Little Women
Aha!
For those of you who couldn't see my logo... I had it as a .tiff file not a .jpg, so that might have made a difference...
Try this.
Better?
I was plugging along at cleaning on my house this morning, when Vernon came back to the house. They had been retagging our replacement heifers... an annual job to find nice young cows to take the place of the older ones we've been forced to sell... and one evidently decided to try to jump out of the alley and had broken her leg. He was sick. These are our best of the best, and it was bad luck. Vernon decided he'd haul her to town since this is the day the local processing plant butchers cows. He'd offer to let them buy her as grass-fed... or grind her up into a LOT of hamburger for us.
And, of course, could I go take his place in the corral?
Sure!
Actually, with Daniel home, I do miss out on lots of activity around here that I've gotten used to doing these past four years.
And I haven't decided if I'm happy about it or not.
I imagine, come -40 degrees, I'll be thrilled that Daniel can take my place!
Some heifers need a tad more encouragement to stick their head in the head catch!
Tools of the day... I actually broke the nice tattoo-er... and we had to go dig out the old one. Actually a spring just wore out... so it's not like I broke it with my own strength or anything... The old one gets you covered in tattoo ink... I could have had a "Ten Sleep Ink" series today! Though betchadidn'tknow Ten Sleep really does have its own real tattoo parlor on main street!
When these old barrels rust completely out... what will we do? I'm pretty sure these have been here the past 30 years. I wonder how old they *really* are!
All the nice new earrings are lined up ready to go into the heifers' ears. Notice they all start with 9. That means they were born in the spring of 2009. We also brand a 9 on their left hip. So, not only are my fingers green... I also smell like branding smoke!
Daniel had a challenge on a couple of the girls... They were born on a frozen March morning... with the temperature well below zero. Their poor little wet ears froze... and fell off! He's hoping there's enough room for their new numbers to be tattooed in their left ears!
Success!
Well, take my word for it!
There they are... looking all grown up with their new age brands and large 9 eartags. What pretty little women.
Now, the rest of the story.
Vernon came back from town with the same heifer in the trailer. Seems that when he unloaded her at the butcher's... she was walking fine. She was putting weight on all four feet. She had evidently dislocated her ankle or whatever (I never saw the injury and forgot to ask which joint!) and on the hour's ride to Worland, she somehow re-located/un-dislocated her ankle. She was such a nice heifer, he couldn't see putting her down, so he brought her back home! We'll watch her and make sure she does OK... but she doesn't know how lucky she was today!
****
November 19, 2009 Puppy Thursday - I Fail AGAIN! Watch this for last year's retagging replacement heifer story... same day!
November 19, 2008 Old Girl - One Last Time, Honest!
Hey, this may seem like a minute detail to ask about, but I'm wondering what the little R means above the number on the ear tags? It looks like some of the others have something else written? Good luck with the lame heifer!
Reply to this
Taylor, that's just notes on who their daddy is... Keeps us better organized when they get bred in the future...
Reply to this
Talk about snatched from the jaws of death! If I were that cow, I'd buy a handful of lottery tickets today!!
Reply to this
Isn't funny, when we went to ear tags we stopped branding the year on the hip. Good looking heifers. Been a great year, hasn't it.
Reply to this
I once did a similar thing for a lamb whose leg was broken, though it was actually broken and he didn't come back home with me that day. The meat tasted AWFUL. Come to find out that a trauma like that can cause the animal to release adrenaline, which will taint the meat to the point of inedibility.
Glad your heifer had a better outcome!
Reply to this
I always like to see pictures of cattle work. That's something about the one heifer - hope she'll be O.K.!
Reply to this