Three calfs; three sizes

Here are some photos I took when building my board fence.

Last week when selecting boards for the fence I shooed a deer out of the hayfield.  It wasn't even dark yet and a large doe was munching on my alfalfa.  Usually I can stand in the yard and clap my hands and they run off.  This just stood and stared.  I walked into the hayfield as that will get them to leave.  Nope.  I walked towards her.  Eventually she trotted off a bit then stopped and looked at me when I stopped walking.  Over and over we repeated this.  Once I was three-fourths the way across the hayfield she finally decided to leave and hopped the fence and went to the neighbor' field.  I guess why bother?  I'm sure she came back after dark.

A side effect of my walking across the hayfield was the cattle in the south pasture came to the hayfield fence.  I guess they thought I would let them in the hayfield.  Nope.  I walked back to the yard and my boards.  The cattle all ran to the middle/north pasture gate.

I'm not letting you through.

A bit later I could hear wire stretching.   The cattle, and especially Mama, were near the fence and Toby wanted to check them out to see if they needed his services.  He was reaching through the fence to try to get their smell.

I chased the cattle away from the fence but they came back when I left.  I did this a few times.  Well, maybe Mama didn't 'take' the last time she was in heat and is in heat again as she kept standing right next to the fence.

Another reason to let Mama and her calf into the north pasture with Toby, Diamond and Maria is that Mama's calf is the closest in age and size to Diamond's calf.  Maria's calf is old enough that she doesn't run around like the young calves do and kind of is of the mindset that she is too old to hang around with the young'uns.

Mama and her calf were near the gate so I opened it to let them through.  The calf ran through but Mama didn't.  She turned away.  I tried a couple more times and she would turn away. The other cattle wanted through the gate and it was challenge to keep them from coming through.  Me stopping the other cattle must have made Mama suspicious and that is why she didn't want to go through.  Finally on my third attempt Mama went through the gate.

Toby went and checked Mama out.  No, she was not in heat.  Beulah now would stand next to the fence and Toby would reach through to try to check her out.

Argh!  Get away from the fence!

Eventually the cattle drifted off.

Mama's calf and Diamond's calf tend to hang out together and both like to run for the sheer fun of running at top speed.

Maria's calf was born March 24.  So she is almost 6 months old.
Mama's calf was born July 1.    So she is 2 and 2/3 months old.
Diamond's calf was born September 8.  So he is several weeks old.

Diamond used to have a straight back.  Between her carrying a calf and now being fat she has lost her shape.

2 weeks.   6 months.

Fence: board and wire

This week I completed two fencing projects.  Neither were large projects; but between rain, bicycling and shorter days, it is all I got done this week.

First up was the board fence.  If you remember a month or so ago I mentioned that Toby was reaching through the fence from the north pasture into the hayfield to try to reach alfalfa to eat.  The fence held, but I worried.  The north pasture / hayfield fence needs to be rebuilt but so far I had placed some corral panels along the fence.  The panels reached the length except for the last section of fence where Toby was putting his head through.

I was able to put the railroad tie in the ground and nail the boards in one afternoon.  What took so long was finding five boards to nail as a fence.  I wanted five similar boards of about the same length.  I don't mind sawing off a few inches of board but don't want to saw off a foot or more.  I can find other boards that match the different lengths.

I had three boards of different lengths that had bark still on them.  Not tightly as the boards are aged.  I used a scraper and scraped the bark off the three boards. That took time. I used one of the boards in my fence.  It is the second board from the bottom.

The soil has plenty of moisture.  Since we have had over 2 inches of rain this month I hadn't needed to irrigate my hayfield twice.  Who knew we would have so much rain?  The hole for the railroad tie goes down 30 inches.  The soil all the way down 30 inches was moist.  Usually this time of year it dry.

As you can see below I reinforced my boards.  They were solid until Toby started rubbing again them. Then they wobbled. The boards are nine feet long.  The cattle were at the west side of the pasture when I started.  As I started to nail the boards Maria saw me.  She mooed for the others and started to come.  Diamond and Mama and Maria's calf also came.  Toby was laying with the other two calves but he eventually got up and ambled over.  By then I had the bottom three boards nailed to the posts and I had to stop.  I stood on this side of the fence as Toby checked out my tools, boards, wire, etc.  He then was fascinated with my shoe as one foot was under the fence boards.  That is when he pressed against the boards and wobbled them.  I also hadn't sawed off the longer boards and he decided those ends that stuck out past the railroad tie made the perfect thing to scratch his head and face.  After a long while he wandered off.

I would remove the barb wire as I nailed up the boards.  I was fixing the barb wire on the last (right) railroad tie when Toby came wandering over again.  So another delay for me until he wandered off and I could get back to work.

You must admit the board fence looks more secure than the old barb wire fence.  One less thing to worry about.


Today I finished attaching to the hayfield / south pasture fence the roll of field fence seen below.  I started from the south end and covered 21 fence post sections.  168 feet.  Even though I rebuilt the fence with 11 strands of barb wire, some cows still could fit their head through the barb wire to eat from the hayfield.  I wasn't too concerned the cattle would break through the fence, but they were starting to make it lean.  The field fence will solve that problem.

I have 14 fence post sections left to add field fence to.  For whatever reason the cattle haven't put their heads through these sections.  So I can wait till later to get another roll of field fence and attach it this fence.

Irrigation pipes and yard work

A few days ago I finished putting away all of the irrigation pipes for the year.  I also unhooked the pump's intake pipe and removed it from the river, opened all the valves, and even unscrewed the priming pump and shutoff valve and shook drops of water from them so none of the valves or pipes freeze this Winter.

In the photo below, the short pipes on the right side are the steel mainline pipes.  The pipes to the left of the steel pipes - the ones without risers and sprinklers - are the aluminum mainline pipes.  The rest of the pipes are some of the pipes I moved twice a day across the hayfield.  Stored in the fruit tree area are the pipes that crossed the north pasture.   You can see why moving irrigation pipes twice a day takes up so much of my time.   I got my electric bill for last month.  Over $500.  On top of $300 the month before.  Irrigating is not cheap.

The hayfield is really growing from all the water (as you can in the background of the photo).  Lots of grass and alfalfa for the cattle later as I do not plan to cut the field a third time.


Today I finished un-cattle proofing the yard as I removed the corral panels and fence wire protecting the house, patio and trees.  This takes some time to do.  I did leave up the fencing protecting the caragana bushes as that is out of the way and also a bunch of work to take down and put up each year.

I also cleaned and swept much of the patio area as I still had last year's leaves under where the fencing is stored.  I hauled off one large roll of field fencing to the south pasture as I plan to attach it to the fence later.  That later may be sooner since I see some of the fence posts have a slight lean to them due to Mama reaching through the fence to try to eat from the hayfield.

And I bicycled 35 miles today.

2019 Flathead Celtic festival

The Flathead Celtic Festival was held again this weekend.  This time the event was held at Centennial Farms west of Kalispell.  A beautiful farm with a beautiful setting.  Donna and I attended for three hours this afternoon.  Seems like more people were at the festival this year than when we attended last year.

Here is a 5 second video of a guy tossing a weight over the bar: https://youtu.be/h6PbGFXR4Z4


I believe the bags are 16 pounds.  I think the winner (curly haired second guy from the right) just barely tossed the bag over the bar at the height of 22 feet, much higher than seen in this photo.

Top House, the same band that we heard last year, was playing again this year. We made sure to attend the festival when they were playing to hear them again.  They did not disappoint.

Yes, it was sprinkling rain as we watched the band play.


If you are interested in my post about last year's festival, click here: https://tallpinesranch.blogspot.com/2018/09/celtic-festival.html

More fence repairs

*sigh*

Those cattle.  Mainly Maria.  Early evening when I went out to work on the corral fence I saw Maria's calf in the north pasture along the middle/north pasture fence.  In the middle pasture near the fence was the rest of the herd.  Some mooing going on.  I looked around the north pasture and saw Diamond and her calf.  Where was Maria; and where was Toby?

I found Maria in the middle pasture among the herd along the fence near her calf.  Fat as Maria is she apparently jumped over the fence where the top wire was broken in the three strand section of the fence.  The north pasture has more and taller and greener grass so it makes no sense to go to the middle pasture.  But Maria did.

After a hassle as the rest of the herd also wanted to come through the gate into the north pasture, I finally got Maria through the gate so she could be back with her calf.

I walked around the north pasture looking for Toby.  He was at the last place I looked.  He was laying down along the buffalo fence next to the hayshed.  Once he got up and went to eating grass, he tipped over the large corral panel with a gate that I had leaning against the buffalo fence.  *sigh*

I fixed the broken fence wire.  I also discovered a dozen or so wire clips were missing from holding various strands of barb wire to various metal posts.  Wooden posts lose some of their staples over time but wire clips stay on.  Strange, especially as I didn't see any wire clips on the ground.  I fixed the fence by replacing the wire clips.

With the middle/north pasture fence fixed I turned my attention back to the corral fence.   To prevent the cattle from pushing off a few boards in the future I cut a large piece of wire mesh into four sections and fastened them to four sections of corral fence.  I only did four sections as the sun was setting, and I also ran out of staples to nail the mesh to the fence.

More calf 14 photos

During the day the calf pretty much hangs around near Diamond as Diamond eats grass.  So tomorrow I will let Diamond and the calf out into the north pasture as the calf can keep up to Diamond.

Here I gave the Diamond and Maria apples.  The calf was interested in drinking milk but Diamond wanted apples and kept moving in order to get as many apples as she could.

At one point Diamond pooped and some of it landed on the calf, who then decided to go back to the corral.  I followed him and eventually I was able to flic the manure off the calf.

Cleaner.

Oh.. yeah.. I guess you did get the manure off me.

Now that the manure was off, the calf decided to go back to Diamond.

Mom!  You gotta stop moving around so much.  I'm trying to drink!

Breaking INTO the corral

This morning I found Toby the bull in the corral south of the barn.  He broke into the corral from the north pasture.  I guess he wanted to be closer to Maria and Diamond in the backyard.  I built the corral to keep the cattle inside the corral.  I never thought cattle would try to break into the corral.

Toby spent the day in the corral.  In the evening he was back in the north pasture.  I decided to nail the boards back on the railroad ties.  I found Toby had completely taken the two boards off the fence, not just one side, when he exited the corral.  He came over to watch me as I put the boards back on the fence.  He shook his head and hopped up and down.  Since I was on the other side of the fence I sternly told him to behave and he settled down.  Eventually he wandered off.  I'll see tomorrow if he breaks into the corral again.

Tomorrow I will let Maria and Diamond and their calves out to the north pasture to join Toby as they have pretty much eaten most of the grass in the front yard.

Broken fence into the hayfield

*Sigh*

Maria and Diamond are always getting into trouble. They are still eating the grass in the yard. To make sure they concentrate on the yard I closed the gate to the NE pasture.  This also prevents them from trying to get back to the hay bales.  In the afternoon they all were eating in the front yard.  Late afternoon I went out to the south pasture to check my pocket gopher traps.  Then I began to put away the pipes from one of the irrigation lines.  I was halfway through the line when I noticed Maria, Diamond and their calves in the hayfield over by the house.  They - meaning Maria - broke through the fence in the backyard.  They were still near the broken fence so they had just gotten through the fence.

I opened the gate to the yard.  I herded Diamond's calf to the gate and Diamond followed.  They went back into the corral and I closed that gate to keep them in.  Maria's calf ran further into the hayfield when I tried to herd her to the gate.  Maria then followed.  They kept running when I tried to herd them.  They were super excited to be in the hayfield and did not want to go back into the yard. They ran over to the gate to the middle pasture.  I stopped them from running further into the hayfield and they turned and ran to the gate to the north pasture.  Toby saw what was happening and he got all excited.  His head was up high and he was running along the north/middle pasture fence and heading to the gate.

As I got closer Maria and her calf took off along the fence and went back towards the house. Once they got to the open gate to the backyard the calf looked like she was going to veer away and back into the hayfield.  But Maria went through the gate so the calf turned and went through also.

*Whew*

I got some extra gates and blocked the broken fence and more of the fence that wasn't broken.  Maria and her calf were not too happy with this.  They came back and wanted through the broken fence and into the hayfield.  They studied the fence but so far have not found a way through my barrier.

It is good I caught them when I did as the alfalfa is growing and having been cut two times this year is really rich now.  Pigs that Maria and Diamond are they would overeat and bloat and die.  I was looking at Diamond this afternoon and she is so fat she looks pregnant with a calf.  They have about a days worth of grass left to eat in the yard and then I can let them out into the north pasture.

So my work priorities have once again been altered by the cattle.  Putting in a newer gate and rebuilding this fence was on my to-do list for later.  It is now higher on my to-do list.

Rain, irrigation, baby calf

Except for a three hour window from about 3:30 pm to 6:30 pm, it has rained all day.  We are over 1.5 inches since the rain started last evening and it is still raining.  The river, which had been running at a little over 60 cubic feet per second (CFS), is now just shy of 100 CFS.  Since we had so much rain I turned off the irrigation pump after I woke up this morning.  No sense moving the pipes two more times.

Diamond was with her new calf in the loafing shed in the corral this morning while Maria and her calf were out in the front yard eating grass.  So I put out some hay for Diamond to eat as she was hungry.  As I left the corral her calf followed me.  So I had to herd him back into the corral to be near his mother.

Diamond was eating grass in the front yard when I left at 3 pm for my dental appointment.  I didn't see her calf.  When I got home Diamond was still in the front yard.  No sign of her calf.  So I went looking for it.  I really has to look as I could not find it.  I finally found the calf curled up and resting back behind my piles of wood in the back yard.  Diamond had hidden her calf well while she went to eat in the front yard.

When it started to rain after 6:30 pm Diamond was still in the front yard.  I hadn't seen her go back to her calf.  I waited a little bit for her to go back to her calf.  I couldn't take it anymore and I went back.  The calf was curled up and laying in the rain.  I tried to get it to stand and walk to the corral and the loafing shed but it just wanted to lay.  Eventually I got it up enough that I could wrap my arms around his legs and I carried him to the loafing shed where it was dry. No sense him catching a cold laying in the rain.  I set him down.  He got up and walked around a bit before settling down in the corner.  I went and got Diamond and herded her into the corral.  She needed to check on her calf in case he was hungry.  Once she got to the corral Diamond then got engaged and mooed and went over to her calf.   Maria's calf followed us and then so did Maria as they thought they were missing out on something.  At least the calf is dry now.

Rain and irrigation

Rain came Sunday evening before my evening irrigation pipe move.  I cold see it coming so I started my move a little after 6 pm instead of the usual 7 pm start.

I was two-thirds the way through the first line of pipes when it began to sprinkle.  Even though I was wet, before turning on water to that line, I put on my raincoat I had brought along.

I was happy Toby decided to go from the middle of the pasture to the west side so I wouldn't have to keep as close of an eye out for him.  The other day when I put out a salt block for him he came over towards me and put his head down and started to jump and buck.  He was not happy I would not open the gate to let him join Diamond and Maria.

I had five pipes left on the second line when it began to rain harder.  The raincoat is water resistant, not waterproof.  I was very wet by the time I turned water to the second line on.  I got back to the house by 7:20 pm.

I dried off and laid down.  Ten minutes later I wondered if the sprinkler water would reach the salt block left out for Toby.  Back on went the wet pants and cap.  I left my shirt off, it was soaked already.  The water didn't quite reach the salt block, but I moved it to the other side of the tree anyway.  Due to the rain I hadn't walked the line to check it after turning the water on.  Now I found the end cap was leaking and a pool of water had formed.  For this particular pipe the end cap leaked.  So I got my tool and, with the water still flowing, popped off the last two pipes and switched them.  The end cap did not leak on the switched pipe.

I for sure was soaked by the time I got back in the house after these 15 minutes.  Daisy had decided to wait the rain out wherever she was at.  She showed up a couple of hours later for supper all wet as it hadn't quit raining.  She is currently sprawled out and sleeping on my lap as I type this post having finally dried off her smelly wet fur.

After Sunday night's irrigation pipe move I have two more (one day) of moves and then I am done irrigating for the year.  For us, this is a very good rain total so far. I'll see in the morning whether I will move the pipes or call it good and turn off the pump.

Finally!! Calf 14

Diamond finally had her calf this afternoon.  Around 3 pm. I just missed seeing the birth. The calf is a little bull calf.  Donna and her daughter came over to help me band and ear tag the calf.

Maria's calf was all excited to see the new calf.  She stayed in the loafing shed rather than go out with her mother to eat grass in the yard.

The milk is not at that end!

Getting closer to the milk!

Donna's daughter also brought her dog along on a leash.  As you can see Maria's calf was fascinated by the dog.

Rain came this evening.  Diamond and her calf stayed dry in the loafing shed.

Diamond's calf came along at a good time.  Maria and Diamond have a day to a day and a half of grass to eat out of the yard.  After that I can let them out to the north pasture to eat there.

Cattle and pocket gophers

I put up the protection and Thursday afternoon let Diamond, Maria and her calf into the backyard to eat the grass.  This has taken their mind off breaking into the hayshed.  Until Friday night I had irrigation pipes across the front yard and the NE pasture.  I am on my way back across the hayfield before ending irrigation for the year. (The hayfield is growing nicely again and will provide good pasture for the cattle later this Fall.)

So far they have behaved, other than a couple times I caught Maria rattling the corral panels across the yard.  She claims it was an innocent mistake and that she was not testing the panel barrier.

Protection around my large walnut tree.  There are signs they pushed against the bottom so as to eat what grass they could reach inside.

This morning I caught Maria and Diamond trying to break into the small walnut tree.  They had pushed and pulled against the wire protection.  They had removed a few wire clips holding the wire fencing to the metal posts and started to push in the wire fencing.  I replaced the wire clips and added another metal post.


I am back trapping pocket gophers in the south pasture.  I had put it off as the cattle are there, but I couldn't stand it and wait any longer.  The cattle self rotate between the middle and south pastures and it seems they make sure to visit the south pasture each day.  Often I find the traps or their marker rods bent. Today they pushed the dirt back into the hole and buried one trap.  I left the milk jugs off the marker rods so not to attract the cattle.  They still find the rods and I often spend extra time each day looking for my traps as I often forget where I last set them.

The other day the cattle stepped on one of my traps and broke it even though I had set the trap right against the south fence.  I had an old trap that had the inner trip broken. I was able to combine the two to make one working trap.  And it works. I already caught a pocket gopher with this trap.

Flathead Lake map

In yesterday's blog post I forgot to include a map of Flathead Lake and Wild Horse Island to show you where it was located.

Our cruise went from a state park between Lakeside and Rollins down to and then around Wild Horse Island and then back.

The island with the ugly mansion is to the left of Wild Horse Island.

The island with the expensive house is one of the two small islands below and to the right of Rollins, MT.

The funicular is somewhere between Rollins and Lakeside.

Flathead Lake cruise

Earlier on my hiking blog I had posted about Wild Horse Island.

http://tallpineshiker.blogspot.com/2019/07/wild-horse-island.html

As the island is only accessible by boat, this is how I got there.   Donna's family held a family reunion back in July.  On July 26 a number of the family members at the reunion rented a pontoon boat to cruise on Flathead Lake and go visit Wild Horse Island.  One of the local family members is an experienced boat pilot.

Donna's zodiac sign is Cancer.  And Cancer is a water sign.  I'm a Cancer and love water, and all the Cancers I've know love water.  Not Donna.  She doesn't even like drinking water.  I wonder if she really is a Cancer?  Anyway, Donna wasn't planning on going on the boat ride.  But her sister visiting from North Dakota talked her into going on the ride.  So I also went along as I love water and lakes.

It was a warm sunny day.  The wind was light, unlike the previous day and the next day which were both windy.   It was a beautiful day for a boat ride on Flathead Lake.

Mission Mountains

Mission Mountains in the back.  Wild Horse Island on the right.

South side of Wild Horse Island.  The slight hill left of center is near where Skeeto Bay is on the north side of the island.

Looking at where the highway goes away from the lake and over to Hot Springs.

The next two photos are of an island owned by, and a large ugly mansion on it built by, a guy from Las Vegas.

The next photos are of the most expensive house (and property) in Montana.  The property is an island.

Mini-island.  As far as I know it isn't owned by some rich person.

The trailer is on an island.

Smoke from a forest fire near Ronan, Montana.

Mission Mountains in the foreground right.  Swan Mountain Range is in the back.

The Starbucks COO had a funicular built so he could go from his house down the very steep hillside to the lake.