Culling : to select from a group

The summer is drawing to a close, much as anyone here hates to admit it.  And with the end of summer begins one huge process...culling the herd. Thankfully, in families, we don't often look at the children and think,"Okay, which of you has to go?"...well, maybe sometimes...However, when we look at it from the farming standpoint, we are looking at (brutal honesty) finances and food.  What can we afford over winter, and what do we need to survive.
Occasionally there's the animal that has a personality we just can't part with (check out Intellectual Agrarian about Chickens), but on the general whole, we are pretty balanced in deciding who will stay and who will go.
To make the fun even fun-er, there's also the task of finding another home for the ones we can't bring ourselves to eat, or finding a butcher for the ones we can't wait to eat.
Did you know that poultry processors don't usually process waterfowl?  This means, if you go duck hunting...first find a butcher to take your dead ducks to, or do it yourself.
The Wife had purchased the ducks in hopes for duck eggs for the children allergic to chicken eggs...and it just makes sense that out of the five ducks she purchased from the local farm store-only one of them is female, and refuses to lay an egg with four males constantly at her side. Really, it's okay because we will eat duck.  The Farmer's Daughter, however, isn't going to be around for butchering.  Which leaves the butchering to the HausFrau and DIY Farmer's Daughters. You aren't missing it, they aren't jumping for joy.
Looking at the large animal livestock...culling is always harder.  First there is more than a dozen weeks involved in raising them. Secondly, there is the shear size of the animal.  We have goats and cow that have big brown knowing eyes.  We have a hard time looking into those eyes and thinking that those will be the tacos of tomorrow.  Often we just re-home in exchange for goods or services.  And, it's easy to say, "Let's butcher a six pound bird." Much harder to say, "Let's butcher a 300lb cow."
Regardless of how it happens, this season of culling has to happen.  Three acres simply cannot sustain a large livestock community.
And so, we begin the process of culling the herd.

Easy to be Distracted

It is the season that Dear Farmer and Family can be all too distracted.
There's chickens to be housed and cared for, buildings to build, the garden to plan and plant, goats hooves need to be trimmed, calf needs brushed, house needs little tweeks here and there, people to visit with, unending chores, fences to build, tractors to fix and clean, barns to clean, yard to cut....the list goes on and on....
With such a list, it's hard to "Stay On Task!"  {Perhaps that will be our theme this year...hmmmm....}
Priority given to things that must be done IMMEDIATELY!, like housing the little chicks.  And our missing 200...they came in yesterday...all 300 of them.  Someone at the chickery is having a good laugh, we think. The littlest chicks cannot fend for themselves, depending on us for their every need...
What else on the farm ranks in that same class? The smallest children.  Okay, both go on the highest priority.
Next on the list probably comes the rest of the animals, and medium size children.
And so on, and so forth...
But the list becomes hazy when the sun is shining and the birds are singing...and all Dear Farmer really wants to do is walk among the cows.  Sit in the shade and admire the beauty of creation.  Watch the children play Frisbee on a warm summer night.  These are both the reasons to keep plugging on through the work of today...and reasons to stay on task tomorrow.
Distractions can be the making of the memory...or the downfall of organization...
And so...we attempt to "Stay On Task!"
However, if you come to visit us, we'll happily be distracted!!!

This Farm has Princesses

The Bucket, the middle-younger Farmer's Daughter, loves to DO just about anything...as long as it works into the current play...
"Mama, you be the Princess Mama, and I am the Princess Mermaid.  What are we doing Mama?"
Usually the Princess Mermaid's Mama responds, "Unloading the dishwasher." After that job, there's plenty more!  Anything can be done singing and laughing as long as we are Princess Mama and Princess Mermaid.
Chicken Dinner, the youngest-younger Farmer's Daughter, tags along with the Bucket.  She tries desperately to be a princess, but past looking cute is yet mastering anything else. Apparently her primary job in the house is to "seek and destroy".
The Bucket tries to wrangle and teach, but Chicken Dinner is young enough to not care about her sister's direction and will march off in her own tornado.
Over-seeing the entirety of the Princess Population is the Oldest of the Youngest Farmer's Daughters...Me-Oh-My!  She is the one that has to be the boss over everything, even if she doesn't know what's going on...she is the oldest of them!  And having the three bigger Farmer's Daughters always bossing Me-Oh-My! around, she knows how it should be done:

"No, no, Bucket, Princesses do it this way!"
"No, no, 'Ninner Dinner!!! Don't Touch that!!!"
"NOOOO!  We will play this or NOTHING!"

Me-Oh-My! Can be ruthless...


Before I had three Younger Farmer's Daughters, I had no idea Princesses could herd goats, use chickens as confetti that they throw to imaginary admirers, or dance through cow-pies in high-heeled play shoes.  I never foresaw a princess dress riding on a tractor, or a tiara-clad little girl dunking chick-heads.
All of this must prove that Princesses really can be everywhere, and do everything. Even farming.

Late-Night Hay Feeding

Dear Farmer was all in a tizzy...rain was coming!
 Lots of rain, over a relatively short time, makes the fields very sloppy for the tractor.
Sloppy for the Farmer.
Sloppy for the feeding process.
Dear Farmer HAD to get fifteen very large square bales out into the fields before the rain came and he would not be able to traverse the tractor-path due to rain.
Hooking up to the hay-forks and loading a helper(WhizBang!Farmer's Daughter) onto the tractor, out they went....two bales at a time...this means they would need to make ten trips to get the cows the needed fourteen bales of hay and three new-to-us feeders into the fields.
They started the process at four-thirty in the afternoon. Tractors don't move very fast.  The process of just picking up two bales can be time consuming.
By five the rain started coming. Little drops can feel really big when you're in an open cab riding in the open fields.
By five-thirty the temperatures started dropping. The two made a quick dash inside for winter coats and gear.  They were feeling the cold chill quick!
By six in the evening the wind kicked up. They were on trip six and just hoping to get in before...
By six-fifteen it was pretty dark.
By six-thirty it was dark and the family was sitting down to dinner...feeling a little bad that we were eating grilled pork chops(Dear Farmer's favorite meal) and he was still on a tractor working. DONE!  Now they just had to park the tractor back down at the machine shed and walk back home in the cold, dark, rain.
Dear Farmer and the WhizBang!Farmer's Daughter sat down to dinner.  We had the food warm, the woodstove hot, and the fellowship lively.
Dear Farmer won't be doing that one again soon.  He can sit back and enjoy the rain...

Waiting for the Rain

Every day, without fail, Dear Farmer is checking the weather. Using his instinct as a farmer, his skills as an untrained meteorological professional, and the ache in his sinus cavity: he interprets the various websites that predict weather, reads the forecast in the farmer's almanac, and watches the animals.

The old-saying is true...cows will lay down when it's going to rain.
The cows feel the change in the pressure system, and when it gets too heavy, they lay down(probably because of the throbbing headache...have you seen the size of a cows sinus cavity?).  So usually we see the cows lay down, and then they get up-move to high ground, and the rain starts.

The goats will smell the rain coming and run inside the barn.  Goats hate to get wet.

Our farm dogs will beg to come inside.  They are wimps when it comes to rain.  One of our dogs will hide in the hallway...the sound of the rain on the metal roof scares her.

Dear Farmer hasn't started to ache in a joint or "feel it in his bones"...but he does get it right more often than the weatherman.

Dear Farmer is used to this phone call...but not this ending.

"The cows are out!"
If I had a dollar for every time Dear Farmer got that phone call...I'd have thousands of dollars! And rain, snow, or shine.  During hay, startled awake, or driving...Dear Farmer drops everything and goes to call the "ladies" back to the fields of safety.
"The cows are out!"
At 10 pm when he just falls asleep.  At 4 in the morning.  While we're on a date.  When we're sitting down to dinner.
"The cows are out!"
Absolutely the worst time to hear that is when we're out of town....which is what happened this weekend.

Dear Farmer and the Wife attended the MOSES Conference.  It's the largest midwest organics conference, and the place where Dear Farmer isn't alone.  ALL the farmers have the same lifestyle.  ALL the farmers are in the same boat, doing the same paperwork, and needing some "atta-boy"-time.  This conference is that refreshment for all those farmers.  And the Wife?  Really, she was just along for the ride.  She went to the conference, heard the speakers, and came out patting Dear Farmer on the back("Look, Dear, you're not alone.").
After a wonderful weekend, on the trek home, we got the phone call.
"Pop! The cows are out!"
sigh.
(then the rest..)"Don't worry, Pop.  We got them back in ourselves.  Drive Safe!"

Wow!  What a blessing to have a family that knows how to do what you do!  A family that can pitch-hit without you, and appreciates you all the more.
Makes you feel like you did things well...makes Dear Farmer feel a tingly and happy inside.

#MOSES2016

So you want to be a farmer? The Reality of Being Organic and Sustainable

"Opportunity is missed by most people because it comes dressed in overalls and looks like work."
-Thomas Edison

If you thought that recycling made you sustainable and organic meant that you didn't use deodorant, then we're a shocker for you.  We take that to a whole new level!!!(Yes, we do use odor protection.)
Sustainable means we put up enough hay in the summer to feed the herd in the winter, and we're planning on growing the grass again next year. So we mow it when it goes to seed-head.  It's not a nice lawn look all year.  Sometimes during the summer it may look quite shaggy-depending on rainfall.
It means when there's an apple tree in the field, we pick it and sauce it so we have food in the winter. We don't complain the apples are the size of your thumb. Sometimes sustainability can take on the same look as common-sense...a chicken gets used four different ways. First as a vet for the cows as it cleans the pasture, next as an egg layer, third as a stew bird for dinner, and lastly as chicken broth preserved for later. We use the sun and air we breathe to dry our clothes, for light during the day and that "fresh air" smell on our sheets.
Everything that's sustainable is hard work, there's no skating by.  Burning wood for heat means cutting the wood, splitting the wood, and stacking the wood-sometimes in the coldest day of the winter.
But it's so worth it!
Organic means we don't use anything God didn't create for fertilizer, animals, and food.  We use our own animals to fertilize the pastures, then give them a dose of watered down compost for good measure.  We don't breed animals to have the biggest body-parts for show or production, we take them as God made them and use them right. That's why our goats have horns, cats have claws, and chickens have bone and skin!  We let the animals eat the grass, the apples, the leaves, the herbs-and we don't peel back an ear of corn for them.  This is the way God meant it to be.
Before you think this is all daisies and roses, can I be quite frank?  Because of this life we live...there are things you may want to consider...wear mud boots(real ones, not fashionable ones) to get to the door. There's chicken poop everywhere.  Why? They have wings, they fly any where they want to.  That means to the house, not just in the barnyard.
There's a goat who will greet you at the car door, and will gladly display for you how she can urinate on your foot and poop all the way to the front door of the house.
The cats like to leave "gifts" everywhere.  Dead mice, voles, ground squirrels, chipmunks...
Be prepared for dirt.  The windows are open in the house and it coats the furniture...really, I dusted it off six times today from the dark wood piano!  The dirt covers feet, shoes, clothes, and gets under nails.  It sticks to the cobwebs created overnight, and onto the faucets where children were washing it off.  It doesn't matter how we attempt to get rid of it, it comes back. A magazine cover will never show the reality of farm life dirt.
The mess. There's a plethora of misc. tools, equipment, toys, and vehicles that don't run. The reality is, we're busy staying alive, there'll be a time to make it all clean(when the dumpster is here), but right now isn't that time.  So, if you're OCD(which I find I am) take a deep breathe and close your eyes as you walk past it. The mess won't change the taste of dinner, and it also won't make the photo shoot for the magazine cover(thankfully).  So just move on. Lastly, prepare yourself for a new brand of sweat.  I promise, we do use odor protection, but it doesn't help the amount of sweat we produce.  It doesn't matter what time of year it is, there's hard physical work we're doing.  Whether it's under the hot sun or bundled in the dead of winter-people around here are sweating!  No need for aerobics class, we pitchfork hay around for hours. Snow-shoeing and cross country skiing are means for checking the fence lines.  Walking miles is a form of transportation, not relaxation. And when you see people standing around this kitchen with dripping hair or frozen hair and wet shirts and socks, covered head to toe in dirt and poop-laughing about the day they just had...know that they've accomplished the "Organic" label that went on that product in the store. AND LIFE IS GOOD!

To Be Industrious

Farming and the character trait of Industriousness go hand in hand.  Did you know that?
The Wife had first discovered this during childhood while talking with her Grandma the Amazing Farm Wife. When Grandma, while hanging laundry on the line, said,"A gardener doesn't go hungry.  It's hard work, but it feeds the family when others might go without." She had said this to The Wife when she lived in town.  Her garden consumed the entire side of the corner lot the house sat on, and it also shared the space with the walkway from the ally and the clothesline.  Looking back, it was a Norman Rockwell moment, but at the time, it was just barely appreciated.  One simple sentence and it planted the seed of Industriousness in The Wife for the rest of her life.

Living on the farm now we have no choice but to be industrious at times...the cows got out and there was no gate to block the road, we had to figure out how to make three people seem like a very large deterrence at the road side...things like this happen often enough to make you prepared at a moment's notice.
Then there's times that we choose to be industrious...to heat with wood, to milk a goat, to make soap, or to boil down bones for broth.
We see our children taking industriousness to the next level...knitting hats, gloves, dishcloths, crocheting blankets, stuffed animals, and slippers, making gifts with wood and nails, and training goats to pack-goat so they don't have to carry the heavy loads.

Recently we spent time with our Uncle Intelligentsia and his wife, Aunt Intelligentsia.  It was fantastic to hear Aunt Intelligentsia tell us of her process to insure the city where they live in be educated and funded for the community garden project.  She has had to be Industrious to see healthy lives restored even in the city.

Dear Farmer looks at Industriousness as a part of sustainable agriculture.  If there is no character of Industriousness in a farmer, there won't be a sustainable farm.  The two go hand in hand.
It's not easy, not always fun, sometimes barely appreciated...but it will change lives for generations.

The Attack of the Sludge Monster!

The Pied Piper isn't the only one who has been battling the "SLUDGE MONSTER" (yes, the sludge has grown)...now it's Dear Farmer's turn.  Here's the story:
So Dear Farmer goes out to do chores and hears the cows bellerin' a storm.  Not really thinking too much of it, and writing off most of the noise to "them hormonal females" he feeds hay and feeds chickens, waters chickens, pets the dogs and trudges through the barnyard to turn off the hydrants for the stock-tanks.  There, near the stock tank, was a yearling bull-calf, stuck in the sludge.  Now, Dear Farmer was walking out to the stuck bull-calf when he realized two things.  One: The cows are all bellerin' looking right at him from on top the hill.  And two: Dear Farmer was sinking as he was walking, getting stuck in the sludge...the sludge was eating him!
Dear Farmer had heard of the Pied Piper and Wife's experience in the sludge, but had written it off to "that boy!".  Dear Farmer didn't realize that there was a real problem going on, the sludge had grown into a full Monster!!!  The river of sludge now encompassed the entire back of the barnyard, through the gate leading to the pasture and around the stock-tank.
The cows, however, realized full well that the low-ground where the stock-tank is wasn't safe.  Though I am sure they lectured that bull-calf, he thought he knew better, and they all watched the bull-calf getting stuck and stuck-er.  All the bellerin' was the cows just being mothers and telling that bull-calf, "You wouldn't be in this mess if you had listened to me!" and then the bellerin' was to Dear Farmer warning him of the danger.
Dear Farmer was stuck pretty well in that sludge, and pretty coated while he dislodged the bull-calf(who was very grateful he was getting saved). As he maneuvered out of the sludge he had plenty of time to look up at those cows on higher ground.  Dear Farmer formulated a plan.  If anyone is going to survive this crazy winter of non-frozen ground, drastic measures were going to be taken....Dear Farmer exited the barnyard and returned...armed with a chainsaw and wire cutters.  He walked the high ground right in the midst of those cows and fired up the chainsaw.  Then he cut away his beautiful oak fence that separated the barnyard from the pasture.  The cows were so happy to not have to stay in the barnyard anymore and happily trotted out the high ground to the pasture.
This story is a love story...Dear Farmer will rescue the helpless from the Sludge Monster!  He loves those cows so much he'll cut away a wooden fence that had blood, sweat and tears poured into it!
This story is a cautionary tale...do not build a barn in the low-lands.  Always build on high ground.
This story is vindication...the Pied Piper and the Wife did not do anything wrong in dealing with the Sludge Monster, it is a monster that even Dear Farmer has had to do battle with.   Beware of the Attack of the Sludge Monster!!!

Cows Go Take a Hike!

Due to Dear Farmer's excellent containment fencing-we haven't had cows get out in the road(also the front of the house) in a while.  No, instead they decided last night it would be nice to take a hike...ahem...in the back 40.  So, when Dear Farmer went out to do chores in the morning...he was missing about half his herd.
The call went out in the house for "all hands on deck!" and we sprung into action.
The Hausfrau Farmer's Daughter had to watch the house...clean up breakfast, make sure the walls didn't cave in.
The WhizBang!Farmer's Daughter had to watch children...dressed, chores getting done, and making sure they all stayed safe.
The Keeper of the Flame had to do his chores and take care of the animals at home.
Everyone else just had to obey the "biggers" in charge.
The Wife got all bundled to go out and help Dear Farmer.  The cows were back...Wa-a-ay back...out past the nearest neighbors and down almost to the next township.
Thankfully Dear Farmer's voice can carry pretty well on a crisp morning.  "Come On, Cows! Let's Go! Let's Go! Let's Go!" , he shouted as he clapped. The cows heard that call eighty acres away and 'bellered response. They were on the move, the hike had to be made back home.
While Dear Farmer was calling and clapping the Wife took the farm-dog out for a "training session". The farm-dog was all excited to get to move the cattle around!  Farm-dog helps, be we usually lock her up when it's important to have the cows go where we NEED them to...because she's just not that good yet.  But this time, she did okay.  At first she was really careful and listened really well to us-but then she got cocky and tuned us out.
 All-in-all the hike home went well....the cows are back in the pasture, the house is still standing, the chores were done, the animals were cared for.  Just the beginning of the day....

Dear Farmer Fights for Life

The Wife got called out to the hay barn early this morning by Dear Farmer, he had a calf down.  He simply said, "We've got to TRY!"
The Wife has learned to grow some thick skin-especially here on the farm.  She assessed the situation: a calf, alone, down in mud(because they always go to the worst location, never the best), having seizures.  There was truly no way to fix this.
However, Dear Farmer is in the business of Life.  Seems strange, as he raises cattle for your table, but he's genuinely in the business of raising, not killing...and for sure not letting "the least of these" die alone in the mud.
It took two hours.  The Wife and Dear Farmer setting up bedding and pen, hauling the calf(they weigh a lot!) from behind the barn in muck up to our knees to inside the barn-protected from the weather.  Then we cleaned the mud off the calf and warmed organic buttermilk and creame to spoon feed her.
The background of the story is, this calf had a mother who loved her and cared for her, but somehow the mother broke her foot and had to be sent to butcher.  The calf had done pretty well after that, while the herd was on grass, but since moving to the hay barn had set herself apart from the herd. Dear Farmer was watching her slip away...he was hoping it wouldn't get to this point.  He wanted her to THRIVE!  But it doesn't appear she will.
For now, she is comfortable and loved on.  Resting on a clean bed of hay in a warm barn.  Chickens happily laying on top of her and around her.  The dog coming in and licking her nose periodically.  The children spoon feeding her and petting her.
This is the hard part of organic farming: letting nature do it's thing and trying to have little involvement.  But when it comes to valuing every life-Dear Farmer is at the top of the list!  No matter how difficult, messy, or long...nothing gets left alone or behind.

And so we bid farewell to #241...

There was a beginning to this blog...it was the result of telling a friend of Dear Farmer's encounters with one specific cow...#241.  If you look back, that was the first story we shared.
#241 was a mean and nasty cow.  She was always ready to run down Dear Farmer, with no rhyme or reason.  With a disposition so negative, bad feet and no back teeth Dear Farmer had her on the butcher-line several times.  Each time she was to "go" she'd have a calf, and so she would need to stay for the survival of the calf.  Dear Farmer didn't mind too much because she was an excellent mother and she gave wonderful calves...well, he wouldn't mind initially...and then he'd be running back to his tractor with an angry cow chasing him again!  The two of them did this dance for four years.
This past summer #241 had a name change, we called her "Ugly".  She began to loose weight and turned to a mess of bones and skin hanging.  She was not looking good, really bad advertising for an organic farm. So Dear Farmer moved her to the barn and tried many remedies for her, none seemed to help.  Earlier this week Dear Farmer went down to do chores, and "Ugly" was laying on the ground near the feeders, dead.
There wasn't rejoicing.  Dear Farmer is a little disappointed, he would have really liked to have had the upper-hand and eaten her...but not this foe.  We all gave a sigh of relief and a nod of the head.  Acknowledging the passing of the enemy who gave us so many great stories...farewell to #241.

The Feeding Frenzy

Dear Farmer has a feeding frenzy going on down at the barn, the cows are coming up for hay.  There's a hundred head coming at the hay bales and they are HUNGRY!
With the hay feeders set up at the barn and the water-tanks winterized, he's feeling pretty ready to endure another northern winter.
Dear Farmer pokes around while the herd jogs into positions, when he looks: the cows are butting eachother for primier positions at the hay, calves shoved into the feeders by the mob, and hooves sticking up in the air(cows were piling up on one another).  There was no discontent sounds, just happy-munching and snorting.  The winter feeding frenzy is in full swing! And Dear Farmer smiles, it is all good.

Winterizing Water

Dear Farmer has been preparing for winter.  It seems it will come without our opinion on when or how much...So, Dear Farmer has placed the mobile coop in it's winter location(it can't move through snow) and placed hay bales around it so the cold wind doesn't blow so much through the floor.  And he's set up feeders for the hay to be dropped in, so it stays off the ground and snow.  Now he's making level ground for the water-tanks to sit on, installing heat-tape on hoses and heaters in tanks, so in the freezing temperatures, all the animals have water. The cows will lay out in the field, nibble on hay and lick snow, but they really enjoy a long drink of water!  The chickens will cuddle in the coop and peck the scratch and water nipples.  The goats keep us entertained with their antics and the children prefer to not have to bring them cups of water when they look thirsty. All the creatures need water all year long.
Have you ever thought to winterize your water?  Many people live in houses where pipes don't freeze in the super-cold northern winters.  But the animals don't have that luxury.  So, Dear Farmer is caring for them, doing what they cannot, and spending a week leveling ground and insulating water systems.  Farmers don't just twidle their thumbs and look at the sky when the weather turns cold.  There's still bunches of work to do.  Like figuring out how to get a drink of water to an animal in the middle of a freezing cold winter.

Dear Farmer counts his chicks before they've hatched!

Dear Farmer just ordered chickens to follow the cows (being the cow-vets) in the mobile chicken coop for next year!  It's a very exciting day!!!  First he got to make someone at the hatchery very excited when he placed an order for 240chicks to come in this year (next year he'll order the remain 160 chicks we need)! Then he got to tell the whole family that the chicks were coming, and what kind they were, and why he chose them.  It's a beautiful thing to have an absolutely silent table of twelve people hang on your every word...and Dear Farmer loves to tell them all the details when they're listening:
He ordered Barred Rock Chickens because they have a nice temperment and are good egg layers, and later they make good stew birds.  They lay well for about four years, they have brown eggs, but the chickens don't eat ticks.
He ordered Black Australorps because they are so docile, good egg layers, they are heat-tolerant(which makes them good for summer laying) and they do eat ticks.
And he ordered a newer breed, the Madisons. They are mix between two other breeds and are supposed to be good layers and foragers, especially bred for living in the cooler weather of the north.
He ordered these three different breeds also be cause they are so diverse in color, which makes it so pretty to look at!
Every so often we get a "broody hen", which means she just wants to sit on her eggs and takes great care of them, so they will hatch. This makes collecting eggs from her a little more intimidating...she'll peck your hand, and sometimes "bite" you...but that's the exception, not the norm.
Dear Farmer's going to be busy this winter, caring for all those chicks, but he's so excited about having a great flock next year, it makes all the work worth it!

Tagged Calves and Castrated Bull-Calves, and nobody got hurt!

Yesterday was a five hour adrenaline rush!  After a week of fencing containment paddocks and wiring new electric lines on those fences, as well as setting up gates and panels---we were ready for pushing the entire herd through the squeeze shoot and dispersing them into the winter paddocks.  It was a grueling process.
Dear Farmer's job is to look over every bovine that comes in the shoot.  Are they healthy? Do they need a tag in the ear? Male or female? Castrate if needed. Dear Farmer shouts out the number of the animal and color tag to the Wife, who writes down everything Dear Farmer observed on that animal and the tag.  The tags are color organized.  Yellow tags mean: organic female, Blue tags mean: organic male, and White tags mean: non-organic breeding stock.
The Wife's other job is to pray for safety for Dear Farmer as he stands behind a bull and castrates.  It can get hairy(no pun intended).  Here we don't use knives for castration, so there's no shots, no knock-out drugs, and no second chances.  We use a Calbrate Bander, the most amazing device known to farmers and well worth the money spent!!!  It's a thousand times more humane as well!
And we castrate while the animals are on green grass, so there's no fear of infection because there's no messes!
The Farmer's Daughter runs the herd through the containment in into the shoot.  She had quite a time getting those little calves to do what she wanted.  But she was patient and used her knowledge of "energy" well. "Energy" isn't a new-age concept.  It's the force of your emotions and the positioning of your body that drives and animal to do what you want.  Sheep herders use "energy" when training their dogs.
Along with the Housefrau Farmer's Daughter keeping all the little people out of the way, and the Whiz Bang!Farmer's Daughter running back and forth from the Wife to the house for miscellaneous supplies-we had four other farmhands helping out.  Including the VeggieMan, the ChickenGuys, our Model Friend and the HerbGuru. They aren't usually working the cattle with us, but they did a great job filling the gaps.
In the past we have had Dear Farmer run over and stepped on, Dear Farmer kicked, Dear Farmer's Daughter kicked, people thrown, panels and gates beaten by angry cows, people fleeing over fences, and paperwork pooped on.  This year we had none of it! God heard the prayers of the Wife!!!
There's quite an adrenaline rush when working with cattle. It's such a big animal, and we are such little people!  There's people "whooping" and "whistling"!  The occasional yelling to a body to move one direction or another.  It's easy to see why cowboys do what they do, it's fun!  But at the end of the day...when the count was in...112 head of cattle...there's the largest sense of accomplishment.  It's like, no matter how bad Dear Farmer's body hurt, it was all worth it.  Everyone was safe, no one got hurt.  112 Head of cattle grazing contently in a field is a beautiful sight.
 

Feeding the Bulls

How do you make friends with a 1,600 lb. bull???  Remember the old saying, "The way to a man's heart is through his stomach."  It's true about bulls too.  Here's the story:
Dear Farmer and the Wife took the middle-five out to the pear tree and apple trees to see if there was anything to be picked.  We knew that if there was anything, it would be really high in the tree, so Dear Farmer strapped onto the front loader our "cage" for lifting people into the air via tractor.  And after we were all loaded into the "cage" he informed us that the trees that we were about to go picking on...that's where the bulls and steers have been hanging out.  Well, there were a few of us that were really glad we were in the "cage" and a couple that were a little leery about being there at all, and one that didn't care as long as he could ride in the "cage" and sing, "Higher!Higher!"
So Dear Farmer drove us all out to the fruit trees. And about as soon as we rounded the corner where we could smell the trees, there were six very large Beltie males. The males looked at us, in a "cage" on a tractor, and did not give the impression they were willing to have us join them in the pasture. They bellowed and snorted. Children who were leery about the bovine before, became nearly terrified. But Dear Farmer was anything but dissuaded from his mission. He continued on, raised the "cage" into the trees, and called out "Toss me some apples!" The Wife did, and Dear Farmer called the bulls by name, like a mother calls to a well-behaved child.  Up lumbered a combined total of 3,000 pounds of bulls, and Dear Farmer held out an apple to each. Lapping his hands like puppies the bulls ate the apples as fast as we could toss them to Dear Farmer.  It became quite comical. The joke was that the bulls were no longer swatting flies with their tails, the tails were wagging. Picking fruit became the secondary activity, feeding the bulls and steers the primary activity. We had to leave. The children were singing "good-bye"s to the bulls and steers, and we went home...Dear Farmer feeling very good about being friends with the biggest bulls on the block.

We live for the emergencies!

The Wives were talking and laughing about all the "emergencies" they have (respectively) had on farms this year.  The laughing was a sign that all the "emergencies" turned out well. In a sense you live from one "emergency" to the next. The down-time is just getting yourself prepared for the next "emergency"...and you anticipate it will be bigger than the last, otherwise you wonder if it was an "emergency" at all.
This morning the Wife and Farmer's Daughter nearly passed Dear Farmer and a neighbor on the side of the road. Thinking it was a neighborly chat, the Wife slowed the vehicle down to wave, and found the two men were corralling a bull-calf that had escaped the paddock.  The Wife did what the Wife has been taught to do: slow vehicle down and put on hazards, following behind the farmers so that the bull-calf wouldn't back-track.  The Farmer's Daughter jumped out of the vehicle and was the presence on the opposite side of the road, and the neighbor's wife ran around opening and closing gates as needed.  It was a team effort, and the bull-calf was back inside the pen all safe.  Dear Farmer assured the neighbor this was nothing, "I had all the steers and bulls out the other night at my place.  You should come over for coffee!"(See Country Hospitality Examples C & B)  The neighbor dropped by some cheese curds as a thank you...they were amazing!
Usually, in farming, what is an "emergency" to one isn't to another...there's nothing new to farmers.  We're doing the same thing that was done at the beginning of time:  raising animals, being stewards of the earth God created, and training the next generation to do the same.
It does seem at little odd, however, that this breed of person...farmers...who seem so dull and slow...they live for the excitement, the thrill, the "emergency"!

We hear the cows!

We had a call while we were on vacation.  The voicemail message went like this: "We hear the cows!  We think they are in the field next door!"
Well...they weren't in the field next door to the person who had left the message....on a clear and crisp night in the country, sounds carry REALLY well.
This absence of light and noise isn't something you get outside when you are in town. Some nights its so dark you really cant see your hand in front of your face. Dear Farmer has actually walked into cows in the dark! When our enlarged family is at the Great Gathering at Photo-star Uncle's Celestial Acres we get the reminder "Bring your flashlights!"  There's no outdoor lights... you can really enjoy the stars, the children run around with glow wands so we can keep track of them, and the brilliance of the campfire light is awe-inspiring.
On a cool crisp night sound carries. We hear the coyotes running in the woods.  We have thought they were right next door, because we could hear them so well, but they were really a mile away.  There's a train that runs on tracks about five miles from our house, we can hear it at 10pm, 1am, 4am, and 6am.
So be careful if you're trying to carry on a private conversation at night in the country...you may be sharing with the whole neighborhood, and you can't even see them!

"You have cows in the road!"

The first thought when you hear a knock on your door at 9pm at night is "this isn't good".  Escalate that adrenaline when you hear the phrase, "Cows on the road!"  YIKES!  It was all hands on deck, and (thankfully) they all thought to throw clothing overtop jammies.  Being dark outside we needed one specific tool: a flashlight.  Dear Farmer raced outside to jump on the ATV (headlights!) and others were left inside to throw on footwear and find a flashlight(preferably one with batteries and working).  The Farmer's Daughter raced out, the Wife was still left looking for a flashlight, how did she find one so fast??? That girl couldn't find anything in a house to save her life(the barn's a totally different story)!  Then the Hausfrau Farmer's Daughter handed the secret weapon to the Wife...a phone.  Guess what all their new phones have on them? Flashlights!  Ah ha!  Figured out how the Farmer's Daughter found one so fast.  Out went the Wife.  The cows that were on the road were the money-making cows!  The bulls(breeding buddies) and five steers(going for market next month)...usually when boys get bored together they get in trouble, right?  I wonder which one of them had the bright idea of "car-tipping"?  It ended just how you'd expect, they got in trouble with the farmer.  As soon as they heard the ATV they looked a little sheepish at Dear Farmer and followed him back home...the rest of the night they sulked.  The adventure of stopping traffic was so much fun!