Some days are worse than others

So many people ask me 'how do not get upset every time an animal dies?' And the answer is, if we aren't affected by the loss or suffering of an animal, then we shouldn't be farmers.

To Ben and I, and most farmers, the illness, death or sale of an animal is never an easy issue and a few weeks ago we had a prime example of that gut wrenching sort of experience. We have had animals die, animals get sick and need to be put down, animals get shipped to auction and animals go into our freezer, I can't think of a single time that the event didn't cause some sort of mental anguish for us. Even #17, an ornery wild child of a milk cow who wouldn't breed back, caused me grief. I always said I hated that cow, she caused me hours of extra work because we had to chase her around the barnyard to go in for milking, four feet of snow outside the old barn door and she would decide to dip and dive amongst the snow drifts to stay outside with the bull. I cursed her many days, but when we found out there was no way she would breed back and we needed to 'cull' her (this generally means they go for beef, not the beef we sell, but to a major slaughterhouse where they end up in wholesale ground beef) I still was not happy. I didn't jump for joy that she was leaving, I felt sorry that her life needed to end for this minor infraction, but we can't afford to keep our cull cows around to live out their days.
So there are many of these instances of mental anguish over the loss of an animal, but the instance at hand was a little different. We had a five year old milk cow with a twisted stomach. We were quite confident that the vet could fix it surgically without the use of antibiotics, but she had a couple strikes against her already. First, her name was 'Ugly' for good reason, sharp angular features dominated her. She was too tall and thin to be a good grazer, her feet were bad from the day we bought her and her teats had always pointed together in a way that had made milking her a little more difficult. This lactation however, her teats were pointing outwards, which means that the dividers in her udder were losing their elasticity(think about aging and gravity in women). The vet arrived, ready and willing to do an operation to untwist the cow's stomach and tack it in place so it wouldn't happen again. My husband, Ben, wasn't feeling well so he was in the house when the vet arrived. I pointed Ugly out and the vet brought her into our milking parlor to get a better look at her. Upon checking her temperature he found that she had a fever of over 103 which is his cut off for not allowing a conventional cow to have surgery. For a non-organic dairy the vet would give the cow antibiotics and come back the next day to see if the temp had dropped enough to operate, but since we are organic the vet doesn't have the luxury of treating with antibiotics and waiting for the temp to come down could mean the twisted stomach would kill her.
About this time Ben came out to the parlor and asked the vet why Ugly would have a fever. The vet explained that Ugly's left lung was not functioning properly and pneumonia was the cause of the fever. Ben was horrified that in May (generally a very healthy time for our cows) we could have a cow with pneumonia, but the vet shrugged his shoulders and explained that he had seen it a lot recently, perhaps due to the cold wet Spring.
So Ben listed for the vet all of the strikes against Ugly; bad feet, bad udder, twisted stomach, pneumonia and an extremely slim chance of living long enough to have surgery to fix her stomach. Basically the decision was written on the wall. We could keep her at home, treat her with natural supplements to try and boost her immunity, but most likely she would die in the next few days and we would have to pay a rendering service to come pick her up. Our other option would be to ship her to auction as soon as possible, get about $1000 for her to be sent to a major slaughterhouse. The vet mentioned that one of our neighbors had just arranged to have some cull cows picked up by our cattle hauler, so that was the last straw, Ugly would be leaving today.

We hadn't raised her, we hadn't even owned her for more than 2 years, she was a good milker, but not fantastic, she wasn't extremely personable like some of the other girls, but she wasn't as unpersonable as others, no great genetic lineage made her more valuable, but she held a special place in my heart as our 'ugly girl.' When the vet mentioned that the cattle hauler would be nearby within the next hour Ben nodded his head in acknowledgement of the decision that we both knew was made. Ben did not make eye contact with me, but I would guess his stomach was churning just as mine was. I needed to turn away from Ben, our son Will, the vet, and most importantly Ugly, to catch my breath as I gulped back a cry and wipe the tears that were welling up in my eyes.


This wasn't the most tragic loss we have had, nor was it the most insignificant, but every time I visit Ugly's calf, a cute little girl named Kermit, I get a ball in my throat and think of how I miss seeing Ugly every day. I miss her when I bring the cows in from pasture, I miss having her at the back of the line, sore foot keeping her from moving very fast, low hanging udder swaying with each step and her sharp hip bones protruding as she meandered back to the barn. I miss her, plain and simple. Do I miss all of the ones that we lose or get rid of, no, but is each loss hard, yes, most definitely!
We paid $2200 for Ugly, fed her organic feed for 2 years and sold her for less than half what we paid, it isn't all about money (if it were we wouldn't be farmers), but we have to pay the bills. So the best we can do right now is respect the animals, respect their sacrifice, respect their nature, respect their memory, this is a business, not a sanctuary. I miss Ugly, Ben misses Ugly, but by the afternoon of the day she left we were on to other struggles, other tasks and even other heartaches.

The cows are out!

So the rain doesn't seem to be letting up anytime soon, but the cows have been itching to get outside and eat some green grass. Well last Saturday they got their wish, and while there isn't a lot of good grazing yet, the cows are still enjoying a half day of munching on some sparse green stuff. The grass seems to be about 2 weeks behind in terms of growth, due to the cold and excessively dreary Spring we have experienced so far.
The fields are wet so we are hesitant to let the cows in our better pastures, but we are letting them on a steep hillside that we plan to reseed in a couple of weeks. This way the cows can churn up the soil a little for us before we use a no-till seed drill to re-plant some perennial forage seed.
For now the lactating cows will get days out on wet, sparse pasture and nights in the bedded pack barn to eat some baleage and corn, meanwhile the heifers and beef cows are picking at a little bit of green grass and eating some hay on the driest ground we can find.
 I love pasture season! I love the girls out on grass, I love moving fence in the quiet of the morning or at dusk and I love watching the girls rush into the next paddock in excited anticipation of the smorgasbord of crisp green leaves. Our cows love the bedded pack barn with it's thick cushy bedding and wide open space to kick up their heels, but just like humans they get cabin fever and no matter how nice the surroundings they long for a change of scenery. Lucky for these girls they get a new paddock every day during the grazing season, and sometimes they get a second new paddock each night.

These are pictures of the girls heading back to the barn last night to get milked. It was drizzling lightly and they could hear the corn being laid out for them in the bedded pack barn, so there was a race to get there as quick as they could. The meandered carefully down my parent's driveway (it make a nice cow lane), but once they got in the barnyard near the bedded pack barn they took off in a sprint.

Chickens, Chicks and Babysitting Florence Henderson and Betty White

Preparing the wagon.

Will helping Daddy haul the wagon.

 Last Monday we decided it was time to get the chickens out on pasture and prepare our garden for Spring. The hens had made the garden next to our house their winter home for a multitude of reasons; they would be close so we could keep an eye on them, the garden would get the benefit of some added fertilizer, electric was nearby for adding a light and a heater for their water dish, and I can easily take kitchen scraps out my backdoor to them or bring milk from the parlor.

Heifers come see what's happening

Setting up the fence

Chickens settling in.

So after 5 months in one spot, Ben hooked out "gypsy chicken wagon" up to the tractor, inflated the tires and drove it down the road to the heifer pasture. Now I move their electric netting fence around each day so they get new piles of manure to dig through and about once a week we will move the entire wagon. There are many benefits to moving the chickens around; they help control parasite and insect problems in the pasture, they fertilize the field, they get some added nutrients from sourcing some of their food from plants and bugs and we get more nutritious eggs. Mother Earth News recently re-published their own findings on the added health benefits of "free-range" eggs.
So once the girls were out on pasture we started getting our old stationary coop ready for new chicks and some weeklong guests. Saturday evening one of my co-workers brought up her two city girls, Florence and Betty to stay for a week while she visits her daughter and grandkids down South. While Florence and Betty seemed a little upset that their Mom didn't want to ride for 12+ hours in a car with them, I think they are happy hanging out on the farm. It may not be the luxurious life of downtown Owego, but they are experiencing a vacation of sorts (more like camping.)

Yesterday marked the arrival of a batch of new chicks from Murray McMurray Hatchery, and we are very excited to check on the babies several times a day.
Will loves his new babies, but has to be reminded regularly that you have to be very gentle and little boys are not allowed to pick the chicks up. Aunt "Daisy" came today to pick up her share of the chicks, a Blue Andalusian, one Silver Laced Wyandotte, two Auracanas and one Golden Laced Wyandotte. That leaves us with 57 chicks, 12 of which are Delaware roosters that we will be raising for meat. We also have some Broad Breasted Bronze turkeys on order from Agway to try raising this Summer.

Leanne

You may have read about Leanne a while ago, she had a difficult delivery of her first calf and was unable to stand on her own for several weeks. Well, this picture is of Leanne. She is still not the most agile cow in the herd, but I have argued with Ben that she isn't the least agile either.
After weeks of babying her, carrying feed and water to her, lifting her first with hip clamps, then with a full-body sling and later helping to stabilize her hind end while she attempted to get up... we can now say that she is fully mobile all on her own. I saw her run last night, it wasn't a pretty run, but she was gimping along, three legs running and one stiff leg only assisting when it could. Hopefully she will do alright on the treks back and forth to the pasture in a few weeks, right now she doesn't have much traveling she has to do.
The other cows have been picking on her a little, but most get out of her way when they see her in their path. She still wears the scars from the hip lifters and the sling, but I would say it was worth it. All those weeks she never lost the brightness in her eyes or the perky look on her face. Leanne was excited every time we came near and knew that it was time to try and get up. She would 'moo' everytime the other cows went in to be milked because she wanted so badly to go with them. Now she can go, but she isn't getting milked, I think she just likes to feel like a part of the group.
We are thankful to have the bedded pack barn because if she had been immobile for that long on a concrete floor there is no way she would have stayed as healthy and pneumonia most definitely would have set in. Now we can hope she gets bred soon, continues to improve while on pasture and gets her chance to be part of the milking herd next year.

Could be the same title as my last post, but instead let's say call this 'Spring'

So it's snowing again (thus I have time to write). Maybe this snow will damper the smell of chicken manure permeating our farm. We received our 3rd tractor trailer load of chicken manure yesterday, the 4th, and hopefully final, load is on its way tomorrow and phheeewwweeeyyy it smells rotten around here. Probably most visitors thought our farm stunk already, but we never really noticed until this crap arrived.
Being organic means that we can't use synthetic sources of nitrogen to fertilize our fields, but chicken manure is an excellent source of nitrogen. Another local organic farmer found a chicken farm in Lancaster, Pa that is sending a truck to Wagner Lumber in Owego to pick up mulch and therefore doesn't need to charge much to send loads of manure up here.
Thanks to Organic Valley's regional herd health meetings we have also learned more about folliar feeding our pasture and hay fields. You might wonder why we would learn about fertilizers at a herd health meeting, but if you knew Dr. Paul Detloff, the veterinarian presenting at these meetings, you wouldn't be surprised by the topic. Dr. Paul came all of the way from Wisconsin to spend a week traveling New York State to help Organic Valley farmers learn about managing herd health on their own farms. Dr. Paul takes a holistic approach to looking at animal health and considers the health of our soils and quality of our forage as the groundwork for healthy cows. We learned a lot about how to make our own fertilizers using a source of sugar, milk, fish emulsion, apple cider vinegar and various other lesser ingredients to spray on our fields or even our home gardens. Dr. Paul also realizes that most farmers have a hard time finding hours in the day to mix these foliar feeds, so most farmers will purchase them from a local supplier, but he uses a homemade blend for his own business growing herbs for the various tinctures he produces and I intend to use his recipe for our garden this Spring.
We were lucky enough to host one of the herd health meetings and have Dr. Paul evaluate some of our cows. He is such a pleasure to listen to and has so much knowledge to share that if you ever get the chance to attend a conference that he speaks at I would definitely recommend it. One of the topics he explained to us was a old German theory on reading bovine hair coats. This theory, which Dr. Paul tested with success on our farm, uses the visual interpretation of a cow's hair patterns to distinguish the quality of milk production (quantity, protein and butterfat), the breeding status or even the endocrine function of a cow.
We have spent the last week trying to implement some of Dr. Paul's suggestions and Ben has had to wake me from a daze as I study a cow's haircoat instead of doing the task at hand while we are trying to milk.
Between our search for foliar fertilizer, the truckloads of our chicken manure sitting a couple hundred yards from my house and the arrival of our clover seed you can bet that the winter is almost over and this snow won't stick around very long.

More Snow ARRRGHHH!

Yesterday was spent digging out. Skid steer didn't want to run, 4' drift in front of the parlor door, much bigger drifts all over the farm, a cow died yesterday, a calf (Charlie)lost her fight with pneumonia, and the milk truck driver got stuck several times on the way to our farm Sunday night. It was the kind of day that made you stomp your feet, throw your fist in the air and shed a few tears, but the sun came out, the best Vet we could ask for drove from PA through really nasty conditions to help out, our neighbor spent most of the day doing all he could to help and my parents worked their butts off helping Ben any way they could. By noon we were getting back on track and today will be business as usual.
The cows are itching to get out and enjoy this sunshine, but for right now the snow is too deep to keep the fence hot enough to restrain them. So instead they kick up their heals and do laps in the bedded-pack barn. It is great fun to watch, especially when Ben spreads sawdust in the evening, the cows chase each other around the pack, bouncing, kicking, bucking and they like to run through the stream of sawdust as it comes out of the blower. Will rides on Ben's lap in the skid steer while I guard the barn door to keep the crazy girls from galloping outside.
Spring is on it's way, some of my seeds are planted, our chicks are ordered, we will be frost seeding clover soon, the birds are chirping more every day, I heard a kitten 'mewing' in the hay mow and I noticed yesterday that my relish supplies are dwindling. There may be ice on the tree branches, but it won't be long now before a crocus emerges and the golden-green hue of buds replaces the ice on the trees.

More babies!

It may be cold outside, but we have had several babies in the last week. This morning Ben pulled a heifer calf that was breach. She survived and is doing well with her Mom. We went to the barn last night to bring the cows in and had a surprise in the barn, a brand new bull calf standing amongst the cows.
Another bit of news is that a 1st calf heifer that birthed several weeks ago was paralyzed after the birthing process. Ben has borrowed and purchased equipment to help her get up and get circulation to her rear legs, but to no avail. She occasionally would put forth some effort to try and get up, but Ben gave up lifting her with the equipment because it seems to hurt her more than it helps. Weeeellll after weeks of little improvement Leanne finally got her rear feet under her for a few steps both Friday and Saturday nights! It seems as though she is on her way to making a full recovery.

Fresh Meat!

We just had a steer and 3 pigs butchered. This was our first attempt at raising piglets, but we hope to raise more in the Spring and potentially get a breeding sow. Contact us for a list of available meat and pricing.

We have been milking in the new parlor for nearly a year and the improvement in our cows' health and our health is immense! The cows get to lie on the soft a cushy bedded pack out of the snow, sleet and wind, they have a nice feeding alley so they don't have to fight to compete for food and they aren't stuck in the poorly ventilated tie stall barn for several hours every milking. Similarly we can milk 80 cows in just about an hour, prep time is about a 1/2 hour and clean-up is less than an hour, which allows Ben to get caught up on all the extra daily chores. We also don't miss all the bending and crouching that we used to do in the old barn or the awful smell of the ammonia filled air in that barn when you pack 60+ cows and calves into a poorly ventilated space. We are extremely grateful for the lifestyle we can now lead!
There may be debt, a 24/7 job and daily struggles, but life is good!