New hay bale for Tobey

On Sunday Tobey had about a day's worth of hay left to eat in his feeder.  But I had to start the tractor to get a couple of hay bales down from the top of the stack so I decided to give Tobey a new hay bale.  I took his old hay and gave it to the cows.  They were less than pleased as the older hay was from Calvin's field.  Tobey got a new bale of the grain hay.  He was happy.  I put part of a small hay bale in the barn's wooden feeder to distract Tobey as I lifted the metal feeder up onto its side and prepared the new hay bale.  Later Tobey buried his head into the new bale and ate and ate.

Calf 11 - Beulah's

Beulah had her calf this afternoon between 4 pm and 5 pm.  From her behavior just before 4 pm I suspected she would give birth later in the day.  Just like last year Beulah quickly gave birth.  When I next saw Beulah at 5 pm her calf was all clean and was standing and drinking milk.  That was fast!

The calf is a heifer.  Another heifer!   But that is ok.  The calf is a beautiful silver grey. A gorgeous color.  The photos don't do the calf's color justice.  I am already thinking of keeping the calf as a replacement heifer for next year.

Beaver dam

Last Fall I told Chris where the beaver dam was that was flooding the field he rented and was harvesting.  He didn't do anything about it.  Last week the 'lake' got even larger.  Today I put waders on and checked it out.  In addition to the dam the beaver plugged the culvert that makes a bridge over the creek.  The culvert makes a higher dam.  In addition the beavers started to extend the dam on the north side where the water flows around the culvert.  I removed the north side dam extension.  The culvert is completely underwater on the upstream side.  The downstream side only has water that flows around the culvert dam.  It is too dangerous to go in the culvert to try to remove the dam.

A few hundred yards downstream is the original beaver dam, the one that floods the field.  The dam was impressive.  Mud and branches.  I didn't see any water flowing through the dam.  The dam is higher than the creek's banks.  The beavers tried to extend the dam on each side of the creek once the creek overflowed the banks.  But that proved to much of an area to dam. (I think that is why the beavers then moved upstream and dammed the culvert.)   I removed much of the lower dam.  The creek is now back in its banks.   At sundown water was still flowing from the fields back into the creek.  Now to see how long it will be before the beavers rebuild the dam.  Since they still have their culvert dam they may not rebuild the lower dam.

Downstream of the lower beaver dam before the dam removal.

Calf 10 - Sugar's

Sugar finally had her calf this afternoon.  A male calf.  She only had one calf, though she looked big enough to have twins.  Her udder for the past few days was so large she hit it as she walked.  I wonder if she has a little Holstein in her ancestry.

The calf is big.  This is her first calf by Buddy and the calf looks similar to Buddy's other calves.  So hopefully I will get full price for the calf this Fall, unlike what happened with her calf last Fall.

While the mother is not as aggressive as Mama can be, and does not attack me, she does get real close when I work on her calf.  Other mothers usually come no closer than a couple of feet away.  I got nervous and then picked up the calf to carry it across the fence to the middle pasture.  Of course the calf was near the north side of the north pasture.  I had to pause a few times to catch my breath.  And the calf struggled.  And the mother was right behind me as I walked so half the time I walked while looking backwards.  A few times I thought the mother was going to come through the fence as Donna and I banded and ear tagged the calf.

The calf's umbilical cord area was still bloody so I got blood all over me as I carried the calf.  Good thing I was wearing my patched up pants and didn't care.

Afterwards... the cows ate their evening hay and the other calves hung out in the corral.

Cattle and calf photos

Still no new baby calves.  Sugar looks very pregnant and could give birth anytime.

This afternoon Tobey the bull was sniffing around a few of the cows.  Some stood up for him to check. One cow refused as she wasn't interested and continued to refuse when Tobey pushed against her. Eventually he gave up and went to another cow.  Since I don't want any January newborn calves, and it has been three weeks since the first cow gave birth, it was time to put Tobey into the south corral by himself.  Since I didn't want him mingling with the heifers I moved the heifers from the south corral to the loading corral until Tobey went into the south corral.  Then I let the heifers out and the cows into the corral to eat hay.  Tobey was bummed as the hay in the south corral is from a bale of Calvin's hay and not the oats/grain hay from my field.  Later in the evening he was eating from his bale.

Tobey in the south corral.

The heifers did fine mingling/eating with the other cows, though some cows refused to let the heifers eat next to them.

Here are some calf photos...

Patrick is learning how to eat hay.

Tiny dancer

Her hair looks to be so clean and soft.

March bicycling mileage

Snow again today.    This has been a long Winter as our first snow was on November 1st.  Where is global warming when you need it?!!!

This was the weekend of the annual Creston auction.  Due to the weather I didn't go.

Anyway.... I thought I'd update you on my March bicycle mileage.   I rode 1025 miles in March.  By far the most ever during any March (the previous maximum was 605 miles).  The 1025 miles double the mileage ridden this year as on March 31 I had ridden 2050 for the year (also a new maximum).

I looked back in my records and found the last time I had ridden 1000 or more miles in a month was way back in October 1997.  20 years and 5 months ago!   I thought it has been a while since I had ridden at 1000 miles in a month but did not realize it was that long ago.  I was a younger whippersnapper back then!

The last week of March I rode 290 miles.  Other than going on a week bicycle tour in 2000 and 2002, the last time I rode more miles in a week was 310 miles in September 1999.  Again, a long time ago.

Now that I am in the first week of April my mileage has gone down considerably.  Partly due to our bad weather and partly to take a break from all that riding.  I have only ridden 124 miles the first seven days of April.

Snow

I woke up to snow on the ground.   The wind and snow overnight had mostly quit by morning.   During the day the snow on the roads melted; the rest stayed.  The airport said we got a trace of snow but they must have been the driest part of the Valley as everywhere else there was more than a trace.  I must have had a half inch to an inch of snow.

Thankfully no calves were born in the storm overnight.  Still no more calves by evening.

Daisy went outside at 3 am.  I woke up at 6 am and called for her.  She came running from the garage.  After a quick meal she jumped on my bed and snuggled up close against my legs for the rest of the morning.

April showers usually mean the tulips flower.   Here are the tulips in the snow.

Buddette (left) and Patrick (right)

Moving and fixing the wooden feeder

Monday afternoon I moved and fixed the large wooden feeder.  While much of the corral had dried up, the area around the feeder was still muddy and wet.  I've wanted to move the feeder for a number of days now, but with the colder weather the feeder was half frozen into the muck.  Also the feeder was loosey-goosey and leaning from the cattle pushing against it while eating. Some of the floor's support boards were partially broken from the bull climbing into the feeder.  As a result, after each feeding half or more of the floor boards had fallen down or were pushed into the muck.

Monday afternoon I had enough and I got a shovel and chipped and dug the mud and muck away from the feeder's legs.  Harder still to remove was the hay that had been pushed out of the feeder by the cows and stomped into the mud and muck. I then put the pallet forks on the tractor and lifted the feeder up and moved it over to a dry place.  The forks weren't quite long enough to lift both sides of the feeder up.  I held my breath and lifted the feeder slowly.  I half expected the feeder to come apart as I lifted or moved it.  But the feeder held together.

Once I set the feeder down I did some repair work.   I tightened up the feeder; replaced one corner leg; and fixed the floor support boards.  Strangely, the floor boards now had a two inch gap and so I replaced one board with another board two inches wider. Now the floor fit back tight both in length and width.   After the cattle ate their evening hay all the floor boards remained in place.  And since the feeder is no longer stuck in the muck the feeder sits a little higher and I didn't see Tobey the bull climb into the feeder.

Former feeder location

I forgot to mention in the previous post about Panda's new calf... but when Donna came over to help me ear tag the new calf, when Donna entered the corral with me all but one of the mother cows stopped eating hay and freaked out.  They called for their calves to come to them and mothers and calves quickly left the corral and walked far out into the north pasture.  Donna and I ear tagged Panda's calf.  Once Donna returned to her car and got ready to leave some of the calves finally started to trickle back into the corral.  Tonight, when it was just me the mother cows didn't bat an eye as I walked in the corral.

Calf 9 - Panda's

Looking at Panda early afternoon on Monday I was sure she would have her calf later that afternoon.  Especially as she then went off away from the other cows to be by herself.  In the afternoon I moved and fixed the large wooden feeder and after I filled the hay and let the cattle back in the corral to eat at 6:30 pm I found Panda laying next to her new calf just outside the corral.

A heifer. I am back to having girls. This is the seventh heifer this year so at minimum I will have a majority of calves as heifers.

Calf 8 - 40's

This morning I found a new calf.  I expected Panda to give birth next due to how swollen she was.  Nope.  Cow #40 gave birth.

This time the calf was a boy.  About time after six straight heifers.

I straddled the calf to hold him down while banding him.  He then peed on my leg.

Mama - as you can see in the above photo - watched as Donna and I banded and tagged the calf.  After the mother cow and calf walked out of the corral Mama came out of the loafing shed and began to charge Donna.  I yelled at Mama to stop and 'knock it off' and she did.


Later in the afternoon I went to add water to the water trough for the two cows and calves.  As you can see Patrick is out cold.  He woke up and moved when I brought a garden hose to the trough.

Calf 7 - 90's

Overnight last night calf 7 was born. Another heifer!!   The sixth heifer in a row.  When the mother saw Donna and I approaching in the afternoon the mother knew what was up and tried to hustle her calf away from us.  After I put the ear tag on the calf they spent the rest of the day in the trees closer to the river.  The mother didn't even come when I put hay out at 6 pm.  I imagine she will be really hungry tomorrow morning as the mother also didn't come earlier when I fed the cows this morning.

I don't know why, but the calf doesn't have a tail other than a short stub.

Note: my camera lens is not dirty.  We had off-and-on snowflakes this afternoon.  No snow stuck but enough fell to make the pavement all wet.

"Kid, Let's get out of here before they do something else!"