We've had a busy 24 hours after another winter storm. We laugh at how these winter storms get named once they get to Minnesota--no one cares about us in the west. But I digress. We had a winter storm warning on Friday with 100% chance of snow in the forecast and didn't get a flake. That storm apparently took a track to the north, thank goodness. So, when there was another winter storm warning issued for Sunday we were hoping it would take that same track (sorry, Saskatchewan), but it didn't. We had heavy, wet snow all morning with wind in the forecast for the afternoon. We did our morning feeding chores and made sure there was a good supply of straw in all the pens. We had one heifer looking like she was ready to calve so we put her in the barn and ran home for a little while. M went to check on her right before the NASCAR race started, and she had had the calf with no problem.
We watched the race with one eye out the window. It continued to snow, but the wind didn't kick in until the end of the race. As soon as it was over (yes, we're race fanatics), we packed an overnight bag and some groceries and took off to the cows intending to spend the night at the house at the farm. Those two miles in between get mighty long when you can't see 10 feet in front of you, so we weren't going to be driving back and forth. We didn't go over any too soon.
As soon as we got there, we put all the heifers with calves back in the barn. Those poor little things were wet with snow. We also put in a couple of heifers that looked close to calving. I'd thought one of mine looked close for a few days so M asked if I wanted her in, too. Of course, I did so in she went. She is so calm and nice, but she'd been on the fight a little bit, pushing other cows around, so I thought she must be getting close.
We had a couple of cows with calves so we pushed them into the corral with the pregnant heifers so they could get some shelter in the shed and stay warmer. Then we let the cows in the calving pasture into the back pens where the heifers with babies had been so that they could get more shelter.
We checked on them again just before dark and nothing was calving. There were already big drifts in the yard so that we couldn't take the pickup from the house to the barn. We checked again about 11 and decided to move a couple of the pregnant heifers into the front of the barn so they weren't in the midst of the ones that already had calves. We had to do a bit of cleaning up and put some panels up to keep them out of all the stuff we have stored in there. I recall when R was leaving us to go back to school that I said his would be mighty big shoes to fill and I would not be checking heifers in the dark in a blizzard like he did. I had to eat those words, I guess.
We then went to bed, but I don't think either of us slept much. We were in a double bed which we're not used to. This morning M said I had all the covers. I told him he had all the bed!
We were up before daylight and it was -4 degrees. Not good calving weather! We went out to check and one of the heifers had just calved.....and made a mess of the barn in the process! M went to check the cows that we had locked in the windbreak and found one there ready to go. She was happy, eager even, to go to the barn, and we had no trouble getting her in. We went to have breakfast, and she had calved by the time we came back to check on her. We went to feed and by then my heifer had had her calf. Very lucky that we had all three of them in the barn and not outside. A new, wet baby wouldn't last long out in that weather.
Thankfully, the sun is out today and the wind isn't howling so we can see where we have to dig out. M had to plow into the calving pasture so he could feed those cows. He also plowed a path from the house so we could get our pickup out, and then he plowed us home. There was a waist-high drift in front of our garage but just a few on the road. Could have been worse.
We're ready for naps, now, so we can dream of spring which is only a two days away, right?
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