Post by Deleted on Apr 2, 2007 15:01:28 GMT -5
Well, I HAVE been busy the last few weeks! We have some new additions here at Love Acres, first and foremost being Bandit, my new milk cow. Well, she's still a heifer, but she should calve her first calf around the middle of September.
We had quite a time getting her settled in, so get a cuppa something hot and settle back, cause I'm gonna tell ya about it! LOL!
We started out yesterday morning, and the weather was beautiful. We'd had a spring blizzard a few days before that dumped at least 8" of snow (wet snow!) on us, but it was mostly gone and the roads were clear and dry. It was a two hour trip down to Philip, where Bandit lived, and we got there with no problems. Then came the loading.
Now you have to understand that even though Bandit has been around people since she was a calf, she's never had a rope or a halter on her before. This I was unaware of until yesterday! So the guy has his dog bring Bandit up to the gate and throws a lariat around her neck (Bandit, not the dog). Then the rodeo began. I had heard that cows weren't athletes like horses are, but all those people are WRONG! Cows can make every move I've ever seen a horse make, and then some. She bucked, she reared, she flopped over on her side and rolled. It took about 15 minutes for Nels to get her snubbed up to within 10 feet of the snubbing post, then he let her stand there and catch her breath. Eventually, he got the halter I'd bought on her and the leadrope attached, and then we began the pushing and pulling routine. Another 15 minutes or so and she was in the trailer. Mission accomplished! Or at least half of it, anyway. Getting her back out should be easy, right?
So we drove back home and Bandit was very good in the trailer. She was quiet and didn't move around a lot, although she pooped about a week's worth in there. The smell is incredible.
We pulled in at our house, backed the trailer down to the corral gate and went inside to have a bite to eat and rest up from the drive and the cow-pushing. Bandit needed time to settle and calm down, too. Half an hour later, we went back out to unload her. We had to get her off the trailer, through the corral gate and across part of the corral to the pen we built her next to the barn. But the trailer wasn't close enough to the corral gate. I told Rich to back it up a little farther and he said, "Nah, it's good enough - I don't want the trailer door to bump into the fence or something." Yeah, famous last words. He went in, grabbed the lead, and Bandit stepped out onto the grounds of her new home. And immediately cut right and through the too-wide gap between the trailer and the corral fence. Rich hung on gamely.
I dashed around the other side of the truck and trailer to try and herd her back toward the gate, but oh, no, she was having none of it. Rich finally got her stopped by main force and they were at a standstill. Every time I made a move toward her, she darted sideways and dragged Rich another 5 feet AWAY from the corral. By the time they were halfway to the house, I decided to call for help.
Our sweet neighbor, Joe, who's about 78 now, I think, came over with his 22 year old daughter (yes, those numbers are correct), and some more ropes. While we were waiting for them to get here, Bandit did some more thrashing around and managed to rear up and miss Rich's head with her front hooves by a matter of inches, then crashed over on her side and lay there panting. Rich promptly planted a foot on her neck to keep her from getting up, and I put another lead rope around her neck, looped through its snap like a choke collar, for some backup. And we waited. Here she is, resting in between rounds:
Joe got her up and he grabbed one rope and Rich grabbed the other, while his daughter Terri and I were pushing. Bandit went one way and surprised Rich, who lost his grip on the rope and Joe was left holding the lead attached to the halter, which slipped off three seconds later and she was free! She ran straight into the garden (luckily I have nothing planted out there yet) and into one of the compost bins. We followed her in and Joe tossed a loop over her head with his longer rope. She didn't like that, so she launched a two-footed kick right into his leg just above the knee. Yowza! I never saw a cow launch a kick like that! A horse couldn't have done any better.
After we decided Joe's leg wasn't broken, the other three of us took over. Rich got his rope back around her neck and Terri had the front of the long rope, with me behind her just in case. Rich and Terri would pull together until Bandit took a step, then they released. This was working much better than the push-pull routine. I don't know why I didn't think of it before. Oh, yeah, I remember, it was because SHE WAS ACTING LIKE A DONKEY!
Slowly but slowly, they inched her across the garden, out the garden gate and over to the corral gate. There was a bit of a commotion going through the corral gate, but we got her back in formation inside the corral, and off we went, one step at a time, to the cow pen. Now she's in there, safe and sound, like nothing ever happened.
Here she is, in her pen just after the neighbors left:
This morning I went out and found her sleeping in her hay, bless her heart. She seems to be totally content in her pen, although she's still skittish and doesn't want me to touch her yet. I've been just going out and talking to her every so often today, and she's started taking steps toward me when she sees me, and she moos at me when I leave. I'll give her a couple of days, then see if I can get the halter on her again. Today the weather was really nasty, with wind, fog, snow, and rain, so I'm not in the training mood just yet. Give me some firm footing and nice weather when water's not dripping in my eyes, and maybe I'll feel more like working with her.
We also got some new chicks last week. I've lost another of my hens, just like Persephone, just went to sleep and didn't wake up... So now I'm down to 8 hens and 2 roosters, so I got 10 more pullet chicks. They're in one side of the coop with a heat lamp on them. Here's a couple of pictures - sorry my camera doesn't do well with dim light or red light, so these are really grainy, but you get the idea.
The other day, I found one of the chicks on her back, well outside the heat range of the lamp, shivering and kicking her feet. I scooped her up, took her in the house and held her for an hour until she stopped shivering. Poor little thing, what possessed her to go take a nap that far away from the heat?? She's fully recovered now, though, and doing just fine.
The guineas have finally started laying eggs, too! Here's my first one!
I asked Rich the other day if he wanted to have guinea eggs for breakfast and he said "NO!" When I asked him why not, he said, "Because they're ugly!" The guineas, not the eggs! LOL!
We've also been busy with things like building Bandit's feeder for her inside stall in the barn, doing touch up repairs on the coop, and replacing fencing, too, but I don't have pictures of those. Well, I do have a picture of Bandit's new feeder, but it's not on Photobucket yet, and you're probably not interested in seeing a feeder, anyway! LOL!
Here are some more pictures from around the place during the last month or so.
The chickens found Rich's flower box in front of the shop and thought it was just a dandy place to take a nap:
Sunrise at Love Acres (with guineas):
Aiesha coming in for her breakfast, through all the poultry!
Here's Pippin going to work (his job is "watching for mousies in the coop"):
And the chickens early one frosty morning a couple of weeks ago:
And when I come in from working hard outside, I find this lazy couch potato:
I mean, does he look comfortable, or what?
Well, it's time for me to go back out and check my critters again, so I'll lay off posting more pictures for the time being.
See you guys soon, I hope!
~Lannie
We had quite a time getting her settled in, so get a cuppa something hot and settle back, cause I'm gonna tell ya about it! LOL!
We started out yesterday morning, and the weather was beautiful. We'd had a spring blizzard a few days before that dumped at least 8" of snow (wet snow!) on us, but it was mostly gone and the roads were clear and dry. It was a two hour trip down to Philip, where Bandit lived, and we got there with no problems. Then came the loading.
Now you have to understand that even though Bandit has been around people since she was a calf, she's never had a rope or a halter on her before. This I was unaware of until yesterday! So the guy has his dog bring Bandit up to the gate and throws a lariat around her neck (Bandit, not the dog). Then the rodeo began. I had heard that cows weren't athletes like horses are, but all those people are WRONG! Cows can make every move I've ever seen a horse make, and then some. She bucked, she reared, she flopped over on her side and rolled. It took about 15 minutes for Nels to get her snubbed up to within 10 feet of the snubbing post, then he let her stand there and catch her breath. Eventually, he got the halter I'd bought on her and the leadrope attached, and then we began the pushing and pulling routine. Another 15 minutes or so and she was in the trailer. Mission accomplished! Or at least half of it, anyway. Getting her back out should be easy, right?
So we drove back home and Bandit was very good in the trailer. She was quiet and didn't move around a lot, although she pooped about a week's worth in there. The smell is incredible.
We pulled in at our house, backed the trailer down to the corral gate and went inside to have a bite to eat and rest up from the drive and the cow-pushing. Bandit needed time to settle and calm down, too. Half an hour later, we went back out to unload her. We had to get her off the trailer, through the corral gate and across part of the corral to the pen we built her next to the barn. But the trailer wasn't close enough to the corral gate. I told Rich to back it up a little farther and he said, "Nah, it's good enough - I don't want the trailer door to bump into the fence or something." Yeah, famous last words. He went in, grabbed the lead, and Bandit stepped out onto the grounds of her new home. And immediately cut right and through the too-wide gap between the trailer and the corral fence. Rich hung on gamely.
I dashed around the other side of the truck and trailer to try and herd her back toward the gate, but oh, no, she was having none of it. Rich finally got her stopped by main force and they were at a standstill. Every time I made a move toward her, she darted sideways and dragged Rich another 5 feet AWAY from the corral. By the time they were halfway to the house, I decided to call for help.
Our sweet neighbor, Joe, who's about 78 now, I think, came over with his 22 year old daughter (yes, those numbers are correct), and some more ropes. While we were waiting for them to get here, Bandit did some more thrashing around and managed to rear up and miss Rich's head with her front hooves by a matter of inches, then crashed over on her side and lay there panting. Rich promptly planted a foot on her neck to keep her from getting up, and I put another lead rope around her neck, looped through its snap like a choke collar, for some backup. And we waited. Here she is, resting in between rounds:
Joe got her up and he grabbed one rope and Rich grabbed the other, while his daughter Terri and I were pushing. Bandit went one way and surprised Rich, who lost his grip on the rope and Joe was left holding the lead attached to the halter, which slipped off three seconds later and she was free! She ran straight into the garden (luckily I have nothing planted out there yet) and into one of the compost bins. We followed her in and Joe tossed a loop over her head with his longer rope. She didn't like that, so she launched a two-footed kick right into his leg just above the knee. Yowza! I never saw a cow launch a kick like that! A horse couldn't have done any better.
After we decided Joe's leg wasn't broken, the other three of us took over. Rich got his rope back around her neck and Terri had the front of the long rope, with me behind her just in case. Rich and Terri would pull together until Bandit took a step, then they released. This was working much better than the push-pull routine. I don't know why I didn't think of it before. Oh, yeah, I remember, it was because SHE WAS ACTING LIKE A DONKEY!
Slowly but slowly, they inched her across the garden, out the garden gate and over to the corral gate. There was a bit of a commotion going through the corral gate, but we got her back in formation inside the corral, and off we went, one step at a time, to the cow pen. Now she's in there, safe and sound, like nothing ever happened.
Here she is, in her pen just after the neighbors left:
This morning I went out and found her sleeping in her hay, bless her heart. She seems to be totally content in her pen, although she's still skittish and doesn't want me to touch her yet. I've been just going out and talking to her every so often today, and she's started taking steps toward me when she sees me, and she moos at me when I leave. I'll give her a couple of days, then see if I can get the halter on her again. Today the weather was really nasty, with wind, fog, snow, and rain, so I'm not in the training mood just yet. Give me some firm footing and nice weather when water's not dripping in my eyes, and maybe I'll feel more like working with her.
We also got some new chicks last week. I've lost another of my hens, just like Persephone, just went to sleep and didn't wake up... So now I'm down to 8 hens and 2 roosters, so I got 10 more pullet chicks. They're in one side of the coop with a heat lamp on them. Here's a couple of pictures - sorry my camera doesn't do well with dim light or red light, so these are really grainy, but you get the idea.
The other day, I found one of the chicks on her back, well outside the heat range of the lamp, shivering and kicking her feet. I scooped her up, took her in the house and held her for an hour until she stopped shivering. Poor little thing, what possessed her to go take a nap that far away from the heat?? She's fully recovered now, though, and doing just fine.
The guineas have finally started laying eggs, too! Here's my first one!
I asked Rich the other day if he wanted to have guinea eggs for breakfast and he said "NO!" When I asked him why not, he said, "Because they're ugly!" The guineas, not the eggs! LOL!
We've also been busy with things like building Bandit's feeder for her inside stall in the barn, doing touch up repairs on the coop, and replacing fencing, too, but I don't have pictures of those. Well, I do have a picture of Bandit's new feeder, but it's not on Photobucket yet, and you're probably not interested in seeing a feeder, anyway! LOL!
Here are some more pictures from around the place during the last month or so.
The chickens found Rich's flower box in front of the shop and thought it was just a dandy place to take a nap:
Sunrise at Love Acres (with guineas):
Aiesha coming in for her breakfast, through all the poultry!
Here's Pippin going to work (his job is "watching for mousies in the coop"):
And the chickens early one frosty morning a couple of weeks ago:
And when I come in from working hard outside, I find this lazy couch potato:
I mean, does he look comfortable, or what?
Well, it's time for me to go back out and check my critters again, so I'll lay off posting more pictures for the time being.
See you guys soon, I hope!
~Lannie
. good job. motivating and interesting.
