The Bulls

There's something about visiting the bulls that's a little intimidating. Maybe it's the angry bull stare. This bull is definitely giving the 'Stay the heck away from me' look. 

Maybe it's because just on the other side of the fence is a whole corral of female cows. 

He can smell them. 

He can hear them. 

He can see them. 

He just can't get to them. 

These black angus bulls don't seem quite intimidating. They aren't standing right next to the fence that separates the cows from the bulls, so maybe they're on to something. Remove yourself from the temptation.

I stared at the bulls, and the bulls stared back at me. This one seemed quizzical and started walking towards me. 

I watched. 

I waited. 

I wanted to know what it would do. After all, for most of the year, the bull's life isn't too exciting. They eat, they sleep, and maybe they dream about the short period of the year they get to do what they've been selected for. 

Now before you go thinking that their lives are totally a bed of roses, here's a little more information. The bulls were "trich tested" this last week (they must be tested annually), with some fluid removed from a sensitive part of their anatomy and studied under a microscope to determine if they have any Trichomonas foetus protozoa. This sexually transmitted disease (yep, cows have'em too) causes the disease Trichomoniasis, which often causes miscarriages or infertility and reduces the size of the herd. There is no treatment for the disease, so there is a strong prevention program

By the way, the disease Trichomoniasis is also found in humans, but it is caused by a different protozoa, Trichomonas vaginalis. 

Please, let's get back to the bulls!

The bull took a few steps forward and stopped, still watching me. I watched him back, willing him to get closer.

But he decided sniffing the manure was a better option than getting closer to me. How do you think that makes me feel?

Baby Calves

The heifers are nearly done calving, and it won't be long until the cute little baby calves are turning into teenagers. I'm a sucker for the baby calves, so I have lots of pictures of them! Here's number 77. Each calf gets the same number as his or her mama, so when they're being moved from pasture to pasture it's easier to keep track of them. Although the older range cows are often better at pairing up, heifers can easily get confused and lose track of their little ones. (Perhaps that same phenomenon applies to humans and is why Desert Boy made it to the post office five minutes ahead of me yesterday.)

And there are quite a few little ones. Unlike some earlier photos where they were chasing each other around, on this day they seemed to be resting. I must have missed the play session.

The additional hay is to help keep the calves warmer and drier, because when they are first born they are all wet. When a stiff wind is blowing on a cold night, it doesn't take long for a calf to get chilled. 

Here's a wet calf--it is only a few hours old. It still looks so unsure of the world and is sticking close to mom.

Mom eats on. The calf looks slightly less worried.

Mom is keeping a close eye on me. Never get between a cow and her calf--that's a good way to get trampled by a 1,000 pound beast. Yet the cow is very gentle with her brand new calf. And this calf is still getting accustomed to an entirely different environment. Do you see the umbilical cord hanging down from the calf?

The calf is starting to explore a little more. And mom is still eating. Do you wonder what she's so intent on eating? There's no green hay in sight.

She's eating the placenta. It's full of nutrients and apparently she wants them. If she doesn't eat the placenta, there are plenty of other animals that will: eagles, coyotes, ravens, and dogs. 

If you're groaning, keep in mind this is a nature blog. I'm just showing it how it is!

Feeding the Heifers-Part II

Feeding the heifers is an important ranch chore from late January to mid March. Yesterday we saw the cousins getting the hay ready, and today we're going to take the hay out to the circle field, where the heifers are. Desert Boy was very excited to have another opportunity to drive the tractor. He still doesn't steer very well, despite my husband trying to show him. I've told him I think we should wait a few years, but I get outvoted.

We have two different kinds of hay on the trailer, oat hay on the left and alfalfa hay on the right. This mixture gives the heifers a more balanced diet. (At least I think it does--my husband isn't around to check with, but if it sounds reasonable it must be right, right?)

One of my jobs was to take the fence down so the tractor could go through. Because the cousins usually do this job, the fence is closed with a ratchet strap. It's so much easier than the usual loop of barbed wire that you have to wrestle with while trying not to get your clothing torn.
As soon as we get into the field, the heifers come quickly. They like to eat. After all, they're pregnant, and pregnant females everywhere like to eat. My husband is taking the twine off the bales of hay, and although cows are usually a little hesitant around humans, these heifers are totally ignoring him in their quest to chow down.

Number 138 is staring at me, just daring me to get between her and her hay. I wouldn't even think of it. She is, after all, a lot heavier than me. She's also pregnant and who knows what those hormones are doing to augment her strength. Supercow. It's the new hero comic, just wait.

Some of the heifers already have calves. Most of them were sired by semen from a black angus bull that was artificially inseminated. Therefore nearly all the calves are black.

But here's a brown one. Its dad is probably one of the "cleanup" bulls. For the number of calves being born, there are usually two bell curves. One peak is nine months after the artificial insemination, and another is nine months after the cleanup bulls were allowed in the pen with the heifers. The peak around the artificial insemination is usually more pronounced because the AI took place over just a few days, whereas the cleanup bulls did their business over a longer time period. (Did I need to put a disclaimer at the beginning of this paragraph? Sorry if I did and you are now totally disgusted learning about the intimate lives of cows.)

Back to the food. The hay bales are set on chains that rotate as the tractor drives, so the hay slowly falls off the trailer. The heifers don't want to wait for the hay to reach the ground, though, they want to eat now.

I love the expression of the cow in the back corner, the one that says "Hey, don't leave me out! I want some hay too!"

The heifers are chowing down as fast as they can, grabbing clumps of hay and chewing away. The arrival of the hay trailer is definitely a high point in their day.

As the trailer moves, some of the cows stop at the first piles of hay falling off, but many keep following the trailer. There must be something to the old adage the grass is greener on the other side...

Standing on the trailer and watching the cows, I kind of feel like we're in a long parade, with the tractor as a lead. I wonder how long the heifers will follow the trailer.

They keep coming and coming...

The little calves watch their mamas and decide they should come check out the hay too.

But then a couple get distracted and chase each other. Little calves are just the cutest! This is the biggest reason I like to go along to feed the heifers--to see the little calves.

Desert Boy and the Cows

Desert Boy likes hanging with the cows. And they seem to like watching a little two-foot tall blue munchkin try to climb under the fence so he can  play with them. Desert Boy clambers into the feeding trough with no trouble.

He doesn't seem to be at all fazed by so much beef looking at him intently. In fact, he's oblivious to it.

That's because he's busy eating the feed. Yum. If it's good enough for the cows, it must be good enough for him.

Then Desert Boy starts trying to feed the cows by hand. They move in closer to see if he's for real.
Yes, that's Desert Boy in Wranglers and cowboy boots talking to the cow. 

Hey, Isabel. Come on over. I have a secret I want to share with you.

You have such sweet breath. And such big eyes. I love your complexion.

I can only imagine the heartbreaker Desert Boy will be in about 15 years. I wonder if he will still cross his legs like that.

Okay, time to move on. It's better to spread the charm. Here's a huge Hereford. I mean really huge. And Desert Boy just looks at her curiously. 

She gets even closer, getting down to eye level with Desert Boy and poking her noise through the cables.

And Desert Boy reaches out and pets her. 

Fun Cows

I had fun watching cows the other day and caught some fun expressions. I love to imagine what the cows are thinking. They are obviously curious, but cautious at the same time.

They all line up, ready to begin their high kick. Okay, maybe watching the cows makes me get a little loopy. It must be the smell of all that sweet feed and manure.

As I check out this group on the other side, I see most of them are paying attention. Then I look at the back wall, and what's that I see in the window?

Why it's a cow, not wanting to miss any thing.

Ah, how can anyone resist a sweet face like this one?

Desert Destination: A Visit to the New Calf

As I mentioned a couple days ago, the first calf of the year was born last week. I just had to see it, so yesterday my husband, Desert Boy, Henry, and I loaded up in the truck and went out to take a visit. This calf was born premature by a couple weeks, but it looks like it's doing okay. Not great, but okay. The mother is a heifer, a first-time mother, so she doesn't really know what to do, and because she had her calf early, just as the other heifers were moved to the birthing field, she and the calf are on their own for a few days and seem a bit confused.

Here's the mom, a black baldy. The calf looks mostly black because the semen was from a black angus bull. The mama cow is watching us suspiciously, which is a good sign. Our plan was to take a quick peek at the calf and see how it's doing, and then get out of there. 

Except sometimes plans don't always go as you expect. In this case, we finally got a bunch of rain. That extra moisture, coupled with a ditch that's running to make sure the cow gets plenty of water, made the normally drivable road into a muddy mess. And we started spinning. So my husband put the truck into four wheel-drive. And we continued spinning. The mud flew on to the hood, onto the windows--it was now raining mud. And the tires kept digging deeper and deeper in the mud. 

Finally, I looked at my husband. "I don't think we're going anywhere."

He grinned. "I don't either."

Usually we're in a hurry to get somewhere, but this was a Sunday afternoon and we had had a relaxing day, so we stayed calm. We got out to take a look and saw that the tires were half-buried in mud. We didn't have a shovel, so we got a bunch of sticks and put them under the  tires. But we were in too deep. We needed to go for help.

Fortunately we had on our coats and boots, so we were prepared to go for a little walk. We headed off down the muddy road, along the edge of the field, towards the misty mountains. 

And we kept walking...

We needed to go across the field and towards the white specks on the right side of the photo, past Henry, who was having a grand old time. Our house is near the trees in the middle of the photo. What, you can't see the trees? They're a long way off. 

Desert Boy walked for a while, and then he wanted to be carried. When it was my turn, I put him up on my shoulders and he used my ears like reins. I told him he really wasn't supposed to pull on my ears.

The field we walked through was good walking. It had been planted with barley last spring. After it was harvested, it was planted with alfalfa. The short stalks are from the barley, and the mat-looking stuff is the baby alfalfa.

The Canada geese really like the field and their scat was everywhere. They sure can clean up any leftovers. Soon we crossed the field and came upon a treasure--an old junkyard. The main equipment yard is huge, but not everything is in it. This particular junkyard housed lots of older vehicles. I took quite a few pictures, but in this post will just show the station wagons to complement the post earlier this week.
This is a Chevrolet Nomad. Don't you just love the trim on the side? Because it's a four-door station wagon, we can surmise it was made between 1958 and 1961, and this was the top-of-the-line station wagon for Chevrolet. The original Nomad came out in 1955 as a two-door station wagon and was produced for three years. I am still scratching my head about two-door station wagons.

This station wagon with the cool fin taillights is a Studebaker. It was kind of hard to get a good look at it because of all the brush growing up around it, but it's probably from the 1950s and might be a Commander model. 

We spent quite a bit of time looking around the old junkyard. I must say, if you have to get stuck, it's quite an enjoyable experience if you have good weather, comfortable clothes and shoes, an interesting junkyard to meander through, and a camera to document the whole trip.

By the time we got the backhoe and took it back to the truck, it was getting pretty dark. But it only took a minute to pull the truck out, and then we were on our way.

The little calf was up and exploring her surroundings. Probably tomorrow she and her mom will be moved with the other heifers and hopefully they'll get more accustomed to being together and figure out what they're supposed to do.