These pictures aren’t the greatest but I wanted to share all the fun things that happened last week at our county fair! Our niece bracing her lamb.Our other neice, Jill. Her sheep was being very stubborn and holding up the class but Jill handled it like a champ.Jill setting her lamb’s feet in the proper place. She ended up winning her class!Our nephew showing in the Cloverbud class. The little ones are supervised by an older helper and no ribbons are awarded. It is a great way for them to learn.The best part: my caramel apple!!It is hard to tell in this picture but this steer weighs 1800 pounds!Aren’t the sheep cute in their pajamas!We went up on Sunday night to see the animals and exhibits. Then we went back on Tuesday to watch our nieces show their sheep. They did great and I learned a lot from watching. Do you attend your county’s fair? What’s your favorite thing to see or do?
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I Wish I Was A Cow…Or A Cat!
Can you see them? What about now? This is how our two calves spend their days. They aren’t real interested in eating their corn or picking at the hay. They don’t even go wild for the lush green grass like I expected. They mostly lounge around the pasture and sleep in the sun. It is a beautiful sight, and I’m jealous. We don’t have any set plans for the weekend yet. We may head up to the beach tomorrow and get Brian’s Mom’s camper settled in to her lot for the summer. I can hardly wait to get back to the farmer’s market in Port Austin. It is the best one around by far, especially on holiday weekends. Then we have a lot of work to do around home, as usual. What are your plans for this weekend? Is the weather supposed to be nice? I’d love to hear about it. P.S. This just in…he’s trying to help me type with his back feet I guess.
Continue reading#09 is Trouble!
Things are all under control now, but we had a not so fun experience with this calf last weekend. It was time get them out of their little pen inside and out on the green pasture. We worked on the fence for 2 days to get things fixed up for them. We had calves in that fence last year and they did fine with it. All we did was add a hot wire around the top and tighten up the rolled fencing. Three sides of the pasture are rolled cattle fence and one side is the horse fence (4 strands of high tensile hot wire). We put the calves in the trailer and let them out in to the pasture. They ran around a bit and all was fine. We parked the trailer. Calf #09 promptly climbed between the strands of hot wire and went to visit the horses. I tried to corner him in the horse pasture so he went between the strands again and took a nice run around the yard. At this point we realized that neither of us had plugged the fence charger back in after our last minute repairs. Great. Anyhow, we got darn lucky
Continue readingReal Milk?
Remember all the times I’ve mentioned that we mostly just buy dairy products from the store now? Well that might change. I looked in to a cow share program a while back. I gave it some thought and then put it out of my mind. Then out of the blue the program coordinator e-mailed me again just to make sure that she had indeed responded to my first e-mail (she did). That same week a new intern started at my workplace. We got to talking and it came up that she is part of the same cow share program. Her family loves the milk and doesn’t plan on switching back. I am still a little leery about the whole thing, to be honest. The milk comes straight out of the bulk tank on the farm. It is from Certified Organic cows. It is not pasteurized. I know there is a huge debate over whether or not pasteurizing is important. I think it is safe to say that if the cows are healthy there is no life-threatening risk involved. Still, there are recommendations that pregnant women not drink unpasteurized milk. God willing, that will apply to me one day (far away).
Continue readingFarm Update
No particular topic today, just thought I’d fill in with the latest happenings in our life. I thought this blog would be more of a day to day journal of the farm but it seems like every time I sit down to type I feel the need to find a specific topic. Well, not today. I considered titling this post “The Downside of Farming” because things haven’t been the greatest around here lately. Brian found 7 baby Holstein calves for sale last week and we bought them. They were cheap and we thought it would be nice to have some calves around again since we still don’t have a place to bring our bigger cattle home to. Anyway, cheap isn’t cheap when they all die on you. Brian’s sister took 2 and we kept 5, but we only have 2 left. The other 3 basically died of scours which is a broad diagnosis in calves. I fought hard to save the last one, taking his temp and tube feeding him milk and electrolytes. Didn’t work. I am pretty sure now that they probably never received any colostrum which gives them very low chances of survival. They remaining two are doing
Continue readingOur Winter in Pictures!
I’m away from home at the Michigan Vet Conference this weekend. I want to get a post up but don’t feel like saying a lot so I thought it would be a good time to post some pictures. These are all from the last few months (some are from fall). I’ll take advantage of the hotel’s wireless and upload these now instead of fighting with my connection at home. Enjoy! Brian’s grader, our grain setup in the background. Our first batch of Seventh Generation TP, Maci apparently wanted it out of the box! The TP neatly stacked in the cabinet. We really like it BTW. Sam doesn’t help much when I’m sewing. Our Christmas tree with all western ornaments this year. It is hard to see but look close: you can see Maci’s paw about to clock Baxter upside the head, and him about to fight back. They box all the time! He crammed himself behind the printer to recuperate. And they’re friends again…usually not this cozy. This is from early fall. Brian built this calf shelter in one day. I had mixed feelings about treated lumber and decided it is better for us than replacing/rebuilding every few years. I
Continue readingBIG CATTLE (Sorry, just have to vent!)
So I got this little gem in my inbox today from a close friend: *********************************** I’m sure those of you who aren’t in the cattle business don’t understand the issues here. But to those of us who’s living depends on the cattle market, selling cattle, raising the best be ef possible… this is frustrating. As far as my family, we don’t eat at McDonald’s much (Subway is our choice of fast food), but this will keep us from ever stopping there again, even for a drink. The original message is from the Texas Cattle Feeders Association American cattle producers are very passionate about this. McDonald’s claims that there is not enough beef in the USA to support their restaurants. Well, we know that is not so. Our opinion is they are looking to save money at our expense. The sad thing of it is that the people of the USA are the ones who made McDonald’s successful in the first place, but we are not good enough to provide beef. We personally are no longer eating at McDonald’s, which I am sure does not make an impact, but if we pass this around maybe there will be an impact felt.
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