It's that time of year to take calves to the livestock auction. I had to wait until the pickup I bought from my brother was fixed. The auction is on Thursdays and I had planned on taking the calves early Thursday morning. But our weather - Winter weather now - keeps changing day by day.
Today was suppose to have bad weather and snow and on into late at night. Thursday morning would be iffy. To make an early Thursday start earlier I had planned on putting the calves into the loading corral overnight Wednesday and also parking the stock trailer at the loading corral's gate. Then it would be a quick load of cattle Thursday morning.
Last night, due to the latest weather forecast change, I thought of canceling the trip on Thursday and delaying it until next week. Since I need to make two trips to haul the calves that meant two trips next week.
This morning it starting snowing around 9 am. Not looking good as the weather prediction already started. But the snow quit after an hour and the clouds lifted and were not so dark. Donna stopped by after her appointment to see the doctor. She said the Thursday morning weather forecast had improved for Flathead Valley. Missoula - where I would be going - still had some freezing weather, rain and snow. I decided not to wait a week to make one trip. I can take cattle down a day or more before the auction. One then just has to pay a daily cost of hay per head of cattle. It was already 11 am. I went and filled the pickup with gas and got the trip permit to move livestock out of the county. It was after noon when we started the livestock loading. First I had to get the calves into the loading corral. Then I had to back up the livestock trailer to the gate. Backing the livestock trailer in the corral was difficult. This pickup, while it has a more powerful engine and is a 3/4 ton and not a half ton, is not a four wheel drive. With all our recent rain and snow the corral's ground is a little soft. But mainly the problem I had was the odd grass (weeds?) growing in the corral is very slippery, especially when wet and/or snow covered. It took some effort but I finally got the trailer backed up fairly well. I would have preferred the stock trailer gate to match 100% with the livestock gate, but it was close enough as moving the trailer was difficult.
I have more calves than will fit in the trailer. I wanted the larger calves loaded and the smaller calves left for the trip next week. That meant all but one of the steers would be loaded and then a few of the larger heifers. Getting the calves loaded was a hassle as first they didn't want to go into the trailer. Second, the smaller heifers would then be the first to go down the ramp's path and I would have restart the process. Once I got the first steer finally into the trailer, the other calves were a little more willing to enter the trailer. While Donna watched and discouraged the calves in the trailer from coming back out I got more calves in the trailer fairly much one by one.
Years ago I could haul 10 calves. Then only 9 calves. Last year I was down to 8 calves. This year I only got 7 calves into the trailer. If I hadn't closed the inner trailer gate to stop the first 3 calves from exiting the trailer, perhaps I could have squeezed one more small heifer into the trailer. I have seven calves left to take to the auction next week, and they are smaller, so they should fit into the trailer easily.
Now that the calves were loaded I found that I couldn't move the stock trailer. The pickup would just spin its tires. *sigh*
I got my tractor and hooked a chain from the tractor to the pickup and easily pulled the pickup and trailer out of the corral. Once out of the corral, and on the yard's grass, the pickup easily moved the trailer.
Donna and I were on the road by 1:33 pm. As we drove south the clouds got dark to the south and west. Doesn't look good, but I was on my way. No turning back. As we started driving east around Flathead Lake the snow and rain fell. Not good, but fortunately this lasted less than half the drive around the lake. Then it was back to dry roads. A few times closer to Missoula it rained a few times briefly as we went over a few minor mountain passes. Rain stopped by the time we reached Missoula and it was dry when I unloaded the calves at the auction. There were a lot of cattle already in the pens and a number were bellowing. While waiting to be unloaded some of my calves mooed back at the sound of the cows mooing in the pens.
While the pickup can handle the trailer weight better, and the pickup has a more powerful engine, I still found climbing long and steep hills slowed the pickup down. A little more than I expected. But still, the pickup hauls the stock trailer better than my other pickup.
Leaving Missoula to return home it began to rain. Long and hard. It was nice to not encounter all that rain when I hauled the calves in the trailer. It stopped raining by the time I got closer to Flathead Lake. By the time I got home the sky was partly cloudy and somewhat clear. With all that rain down that way, the forecast predicted slick roads tomorrow morning. Another good reason it was better to haul the calves today and not tomorrow morning.
I didn't get home until 6:30 pm. The sun would soon set. I had to use the tractor to put out the rest of a bale of the oat hay for the cattle to eat as the ground and grass is still somewhat snow covered. Then it was dark. So I was unable to wash all the manure out of the trailer. The temperature right now is below freezing so the manure will freeze in the trailer tonight. The weather forecast predicts high temperature for quite a number days to be around freezing and maybe a degree or two warmer than 32 degrees. So who knows when I can clean the stock trailer of manure. Our normal high temperature right now is supposed be 54 degrees.
With all the rain I was unable to take a photo of the waterfall near St, Ignatius on the drive home as I couldn't see the mountains at that point. Here are some other photos on the drive home.
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| Mission Mountains |
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| The clouds are hiding the tall mountains. |
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