Headstrong children = headstrong cows...

Aeryn is teaching Alex how to make duck
noises to call to the ducks in the pond.
At this point Alex is almost able to
mimic the sounds his sister makes.

The quality of stubbornness is not in short supply in my life. I face it daily with both my children and my cows. Cows are often just like children. At least we treat ours like children...Maybe we are doing it wrong. Nah I don't think so . 

Last night Aeryn tried to take Rachel for a walk. The girls have not been on a halter much since we came home from Cheshire fair due to time constraints on our part. Needless to say it was a bit of an interesting experience. 

A few of the ducks in
the pond.

They are getting much better about the barn. They come right in now when it is time to eat with no hesitation. Before, the small ones were a bit scared. Now they associate the barn with getting food so its all good.Having them in an enclosed space makes it a whole lot easier to catch them. We have no problems getting their halters on and off any more. 

So last nights task was to get them all in the barn, get their halters on them, and get them out walking on show halters. In my mind it sounded like a really good plan and it sounded super easy. We started with Rachel who walked really well out of the barn for me. However when Aeryn took the halter Rachel seemed to remember that she was over four hundred lbs heavier than Aeryn and managed to get away. So there she was running around on the lawn with her show halter on. 

She wanted nothing to do with coming to a bucket of grain and even went so far as to jump over the electric fence to get away. (I am now thinking that the electric fence may not be so productive after all if my heifer is able to clear it like a horse. Maybe I should look into show jumping cows?) It took a little patience (and a lot of Aeryn running around the field) but we finally managed to catch her. 

One thing that I have learned in all of my years of working with cows is that when they break away like that it is NOT time to stop the training session. If we had let her go and just do her own thing it would have taught her that she could do it every time and get away with pushing Aeryn around. So after we caught her I am the one that took her for a walk. The made the evening not as productive as I had wanted it to be because I had wanted to be able to take more than one animal out. But I would rather put a kink in my original plan and change it up a little than to risk one of my children getting seriously injured.

Alex wanted to walk down the road with us and Aeryn managed to get a few pictures of him walking along holding Rachel's lead. He is quite the little farm boy.

Our friend Dan...

For a couple of weeks we took care of a horse. A big Belgian draft horse named Dan. He belonged to the people who owned one of the pastures that we are going to be using for the Fall and Winter. When they moved to Virginia they started looking for a family to adopt him.

Dan is 23 years old. Pretty old for a horse. He limps when he walks and take a little extra time to get from point A to point B. But that did not make him any less likable. He was friendly and strong and proud. Over the course of the time that he shared the pasture with the cows he and I would stand at the top of the hill and watch the kids, dog, and cows run around in the field. He was like a sentinel standing over the younger generations. 

Aeryn fell in love with him immediately. She has wanted a horse for as long as I can remember and this was kind of like her getting one. For a brief time. We spoke with Jay and told him that if the owners did not find someone to adopt him than we would feed him and love him right along with our cows. As Aeryn says "Old horses need love just as much as old people." Smart little girl. 

Dan has moved on now. To a new life. He was adopted by what appears to be a wonderful family and is now sharing a pasture with a couple of other horses. He seems to be very happy in his new location. This knowledge softens the heartache Aeryn felt when I told her he was leaving. 

But Aeryn made me think. She is right when she says that old horses are like old people. Just as old cows are like old people. Animals have thoughts and feelings too even if we can not always tell what they are at a given time. My observant little girl is able to tell when her cows are happy, sad or scared. She knows when they are getting nervous or a bit stressed out. And the same applies to horses. Which makes me wonder are they really that much different than humans?

For the majority of my life I have preferred the company of horses and cows to humans. They are farm more pleasant to be around. Animals are also not deceitful. They are truthful and honest in their actions and mannerisms. 

Alex also seems to have a connection with animals. He could sit and watch Jay and Lilly's chickens for hours. Yesterday he and Aeryn got the joy of feeding them some bread under Lilly's watchful eye. I hope within the coming days to catch a picture of Alex crouching down with a big red chicken in front of him as he tries to get her to come over for him to pat. As a mother I have a horrible fear of the chicken just pecking his eye out. But my innocent boy has no fear. 

So I would like to give a thank you and a shout out to our friend Dan. He has made me think about the wonders of having animals in our lives. For us it happens to be being surrounded by horses and cows. For others it may be goats, sheep or chickens. And then there are people who have cats, dogs, birds....Animals are a blessing. Our lives would be empty without them. 

It's not about the money...

     If you want to earn millions of dollars, I am doing the two things in life that you do not want to do. I work in education and I am a die hard farm girl. However I think that these are two of the most rewarding passions anyone can pursue. Just not financially.
     When embarking on our bovine endeavor our resources were very quickly depleted and I realized that if this was going to continue I needed to do something a little different with our finances. My answer to this problem was to get a second job. And where did I apply you might ask? The local Tractor Supply Company. Finally a job where it is okay to bring out my inner redneck girl.
     So I am really writing this post for one of my coworkers, who after friending me on Facebook decided to read my blog. Not a bad thing. I WANT people to read what I write. I just never actually think about WHO reads it. It made me a bit self conscious but after a couple days of thinking about it I decided that it was a good thing. After all, he admitted that he does not like to read. And yet here he is reading my blog. SO...go me. Anyway back to working at Tractor Supply. I have worked there for about a month now. And things are great. I work three or four shifts during the week after I get out of school. The money is good and it also provides a discount on feed and supplies. Not a bad incentive to be good at your job.
     But as I was saying. Farming is definitely not about the money that can be earned in doing it. If you were to calculate man hours compared to profit and loss you would be seriously disappointed. Yet there are many people like me, who are getting back to their roots and working their own farms.
   Why would they do this? Who wants to work all day at a full time job, and then come home to feed animals and clean stalls and fix fences? Who wants to have to worry about all of the vet bills and hassles of worrying about the health and safety of a herd of animals? The answer...
     People who are real. In all my days of working on/around/with farms all of the people that I have met are down to Earth, real people. They do not have delusions of grandeur or aspirations of owning that fancy car and huge house. They are honest, hard working people. The ones that I want to be around. Tractor Supply has helped me connect with those people. (another bonus to the job)
     Back to the point though. No matter how bad a day I have had or how tired I am I know that I can go to the barn and feel better. Even stringing fence with Jay and Aeryn after a long day just makes me feel...satisfied. Like somehow, all the hardship, is worth what we are doing. I know that personally, my gains are worth the extra time and effort that we are putting in.
     My children are happier and healthier for all of the work that they do. Even Alex. He is out in the field with us feeding and fencing and having a good time. I look at them and realize that they already know more about life than most adults that I know. Aeryn knows the rigors of a hard days work. But she has also learned the benefits. Alex already knows safety rules and where he can and can not go without someone being with him. He has learned what an electric fence is for and not to go into the pasture alone. How many other people have toddlers who know these boundaries?
     So for us, it is not about the money. I am willing to put in the hours needed at TSC for us to continue this adventure. We will continue to learn and grow. And I will continue to write. Lets see if my coworker continues to read.....

Rotation, rotation, rotation

     So, thanks to Jay, we now have four more fields to rotate our cows into. Three of which are, or can be, attached to a barn. What a life saver for this winter. The barn is the perfect size for our four ladies and their new friend Dan (who I will talk about later) It gives us a great place to feed them on those cold winter months as well as a place to store bulk amounts of hay and grain. It also prevents us from having to lug the grain the distance from Jay's garage to the field. 

     More fencing was in order to get these fields ready to move the girls in. Well, in all actuality we moved the cows first and then worked on the fencing when they were getting used to their new field. Jay had brought down hay on the horse drawn wagon and we also used the horses to fence the far end of the pasture.

   Mary was with us fencing that first night. She helped set fence posts while Aeryn and I fixed the gate at the top of the field. Alex got to sit in the wagon with one of his favorite peope, Lily. He is actually even calling her Lily now. As opposed to calling McKinley Lily because he was under the impression that all dogs are named Lily. Jay drove the wagon and laid out the string. 

   The second evening we had set aside to work on the fence I got their a bit late because I had had to work a shift at Tractor Supply. The sky quickly darkened and we made it from the end of the field into the barn just in time for the sky to bust open and pour down on us. The cows had yet to go into the barn so I wanted to show them that they had a shelter from the rain and I diligently stood their, in the rain, until they came to the sound of my voice. 

Everyone enjoyed eating their grain where it was nice and dry. I on the other hand could not wait to get home and get into some dry clothes. 

Last night we did a bit more fencing and moved the grain barrels, and wheelbarrow down to the barn. Aeryn has gotten off pretty easy with the cows being in a pasture all summer. Now she will have to do some real chores and keep our "borrowed" barn clean, neat and tidy. 

We also got to weight tape the cows since we had them in an enclosed area. Though no one wanted to stand still to get a rope halter on so that they could be tied to stand. We got it done though. Weights will be posted later this evening.