The story began yesterday… how after the birth of a calf… there are things we always do.
Once the calf’s on the ground, then comes…
you guessed it…
time to clean up.
Even though our heifers are the only ones to use the calving shed (our cows do it out in sheltered areas), it’s still a pain to have to clean up the mess.
The pens where they are installed once the calving process starts, are bedded with straw and now that straw must be removed.
If the placenta wasn’t eaten by the cow, it’ll be tossed out of the corral… where, I know, my dogs used to snack upon it.
Yumyum.
Yeah.
Remember that when you let dogs lick your face. Oh, the Things They Have Eaten!
Wet straw from the amniotic sac is sometimes pitched out too, but most of the straw is still dry and relatively clean. It is simply forked out of the little pen into the bigger pen, to create a nice bed for the heifers to lay on every night. Face it, the straw will be wet soon enough from snow and mud and rain…
But it’s better than having them lay in the mud!
Each pen is cleaned.
In the spring after we’re done calving, this straw/manure mix will be cleaned out and hauled off with the manure spreader… fertilizer for fields!
Next, the newborns have to head out with momma.
They’ve bonded.
They can recognize each other.
The babies can just totter along… but it’s time to head out into the BIG NEW WORLD.
It can be Scary.
There’s white stuff and wet stuff and brown slick stuff and oooh, what an adventure!
More on that tomorrow!
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March 4, 2010 Questions and Answers
March 4, 2009 Heifers 3
March 4, 2008 Agility
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