Rain Dance

We are expecting nasty weather for tonight and tomorrow. I have been chanting to the radar map at weather.com. I really want that wet stuff to some and make it too miserable to work outside so that I won't have to spend the day trenching and all that very fun stuff that comes with such an enjoyable task, like greasing joints, filling 5 gallon jugs with diesel, lugging that diesel from the pickup to the trencher, lifting those jugs to the fuel tank, emptying the jugs, changing the teeth on the trencher (oh, great joys). The best part of fueling the tencher is that just enough spills on me that it almost covers the smell of the grease ground into my skin. Are we having fun yet????



So, 60 mph winds, bring it on. Ice-cold rain, my pleasure. My house is not yet a home. There are stacks and piles that need me. Boxes still abound me. The great call of the domestic beckons me. How shall I serenade you, oh lovely bad weather. Just know that I truly desire you.

It was a little before 4am when....

That's right. My day started a bit before 4am, when Noah came and put his head close to mine and started retching. Groggy I was, of course, when I pleaded with him not to barf on the bed. I searched for something to slip in front of his mouth, but couldn't grab anything fast enough. Up came the usual slime and some less usual pieces of wood. Oh Noah, when you are tearing at a pile of tree stumps and branches to get to the rabbit underneath, it's really better not to swallow the wood that breaks away into your mouth. Really!

So I cleaned that up and headed for coffee.

Around 7am, Kyle showed up. He and I would be trenching today at the other place we have about 8 miles from here. However, before heading there, I needed to feed Little Guy, the calf. As you may recall from my previous post, Little Guy was my orphan calf that I was feeding milk to with a bucket. He had actually been putting on some weight and getting a bit more vigorous as well. I had him in a small corral that was part of a network of corrals that circle our big red barn. The new resident donkeys had access to several of the other corrals. I wanted the calf to have a little more move-around space, and since he seemed to want to make friends with the cat and then the dogs, I thought he might be able to buddy-up with the donkeys. And, for a short while, he did.

The jennies (female donkeys) never did show any interest in Little Guy. The jack showed only mild interest at first. However, after a couple of hours, the jack started to nose the calf around a bit. Within the course of about 15minutes, that jack came to realize that he could push that calf around pretty easily, and thus, dominate him. Once the jack knew that the games were on, and I could not get in there fast enough to stop the attack. First the jack bit the calf on the back, which made Little Guy bawl but not run. He was confused and did not immediately understand that he'd been intentionally assaulted. The second time the Jack's chops went into the calf, the calf wised up and started running. That's when I tried to get in there. I had a damn clumsy gate slow me down, and they were damn fast. They circled around the barn, and the last thing I heard was a loud, mournful bawl from the calf. When I got there, Little Guy had slipped out of the corral between some boards and was off to the hills where the rest of his herd was last time he saw them. That was just past sunset, and there was nothing I could do for him at that point but hope he could stay away from trouble until morning.

He did get to the herd unscathed. I started taking his milk to him there. I figured he would recognize the red bucket I had been using for his milk, which he did, and if I set it down and walked off a bit, he came right to it. So, I have been taking him his milk twice a day, now, for several days. The challenge is, however, that that pasture is about 600 acres of rolling hills and 3 dams, and has about 100 cows and their calves in it. It takes some time to finds him, and this morning, after an hour of looking, I didn't find him. I wasn't worried though. I was pretty sure he was just tucked away somewhere too out of sight for me to see. I figured I would catch up with him in the evening with some warm milk.

So, I went off to spend the rest of my day on a trenching machine going about 35ft per hour. We are putting in lines for additional watering stations for cattle. A trenching machine is a big, loud, and very slow moving machine that digs a 10 inch wide tench (dah). Our tench is 6 feet deep, cuz' that how deep our freeze line. In Virginia the freeze line is 18 inches. Such fond memories. Anyway, I was on that thing for about 5 hours today. The rest of the time was spent greasing the thing. On these big machines, one is supposed to inject grease into moving joint. It's a very greasy job.

I told Kyle that I came to work with cows and play with horses, not grease load machinery. He said that lots of people want to come be cowboys, but cowboy'in it is about 30 minutes of the day. The rest is everything but. I said, "But I'm the giiirrrl." He told me to put the grease gun down and load up onto the trencher. I'm not sure I like that man!

Here's me at the trencher and near sunset.

After shutting down for the day, I rushed home to deliver mile to Little Guy, assuming I could find him. It was near dark when I spotted him. He was hungry enough to shed some of his weariness, and came forward for that warm milk before I even had set the bucket down in the grass.

I then fed the horses, the donkeys, the dogs, and myself. It shower and bed time. Who cares about the chaos that still prevails in this cluttered house.

Got Milk?

He's definately put on some weight. Still doesn't trust me, though.

My 4 Brats

Looking out the back of the house at my undulants.

Elk Spaghetti

Found some ground elk meat in the freezer when I first arrived. It was a gift from Gordon, Gary's brother. I had been wanting to experiment with it, and when Paul showed up with some homegrown tomatoes a neighbor (that I have not yet met) sent over for me, I knew what I wanted to do. I made a spicy tomato sauce with lots of oregano and garlic, a few anchovies, and some cayenne pepper. I fried up the meat and threw it into the sauce (well, that's how my kitchen looked when I was done - like I threw the meat into the sauce). I ate that spaghetti for lunch and dinner yesterday, and am having it right now for a late breakfast. Very tasty, if I may say so myself. Unfortunately, I can't really taste the elk behind explosion of tomato and spices, but the texture is good. My guess is that it is a rather mild wild meat. I will have to do something a little simpler with the other roll still in the freezer.

I got hugs from 4 horses this morning. I am a happy camper (that needs to go get some things done).

It's 5am, and outside it's dark, windy, a little cold, and my John Henry is out in the corrals. He just arrived from Virginia after a 4 day trip. He's a little spooked and rather hungry. I think I am more happy to see him than him me, but he certainly recognized me. He seems in decent shape after such a long ride, but I will know better when I see him in the daylight.


Have had a few additional four-legged creatures come to run, I mean, come into my life. The first was Little Guy, the orphaned calf. Paul convinced me that, although Little Guy could eat enough grass to stay alive for now, when the cold hit he wouldn't have enough meat on his bone to withstand our harsh winter. His only chance was to get some high-fat milk into him, as well as grass and, maybe, come grain.


So, Paul and I set about catching the calf. Kyle had tried several times on Friday, to no avail. The little bugger was just too fast. Herding calves is about like trying to herd cats; they tend to go the opposite direction from where you want them headed. You'll get them going a little ways, and then something clicks in their brains. They become willing to die trying to get back where they came from. In their minds, that's where they last saw their moms, so, that's where she will coming looking for them. This is even the case if you move the whole herd and the mom's led the way. Once the calves fall behind, as some tend to do, the moms have to stopped to allow the little ones to catch up. If you don't hold up the cows, the little ones will get all squirrely and insist on heading back to where they started from.


Anyway, Kyle could neither catch nor herd Little Guy on Friday, so on Saturday, Paul and I went after him. First we had to find him. The cows and their youngsters are spread over hill and dale, around several dams, and on both sides of several fences. When I spotted him, Paul did a sneak up and dive for the calf routine that was a play straight out of a baseball training manual. Really looked like he'd made a belly-slide for first base. Unfortunately, the calf flew out of there, and even worse, it wasn't the the right calf. I told Paul, as he stood up brushing the debris off his belly and knees, that I was just sure that had been him. But sure as I was, I was wrong. And we were off to find the right Little Guy.


We did find him, and Paul did catch him - by the tail from the 4-wheeler. Paul hung onto that tail as the calf pulled him over the back of the bike. He quickly scrambled to get on top of the calf. He tied his hind legs with twine and looped part of the twine over the calf's head. Little Guy was immobile. Paul got himself and the calf onto the back of the Mule, and I drove us back to the barn.


Now, we had to get some milk into our new bundle of joy. We tried the bottle for a while, then we put down the whiskey and decided to get the milk bottle ready.

I'll tell you all about that adventure a just a bit. Gotta run for now.

Must See TV - forgive me

Notes on health care - watch if you care........to.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/ns/msnbc_tv-rachel_maddow_show#32905906

Our Smallest Calf: do i let him die

What is our smallest, and we believe to be our youngest calf, has just been orphaned. Our other calves are all 300 to 500+ pounds. This little puppy is maybe 100 pounds. He's a very pretty little thing, chocolate brown with white blazes on a cute little face. He was born after all the other calves were branded, banded (castrated), and ear-pierced with an ear tag that identifies who is mom to that calf. Anyway, Little Guy's mom died last night. She hasn't been doing well - very bony back and hips, projectile diarrhea, slow moving. We suspected that her teeth were worn and gone (and when I checked the carcass I found that we were right - no teeth); she was in very poor condition when we bought her, for probably the same lack of teeth. Her kid hasn't looked all that well, either. He's underweight and has not been thriving. We recently had some bug going through the part of the calf herd that he's in, and while he didn't seem to have that bug, he's seemed just as lethargic.


Anyway, this puny little thing is now without his mama. He hasn't been getting much milk to this point, and a couple of days ago we did bring him in to try to bottle feed him without luck - we gave up after about 20 minutes. The process includes pinning him between two metal panels and forcing the bottle into his mouth. He thinks we are trying to kill him, truly. It's not hard to drown a calf by forcing milk into his mouth unless you "tube" him (that's, run a tube down his throat and pour the milk into that).

So, when his mom was found floating on the edge of the damn, it was time to decide whether to bring him in and keep him in the corral by himself so that he could be tubed 3 times a day (my duty), or leave him with the herd and hope he finds a cow willing to adopt him, or that he can just eat enough grass to stay alive. The grass is not at its most nutritious this time of year, although it's great if you're an adult herbivore with all your teeth or you're getting a healthy portion of mama's milk to go with the grass.

He's got a 50/50 shot either way. I have been out twice today to check on him. He seems no better or worse that yesterday when his mom was still alive. He has not hooked up with another cow, but is eating grass. He's very thin and I worry for him. If I knew I could save him by bringing him in, I would. Unfortunately, moving him out of the herd, keeping him isolated, and forcing a tube down his throat is as least as stressful on the little guy as losing his mom and her milk. It's a toss up. Did I mention that he's a real cutie?

On a different note - I was out stacking large round bales of hay with the backhoe today, when I got the backhoe stuck in a ditch. Tomorrow Kyle gets to get his laughs and then gets to rescue me.

The house is still crazy with stuff and boxes. Knee still taunting me. Dogs all good. Missing my good friends.

Trish

On the Western Front

All is quiet on the Western Front. Moved 3 groups of cattle today. Mostly, I just led them while Gary and Kyle pushed from behind. The standard call used when you want cattle to came to you or to follow is, "Come cow," or "Come bos." The "bos" is the singular form of bovine which is the Latin term for cow. I like calling them, girls. "Come girls, good girls, that's my girls." I think they like it better, too. And the steers really don't give a damn what I call them, since they had their u-know-whats removed.

Gary arrived last night with the rest of his trophies. Where all that is going to go in the relatively little place and all its low ceilings, I haven't a clue. Even without the huge remnants of once beautiful animals to contend with, just figuring out where to put the rest of our crap is a challenge. Do any two people really ever need as much stuff as we have? I ask you???

Noah seems fully recovered from all this traumas. He still has scabs under his armpit, along some ribs, and on his nose. Still no sign of that blue latex glove.

Like I said, all is quiet. Thank goodness.

Hope you all had a great 3-day weekend.

Noah finds trouble

I have been staying busy with sick calves, moving cows, sorting cows, and walking in cow-muck deep enough to suck my shoe right off my foot, and it happened so fast that I set my naked foot down before I realized my shoe was elsewhere. I had to stick that nasty foot back into the shoe and move on, cause Kyle and I were in the middle of sorting the calves away from their mothers so that the youngsters could get some shots. It was about 6 hours later that I finally was able to get out of my shoes and wash my foot.



On Saturday, Paul and I were back to getting the pasture ready to move cows and their calve into it. I continued to work on the water troth, while Paul was on fence duty. His dog, Oscar, and Noah went with him. Well, those buggers took off to the creek for a wild day of chasing rabbits and whatever else they could rustle up. They departed at about noon, and didn't return until after 9pm. I was sick with worry. Poor Paul saw how worried I was and went out to look for them in the dark (we'd both been out several times prior).

I knew that, as long as Oscar had not returned, the two rascals were still together. I really feared that they would get separated and Noah, being young and stupid, would be lost forever. But, they did return, but not unscathed. Noah had about 20 porcupine quills on his lips, as well as several scratches on his face and body from tearing through brush. He looked like he'd lost at least 5lbs and gained about 10 years.

Noah wasn't letting me anywhere near those quills, so I gave him a double dose of tranquilizer I had from one of Maddie's surgeries. He was sedated enough for me to remove all but on deeply embedded quill. I let it rest for the night, and we both fell asleep on the bed.

After a couple of hours of sleep I woke because it was too still. Noah was still lying next to me, but I could not feel or hear him breathing. I put my hand on his side, and there in the dark I could not feel his heart or chest moving, I switched on the light and looked at him. Nothing was moving. I put my hand back on his chest. Nothing. I lifted his head a bit. Nothing. I sank inside. I thought he was dead, and that I had killed him. I started pushing on him harder and I touched his sore lip where the remaining quill was. He roused. Thank God. I honestly thought for a moment that I had killed my dog. I woke many times that night to rouse him. He was in too deep of a sleep. In the morning he was okay, but a bit groggy.

I took him to the vet to get the last quill removed, and had a whole new stressful experience. The vet gave Noah a small dose of an anaesthesia drug, and went under seeing double and flailing about a bit. As he came out of it, the vet allowed me to leave with him. He was out cold, with his tongue hanging out the side of his mouth and his head limp as a rag doll's. He started coming out of it on the way home, but with much bigger thrashings than he had on his way down. I had to pull over and hold him down for a bit. When I could, I got back into the truck and rushed the rest of the way home. There, I spent the next hour restraining Noah, to keep him from bonking his head on things. I understand that there is an antidote for these drugs so that the animal comes out of that state quickly. Next time I see that vet, I will ask why in the heck he didn't give it to Noah.

So, you'd think the excitement was over with Noah. No, not just yet. Last night he decided to swallow a latex glove. Why, I have no idea. He is not the chewing nut that some of my previous pups have been. I was having a hard time keeping food down, but that has passed. Now, we are careful observation mode in case he gets blocked up. The best and most probable outcome, at this point is that it will just outcome the other end. My guess is that it will be very easy to see.

Tomorrow, I'm back to stacking 1000lb round bales of hale using the backhoe for 4-5 hours. I think its time to change my email from rancher-to-be, don't you?

Getting started in SD

I find myself really wanting to write about this new life I have, to create something of like a log, but these days they're called a blog. I also want to share my experience with all the people I love, but am so far from. So this is where you will find my stories and blerps about what will most often be my misadventures as a newbie rancher. For instance...




I got up this Saturday morning with the plan to get a bunch of these boxes the hell out of here. The disorganization in this place is making me crazy, and I can't even start on curing that until I can get the big items into place, which can't happen until the number of boxes is reduced!




I was just getting started on all that when the power went out. I thought to call Gary to get a handle on the history of the power outages, but my cell phone was dead. So, I hopped in the truck, where my car charger is, and went to visit the horses while the phone charged. When I got back to the truck, its battery was dead. I walked the 1/2 mile home. On the way, Gary's brother Chris called to let me know that it would probably be several days before the power was back on due to some big problem somewhere (my mind went into "oh, crap" mode, and I stopped listening. Chris said something about getting the generator set up (what generator, and where, and how???). What came to my mind was that the cows on water tanks would need water, as the well pump would not be working. That meant moving cows that weren't in pastures with dams/ponds. That meant moving cows alone.




Now here's the thing. Our main and only guy, Kyle, was out of town for the weekend. And Paul, who lives on the ranch and helps out on the weekend, was out of town, also, for the weekend. I was basically screwed and, literally, powerless - the truck, wells, house, phone, all dead (the cell phone died again after talking with Chris and then Gary.




So, I headed out to check on the water situation for the one group of cows I knew were exclusively on well water. Their water was good, but as I looked at the grass, I thought that they really needed to be moved to fresh pasture sooner, rather than later. Kyle and I had agreed to move them on Monday, but that was 2 days away, and some of those older cows really shouldn't be shorted grass at all (they already are underweight, and it's not even winter). But where to move them to?




When I got back to the house, blessed be, there was Paul, and the power was back on!!! Paul and the neighbor that brought me the corn earlier this week, Eric, were both there. I enlisted Paul's help after getting an earful from Eric.




Eric will always have an earful for you. He is generally very funny, if a bit acerbic. Well, I was able to, without meaning to, make him shut his mouth and walk away. I gave him a brief run down of how the day was going and all that I needed to figure out and do, and ended all that by stating that to top it all off, my menopause had, just this morning, decided to take a leave of absence. Well, that proved too much for the man. He took a couple of steps backwards, waved is hands, turned on his heels, and he was gone. I never would have guessed him to the sensitive type. (BTW: when Eric brought me the corn, he announce to all present, that would be Gary, Paul, and I, that I would need to figure the value of the corn so that Blacky could get his taxes for it. My guess is that he is that is word choice was more to get my goat than anything else, but I am not yet entirely sure.)




So, everything just got simplified; no generators to worry about, I had help to get the truck started and to move the cows. Paul and I decided on which pasture to move the cows to, but of course, then it all got complicated, again. That pasture needed some fence repairs, which Paul would do, and the water trough, oh my god, it was disgusting. There were these dead things in it and it stunk in a make-you-gag sort of way. The dead things turned out to be a rotting rabbit and two decomposing hawks (I knew they were hawks only by their talons). I took the job of cleaning the trough out, which meant getting a water pump set up and vacuuming out as much water as possible, then shoveling out the rest of the decaying, rotting matter out with a shovel. There is not, of course, a way to just drain the retched stuff out of that 500 gallon tank. No, that would be too easy! And, of course, the first pump we set up didn't work, so I had to go get the other pump from the other ranch, 8 miles away. Once we had that in place, we found that the vacuum hose leaked, and the pump was just sucking air.




So, I headed back to the other ranch to get the other hoses. One of the hoses that I thought I needed was connected to a large water holding tank on a flat bed truck that fed into a trough that was full of water, but not in use. There was not any water coming out of the tank. so I assumed that the valve to the hose was off. Not the case at all! Just as soon as I disconnected the hose, a burst of water hit me square in the chest, and just kept on coming. I was quickly drenched, and the lever to turn off the gushing water was just beyond my reach. I didn't see a way to climb up onto the flatbed. Brain in full gear said, "get the horse lead rope from the cab of the truck." I did, but I could not lasso the valve handle without the gushing water catching the rope and throwing off like a talent wild stallion. I went around the other side of the truck, and found a way to climb up (did I mention I am having some knee issues?). I got the valve to the water turned off, and went to load the hose onto the truck to get it to where I needed it to be, but the damn thing was completely secured to the trough. And, just as I rolled my eyes skyward, I noticed several hoses just laying in on the flatbed between the cab and the tank that were exactly and all that I needed. I grabbed them, loaded them, sighed, and ... well, it was an onward and upwards kinda moment.





Got back to the tank and, with a lot of help from Paul (actually, more like I helped Paul a little), we got the pump going and the water was slowly being vacuumed out of the tank. In the meanwhile, I used a pitchfork to fling out the rabbit and hawks and some other unidentifiable skeletal remains. As the nasty water went down, I began to shovel out black stinking goop. A couple hours later, and after a time thinking about how this belongs on that tv show about dirty jobs, I had gotten out all I could. And, the sun was starting to set. After all that, the cows would have to stay where they were for the night.




Guess how many boxes got emptied today.




Yep, that's right.

Zero

When my big red boy shines his eyes at me, I smile, oh how I smile.

It's about trust.

Dreamt last night that John Henry came galloping over a hill to come to me, and half way down the hill he leaped into the air, flew a great distance to land just in front of me. I feared he might run into me, but I stood there, allowing him the opportunity to not smash me. He didn't. He landed in front of me, and then immediately leaped back into the air to bound over me, landing on the other side of me some small distance away.

My soul is showing me to trust.
I do.
I trust the path I am on with my horse
I trust the path I am on with my life