Calf table

Did I wake up Thursday morning thinking I would buy a calf table?  Nope.
Did I even know I wanted a calf table?  No.
Did I even know what a calf table was?  No.

But I knew my friend Tim wanted a calf table.   Thursday afternoon I saw in the Mountain Trader two calf tables for sale for $100 each.   I called Tim but he was in South Dakota.  He was really interested in a calf table and asked if I would check it out for him.  I called and learned the tables were still available and were in Pablo, Montana, about 70 miles away.

Donna was up for a road trip so she came with me to look at the calf tables.  While Donna wasn't familiar with calf tables, me not knowing what to expect a second opinion would be useful.

The place where the tables were located was a shambles with junk, old tractors only good as scrap iron, and pieces of machinery everywhere.  What did I get myself into?  Donna wasn't sure she wanted to get out of the pickup.  She thought would have nightmares that night about the junky place.

This was far from the worst of it.

While the owner, Zon, was 85 years old, he looked and acted ten to fifteen years younger. He had about 150 head of cattle. He knew about cattle.  We talked de-horning methods, cattle and calf nutrition, prices, and about a cow he had that hadn't gotten rid of all her placenta after giving birth for the first time.  He tied a weight to the placenta thinking that would help pull the placenta out but the cow went crazy so he took the weight off and penned the cow and calf to keep an eye on them for potential problems.

He had two calf tables, one he has used before buying a newer one, and a spare he never had to use.  Both calf tables worked.  They were different.

I preferred the calf table he has used regularly. I carefully drove into the corral to load the calf table.

Here is a 3 second video of Zon lifting the table.  I didn't have time to take a longer video as I had to grab the calf table to make it stop spinning and swaying and to guide it into my pickup's bed.  When Zon first started to lower the table into the pickup bed the loader dropped suddenly.  The rest of the lowering went slower and smoother.   I held onto the table as I had visions of it swinging into my pickup window.

The tractor is an old "put-put" tractor: https://youtu.be/rDIMGnPdXh0

The other calf table I left for Tim.  Zon will hold it for Tim until he gets back from South Dakota in  week.


On the way home Donna and I ate at the Hot Spot Restaurant in Polson, Montana. It is a Thai restaurant. Yum!  I had:

The portion was so big I didn't eat it all. I took some home to eat later.  The spice level was perfect for me.  Spicy enough for flavor but not too spicy, although if I rushed eating the curry the spice level would increase.


Once home my next challenge was unloading the calf table.  I was able to move it by hand, but I didn't want to slide it out of the pickup and drop it to the ground.  On Friday I asked Wyatt and he lifted it out of the pickup with his tractor. 

I put the calf table in the loading corral for now.

The front "V" section is a head gate to hold the calf in place.

Then you can see one side can be moved in to hold the calf's body.

Why it is called a calf "table".   The whole unit swivels on its side.

The view from the back.

What I like is the "ribs".  Once can give shots through the openings.  Each rib can be opening for more access. For example if you want to brand the calf.   The bottom wood section flips down for easy access to the hoofs and lower legs.

What a useful piece of equipment.  And to think that before Thursday I didn't know that I could use one.

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