Cow and calves and salt and hay

No new baby calves today.

This morning I moved cow 110 and her calf over to the south part of the corral to be with last year's calves.  Her calf wasn't hungry this morning and the mother cow was acting normal and protective of her calf.  In the afternoon I saw her calf drink and the mother stood still, like she should.  So the effort to get these two to bond is done.


In the following photo, when I built that fence I had also attached a metal pipe to it.  That was so the cows, or bull, wouldn't push against the fence boards popping them off.  Well, instead the cows, bull, and calves like to rub against the metal pipe and itch.  Days after I took this photo the calves completely knocked this section of pipe off the fence and somewhat bent the pipe.

This is the calves' salt.  Yup.  I had to clean it off and wash the salt block so they would again lick the salt block.

When I put out a new large hay bale, with the tractor I first tip the metal feeder on its side.  As the calves pick at the remaining hay I go and get the large hay bale.  This time while I was gone the calves pushed the feeder and ended up tipping it over.  Fortunately no one was hurt.

One of the steers likes to stand on the hay to eat it.  He can't get his back legs in the feeder and hay though.

This is what the feeder area looks like for the cows and bull out in the pasture.  This is why I move the feeder to a new location each time I put out a large hay bale.  This afternoon I put out another large bale for them.

Calf 5 - 110's

Cow #110 had her calf yesterday.  A black little male calf.    Cow 110 is the reluctant mother.  Every year she won't let her calf drink and will head butt or kick the calf to keep it away from her.  I always have to put the cow and her calf in a small area of the loading ramp part of the corral and the calf then can drink from the cow.  After a half day to a day the cow will then bond with her calf and let it drink.

Yesterday when I went out to feed the cattle at 5 pm cow 110 was standing near the corral gate and I could see her head butt her calf.  A few times the calf went flying.  He kept getting up and trying to drink as he was hungry.  I called Donna to come and help me. But the time she arrived I had gotten the mother and her calf into the loading ramp area, and with Donna's help, we were able to get the cow and calf in a smaller area where the mother couldn't move much.  The calf then was able to figure how to drink and then drank.

Because the temperatures still go down to the lower 20s overnight I wanted to have the cow and calf be in the roofed area next to the barn overnight.  We herded them over there and I put out hay for the cow to eat.

I fed the rest of the cattle in the rest of the corral and then reloaded hay into the pickup for tomorrow morning's feed.   The cow occasionally would head butt her calf even though he wasn't trying to drink anymore.  Donna watched and prevented the cow from head butting her calf.  But it was getting close to dark and Donna had to handle her pet turkey before dark. The hay bale was very tightly wrapped and it took longer to load hay into my pickup.   When I was done and went to check on the calf I seen the calf laying in the corner and against the metal corral panels in the hay the cow was eating.  I wondered if the cow had head butted the calf into the panels.  The calf was alive and after a while stood up and wandered over to the other end of their laying area.

The cow would occasionally give a dirty look at the calf.  I got some long boards and divided the laying area into two.  One area the calf could lay and he could walk under the boards while the mother could not.

Time had passed and it was about four hours since the calf last drank.  I tried to get the calf to drink in their laying area but the cow would kick and move and try to prevent the calf from drink.  After several attempts we herded the cow back to the loading ramp area.  I then got the calf over there too.  The calf didn't want to walk and would lock his legs and not move them.  I had to push him all the way over, at times lifting his back end and pushing and the calf would try not to move his front legs.  I was breathing heavy and tired but the time I got the calf back to his mother.

The mother didn't try to fight the calf as much this time and the calf drank faster.

It was 11 pm now and four hours would make it 3 am.  I decided to leave the cow in the loading ramp area as she could handle the cold temperatures.  And the wind was blowing which made it colder.   This time I tried to carry the calf and was able to do so and get it back under the roofed area where he could lay in the straw and out of the wind.

At 3 am Donna came over to wake me up and help me with the calf.  All went smoother and this time I was no longer complaining and talking to the cow or the calf telling it what to do or not do like I did repeatedly earlier as I was annoyed at the cow's behavior.  Earlier Donna was trying to get me to stop talking to the cow and calf as she said they didn't understand what I was saying.  I was hungry and cold as I hadn't eaten since noon and I was upset at the mother as she was head butting or kicking her calf as I was afraid she would hurt or kill her calf.

We were done by 4 am.  At 8 am once again.  It was light outside now and everything went better.  The cow knew I wanted it to stand in the restricted area and would now walk there to feed her calf without me having to push her into there.

After 8 am and during the day I left the calf in the loafing ramp area.  I wanted the two to bond so the cow would get over her bad behavior.  I got some boards and a piece of plywood to make a small area in one corner so the calf could lay under there if he wanted to get away from his mother.  But she seemed to bond and stop pushing the calf around.

I went back into the house after I fed the other cattle and then slept until noon.

Still, by the end of the day the calf didn't seem to drink easily.  After 5 pm the cow mostly stood still but the calf stood the wrong way and ended up trying to find the udder between the cow's front legs.  The cow would push her head against the calf slightly to encourage him to back up.  The calf would but only go halfway, then look under the cow's belly before once again moving back to the front legs.

I figured he would figure out to turn around or go backwards.  But not really.  A few times he moved back far enough but ended up pushing against her back leg and not the udder whereby she would kick her leg and the calf would move away.

Finally I went in there to turn the calf around but then the cow would turn around.  She seemed to want to go to the restricted area so I opened the gate to that area and she walked in.  I moved the calf next to her making sure I turned him around so he would back in and then face the best way to drink from her udder.

I checked again a little while ago.  The calf was awake and not laying under the protected area I made earlier in the day.  The cow was standing but the calf must have drunk as he didn't want to get up to drink but just lay there.  When I petted him to encourage him to stand he laid there and her mother then came over to gently moo and sniff and lick him to check him out.  He continued to lay.   I'll check again just before I go to sleep later.

Since the wind is calm and tonight's low temperature is suppose to be in the upper 20s I plan to leave the calf with his mother.  He didn't seem cold when I checked a little while ago.

Frozen river

Baby calf #4 survived the night.  Since I had the calf in a shelter the low temperature last night was 30 degrees and not the 19 degrees predicted.  Of course, not as cold since I had the calf in a shelter.

No new calves born today.

The temperature the past few days have been near normal.  Over the weekend the coldest temperature was 10 degrees.  Still it seemed like it was colder.  Over the weekend we had a half inch of snow and it took a number of days for this to melt.   During the weekend the well to my house froze two mornings.  First time because the light bulb in the pump's shed went off overnight.  The second night the water froze again even though the light bulb stayed on.  It was 34 degrees in the pump shed but apparently the ground floor of the pump shed froze.  Strange as that never happened.

The water pipe for the livestock's water trough froze.  The pipe is a frost freeze hydrant and I've had this for many years and it never freezes.  I tried using a heating torch to unthaw it but that wasn't working.  It took several days to unthaw and that was only once the temperature was in the mid to upper 40s.  Strange.  For those several days I had to use four garden hoses to go from the house's well over to the cattle's water trough.  After each time filling the water trough I had to drain all the water out of the hoses so the water didn't freeze in the hoses.

And lastly... the river completely froze over this weekend.  There was no ice at all on the river before this past weekend.  Most years the river doesn't at all freeze over.  It usually takes several days of temperatures of all least 10 below zero and  high temperatures of only the single digits.  We don't get weather like that often.  But this weekend the river completely froze over even though the lowest temperature was only 10 degrees above zero.  And it took days to thaw.  Finally tonight I saw the ice no longer went shore to shore.  The ice was only on each side of the river.  Again, strange.    And when I went for a bicycle ride this afternoon I rode by a very large pond and that was still completely frozen.

And this is March!!!   Global warming.  The earth is supposedly getting warmer but the temperatures are getting colder.  And a minor cold temperature acts as if it is a major cold temperature.  Strange.

Unbelievably iced over!

Calves 3 and 4

Yesterday afternoon cow #80 gave birth to a male calf.  I saw it around 7 pm.  The calf was standing and walking and dry.  Since it was getting close to sundown and the calf was fine I decided to wait until today to band it and ear tag it.  It was sunny and yesterday's high temperature was 46 degrees.  Finally back to normal temperatures.  The wind was calm and the overnight low was suppose to be in the 20s.  The calf should be fine out in the pasture overnight.  The overnight low temperature was 16 degrees.  This morning when I checked on the cattle I found 80's calf was dead.  Apparently the calf froze to death.  I was shocked that this happened.  And not happy that it did happen.

Global warming.  The earth is supposedly getting warmer but the temperatures are getting colder.  This is the coldest March since I moved here 20 years ago.  I am very tired this year with having January temperatures in March.  There is a reason I don't have cows calve in January.  And the weather forecast for the next week is to mostly have colder than normal temperatures.

Cow 80 is heartbroken over her dead calf. I haven't moved the dead calf yet.  Cow 80 spent most of the day laying next to her calf and mooing.  When I came over to look at the calf cow 80 looked at me like "help me and fix my calf for me.  Usually cow 80 is a bully towards other cows and tends to ignore me.  Not today.


This afternoon cow #60 finally had her calf.  Cow 60 is a white-faced black cow.  Her calf is an all black male calf.  Looks just like the calf that died last night.   The weather forecast is for a low temperature of 19 degrees tonight.  This night the wind is blowing at 18 mph with gusts in the upper 20 mph range and is supposed to blow all night.  I am not having another calf freeze to death.    At 5:30 pm Donna came over to help me band and tag the calf.  First we herded the cow and calf into the corral and placed them in the roofed area with straw next to the barn.  The other two cows in that corral had pulled hay out of the feeder and the other two calves have, and can, lay on that hay.  Being in the roofed area with straw, and out of the wind, should help the new calf survive tonight.  None of the other cows look close to calving tonight, but then again I was surprised cow 80 calved a day before cow 60.

When Donna and I banded and tagged the calf I had cow 60 outside the corralled area so she wouldn't get upset and push or step on us.  Here the calf is banded and tagged and I am about to herd cow 60 inside to be with her calf for the night.

Two calves meet

This morning I let Red and her calf out from their small area under the barn's roof and into the larger corral area south of the barn.  Red wanted to eat hay right away and her calf wanted to check out the corral area.  Red was worried and constantly had to quit eating hay, moo at her calf, and go over to get her calf to come back and stand next to her as she ate hay.  Over and over.  By afternoon she was a little calmer and her calf didn't have to stand right next to her.

Red's calf checking out her older brother.

Btw - here are a couple of photos I had taken of Sugar's calf yesterday.

Red's calf ear tagged

Red's calf is doing quite well considering the bad weather she was born in early last evening.  I put an ear tag on her this afternoon.

I left Red and her calf in their area all day to be alone.  I'll let them out tomorrow to be with the other cattle.  By late afternoon Red's calf was watching Sugar's calf run around the corral.

In the morning before the ear tag was added.

Watching Sugar's calf run around the corral.

Here is a 2:15 minute video of Red's calf running around: https://youtu.be/SNkrliLufsA

Calf 2 - Red's

What a day.   The second calf was born today.  A day where the temperature was in the low to mid teens which is about 30 degrees colder than normal, the wind blew strong and gusty all day with wind speeds in the upper 20s with gusts to 40 mph, wind chills below zero degrees, and some snow on the ground as light amounts fell off and on much of the day.  If this was January and not March it would a very bad January day.  Where is global warming when you need it?

So not a day when one of my cows should calve.  But in the morning Red's udder was larger.  She was getting closer to calving.  So I checked on her and the other cows many times today.  After 5 pm it looked like Red could calve within a few hours.

Yesterday I put another large hay bale just outside the corral.  That way, when not eating, the cattle could find shelter in the corral and loafing shed.  And they did.

After 5 pm Red finished eating some hay and appeared to be looking for the right spot to lay down and possibly calve.  The loafing shed was full of cattle.  I decided to put Red in the corral south of the barn to be with the other calves and Sugar and her calf and Red could have a better place to calve.  And I wouldn't worry about Red going out into the pasture with no wind break to have a calf under a tree all alone.  Red didn't want me around or to herd her, so it took some herding, and going around and around in the corral and out of the corral, in the strong wind to convince Red to go into the south corral.

Over an hour later Red was mooing.  She wanted to lay down and calve and the other calves were all interested in Red and wanted to sniff her and check her out.  It was a pain.  I tried to herd the calves away from Red and then Red would also get up and then move around.  After some time I got Red to the east end of the corral and kept the calves on the west end.

By the time Donna arrived Red was just starting to calve as the calf's front hooves were just starting to come out.  We waited south of the barn and out of the wind while Red calved.  Not slow and not fast. The calf's body was out except for her back legs when I walked over to help get the rest of the calf out as there was no waiting for the calf to freeze.  But Red stood up when I approached and the calf all came out.

Donna has lent me large old towels and I used one to try to move the calf over and under the roofed area west of the barn.   Years ago I had built a wall on the north side and this wall and the barn blocked the wind.

The calf was wet and slimy.  And it was a big calf and I'm getting old.  I struggled in the wind and cold to lift and carry the calf as it would slip out of my arms.  It took three or four attempts before I got the calf over to the roofed area.  Just before Red had her calf I had brought a straw bale to this area and spread it apart so the calf and Red would have a soft and warm bed to lay on.  While Donna used the towels to dry the calf off I got another straw bale from the top of the barn.  Red was still checking out the fluid where the calf had been born.  Then I herded Red over to be with her calf.

While Red had been in delivery I had brought over three corral panels.  I placed these panels around the roofed area.  This was to keep Red in, but mainly to keep the other calves out.  The newborn calf needed no interruptions when she learned to stand and then how to get milk from Red's udder.

Standing didn't take too long for the calf.  Figuring out how to get milk was harder.  Red was antsy with Donna and I nearby, and the other calves that were standing and looking just on the other side of the corral panels at Red and her calf.  The newborn calf was checking the barn wall and the roof's wall for milk.  And sometimes the front part of Red. I tried to move the calf back to Red's udder but Red would move and back up.  So Donna and I stood back and waited and watched the calf.  Around and around and I was getting impatient it was taking long for the calf to drink.  Even the few times the calf was near the udder it would search high and not low for a nipple and fail.  Finally when it was near the udder I moved in and tried to move the calf's head down to a nipple.  Before the calf could get a nipple in its mouth Red moved and kind of kicked her leg to get the calf away.

*argh!*

Donna and I stood back then.  The next time the calf was able to get a nipple and briefly suck before Red moved again.  The calf was figuring it out; Donna and I were cold; and us leaving allowed Red to stand and not move whereby the calf could finally drink.

I have checked several times since then.  One time Red was laying and the calf standing near Red.  The last time I checked over an hour ago Red was standing and the calf was drinking and drinking.  I'll check once more before going to bed but I think they are on track.  The calf has drunk milk and both have a covered place out of the wind and a large pile of straw to lay on.

This is why I don't have my cows have their calves in January.

Thankfully Red had her calf before it got dark.  Otherwise the outcome would have been worse.

Just before dark I got a few photos of the calf.  Red is a red Angus cow. Her calf - a heifer - is all black.  Before Toby became the dad, Red's calves always were all red.

More field fence added

Today I finished adding field fence to the fence rebuild I did last year between the hayfield and south pasture.  Even though I had put 11 strands of barb wire on that fence rebuild last Summer I noticed that Mama cow was still able to get her head through the fence.  Last year I had added field fence to two-thirds of that fence rebuild.  I didn't get the entire add of field fence done last year due to my injury last Fall.  So yesterday and today I got more field fence and finished adding it to that fence.  So another of last year's jobs finally done.

I took off the fence that short section of wire fence.  I put that piece of smaller wire section onto the fence next to the hayshed, on the short section that goes from the hayshed to the nearby gate.  This smaller section of fencing is too small for a cat or dog to go through, unlike some traditional field fence that has larger sections since that fence is for cattle. Over time I plan to get more of this smaller section of fencing and put it on the fencing and gate between me and Curtis.  That way it will stop cats and dogs from going through my fence and gate in that area to get to my hayshed.  It will also stop Daisy from going over to Curtis's place to catch the mice there.  But Curtis already got mouse traps and trapped mice this Winter when Daisy was kept inside my house while he was recovering from his eye injury.

Calf 1 - Sugar's

The first day I could have a calf born and this afternoon one was born to Sugar.  A beautiful looking little male calf.  Kind of a surprise.  While it is the first possible day for the cows to have a calf, yesterday when I looked at the cows I didn't think one would have a calf born today.  I figured Sugar, Red and #60 looked to be at least a few more days out.

Last year Sugar had her placenta detach prematurely and the calf died.  So I am happy Sugar is back to normal when having calves.

I planned on putting a large hay bale out later in the afternoon so I had kept the cattle in the corral after feeding them in the morning.  So Sugar gave birth mixed in with everyone.  How I realized something had happened was that I had heard for an hour or so a cow occasionally mooing in the corral.  Finally I went to see what was going on and found a recently born calf.

Sugar was mooing at the other cattle to keep a distance from her and her calf.  The calf was walking and seemed to be looking for milk.  The calf was looking at the front part of Sugar or else looking at other cows nearby.  I opened the loading corral gate and put Sugar and her calf in there so they could be alone.  Later when I put the large hay bale out I let all the other cattle out to eat it.  I put some other hay in the corral and closed the corral gate and will keep Sugar and her calf in the corral for a day.

Donna came over to see the calf and help me band and ear tag the calf.  By now the calf was standing next to Sugar but not trying to search for milk.  Earlier I thought I had seen a little white on the calf's mouth, and Donna saw that one of Sugar's nipples was smaller than the other nipples.  So we think the calf had drunk some milk already.  The calf would move around and occasionally try to hop so it did have energy like it had drunk milk earlier.

So... I'm off to a start.  The bad news is the weather forecast for this weekend and next week.  A strong artic cold front is predicted to come on Friday.  Friday and Saturday it supposed to snow and be windy and cold.  The high temperature predicted this coming Saturday is only 18 degrees.  Our normal high temperatures these days is in the low 40s.  Possible record low temperatures.   Not a good time to have calves being born.   Every year it seems as if something is a hassle when calving.  I hope this weekend none of the cows have a calf.

21 second video of the calf and Sugar:  https://youtu.be/fGeR_PhuRy0