could chop it out of the ground.

For another hole I found a horseshoe when digging the edge of the hole.

By the time I was done it was well after 10 pm and getting dark. Another long day.

Oh yeah... the "lust" part of my post. In the afternoon I moved my cattle from the south to the middle pasture once I finished my fence work. The neighbor's cattle who had earlier been in sight from the middle pasture had moved up on the ridge and to the NW of my property and out of sight by the time my cattle came to the middle pasture. That didn't stop the bull from bellowing every so often.

As I was chopping the large stump the cattle came over to the middle/north pastures fence. One heifer in particular, number 55, was all excited and tried to reply to the bull. Her call was more like a weak squeak. Thank goodness as I don't think the bull could hear her. Whenever the bull would call I tried to talk to her to cover up his sound. The same when she called out.

#55 had the look I saw on the lovesick heifer from last year that eventually made her way to the bull. She stood right at the fence and was wide eyed and trying to see though the trees to the bull. Her nostrils were flaring as she tried to get a scent of him. The rest of the herd paid no attention to the bull's calls and eventually moved on. #55 kept an eye on the herd but still wouldn't leave the fence. Eventually the bull shut up and she rejoined the herd.

20 females and a bull. This is going to be a long time. This morning the cattle are all hanging down by the river instead of their usual siesta in the SE corner of the pasture. I'll have to go down there this afternoon and check it out.