Vacation Destination

I am sure all of you know someone, or maybe you are that someone, who has a home away from home.  Maybe it is a beach house that your family goes to for the summer, a hunting cabin up North, or a condo in the States where you spend the winter.  Regardless of who it is that you know, you get the point.

I know of a few couples who spend their winter in their RV, travelling the States.  Just like the geese, these couples fly South for the winter.  Seems pretty reasonable and straight forward, and I am sure all of you knew this.  But what some of you may not have known is this: on our farm our cows have a winter home too!


Yes, you read right!  Every year when the snow comes, my family starts preparing our North pasture just behind our barn for our cattle! This is the one time of the year when all of the cows are together in the same pasture, no bulls allowed!

In the summer, this winter home is seeded to crops.  Since I can remember, the cow's winter home has served as a grain crop, a canola crop, and this year a hay field! Lucky for us, having our cows out there for part of the winter means we have the best, natural soil enhancer!

So, why do we move our cows??

On our farm, our cows usually begin calving (having babies) around the beginning of March.  This means that by the end of February my dad has to start checking the cows every few hours make sure none of them have problems while trying to calve.  As you all know, tempratures in this province can be fairly drastic, so we don't want a cow to have a wet little baby outside in the freezing cold temperatures for too long, we want to make sure we are there shortly after the babies birth to bring it into the cozy barn, or to help the mother calve if need be.

So at the end of February we move all of our calves to a maternity pasture, nice and close to the barn! This is their vacation home

Just a few of the cows out on swath grazing a month or so before they got moved to the maternity pasture!

One of our biggest concerns during calving season is keeping those babies healthy!

On really cold nights if a calf isn't brought into the barn and warmed up on time bad things can happen...

The mama cow on the left froze her ears off when she was a baby! Notice how they are smaller than the cow on the right.

The baby could lose it's ears! When the little wet ears are left out in the cold for too long, they can freeze the tips off and leave the baby looking like this one!  The calf is still just as good as any other calf, they just tend to look like little goats!

Or the babies could get sick.  For sick babies we usually put them under one of our heat lamps, in a special little room just big enough for the babies.

And worst case scenario, a baby could die.

So we make sure that we are always out in the field, checking the cows every couple of hours.  My dad and grandpa are really good at being able to tell a couple hours before when a cow is going to calve.
Usually the cow will:

• head off to a secluded area of the pasture by herself.  A few years ago my dad got lazy and didn't close the gate when going on hi bihourly check.  This is usually not an issue, none of the cows ever think to leave their winter home.  As an exception to this rule, my cow decided she wanted to go back to her summer home to give birth.  So she snuck out of the pasture and headed across the highway where we keep one of our groups during the summer.  Luckily for my dad, he could easily see her tracks in the fresh snow and found her in no time at all.  Luckily for me, the highway wasn't busy that night! Needless to say, my dad never leaves a gate open anymore, unless our Border Collie, Lady, is around to watch over it.  
• the cows udder will have gone through a noticeable change in the week before they are about to calve. The udder begins to "spring" meaning, it tightens up with milk in preparation for the baby. 
• The cow will have a water bag, a whitish sac filled with fluid that will break when the calf begins to tell. If the bag has broken, there is usually a string of it hanging down, and there will likely be wet parts on the cows legs!  
• Be hunched up in her back,  with her tail up, or pointed straight outwards, looking like she is pushing.
• Eventually, in most cases, the cow will lie down on her side and push the baby out.  When the baby finally does come out, the cow immediately starts tending to her young, and within a few hours the baby will be standing up, taking it's first drink of colostrum - a special, nutrient rich milk that helps to give the babies antibodies that they need. On our farm we milk some of our better milk producing cows so that we have some extra colostrum to give a baby calf if need be.  We store this in our freezer in icecream pails.  I can remember a few years ago, a friend going to grab our ice cream for dessert, opening the pail and saying "I think this ice cream may be bad, it looks pretty yellow".  Thankfully for her she didn't take a taste test, I don't think colostrum tastes very good!

After the cows have their calves, they get moved from the big calving pen, to a smaller pen where their mama's get put on a higher cut of hay (higher quality) and some grain for a few days while they adjust to their new babies.  This also alows us to keep a close watch on the new babies in case anyone isn't eating properly, or gets sick.  It is in these small pens that the babies begin to socialize with one another! Watch my little twins as they chase one another around! (sorry for the bad quality, I always snap pictures and videos from my phone when the babies are doing something cute, I don't always have my camera!)

  

After a few days in the new baby pen, the calves are moved out to their summer pasture.  Unfortunately by this time, there is still a great deal of snow on the ground so we have to feed them silage each day or spread out a bale of hay for them! 

In this picture, almost all of the snow is gone, but the grass just isn't  good enough yet so my dad still had to feed the cows a little bit! This picture was taken at the end of April!

Once enough of the cows have calved, we begin dividing them up by breed, and they get taken off to seperate pastures.  On our farm, all of the heifers get bred to a Red Angus bull, because they are known for their smaller sized calves, which means hopefully more ease when calving for their first time.  Our red cows usually go with a Charolais (white) bull, and the tans and whites go with our Red Angus or Simmental bulls.  We breed for tan or lighter colored calves, and with this method of breeding we usually get them!  We can't always sort the cattle like this though because you don't want a cow to be bred by her father! 

Here are a few of my dad's cows this afternoon, relaxing in the sunshine.  The red white faced cow lying down is my cow Sophie!

Isn't it amazing! The birds chirping in the background, the green grass, and the happy cows!

Today we let some of my grandpa's red cows change pastures.  With all of the rain the grass in the pastures is lush and amazing! The cows couldn't wait to cross the creek to get to their summer home!

My dad leading the way to check the creek as the cows follow on their way to their newest destination!

Dad walking back, the cows knew where they were going, and he didn't want to cross the creek on foot like them!

A few of the babies missed the memo and didn't follow the whole herd to the new pasture! Lucky for them, one of the mama's came back and got them! It was adorable seeing all six of the babies running after her!

Just like many summer homes, our cows summer home also overlooks a lake!

Who knew our farm was such a vacation destination!

The weather was beautiful today! I had a great day hanging out at my vacation destination with my grandpa and my dad!

Until next time!

Sam