I went back to bed and dreamt and dreamt. I got up after 11 am. After a bit I sat then laid on the couch. Daisy was laying/sleeping on the couch's top. I then had dreams of me dreaming. Crazy.
Dream A had dream B. Then in dream A I would realize I had just had dream B. Before waking up from Dream A I then had dream C and the same thing happened where I realized I was dreaming. Dream A then had dream D and the same thing happened. Then I woke up briefly to see it was 12:15 pm. I quickly fell back to sleep and dreamed until 12:35 pm when Donna arrived to help me move the cattle.
Cattle movement. Time for the three remaining heifers to go out to join the herd - and the bull. It went fairly well as the heifers went where they were told. Except for one black heifer, #90. She veered away from the open gate and the other two heifers who ran through the gate. #90 ran along the fence. By now the whole herd came running from across the middle pasture. I had to go two-thirds the way down the fence line to herd the heifer back to the open gate. After another veer away from the gate the heifer circled around and went through the gate just as the herd caught up to us on their side of the fence. I got the gate shut in time.
Then it was time to move Mama and Diamond from the south corral to the fruit tree area and grass. They still haven't had their calves otherwise it would be easier to have them be with the herd. Mama and Diamond had just finished eating their hay bale last night so the timing was excellent. This move also had a hiccup. I was able to herd Diamond through the small gate in the board fence but Mama didn't want to go through that gate. Going through meant stepping on a few flat concrete blocks I have in the ground. They used to be borders to my garden when I had one.
Mama didn't want to step on the concrete. Herding her was going nowhere. She knew what I wanted her to do but she refused to go through that gate. Eventually I had her go through the NE pasture gate and then through the large green gate into the fruit tree area. It helped that Diamond was already in the fruit tree area otherwise Mama would have preferred to stay in the NE pasture.
Where was Donna when herding Mama? She was in or by the safety of her car. Donna is convinced Mama is out to get her. Donna is not afraid of any other cattle, or either of the bulls I have had, but Donna has seen Mama in action and knows how fast she can be.
Moving the heifers allowed me to see what mischief they had been up to in the fruit tree area. A few days ago Donna had gotten some of my rhubarb. I have metal panels around the rhubarb and either Donna didn't re-latch the panels securely, or the heifers saw her in the rhubarb area and then thought if Donna could get in then so could they. I found one panel laying on the ground and all the rhubarb and strawberry plants were eaten. I hadn't weeded the area this year and the heifers also ate all the weeds and grass growing there. Nothing was left.
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| Plants are all gone. |
Toxicity:
Rhubarb stalks contain oxalic acid, which is toxic when eaten in large amounts. Most animals avoid rhubarb, but hungry animals will eat almost anything. Use a process of elimination to identify the animal eating your rhubarb and then take action to protect young, tender stalks.
Symptoms of rhubarb poisoning in grazing animals include diarrhea, depression, trembling, and drinking and urinating more frequently. Animals are rarely poisoned by consuming small amounts of leaves, but in large amounts, rhubarb leaves can cause kidney failure and even death.
Hungry animals? You can see in the photos there is plenty of grass where the heifers were located. This heifers are greedy and willful and that is why they had to eat everything. Other years before I had different fencing around the rhubarb the cattle would reach and sample rhubarb leaves but tended to avoid eating them.
So I am going to have to keep an eye on these heifers over the next few days. Hopefully splitting the leaves among the three animals means the amount was low enough to not cause problems.
That's not all. I had protected a small black walnut tree growing in the fruit tree area. The heifers pulled the two metal rods from the ground and moved the roll of fencing protecting the tree. Then ate the tree. One of the rods was still through the fence roll.
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| After I replaced the tree protection |
This photo is of my other black walnut tree that is in the front yard. The heifers weren't able to get to this tree when they were in the front yard eating grass.
I have a small current berry bush. The heifers figured a way to bend the wire fencing and got in to eat that bush.
I could see where they had attacked other fencing protection for trees and bushes and those held. You know, they have lots of grass, but these heifers want what is protected... just because.
These flowers had not flowered when the heifers were in the front yard. Otherwise I am sure they would have figured out some way to eat them.
I counted the hay bales. It appears I made 57 of them.
It is fortunate I finished the baling yesterday. It has rained lightly off-and-on all day today. It never dries completely between rain showers. The forecast is for this to continue all the way through Sunday night. Having wet hay for this long could mean mold.
During a break this evening I went for a bicycle ride. I needed to ride to charge my energy back up. Otherwise after moving the cattle and having breakfast I fell back asleep for the rest of the afternoon until almost 7 pm.
During my ride I rode by three fields with hay on the ground. I am very surprised. One field by the school was cut a week ago last Tuesday and Wednesday, two to three days before I cut my field. When I was rushing about trying to fix my baler's belt on Tuesday I drove by this field. The farmer had only baled a couple of rows and his tractor and baler were in the field. Today I saw that he had only baled about a dozen rows. The rest of the hay is wet and brown on the ground and the tractor and baler is sitting in the field. He has a big new tractor and newer baler. I saw him cut his field. He has a newer mower/conditioner (moco) and was zooming along the field to cut it. He looked to be moving more than twice the speed I was able to when cutting my field. He has the horsepower and baler speed to have finished baling his field by now. His field is maybe twice the size of my field - at most.
I was surprised the two other fields were cut and the hay down. They were cut sometimes after I cut my field and I cut my hay at the very last one could cut and still have it to dry and bale. Didn't this farmer know the weather forecast? And why both of his fields? They are large fields. They were nice fields. They are irrigated, and I had seen this Spring the farmer fertilizing his two fields. Crazy. I wonder if he can salvage his hay or if it will get moldy.
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