After the Storm

View in Sleepy Eye, on the south side of the storm as it passed to the north of town.

Looking to the southwest of Sleepy Eye, as the storm passed to the east, producing some very ominous rotating clouds! Jon called me from the farm as he also watched this storm.

Damage: Pipe on our manure pump was blown over  and twisted off.  Nothing a little fixing tomorrow won't fix, but it looks bad.  We also had a number of trees lose branches thanks to the VERY strong wind (excess of 65 mph).

Pea combines parked in the field south of the farm, where they were harvesting peas up until the storm hit.  Thanks to the power outage they were waiting for the plant to re-start and send the trucks so they could unload their hoppers full of tasty peas.

Jon hooking up the generator to the power box by our milking barn, however, since we hardly ever use our generator, we didn't know it wasn't in working condition until we tried to get her running.  Thank goodness for the Linemen that got the power back and running so quickly!

Heifers checking out the storm damage, now that they were no longer afraid to be outside.

Rainbow at the end of the storm. We were definitely blessed to be so protected, family & friends are safe, crops are still standing, & buildings are undamaged.

Tonight I expected that I would be able to write about our peas being harvested today, I even have pictures and video to post, but Mother Nature had some different plans for us.  This afternoon at about 6pm, our local area saw some very serious storms move through.  We know of a couple of farms that experienced damage and some crops that were either blown over or are hailed off (hail stones shredded the plants and the fields will need to be replanted in serve cases).  One dairy farm near Courtland lost their dairy barn and had to relocate about 800 cows to various farms in the area.  Thanks to the help of area farmers they were able to safely move these animals.  I can only imagine what those girls were thinking when the roof blew off their barn!  So between tornadoes, strong winds (65mph or more) and hail (as big as 4.25 inches!) it made for an eventful evening locally.  Thanks to the wind, we experienced some damage out at the farm.  Thankfully the corn is still standing, but my in laws did lose some trees and branches from trees in their yard.  As you can see above the manure pump succumbed to the power of the winds as did my flowers planted around the milking barn. 

The biggest challenge of the night was the power outages.  We were without electricity on our farm for about 1.5 hours.  Without power we were not able to do much.  Electricity runs so much on a dairy farm: water pumps, well pumps, milk coolers, milk pumps, lights, fans, curtains, sprinklers, etc.  So our cows had no fans or water until the power came back on.  We couldn't feed calves since we didn't have hot water for them.  Without electricity we couldn't milk cows either!  Rest assured though our milk stayed cool in its insulated tank.  The milk was about 42 degrees once the power came back, definitely safe and cool.  We would usually hook up a generator, run by a tractor, but tonight we discovered that our generator is not running (will be fixed tomorrow).  So we waited patiently for the excellent linemen of our local energy cooperative to fix the down power lines.  They promptly came out after the storm and we had power in about an hour!  Bless those men! They do good work!  The cows were a little crabby about being milked about an hour later than usual, but we got through it.  Thanks to Brown County REA! You do great work!  Hopefully I will be able to report less stormy news tomorrow!  God bless!!

Behind the Scences of a Colorado Beef Feedlot

Today I took the time to read an article that has been circling around the Ag community online.  It's worth sharing, that is for sure!  It features a vegan, Registered Dietitian, Ryan Andrews, who was allowed to visit a 22,000 head beef feedlot in Colorado.  I'll admit that I expected this article to spread further untruths about animal agriculture, but I was pleasantly surprised by this man's ability to be open minded during his visit and to make some astute observations.  Even though he walked away still not interested in eating meat, he did walk away with a new perspective about beef and animal agriculture.  So please take the time to check it out. Cattle Feedlot: Behind the Scenes

Got it DONE!!! Making Hay when the Sun Doesn't Shine!!

We have successfully finished out 2nd cutting of alfalfa!  It was a challenge and if I ever meet a weatherman in person I might have to ask him the following: "How can you still have a job after being wrong so many times?"  Our weather forecast for Thursday was for rain, which we missed, thank goodness as those storms were filled with wind, hail, and tornadoes.  We pray for those who were hurt by these storms.  On Friday it was supposed to be about 80 degrees and light breezes, but we had mid-80's and a strong dry wind....which accelerated the drying of our alfalfa, much faster than we anticipated.  As a result our hay was dry sooner than expected, and we had to move faster.  At midnight on Friday, Jon, I and my brother in law Marcus decided that we were going to keep on chopping alfalfa until we saw dew, which would make the alfalfa too wet to chop.  But as long as there was no dew we were able to keep on chopping.....and we kept on chopping alfalfa until 9 am Saturday morning. Yes, you just read correctly, we chopped through the night and finished right before morning chores.  That means that Jon and I worked about 35 hours straight without any sleep.  We finished chopping and jumped right over to milking, feeding and our morning chores.  At 2pm we made it home, and took a well deserved nap for 5 hours!  We were very happy that we finished our 130 acres of alfalfa even if we had to work that hard to get it done.  Unfortunately since we worked so hard and in the dark, I don't have any pictures of 2nd cutting alfalfa, but if you saw the 1st cutting, it's pretty much the same thing all over again.

It's great to be able to work with my brother in law as well.  He's an excellent worker and never stops until he finishes a job~which is great for chopping alfalfa!  We worked that hard to chop our alfalfa because we know from years of experience that high quality feeds make healthy cows which in turn make healthy nutritious milk.  Focusing on quality has helped us gain so much in milk production, but more so in cow health.  As cows are ruminants, forages and forage quality make a huge impact on health. 

We also had a successful morning on Friday taking our 6 day old calf Fuji to New Ulm for the KNUJ Dairy Day at the Glock.  Fuji visited with many adults and kids, celebrating June Dairy Month for a good cause: area Food Shelves.  Now that she's home, Fuji is spoiled and looking for a head scratch almost every hour!  She's so darn cute though, neither Jon nor I can say no to her...so we give in and she's getting even more spoiled.  I have some pictures of her that I hope to post soon!

Rain Delay

I just thought I would take some time to blog, as I might be missing in action for the remainder of the week.  We are patiently waiting for Mother Nature to cooperate with us; we are waiting to cut our 2nd cutting of alfalfa.  We have enjoyed some much needed rain for the past few days and it has been great for the corn and soybeans, but it has made a mess out of our silage bag pad and we know our alfalfa fields will most certainly be moist and soft.  Today we saw the sun for the first time in days, and it was a welcomed sight!  With a little bit of a breeze we started to see dry soil again.  We will need more days like this before we can hit the fields, but it sounds as though we have a chance of rain again on Thursday. 

Time will tell, but for the time being, Jon was able to haul liquid manure over to the neighbor's harvested pea field.  It's great to have such ag-friendly neighbors who appreciate the value of cow manure and its ability to grow great crops!  We definitely appreciate having neighbors who will take our cow manure.  By doing this they help us make sure we don't over apply nutrients on our own fields as well as stay within the limits of our manure management plan.  Plus, sharing manure with neighbors helps them grow awesome corn too! 

We were also able to take some time to work on a cow who suddenly developed a sore foot.  Isabel, our 3 year old cow (who has had 2 calves and is pregnant with her third) started to favor her front left foot on Sunday.  Sometimes cows will injure their feet like people do, misstepping.  Other times cows have a more serious issue like a sore or infection.  We trim the entire herd twice a year, which eliminates most problems, but since it's been about 5 months since the last trimming, little issues like this sometimes pop up.  Isabel continued to favor that foot, so we decided yesterday morning (Monday) that she needed some medical attention.  We lifted her foot with a rope, as we don't have a hoof trimming chute.  She was actually a great patient.  She calmly stood on 3 legs as Jon diligently worked to carve out the bottom of her foot.  He carved hoping to find the problem, but we didn't find anything wrong with her foot!  When we were about to give up on Isabel, Jon checked for a second time between her toes and found what appeared to be a small sore.  Sure enough, that was our problem...a small sore that looked to have developed from a small stone getting stuck in her hoof.  Cow's hooves are much like our fingernails, so they can pick up stones occasionally.  We removed the small stone and the hoof tissue that was damaged.  We applied some salve to help heal Isabel's foot and wrapped her up.  While Isabel didn't start walking perfectly right away, she definitely was running around today!  Keeping a close eye on our cows is critical to keeping them healthy.  By catching Isabel's foot injury early we prevented any further damage to her foot as well as the risk that she could have slipped, fell and hurt herself even more.  We work hard to prevent injuries and illness, but early detection also helps maintain healthy cows!

Hopefully I will be doing hay soon...pictures to follow!

Keen Attention to Detail at South Dakota Dairy

Meet the Gross Family of South Dakota.  They are another example of excellent dairy farmers who's keen attention to detail has allowed them to take excellent care of their cows. 

I may be in and out these coming days, as we are preparing for the 2nd cutting of alfalfa for the year.  We are also going to be hauling manure tomorrow.  Yep, that's right, it's time again to haul out some manure and water from our barn and parlor out to the fields.  We have some excellent neighbors who raise peas.  These peas were harvest today, clearing the field to be planted with soybeans, but before they plant some soybeans, we will be fertilizing it with cow manure.  It's really a great exchange.  By hauling manure to our neighbor's farm, we are making sure that we don't over apply these valuable nutrients on our own land and we are also keeping up on neighbor relations....who could really turn down free fertilizer?  So, we'll be busy in the fields, but I hope to have some pictures to share when I get a chance in the days to come.  Happy Summer & June Dairy Month!