Mama's calf photo

Mama's newly born calf seems to be doing fine today.  He mainly sleeps.   I guess the twin calves are growing as they do look larger than Mama's calf.

Mama, who was eating hay I had just put out in the feeder, heard me talking to the calves and had to walk over to check out what was going on.  Mama is protective of her calf but this year - at least with me - she mainly keeps an eye on me and doesn't charge me.

Calf 16 - Mama's

This morning I had another new calf born.  This calf was Mama's calf.  Last year Mama was late and did not give birth until July 1.  I expected a calf around June 1 this year and was pleased to have one born now before I let the cows out to grass around June 1.

Because Mama is very aggressive the first three weeks after her calf is born I had her in the south corral with Toby and Speckles.  That way it would be easier to deal with her newborn calf if it was a boy.  And yes, it was a boy.

I didn't have the other cows in the main corral temporarily.  So I was able to let Toby, Speckles, her calves, then Mama and her calf out into the main corral.  Mama and her calf were last to go through the gate.  Once her calf came through I closed the gate and kept Mama in the south corral away from me and her calf.

I carried the calf out of the corral as it rained the day before and the corral is still muddy.  In the backyard grass Donna and I were able to band the new calf.  I didn't put an ear tag on the calf as I had not made one yet for the calf, and the calf is unique looking so I can tell it is Mama's calf without a tag.

Then I put the calf back into the corral to be with Mama.


I first seen the calf in the morning.  From this distance I was trying see if I could tell if it was a boy or a girl.

It was hard to see much of the calf as Toby decided he had to check me out, and he is so large he blocks a good view of the calf (or anything else behind him).

The calf's balls are banded.  He has white balls. 

A pretty calf.

Back with Mama.   Mama's nipples are so large the calf can only really drink from the back two smaller nipples.

Mama sniffing the calf to check out what Donna and I did with her calf.

Just two cows left to calf.   I expect Diamond's calf to be born in August.  Not sure when Maria's calf will be born as she is late, and while pregnant looking, doesn't look like she will calve soon.

Cow 40's injured leg

Over a week ago I had decided to sell the two extra cows and their calves now instead of later.  They were cows I had replaced with heifers last year.  Due to my head injury I didn't get around to selling the cows last Fall.  Since I had extra hay I kept them to this year.

I had thought about keeping them until August or so when their calves would be large enough to be on their own if the cows could only be sold for hamburger. But people were still buying pairs at the livestock auction now and I decided I wanted to simplify things sooner than later even if it meant getting a little less for them.

The auction is now on a bi-weekly schedule.  They had their last Spring sale last Thursday.  That is when I decided to sell my two pair. But, last Monday morning I discovered cow 40 had injured her leg and had trouble walking.  Cow 40 was one of the cows I had decided to sell.

Great.  Just great.  The selling of my cows were off.  I wasn't going to take only one pair to the auction.  And it is just as well I didn't go to the auction. Last Wednesday if rained an inch and the corral turned to mud.  I doubt I would have been able to pull the stock trailer in the corral as I could barely drive just my pickup in the corral.

I don't know why but it seems like every late Winter, or Spring, cow 40 somehow injures one of her legs.  That is also why I decided to sell her.  Each year after a week or two of rest her leg is back to normal.

So I put cow 40 and her calf into the loading corral.  No other cow would bother her while she healed, and there was no other reason to walk around much.  I noticed this afternoon that her leg is much better.  After a few more days she and her calf can be placed into the south corral where the bull, Speckles and Mama are located to continue healing and avoid some of the other mean cows that like to fight, and I'll be back to only two places to provide water and hay, not three.

Another breakout attempt

This afternoon I seen that cows 70 and 90 were in heat and were pestering and mounting each other.  Of course Toby the bull was in the south corral moaning/mooing as he wanted to help those two out.  Later when I put hay out to feed the cows I seen that the top two boards were partially off the corral fence divider.  These were the same fence section boards he had pushed against yesterday.

Since I had put up the metal pipe Toby was unable to push on the third board. I also had put in a short wooden fence post and that held into place the bottom board.

As you can see the wire was also really bent but it held the boards.  And you can see how long the nails were that he pushed out with the board.

I re-nailed the boards back to the railroad tie.  I also pounded in more long nails into these and a few other boards.   I also pounded into the ground another old wooden fence post to help stop the movement of these fence boards.   I can't wait until June 1 when I let Toby out to mingle with these horny cows.

Since Toby wasn't able to get the bottom two fence boards loose the cattle were unable to get into the south corral again to eat from that hay bale.



It didn't rain today but as you can see it is still very muddy in the corral.  Fortunately I still can drive in the corral to unload hay.

Another breakout and break-in

This morning I found another breakout and break-in by the cattle.  The bull pushed the same part of the corral fence and pushed the boards out on one side.   This allowed the cows and calves to come in to the south corral to eat from the bull's hay bale.  Speckles and her calves were out of the south corral and out in the extended corral away from the other cattle eating her hay.  Several of the cow's calves were laying in the loafing shed where it was dry.

Why did the bull push on the fence again?  One or more cows were in heat and encouraged the bull to push on the fence.

While the boards were off the fence on one side they were still attached to the wire fence.  The opening wasn't that large but somehow the cattle all got into the south corral.  Probably the bull pushed the boards away from the fence until the cattle got into the south corral?

This was the same fence section the bull had pushed on a few weeks ago but didn't open like this.  While I had put the metal pipe back on the corral fence I was short since the pipe was broke and didn't cover this section.  I re-nailed the boards back on the fence.  Then I chased the cows and calves out of the south corral and into the main corral.   Many immediately went back to where they had earlier gone through the fence.  They couldn't get back into the south corral and I heard lots of mooing.

Donna came over after a bit and managed the gates and I herded Speckles then her calves back into the south corral.

As you can see below when the cows were in the south corral they pigged out on the large hay bale.  I had put a full bale in the south corral earlier this week and the bale should have lasted the end of the month.  Then it would be time to let the cows and bull out to grass.  But since the cows got in the south corral they ate half the bale in however long they were in this area and I doubt this bale will last Speckles, the bull, and Momma to the end of the month.  More work for me.

I spent the rest of the morning working on attaching the pipe to the fence.  I got all but one section hung with pipe.  The last section I hung a long board rather than try to fix and reattach the last broken section of pipe.   This was hard work.  We had over an inch of rain overnight on top of several rainy days this week.  So the corral is mud and water.  It was very hard to walk in the mud as it often tried to take my mud boots off my feet.  And the boards I used re-hang the pipe and cover one fence section were a pain.  The smaller boards would split when I pounded nails into them.  The long board section was hard wood and would bend nails.  It took forever to complete the work.

Now to see how long before the bull messes with the pipe and board.  When working with the pipe I had to take off the pipe from the fence and restraighten the pipe as the bull had bent the pipe as it hung on the fence.

I didn't re-feed the cattle until this evening.  Then they only got 2/3 the normal amount of hay as the corral was still mud and standing water everywhere and I could barely drive with my pickup.  When checking things out I found several ducks standing in water in a corner of the extended corral.

After I had fixed the fence and pipe in the morning I ate breakfast after noon and then went to sleep and slept most of the afternoon.  This was a bad, wet and cold and windy day.  I wanted it over before something else bad happened.  By late afternoon I discovered my bicycle mileage computer had quit working.  Initially I thought it might because the battery was low so I replaced the battery.  Nope, that wasn't it.  It was because it was a bad day and it is unknown why the computer won't work.  I've had other bicycle computers for decades and never had this happen.  I'm glad the day is about over.

Fruit trees and flowering

A cold Spring.  But some of my fruit trees are flowering now.

Usually the first of my fruit trees to flower is my apricot tree.  Not this year.

A few blossoms on one of my cherry trees.   These trees are struggling to stay alive.  I'm not sure why they have been struggling, but they are still hanging on.

This is my serviceberry bush.  (In the Midwest we called them Juneberry bushes/trees.)  The bush is dong well and is flowering well also.   I have the small fence around the bush to try to keep the birds from the berries.  Otherwise I don't get any berries.  The same reason I have a fence around the cherry trees.

Why I really noticed the flowering of the trees recently is my one pear tree.  It looks like this will be another year of lots of pears.

My other pear tree is also struggling to stay alive.  So no flowers on this pear tree.  I've learned not to "go light" when buying fruit trees.  The large flowering pear tree I bought from a nursery and paid more.  All the struggling trees I bought at a Walmart - or other store - nursery at a cheaper price.   They don't die, but after some years they begin to struggle.

In the previous photo background that is one of my apple trees.  No blossoms yet.  Not sure if this will be an "off" year.  I pruned the apple trees but that was during this past Winter and that usually doesn't stop the trees from blossoming the same year.

Stump 2 removal

Today I finished my work on removing a second for the year stump from the middle pasture.   This stump is from a dead tree that fell over last year.  I had cut up the fallen tree last Fall.  I had planned on digging a little around the stump and then burning it.  However the stump didn't have much roots.  When digging I chopped through a few of the side roots so I wouldn't have to dig so wide. I didn't dig deep either.  The stump didn't have a major tap root.  It had a couple of smaller "tap" roots that went down.  One root was smaller than the other and about ten chops with my axe and I cut through that root.  Out of curiosity I pushed on the stump and the other root broke and the stump fell over.  So all I had to do is clean up the area, fill the dirt back into the hole, and I didn't have to burn the stump.  This stump was easier to remove than normal.

Tree branch trimming and harrowing

This afternoon I finally finished my harrowing for the year.  I had harrowed everything but the south pasture a month ago.  I waited to harrow the south pasture until I trimmed the lower tree branches in that pasture.  Last year I had trimmed the trees in the middle and north pastures and decided to delay the south pasture until later.  Well.. a year passed and it still wasn't done.  So I did it now.

I trimmed the lower branches for two reasons. One is that the cows eat/taste them and over time some of the branches lose much of their needles, which do not grow back.  Secondly, the tractor is higher than the pickup.  Now that I use the tractor to pull the harrow it is better to try to raise the branch height.  Many of the trees still have branches lower than the top of the tractor cab as that height is pretty high and those trees have a good set of branches.  But the trees with oddball lower branch height were raised to be consistent around the tree.

I have 64 trees in the south pasture so this took time.  Often I had to stand on either a step ladder or an extension ladder to reach the branches.  A few trees had their branches growing down then out.  Think of a clock's hand position at 4 or 5 or 7 or 8 o'clock for a branch that is 10 to 20 feet long.  Sometimes I stood at the top of an extension ladder to cut a branch at the tree trunk whose end was less than 6 feet from the ground.

Because I stood on ladders, and since a few times in the past I had to jump from a ladder while holding a chainsaw and sometimes throwing the chainsaw as I jumped, I decided not to use a chainsaw this time. I hand-sawed the branches and that was slower to do, especially as some branches were thick.  So the going was slow.  And made even slower as I got tired of sawing branches, both physically and mentally.

But using a handsaw turned out to be good.  Last Friday I had a case where a step ladder started to tip, or I lost my balance.  One of the two. And I jumped off the ladder to the ground. I didn't stay on my feet and fell to the ground. I didn't hit anything, but something happened.  I got very confused. Somehow I got back home and fortunately decided I had to talk with someone to figure what was going on as nothing made sense. I forgot Donna's phone number but remembered Jan's number.  Both came over and talked with me as they both realized I was very confused. After a bit, and after we all walked out to where I had been trimming tree branches, I came back to earth and started to remember - somewhat - what had happened. And what was going on currently.

I am back to 'normal' now.  I have jumped off a step ladder before and never short-circuited my brain. What I think happened is that since it has been just eight months since my head injury, the hard jostling of my brain temporarily short circuited it.   I have a doctor visit later this week to go over what happened last Friday.

So I am glad to be done with tree branch trimming and ladder climbing for now.

The following tree has broken and dead branches halfway up the tree.  Branches broken off the tree over the years were still held up by lower branches.  The photo is after I 'cleaned' up the tree.  I had to climb on branches as the height is higher than my extension ladder could reach.  And I did half of this the evening after my step ladder accident.  So the going was even way slower as I was being extra careful.

How high the extension ladder was and how high I trimmed another tree.

Early on as the grass is now all green.

One tree had a thick cluster of small dead branches on one of its large branches.

Some of the branches I trimmed off a nearby tree.  I tossed the branches on top of an old branch pile I hadn't cleaned up or burned from a previous fallen over tree.

I even chopped and removed a nearby dead tree stump.

I broke several saws.

Even though I wore gloves I still cut my finger twice.  Often I would saw using one hand and the other hand held onto a nearby branch so I wouldn't lose balance and fall.  Sometimes the saw would continue on after I cut a branch before I could stop it and it went against my nearby hand.  As you can see the glove didn't really work well.

A couple of days after my Friday accident I had an extension ladder that wanted to tip sideways when I stood near the top.  Usually extension ladders are not a problem and are stable.  But that day everything - no matter what - was going wrong (I also had the dead calf that day).  So after two different times of the ladder wanting to go sideways I quit for the day.  It was a strange day and I wasn't taking any chances.  The next day, and since then, I had no extension ladder problems.

Another dead calf

Today was another bad day in a bad calving year.  This afternoon I found another dead newborn calf.  I don't know why it died.  Perhaps it was a stillbirth.  The temperature this afternoon was in the mid-50s on a sunny/cloudy day.   It was a nice looking heifer calf; a decent sized calf as it was heavy to pull out to the pasture to be recycled by Mother Nature.

Between the previous calf losses, the twin calves, several cows tearing out their ear tags, I got confused.  Since we are now in the third heat cycle for the cow's breeding period from last year, I thought all the cows had calved and that I only had the 3 late cows left to calf, not four cows.  I thought this cow had lost her calf earlier this year.  So I was surprised to find the cow and her dead calf in my loafing shed this afternoon.

Out of 15 cows to give birth I lost 3 calves this year.  It has been a rough calving season.