Easter

May you, one and all, have a Blessed Easter!  I will try to come back and catch up soon...

Don't just count your blessings...share them!

Love and Peace to everyone,

Cava-Lanes Holsteins

Rambling, on and on, and on...

There has been so much going on...since my last post "Where's The Beef?".  The steer, Melinko, has gotten out 3 or 4 more times; today being one of those times.  We went to our first sale this season...the River Falls Dairy Club Sale.  Where we sold Diva, a calf by our Debra cow.  Diva found a new home and will be staying in Wisconsin.

We held another Dairy Farm Management Team Meeting and there is so much to do before the next meeting in April.  All this along with the new jobs and cleaning up for spring...whew!  How is your week going?

Where's the beef?

I was sitting at my computer in my living room trying to catch up on reading everyones blogs.  The dogs started barking like someone was in my driveway, so my youngest went to look out the door.  She starts yelling "the beefers are out!"  I look over and yep...both the show heifer and the show steer are looking into our front door windows.

I grab a coat, shoes and bolt outside.  They stand in my front yard just watching me as I run to the barn to grab halters and a bucket of grain.  As I approach them (shaking the bucket of grain), the just watch me and Melinko (the steer) starts to eat my little apple tree.  They let me get all the way up to them, I put some grain on the ground and walk up to Melinko...he takes one look a the halter and walks to the other side of Arianna.  She looks at the halter, puts her tail in the air and runs...oh C#%P!

I decide that if I stay with Melinko maybe Arianna will come back; and she does.  This time she snorts and runs past Melinko, circles back and heads down the driveway to the road.  Melinko takes this as his queue to run with her.

I run for the garage to get the truck; get my phone out and call my father-in-law.  Last time the steers ran on me he was a great help.  No answer there.  I call my Dad; he doesn't know much about large animals, but any help will do right?  Nope, he is out of the area.  The beefers headed west...I only have one neighbor to my west and I just saw them come home.  I call them...their line is busy.

Meanwhile...I get the truck stuck in the driveway AND it will not go into 4-wheel drive.  I jump out of the truck (grabbing the halters again) and run down the driveway hoping they hadn't gone onto the next road.

As I get out of my driveway I notice that they are in my neighbors ditch and turning back towards me.  I called to them and Arianna stareted towards me.

I started backing up, literally walking backwards with Arianna jogging towards me and Melinko following.  As they got to the driveway I walked forward forcing them up the driveway.  I had purposely left the door to the barn open with the thoughts that they might return to their comfort zone.  Which is, luckily for me, exactly what they did.  I followed them into the barn and put them into their stalls.  Believe it or not, they went to their own separate stalls with no help or issues.

I went out to check the fence.  They did not break it...the horses did.

My farrier was out on Monday night and told me that Ellie had a cut on her front left.  No suprise to me, I looked at the fence and it was still up.  Ellie is notorious for going through the electric wire.  Today, however, in the daylight I can see that at the corner by the gate, where the snow is almost over the fence, the top wire is down.  I go over and find that the fence is not only down, but stuck in the snow!  The horses could have walked out at any time over the last 4 days, but just didn't choose to.  They know where the hay is...the beefers, however, thought the grass might be greener on the other side of the fence.

I fixed the fence and all's well that end's well.

County Fair Weigh In

I have got to learn to carry my camera wherever I go!  Everyones blog is so filled with beautiful pictures; and my blog is usually picture free because I never seem to remember to grab it or it isn't ready.

Today was county fair weigh in's for the beef project.  My daughter has a beautiful black steer that she named the Great Melinko.  He is a Maine Anjou crossbred and weighed 940 pounds.  For us that means he is right on track and should weigh between 1400 and 1500 pounds for the show.

We usually raise a show steer with a freezer steer so they have each other as company.  This year due to our economic situation we decided to raise this years' show steer with the heifer that was shown last year.  The heifer was bred after fair and is due on June 24th.  We are very excited as we have always had steers...this means we will be having our first beef baby!  Is anyone else getting ready for the upcoming show season?

Last year's show steer on left; last year's show heifer on right.

Is it me...?

Is it me?  Lately, as I am responding to posts, I hit the submit button and ... nothing happens.  I wait and wait, then finally I get tired of waiting and hit the button again.  This time it works, great right?  Nope, now my comment is posted multiple times.  Very frustrating!  Any ideas (besides being patient)?

While I have your attention, I am also wondering what blogging etiquette is for comments.  I read so many great blogs, but by the time I get to them there are so many responses that anything I have to say is already said.  I truly want the author to know that I am reading (I read about 99% of all the blogs I follow), but don't want to sound like I am copying someone else or dumb.

I would love to hear if any of you have ideas on these subjects!  Are there etiquette rules for blogging?  Thank you for your responses! 

First Barrel Race

I was just reading A&MD Ranch's post about DD's race last year.  It totally brought back memories of my daughter's first barrel race.

I bought my mare (Tabby Bar Leo) as a six year old.  Her history was barrel horse from two until she was about four then she was sold to a farm for breeding purposes.  I found her there with a very pretty paint filly at her side.

A side note about me.  I was buying my second horse as I had made the common mistake of buying a green horse through someone who was going to help me "train" him.  Another story for another day.  Anyway, I love color breeds and while I was there to look at their paint selection, they suggested Tabby.  She was proven to throw color.  She was bred back to the same stud (next beginners mistake...which did turn out well).  I rode her and asked about her background.  They told me that a 14 year old girl had been using her as a barrel horse and that she was not fast enough for her.

Tabby is 16hh, which makes her a bit tall for me, but her disposition was just what I was looking for.  The breeding farm she was on, really wanted me to buy her with the filly at her side.  I knew I didn't know enough to handle the baby, but thought I would learn enough by the time Tabby foaled.  Again, another beginner mistake.  You cannot learn enough without help and living on the farm, which we did not.

Back to my daughters first ride.  We knew that Tabby was used to shows and arenas and both my kids wanted to show.  No problem!  We had a great 4-H leader, she took Tabby in for 30 days for reminder training and my kids went there for lessons.  They learned to set her up for halter classes, and walk, trot, lope, patterns for western pleasure.

Tabby was always level headed and very even tempered.  Where we boarded her, there were always people practicing their shooting with various guns and we were right off a busy highway with motorcycles and semis passing by.  Nothing ever seemed to bother her.

We get to the show and she is her usual self, until...my son, who has shown before but is still very green himself, takes Tabby (at halter) into the INDOOR ARENA.

Tabby gets about 4 steps into the arena and decides this just isn't for her.  She rears up, my son keeps hold of her.  Gets her back down, starts to move forward, she does it again.  This goes on about four times.  The judge has now backed way up and I am on pins and needles...what to do.  Well, after the fourth rear, my son shakes the halter (he may have said something, we couldn't hear) and she just walks forward.  Completes her class and places middle of the group.  Next up...my daughter.  She is 6 years younger than her brother and I am not sure what to do.  Well, she takes Tabby and walks right into the arena with no problem.  Does not place as well as her brother, but who cares...she is just learning.

Tabby did fine in all her under saddle classes, they were held outside.  The last day of fair are the speed and fun classes.  My daughter only entered in the walk, trot classes which meant she could only enter the walk, trot speed groups.  She signed herself up for the egg race and barrels.  None of us thought anything about it.  During the egg race she dropped the egg early and was out.  Getting a little down as she did not get a blue ribbon all week.  She got herself ready for the barrels by watching some of the others go first.  Then she mounted Tabby...

OMG!!!!  The mares ears went forward, she tensed completely up and I grabbed the 4-H leaders arm and said sh#$#.  The gate opened and the mare NEVER broke the trot.  My daughter won the trophy for best time in the walk, trot group.  We all went home happy.

I must say that moment when I realized that I just put an animal with competition experience and my daughter with no barrel experience in that situation I was paralyzed.  I was 5 months pregnant and trying to figure out how I was going to jump the fence and save my daughter.  We laugh now, but at the time...wow!

Sorry about the lack of pictures...my scanner went down today and these were taken over 8 years ago.  Before I had a digital camera.

Thanks to A&MD Ranch for taking me down memory lane!

Do you have friends and neighbors like this?

How do you ever repay the kindness shown to you? We have had a very stressful year (as most people did), yet many positive things also happened.

One of the stressful things that happened was one of my husband's favorite cows injured herself. The vet called the injury a "stifle". Most cows do not recover from this type of injury. She was on a flush cycle at the time and the vet said all we could do was keep her comfortable, continue with the flush and see how she feels. After a couple of weeks, her leg did not seem worse so we continued keeping her on stall rest.

About a month after the flush we had the vet out to check her leg and give her an all over physical. We routinely check the cows for pregnancy after a flush to make certain that no embryos mistakenly remained. The vet liked the way her hip and leg were moving but informed us that she was not only pregnant, but it was twins.

This gives us some extra problems. With a leg injury do you want her pregnant? Much less trying to carry twins? She needs a pen to herself, with winter coming, we wont have that kind of space available...now what?

As we discussed all of this with our vet, he assured me that the leg was coming along better than expected and if we could find her the right situation, he felt she had a good chance of maintaining her health and the babies.

Since it was still warm outside we had some time to find the right "situation". My husband gave it a lot of thought and came up with an interesting idea. Spicey didn't originate on our farm, she was purchased from a farm that was no longer going to milk Holsteins, but milk Jerseys. He called the farm and asked about their winter situation. They, of course, remembered Spicey's dam and said they would love to help.

Spicey's pen is made out of concrete and we used several bales of straw to make her a pack. The pack was very thick, which is why her leg was not as stressed and she seemed to be improving. The Jersey farm had an outbuilding with a dirt floor and straw pack. This would be even more ideal for her leg. We were very excited to take her there. I was a little nervous putting her on a trailer because there is a step to get in or out.

We got her there and she got out of the trailer very well. She walked over to the feed and checked it out before looking around at her new herd mates. I am pretty sure she was wondering why they all looked like solid color heifers to her. She is a very large Holstein and Jerseys are a smaller breed.

While watching her to make certain that she would settle in without any issues, the Jersey farm owner told us that they would be happy to keep her until after she calved. This is a huge responsibility for the farm. Twins are difficult for the cow and the farm, but we weren't sure when we would move her during her pregnancy since we wouldn't want to stress her or her legs.

Incredible that they would want to help us like this! For those of you that farm, you know how difficult it is to find enough space for your own animals, much less make room for someone elses' larger animal.

We were on their farm last week and Spicey is doing great! She has good body condition, barely limps (you really have to look for it and know which leg to watch) and seems really happy.

They said the only time she shows her injury (or age), is when it gets really cold outside. Being 10 and a grandma, she gets a little stiff when getting up at first.

We are so very lucky and blessed that this has all worked out so well. I will try to come back in the spring and let you know how she fares during the birthing process and if the twins survive.

These are not the only amazing friends and neighbors we have...

We had a ton of help from people during our recent classification and Dvorak Farms has been instrumental in keeping us going since we took over from my husband's father.

I would love to hear from other people who have GREAT friends and neighbors that have helped them. In closing, remember to thank GOD each day for the great things and people in our lives.

New Website

I have created a website for our farm...I would love to get some feedback! I had a website once before...when I was in real estate. The last provider I used seemed much easier, this time things are not going as smoothly.

For one thing...I can't get through the process of optimization! Driving me crazy! Adding pages and changing content is soooo much slower than it was a few years ago...is it me?

Anyway, I would love feedback if anyone gets time to look at the site. I really would like the site to be user friendly and easy to navigate.

http://www.cava-lanesholsteins.com/

Thank you!