Here I am, up at 1:54 in the morning, listening to some rock music, working on e-mails. Why you ask would I be working on e-mails at 1 in the morning? Well, the answer is easy...we didn't get home from the farm until Midnight tonight.
It was a good day at the farm, but a long day. We have been working on a cow, Number 20, who has a mystery illness. She gave birth to twins 3 nights ago, and since then she has not been eating as much feed as we hoped that she would. We had the vet look at her yesterday but he couldn't find anything directly wrong with her, so we assume that it is a couple of different things. As a result we "treated" her twice today. She received a "soup" of yeast, vitamins, minerals, and probiotics to help out her rumen-she drank this. And she got a couple liters of IV fluids. She isn't on antibiotics, because she is not sick from an infection but appears to have a digestive upset. Tonight, it was a night and day difference-she was eating everything in sight, so we hope we are over this hurdle.
We delivered 2 new bulls calves today, so we had to tend to the mothers and the boys. All are bedded in and well fed tonight. We also bedded in all of the heifers, dry cows, and milking cows. We had to fill hay feeders in the dry cow lot and the heifer lots. And then at the end of the night we had to head back to the dry cow lot, to look for cows calving-we have 3 that look to be giving birth before sunrise....which brings me to now-this is why I am up....I will be leaving shortly to drive out the farm and check on them. Making sure that in the case that they do calve tonight someone is there to help them and the new calves. I am hoping for no calves until morning-but Mother Nature always wins this argument. So, of to the farm I go, hopefully 3 news calves and 3 happy mothers will greet me =)
Purple cone flowers that made it through the winter.
Pretty vines on the trees in the grove.
Frosted round bales of grass hay.
Winter view of the heifer lot.
Dry cows, relaxing in the dry cow lot on this frosty winter day.
Meet AC/DC, our heifer who is 16 months old and expecting her first calf this fall.
Yevette!!! (our preemie calf from this summer) She's doing so well! She loves it outside, even if it's frosty. She's almost as tall as the other calves her age, but has so much more attitude.
Kittens like to snuggle up with the bulls calves in the calf barn.
Frosty trees in the yard.
Silver Bells, checking out the frost covered shrubs in front of her calf hut.
Our Dairy Barn, almost 5 years old already. View from the road.
Komanche, our heifer, checking out the birds in the tree out in the yard.
It's so cold, but we have such a pretty view outside!
Which one of these doesn't belong? Yep, it's Glencoe, she was our "day care" calf this summer, who visited area day cares. She thinks she needs to be spoiled and is completely immune to electric fences-she goes where she wants to and we just let her.
What a great view from the dairy barn!
Cows eating in a very foggy barn. Yummy! TMR! (total mixed ration-containing alfalfa, corn silage and so many other great feeds!)