Some more cow stories...

I have some cow pictures from the farm that we've taken over the past few weeks that I haven't posted yet... so this will be a collection of various cow pictures...

This is a recent picture of Mocha -- I still want to get one with her next to one of us to show you how big she is, but... you can see her next to that waterer...

This is a picture from last May of me "encouraging" her to go into the dairy yard -- and you can see how her size compares to the same waterer! She wasn't any larger than a medium-large dog. She has spent the last 18 months doing a lot of growing!

 

Some pictures of the "beasties" from across the road.

They tend to gather all at one trough, with only a few choosing to go to one of the other two troughs... I guess they all eventually go to one of the other two troughs until all the feed is gone. When we first started feeding them this fall, they were *very suspicious* of us, but they seem to accept us now.

Carl has learned by experience that it is good to avoid naming any of the feeder calves.... last year, the leader of the feeder calves, always first to the trough was a dairy steer:

We called him "Jersey", which I just used as a descriptive name (because he was a Jersey steer), but... this year, Carl commented on how much he enjoyed the meat at supper one evening, and he found out that it was "Jersey" - thankfully after he had already eaten!

The mama cows and this year's crop of calves are currently in the pasture that is up behind the house, so once or twice a day, we will see them up near the fence and get to enjoy the antics of the young ones.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about a new calf being born and Jimmy catching it, measuring its birth weight, banding, and putting in an ear tag (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2021/10/a-new-calf.html). There was only one cow yet to deliver (ear tag number 17), and Jimmy had mentioned that it appeared that she may be getting close. One day last week when Gracie was in the shop, Carl and I were near the fence and looking for #17 amongst the cows up at the back of the house, and didn't see her. Additionally, we heard a cow mooing from down in the pasture, and by a count of mama cows, it appeared that only #17 was missing. Jimmy had said that the mama cows often go off on their own when they are ready to deliver, so we followed as Jimmy took a walk to find her and see what was going on...

Sure enough, #17 had had her calf, and he was a big fellow. Jimmy caught him, estimated his weight, banded, and put his ear tag on.

While we were down in the pasture, Jimmy moved the "ribbon tape fence" that he uses as temporary fencing to give the cows a strip of additional grass. They get very vocal about their disappointment that they don't have fresh spring grass for grazing, but at least every few days they get a strip of "new" grass that they haven't trampled down or pooped on.

Back up behind the house... they haven't gone to discover that they have a new grazing area yet, but soon one will decide to head out to see what she can find in the pasture and will discover that there's a new strip of grass available.

This past Thursday, Carl and Jimmy made the trip back to Micro, NC (my understanding is that the town is aptly named) to deliver the last two feeder calves for this year to the processor.

The two feeder calves after being unloaded at the processor.

Carl had told me that the processor location was pretty non-descript with no obvious name displayed - this time, he took a picture of the front of the building, and I can see what he meant.

While there, they also picked up the beef from the two feeder calves that they delivered 3 weeks ago and brought it back.

Sometimes Carl texts me to know their progress; on Thursday, he didn't, but I checked Google Maps...

Since we share our locations with each other on Google Maps, I could see where his phone was reporting him to be and knew that they had arrived at the processor!

It is always interesting to see the cattle and discover their unique characteristics.