It’s a cold, cloudy, muddy, and dreary January day. I need a pick me up, something to remind me that spring and summer are coming. Here are some of my favorite “critter” pictures to brighten my day and hopefully yours too
The graceful critters.
Baby critters
A mama fox raised her litter in a stack of big bales. They didn’t seem to mind when I snapped frame after frame of them wrestling and playing. She only stayed one year, but I got to take pictures as they grew up.
The feathered critters.
The eagles come every winter and stay until spring. They are amazing to watch and photograph!
This mama killdeer didn’t appreciate me taking pictures of her little ones. She tried over and over to lure me away by faking a broken wing.
Scary critters. Don’t be fooled by that snapping turtle. He can move a lot faster than you think.
Four legged and two legged critters that love to play in the creek.
Some strange looking critters.
The strangest critter ever!
Bigfoot shows up every once in awhile to fascinate and scare the little kids. The big kid in the costume now was once one of those little kids!
Hope these pictures brightened your gloomy January day. Spring and summer will be here soon!
It’s snowing! When you are a kid the words “snow day” means no school, sled rides, snowball fights, snowmen and snow ice cream. When you are an adult “snow day” means slick roads, melting snow on the floor, wet coats and gloves, frozen car doors, and trying to keep the kids entertained in between forays out into the snow. When you are a rancher or a cow it means cold and wet.
Two different winter views from my deck!
Cattle handle cold really well. They put their heavy coats on in the fall and don’t take them off until spring. They are equipped for the cold, but Missouri weather is known for it’s rapid and extreme changes. Image if you had to wear your heavy coat outside on one of those beautiful 65 degree winter days that we had recently. Those days are harder on cattle than a really cold January day, but snow means wet and being wet means the cows need extra energy to stay warm.
We figure how much hay the cows need by their weight. Since we can’t weigh each cow or each bale of hay we have to use estimates and experience to come up with the right amount. We estimate that the average weight of the cows is 1200. 1200 x 3% = 36 lbs. Again estimating that each bale weighs 1200 lbs Mitch will unroll 9 big bales for this set of 276 cows. On a cold wet day he will add a bale. That amount allows for waste and there will be waste. Nothing they like better than standing on their food. If tomorrow when he goes to feed there is still hay on the ground he’ll cut back a bale.
If you think your grocery bill is high just image watching these girls eat their way through 9 bales at $45 each. Every day!
As I was watching him roll out the hay I saw a cow come out of the woods late and by herself. I decided to back track her trail in the woods to see what had held her up. It looks suspicious.
This is what I found at the end of the trail. An early calf, thanks to the neighbors bull. Everything looks fine. It was a nice surprise on a snowy day and I got to take a walk through the quiet snow covered woods!
We sent 71 steer calves to a feedlot in KS. This is the first time we have retained ownership of the calves all the way through to finish.
Mitch and Boomer the truck driver are loading the steers. The calves walk up the loading chute into the trailer for the 4 hour trip to the feedlot.
We sent them as NHTC feeders. NHTC stands for Non-Hormone Treated Cattle. Let me explain a little about the NHTC program. It’s a program that went into effect in 1999 when the US and the European Union agreed to put control measures in place to enable the shipment of verified NHTC beef to the EU. Currently the EU and China require that verification for beef imported into their countries. The program prohibits the use of any growth hormones such as those used in implants.
Most cattle entering a feedlot are implanted with a small pellet that contains a slow release growth stimulant. It goes under the skin on the back of the ear. That implant increases feed efficiency and weight gain resulting in a lower cost per pound of weight that they gain (COG – cost of gain). NHTC cattle will have a higher feed bill because they do not receive an implant. Hopefully the premium paid for NHTC cattle will offset the additional cost and leave a little in our pockets.
Each steer receives EID (electronic ID) tag. The tag can be read manually or with a tag reader.
We went through a verification audit to become certified. Certification involved getting letters from all of our feed suppliers, copies of calving records, lots of paperwork and of course…a fee. The calves have to go to a certified feedlot and from there to a certified slaughter plant. At any point the EID tag can be used to learn where and when the calf was born and if he is enrolled in any verified programs.
Following the feed truck into the pen.
Waiting to get on the truck.
And there they go. A year of work and money. My fingers are crossed that this works.
I’ll keep you informed on how this turns out. Hopefully in the spring we’ll find time to drive out and take a look at them.
We are pregnancy checking our cows today! This is a make or break day for a cow herd. A low breed back rate can signal disease, poor nutrition or bull problems. It also means a huge financial loss. I didn’t sleep well last night just thinking about it. This is how the day went.
7 am – We are out the door to gather the cows. The weather is not nice! A high of 28 and a couple inches of snow on the ground! Mitch pulled all 310 in a 10 acre pasture next to the pens yesterday with the tractor and hay. Today he hits the siren on the feed truck and most of the cows come running while I follow on the four wheeler. After we penned the good cows there is still 50 head out. It’s mostly older cows who have been through this before. Older females are just smarter. We take two four wheelers and start working them in. They keep trying to get away, but they finally go in!
They were easy to pull out of the big pasture with hay because of the snow, but that’s the only thing good about it!
8:30 am – We are gathering up meds and getting everything set. The cows will get a shot of Guardian, a vaccination that gives scour protection to the calves the cows are carrying. They will also be dewormed with Cydectin pour-on.
9 am – The vet, Dr. Melissa DePriest and the three guys who will help today pull in. We spend a little time getting the ultrasound machine set up. Ready to start!
Mitch runs the chute, Adam gives the shot and pours right after the doctor calls bred or open, I keep track of breds/opens and write new ear tags to replace the faded ones.
Cody and Luke feed us cows in a steady line.
It’s a dirty job, but that’s the life of a large animal vet.
The ultrasound is amazing. Take a close look at this picture. It is a calf’s head. You can see the eye socket and the nose!
11:30 am – We have done 160 cows with only a few of the usual problems, a cow that thinks if she crawls through the chute we won’t see her, the one who goes in really slow then takes off like a runaway train so you miss her head and the one who tries to push through the head gate until she chokes herself. Nothing unusual. Time for lunch. I’ve got a pot of hot beef stew and sandwiches in the warm house!
12:15 pm – Back outside. It was kind of hard to leave the warm house. My toes had just started to thaw!
4 pm – We are done! It looks good. I have kept a rough count, but now it’s time to take a better look.
26 open out of 310. That’s a 92% breed back! We are very pleased with that result!
Everything is cleaned up, cattle turned out and hay unrolled. Time to go in and warm up!
