Spring and Cow Antics

Ah, yes, it looks like Spring may be on our doorstep.   March most certainly came roaring in "like a lion" lashing us with crazy winds and stormy weather.   Personally, I'm looking forward to the end of March when, as the old saying goes, it goes "out like a lamb".   I don't think I will ever get used to tornado warnings!    Just sayin'.......

 Anyway, not everything related to Spring is scary.   I picked these daffodils from the little area near our woods to cheer up our kitchen.    Just seeing their sunny faces when I enter the room makes me smile.    Each Fall I plant a few more bulbs in the same flower bed and every Spring the blooms show up.   Huh!   Imagine that!  

The bulbs I planted the first couple of years after moving here are now doubling and tripling so within a few more years we should have a bed full of yellow blooms.   You've got to love a return on your labor like that.....blooms that return year after year without any work on my part.

While the weather was nice and sunny we decided to muck out the barn.   That meant penning the two girls in the small pasture while Joel made the trips back and forth to the compost pile.   Somehow Saber and Shadow got into the pasture with Joel.  Those little scoundrels.

With each trip Joel made on the tractor he had a sweet puppy patiently waiting for his return.  These are the funniest dogs.

As soon as we had the barn cleaned out it was time to let the cows out of their confinement.   Buttercup has absolutely no problem waiting at the gate, but Baby Belle would rather not get so close to me.   Hmmmm, I'm going to have to work on that a lot more this Spring.

Buttercup really loves a good head scratching.   She moves her head around trying to communicate exactly which area of her body would like some attention next.   Who ever knew how much I'd love hanging around these animals?   Certainly not me!  If you had told me 5 years ago that I'd be playing with cows, kittens and alpacas I would have said there was no way.   And yet, here we are, having the time of our lives learning about farm critters.

 I finally had my camera inside the barn on this particular day and now you can see the manger that we built a few months ago.   It works so well and has helped me avoid walking down the slippery slope of the pasture all winter long.

 We did have one small issue, though.   See the metal gizmo in Joel's left hand?    Um, yea.   Somehow Baby Belle had that thing caught in the ring portion of her halter.   What in the world?   We finally figured out that she must have rubbed herself up against some old fencing in the long pasture leading to the front of the farm and dislodged the metal as it attached itself to her halter.  

See the ring in the photo above?   That's where the metal was attached.   Let me tell you, she gave us quite a little rodeo trying to corner her and get ahold of her halter so we could attempt to remove the metal from her.   It took a lot of effort and two sets of pliers to finally open the ring on the metal and get it removed.

I sure am glad that's taken care of as we were concerned she could have hurt herself with such a heavy duty piece of hardware attached so close to her eye.   Ah, yes, just one more small adventure in our quiet little lives.

And so I'll leave you with this parting shot of me coaxing the cows out of the pasture.   I sure do love my life here!

Still working on becoming the cow whisperer,

Bah-ha-ha-ha!

Debbie

Beef Cake the Steer

 Meet Beef Cake, our steer.   Isn't he adorable with those big brown eyes?  And oh, those eyelashes!  Beef Cake has been a short term visitor to our homestead.  When we purchased him early last summer it was with the express purpose that he would soon fill our freezer, so, even though I named him we didn't allow ourselves to develop an attachment to him.

His time on our farm had finally come to an end.  Last Thursday Joel and I went out to the barn a little before 3pm.   We wanted to allow ourselves a few hours before dark for the task at hand.  The moment had arrived to round up Beef Cake and prepare to take him to the slaughter house.   How hard could it be?  Giggle....

But first things first.   We had to figure out some logistics such as do we have the right ball on the hitch of the car to haul this particular stock trailer?   Check.  Now, to hitch and back up the trailer at just the right angle so as to block off any access of escape from the barn that Beef Cake may try to take.  Check.

Swing open the large heavy back door of the trailer against the hog panel that blocks access to the long corridor leading out to the pasture.  Check.  Hey, we don't want to have to chase a steer all over creation to get him inside the trailer.   We closed off gates as best we could to control which areas he would have access to.

That  included penning the girls inside the barn so we didn't have to contend with them running interference as we tried to push Beef Cake in the direction of the waiting trailer.    Check.   Ha!  

Sounds easy, right?   Except you weren't here when we got our boots stuck in the muck trying to get all three cows in the barn.   Then, Joel went into the pen, separated the girls from the steer and drove Beef Cake ahead of him as he shot out of the gate I was holding.  I quickly shut the girls inside the barn.   At least now everyone is separated and all we have to do it get Beef Cake into the trailer.

What you're looking at is Beef Cake....he's a little put out that the girls are in with the hay and he's stuck outside with us.   Let's take a moment to catch our breath.....Check.

Um, yea.....the grin on Joel's face is because we spent almost half an hour chasing animals around the pasture.   Why were we chasing cows, you ask?   You thought the girls were all penned in the barn???    Of course it wasn't that simple!  After rounding up the girls and isolating them inside their pen, Joel had walked out of and closed the gate he is standing next to.....the gate that keeps the cows in the barn.  

Now we thought we were ready to herd Beef Cake into the trailer.   There was one slight problem, though.   Joel forgot to latch the gate and as we were working on getting Beef Cake up to the trailer, the girls pushed their way thru the gate and escaped, creating havoc with all three cows running around the small pasture next to the barn.  Instead of just one cow needing to be herded, now we had to start all over again.

Oh, yea, the three of them loved this new game.    I had scattered the cows' favorite corn, molasses, and grain feed in the trailer and both Buttercup and Baby Belle casually waltzed right into the trailer and began munching on the feed.   The girls had no compunction about getting in the trailer whatsoever.   All the while this was going on Beef Cake was stubbornly hugging the back fence line.  Uh-uh.  No way.  He wanted absolutely nothing to do with that trailer no matter how enticing the feed inside was to him.

Ok, so we managed to secure the girls back in their pen, only this time Joel latched the gate so there would be no escaping for them.   By now Beef Cake was fully on alert.  He knew something was happening here that he didn't want to participate in.   And add to that the fact that he has had very little contact with Joel and he was not going to come into the little pasture next to the barn.  

Our idea was to lead him into the little pasture and close the gate behind him, giving him smaller and smaller areas from which to plan his escape as we pushed him closer to the trailer.  I stood in the trailer shaking a bucket with his feed in it, calling to him the whole time.   Usually he runs straight for that bucket as he greedily gobbles up the feed.  But not this time.  He kept looking at Joel and was not about to fall for our ploys.
 

Finally he walked into the small pasture and Joel was able to close the gate behind him, cutting off his escape route.   Ah-ha!    Our plan was working.   NOT.   I got tired of waiting for him to come to me and walked up to him with the bucket and shook it, willing him to smell the feed and take a few bites.  He actually ate right out of the bucket for me and I continued to walk backwards, inching ever closer to the waiting trailer.    I would get him to within 6 feet of the trailer and then he would spook and run back into the small pasture.   This happened over and over again.   And if Joel tried to sneak up to the gate Beef Cake would sense his nearness and back up into the small pasture, thwarting our plan to trap him up near the trailer.

I guess it was another 20 minutes that passed with us trying various tricks to get him into the 9'x9' area we had cordoned off behind the trailer, making it hard for him to go anywhere else but inside the trailer.   I went inside the trailer again and dumped more feed in there, hoping to entice him on his own.   There was no way we could push him in because he was so quick on his feet we had to dodge him on several occasions so as not to accidentally get bumped into.

For some odd reason, by chance Beef Cake walked right into the 9'x9' area....probably trying to get away from Joel.   Joel shut the gate behind him and walked into the tiny 9'x9' area with Beef Cake. The steer took one look at Joel and bolted right into the trailer.   Huh!   It was that simple.  Beef Cake just didn't want that "guy" to get anywhere near him.   Joel quickly latched the heavy trailer door shut and gave a victory chant.   Check.    We had successfully trailered an animal all by ourselves!

All that was left for us to do was to remove the hog panels that had served as fencing to block Beef Cake's escape and pull the trailer up to the house.   We were both really glad that we had planned ahead and corralled the steer into the trailer the night before our appointment instead of trying to accomplish that early in the morning.

It's nice that our plan worked this time.    We may have had to alter it a bit as we went along, but we got Beef Cake into the trailer alone....with no outside help.   Not like when we had to get the pigs to slaughter and it took a couple of days and 7 of us to round them up!    Holy cow, I don't ever want to have to repeat that process.

The following morning we drove down off the plateau to the slaughter house where we had an appointment to process Beef Cake.   We learned a lot about rounding up animals Thursday, what to do and what not to do.   And I have to say we were pretty pleased with ourselves as we gained some new found confidence in our ability to wrangle these animals on our own.  Life here is one giant learning curve, one that we love to experience every single day.

Beef Cake is at the slaughter house and they called to say he weighed in at 643 lbs.   Now we wait to see how much beef that translates into and will it all fit in our freezers?    Guess I had better get busy and make some more room for all the beef we're about to bring home with us next week.

Blessed indeed,
Debbie

Dogs and Cats....Cats and Dogs

We love all our farm critters.   The "inside dogs".   The "outside dogs".  The barn cats.   The cows and chickens.   Yes, we love all our animals.   But these Pyrenees puppies have stolen Joel's heart.

They greet us every time we step off our back porch.   They keep Joel company each trip he makes to the chicken coop, sitting at the gate waiting patiently for him to return from completing his bird chores.  They walk to the mailbox with me every noontime, and proclaim "A package has arrived from UPS" as the delivery man puts the parcel in a bin we keep outside our entry gate.

And whenever we have any work to perform in the barn they are always there, guarding us(you know that's a very important job for a Pyre), keeping us company, and "assisting" with shooing the cats around the barn.   When we mucked out the barn a few days ago I looked past the gate separating the cow pen from the rest of the barn and there were the puppies, lying quietly and keeping an eye on everyone and everything that was happening.

We were gifted our barn cats the month we bought the alpacas.   There was a Mama cat and her three kittens.   Mama was pretty feral, as were all the other cats at the farm where we bought our alpacas.   I've never had a cat as a pet before and so I had no expectations of what kind of relationship we would develop over time.  

Well, it wasn't long before Mama cat actually let me pet her, occasionally, as I was feeding her and her babies.    She not only tolerated my petting but started to meow her request of "more, please!".   It wasn't too long and her babies were also allowing me to stroke their soft furry backs....some were happy to receive the added attention, others not so much.   To this day, Chloe is the most stand-offish of the four cats.

How do the cats and dogs get along, you ask?    Surprisingly, really well.    When the puppies first came to the farm they would try to satisfy their curiosity about the cats by walking right up to them and attempting to sniff them.   Ha!   That was usually met with a quick swipe of a cat's paw to their nose.    The puppies soon learned their limits with each of the cats and now the four cats and two puppies have developed a healthy respect for one another.

The cats have grown bolder in their attitude toward the puppies and I've even caught them(the cats) lying on their back, taunting the puppy to move in ever closer.   And then just that suddenly, the cat will bolt up and run thru the large open weave of the wire walls separating the pens in the barn.   It's quite a dance these critters perform and they never seem to tire of playing with one another.

Except for Chloe.   She had just about had enough of the puppies on this particular day and she swiftly climbed her way up, up, up higher into the rafters of the barn.

Nope, I'm not high enough yet!

"Ah, yes.  Now that's better." she says.   And the puppies walk around below her all the while wagging their tails because they know soon enough she'll come back down and play once again.

The weather was so beautiful on this one day last week that Joel and I decided to take a walk down off the farm into the valley below.    I never tire of the view of the majestic bluffs that line the lower portion of our farm.  We feel so blessed to be stewards of this land for a few years and love our time spent with the critters running around the farm.   Come and see us sometime and we'll show you why living here makes us so happy.

Looking forward to acquiring more critters this Spring,
Debbie

We're Gonna Need a Bigger Tractor

Remember the movie Jaws?    I"m sure we're not the only family that quotes one of the best lines in that movie.....you know the line.....when the guys on the boat get a close up look at Jaws and utter....."We're gonna need a bigger boat.".   Well, that's been Joel's line here lately, except replace the word boat with the word tractor.

When you first move from the city to the country, you have absolutely no idea exactly what size equipment you might need to invest in.   Sure, we knew we needed a tractor.   But since we had no intention of sowing seed on 50 acres we surmised a sub-compact tractor would be sufficient to take care of our hobby farm needs.  

But then we had a few alpaca die......sure would have been nice to have a tractor with a backhoe (or as I fondly call it, a "digger tool") to dig their burial hole instead of using a shovel.   That phrase usually elicits hoots and howls from Joel.   And then there is the never ending supply of manure for our compost piles.   We used to shovel the poop from the alpacas out of the barn by hand and Joel schlepped it in the wheelbarrow to the compost pile.

Then we sold the alpaca and got back to our original intent.....animals that produce food we can eat.   And so now we have our sweet Jersey cows who will provide us with milk, cheese and other dairy goodies for many years to come.   After breeding, if one of the calves is a bull, he will provide us with meat.   There's just one thing, though, about cows.   They poop....a lot.....in huge piles.....seriously!    A lot more than alpaca, that's for sure.

Dairy cows need protection from the winter elements, and so we put the cows in the side of the barn where the female alpacas used to live.   Now the cows have the barn to keep the elements at bay and that works just fine, with one exception.   When it was nice weather I used to go inside the pen with the cows and walk down into their pasture to drop their morning and evening ration of hay into the hay feeder.    But when Old Man Winter arrived, it was slick walking down hill to the feeder and I really didn't relish the idea of slipping and falling on the icy, snowy incline.....littered with, you guessed it, poo.   Now that creates an image, doesn't it?

Joel came up with the idea of building a manger inside the barn attached to one of the walls where I could simply pop the hay over the top of the wall into the manger, thus eliminating the need to walk anywhere slippery.   We spent an afternoon a few months ago building and tweaking the manger and it works like a charm.   With one exception.

Now the cows hang out in the barn a lot more hours of the day.   You know what is coming next, don't you? It would stand to reason that if they hang out in the barn more, they will also poop in there more.    Aw, man.   Thus bringing me back to Joel's lament....."We're gonna need a bigger tractor.".

Yeah, that's a mess.   And we like to keep this area as clean as possible since the cows sleep in here at the far back corners of the pen.   There's no way we can muck out the barn using shovels and a wheelbarrow.   Well, we could, but it would take us hours and hours by hand.

And even when we switched to using the tractor we realized we should have a bigger tractor with a bigger bucket on the front.    As it is now, Joel makes trip after trip picking up the  contents on the floor of the pen and running it back to our newest compost pile.

I should backtrack a minute here.   See the cows watching Joel?   Well, we have learned by experience that the cows are very curious animals and when we have worked in the barn in the past, they hang out with us.   They generally get in the way, stand behind the tractor as Joel is trying to back up with a huge pile of manure-strewn straw in the bucket of the tractor and walk all over the areas we are trying to clean up.   Now I know that before we start any work in their pen, I have to round them up and drive them into a small pasture with a gate.....where they stand and watch our every move.   Funny critters!

So, back to the tractor.

Joel loves to extoll the virtues of all he could accomplish "If I had a bigger tractor..."   I just smile at him and nod my head in agreement as I visualize huge dollar signs in my head and think, "No Way!".

Even with the use of the tractor, mucking out the barn still requires some hands on work with the shovel....and that's my job.   You know, as the assistant barn mucker.   Giggle.....On this particular day, I had to shed my barn jacket as the exertion of shoveling out the corners and sides of the barn warmed me plenty.

I had to show you this pic.    When we first walked out to the barn Joel spotted two of our barn cats sitting nice and comfy, one each on the seats of his tractor and my mower.   Can you see the black and white Mama cat on the seat of the mower in the background?

Miss Chloe was quite cozy nestled on Joel's seat.....that is until he shoo-ed her away so he could use the tractor.   The cats love to sit up there where the dogs don't think to look for them.   It's been so much fun to watch the interaction of the four, wiley barn cats and the Pyrenees puppies.  

Once we are finished cleaning out the barn I walk back to the cows in the pasture and open the gate for them.   They are so funny!   They immediately head for the barn......I believe (unless you can prove otherwise) they are excited to check out their newly cleaned  pen.   First, they get a drink of freshly drawn water and then they look at their salt lick and, of course, they wander over to the manger to see if I put in some fresh hay for their treat.

The last place they check out is the fresh bed of straw where they will lay their sleepy heads at night. See what I mean?    Don't you agree they are curious and smart animals?

This coming week we have a new challenge to meet.   It will be the first time we have to round up one of the cows and get him into the stock trailer.   You see, Beef Cake, our steer, is going to the slaughter house on Friday.   But we think it may take us (ahem) a little bit of effort to coax him into the trailer, so, we plan on working on that Thursday afternoon so we are prepared to leave the farm first thing Friday morning.  

After Beef Cake is gone, I guess one good thing about us only having the two much smaller mid-mini female cows is .....you guessed it......a whole lot less poop to scoop.   See, we may not need a bigger tractor after all!

Wish us luck,
Debbie

Yes, another Puppy Post

Several of you have asked for updated pics of the puppies...so, here they are.   They are now 11 weeks old and growing like weeds.   Shadow, the black female is much larger than Saber but he is doing his best to catch up to her.   Twice a day when Joel goes down to the chicken coop he let's them out of their 10'X10' pen and they eagerly follow him everywhere.......that is, they follow him after they inspect the barn for any food the cats may have left behind.   Oh, the curiosity of puppies!  Of course we play with them several times a day in between those chicken coop trips.

The puppies follow Joel to the two large gates leading to the coop and then sit patiently while he feeds and waters the chickens.  Well, sometimes they sit patiently.

They do end up playing "Tag, You're It" with one another once they lose sight of Joel.   And the leaves piled up against the fence line make wonderful rustling noises when they run through them.   How much fun is that?

Whenever the puppies are frolicking around the farm, the alpacas walk up to the fence to keep an eye on them.  We're not sure if the alpacas are curious about them or if they are watching to make certain the little dickens stay out of trouble.

Trouble?    Me?    Never!    Shadow is a little bit independent.   Unlike her brother, she prefers to wander off when called.   But just look at that adorable face.

Saber, on the other hand, is more than eager to run right up to us when called, especially when there are treats involved.  Today they had their first lesson on walking with a leash.    Um, not something they were especially pleased about.   But they'll get the hang of it eventually.

Oh, and I almost forgot to tell you we had another mama hen hatch 3 more baby chicks.   Can you see them under the chicken on the left?  That makes 5 new chicks this summer, although one of the first chicks didn't make it.   This hen struts up and down the chicken yard clucking to her babies, as proud as could be.

Once Joel finally finished taking care of the chickens these little guys decided to greet him at the gate again.

See what I mean?   Saber is more than happy to run to Joel and receive his reward of a treat.   Not Shadow, no way.  Those leaves and twigs on the ground are much too interesting to obey such a simple command as "come".

Alright, so, eventually she did go to Joel and get her treat, too.   Then it was off to another adventure. You can see the alpacas walking behind the pups to watch where they were off to next.

What lucky puppies to have so much free space to roam.   One of their favorite places is up near my studio.   They really like to hide under the studio where it's nice and cool.   We can't always see them but we can hear them nipping at one another and then suddenly they will appear in the sunlight again, one always chasing the other.   I'm so glad we decided to get two pups as they keep one another company and have so much playing together and tumbling over one another.

This is our first experience with "outside" dogs so we feel better knowing they have each other for companionship.   AND, it keeps us from feeling guilty leaving them in their dog run and dog house instead of bringing them inside with us.    Hey, two "inside" dogs is already enough for our little house.

While I was shooting these pics today I noticed some yellow leaves on the ground.   Wouldn't you know that some of the trees are already starting to turn into Fall colors.  

Pretty soon this tree will be totally covered in brilliant red leaves.    Ah, Fall must be just around the corner.  Yippee!

Covered in puppy kisses,
Debbie

Newest Arrivals: The Puppies

Yes, today we brought home the newest members of our farm.   We're pleased to introduce you to the sweetest puppies......Saber and Shadow.  Last weekend Joel and I helped to feed the animals at Craig and Kristi's farm while they were out of town.  It was an interesting experience, to say the least.

Let me see, I believe they have 5 horses, 2 jersey cows...or is it 3?   Two of the biggest hogs I have ever seen.....they are both the size of a VW bug.   They also have 11 alpaca, 1 mule, a turkey and dozens of chickens.   We also fed 1 inside dog and 3 outside dogs including the mama of our puppies.  Oh, and yes, there were 8 puppies, too!  Whew.   And I thought we had a lot of animals to feed.

While we were there, I spent a lot more time with the puppies as I wanted to make certain of our choice before bringing them home to our farm.   You know, you really can't begin to tell the personality of a puppy until it's a little older.    And maybe I jumped too quickly on the "white puppy" bandwagon a few weeks ago when I switched from the black puppy to the white one.

On websites that describe how to choose a puppy they warned over and over again not to pick the one that is too hyper, or the one that is too shy, etc.   Wouldn't you know it, as we observed the puppies over the weekend we noticed that the white one was a little more "active"  shall we say than the black one.   What we are looking for are puppies that can calm down and have a laid back disposition.   After working with the puppies over the weekend I/we changed our mind back to the black one.  And so, today we brought home the tan male puppy Joel is attached to and his sweet black and tan sister for me.

They were a little bit shy about coming out of the pet carrier once we got them home, but soon they were both eating and drinking from their new dog bowls and playing with one another....little tails wagging the whole time.    There's just nothing like adorable puppies, is there?    They give you unconditional love and puppy kisses, all the while their tails are thump thump thumping back and forth.

We've been down to play with them several times already today and now they are tucked in their new dog house on a cozy new dog bed.   Saber is the tan one and Shadow is the black one.  Yes, we have finally decided on names.

They seemed oblivious to the alpacas and our cow, but the alpacas and cow were most certainly watching the puppies from the edge of the fence.

 And the alpacas kept screeching their "alarm" sound whenever they looked over and saw those dastardly puppies frolicking around in the grass.   Heavens, no!    Even Buttercup stood at the fence staring at the newest creatures.   Pretty soon these little puppies will be big grown up guard dogs patrolling our property line and protecting all our animals from coyotes and intruders.

As I looked over into the barn I caught the cats lazily sizing up the puppies.   It seems the puppies have created quite a stir on the farm.   

One thing is for sure, they have already captured our hearts.

In Puppy Love,

Debbie