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Here Comes The Sun

The newest project around the ranch has been the installation of a solar pump for a stock well.  One of the pastures that we lease doesn't have any natural water, just a well.  Last year we had to run up there every day and start a generator to pump water.  It's about 8 miles through the prairie from our house to the well so it got old before long.  M had done some research on solar systems and talked to a lady at a booth at the MATE show in Billings in February.  They determined what we'd need based on the depth of the well, flow rate, etc. and shipped us everything we'd need.

They had to build a small corral for the solar panel assembly so that the cows couldn't rub on it.  M told R what needed to be done and R did most of it by himself.  Actually, he didn't do it exactly like M had told him because he saw that it wasn't going to be big enough that way.  M was pretty impressed with his work.  R was gone for the weekend so on Sunday M enlisted me to help him put the solar panels up.  Not sure why he decided to have me help him do a job that required lifting and working over my head other than he thought I'd be good at reading the instructions.  We managed to get the two solar panels up on the pole and then added the tracker system.  That allows the panels to follow the sun so you get more bang for your buck. 

The hard part came on Monday when they had to pull the old pump and put the solar pump down and then hook up the electronics.  They seem to have forgotten to send the instructions for that part.  The guys had some trouble getting the old pump pulled out but eventually got it, put the new one in, hooked it up and voila, it works!

M showing our neighbor how the solar system works.

Yesterday M and R moved the heifers up to that pasture and on Monday they moved another group of cows and calves near Richland.  Just one more group to move, but we have more fence repair to do before we can do that.

R was gone over the weekend and left Kobe with us.  Talk about busy with two puppies in the house!  They played well together, but it was a bit exhausting.  Good thing we bought paper towels by the case!  R is a little worried about the payback when he has them both for awhile.

Junior and Kobe taking a break.

 C and J are busy spraying, and they can see the end.  R is gearing up to start cutting hay.  We've had rain showers every few days so the grass is looking great.  Keeping our fingers crossed that we get some sprinkles in July.

Making Babies (we hope)

We continued the breeding process last week. We left the CIDR devices in for ten days and then had the fun job of pulling them out again.  At that time we gave them a shot of hormone and applied heat detection patches to their backs.  The ones we had last year were self-adhesive, but we had the vet order them in for us this year and they were different.  When I opened the box and discovered tubes of adhesive I groaned thinking they were really going to be a pain in my butt to apply.  Luckily, M's sister and our niece arrived just in time to take over that job.  And, an excellent job they did!  Our 15-year-old cousin was helping us again.  He was helping work the chute and R was pushing so the three of us shared the job of pulling out the CIDRs.  Our niece has a 5-year-old daughter who was asking R all kinds of questions about what we were doing.  His response was "I just don't know how to explain it to you".

The next day we started looking for the heat detection patches.  They were white when they went on and I thought the black cows looked like walking wounded, all with a white patch on their backs.  The cows "ride" each other when in heat and when they do that the patches turn color.  The next day we started to see red ones, like they were bleeding through their bandages.  Those with red bandages were separated and put in pens to be bred in a few hours.

We had a half-inch of rain that night so on Friday we were working in muck again.  We bred some early in the morning and then took a break and then we had a big bunch to do Friday afternoon.  Our AI person had another friend come help him so that it would go faster and he wouldn't get so worn out.  By Friday afternoon (the third time through the chute in ten days) the cows were as tired of us as we were of them and weren't as easy to work with.  Plus, the hotshot ran out of battery.  Not good.  We left a gate open so that once they were bred they could go out of the corral into a holding area before being sent out to pasture.  M told me that if he missed catching one in the head gate to run and close that gate.  Unfortunately, that either meant crossing quicksand in the corral or taking a longer way around.  I said I would run like the wind.  M said it would be okay if I didn't get there in time as long as I did a face plant in the mud and he got to see it.  Nice guy.  I did have to make that run a couple of times, especially toward the end when everyone was getting tired.  I was never so glad to see a cattle oiler salesman as I was that day because I had to run home and write him a check so I missed out on the last few.  I'm still wondering who thought it was a good idea to do 120 head.  We were all pooped.

We took it a little easier over the weekend although R and M put some bulls out on Saturday morning.  M has the scar to show he was working.  They had a bull loaded in the trailer and were going to gate it in the front of the trailer.  When M went to close the gate it kicked the gate which came back and whacked him and give him a nice gash in his forehead.  I tell everyone that he mouthed off one too many times and I let him have it.

It was a pretty laid back weekend, though.  J and K and the baby went camping at the lake, C and his wife went out of town for a wedding, R went to Glasgow to a demolition derby and we went to see M's parents, sister and her family for the evening.  Sunday we had a bit of a come-and-go family day at the parents' house for Father's Day.

Today M and R moved the heifers to their summer pasture.  We have a couple more groups of cows to move and a couple more bulls to put out and then we feel like we can take a breath before haying starts and hope we made a bunch of babies.

Hey, Could You......?

My day....

"Hey, could you watch my dog?  I'm fencing at the river and don't want to take him".  Sure, two puppies will be no trouble at all.  R's puppy (Kobe) is half border collie and have lab and is about 10 weeks old, I think.  Ours (Junior) is full border collie and 7 weeks old.  We haven't had a full-time puppy since 1995 so it's a bit of an adjustment for us.  Kobe is growing by leaps and bounds and looks so huge compared to Junior.  Junior was a bit intimidated at first, but he definitely held his own and let Kobe know when he'd had enough.  It was nonstop motion here for a few hours.  I did have to try to mow my lawn, though, so they went to puppy jail for a little while.

"Hey, could you take lunch to J, C and Jared?"  Uh, sure, but I have two puppies and no ideas for lunch.  No problem, sandwiches all around and Kobe in the dog crate while Junior made the trip to the field.  I think Kobe wore him out because he had a nap in the pickup.

"Hey, could you help us move and give us a ride back to town since it looks like it's going to rain?"  Sure, I have nothing else to do.  That plan changed when a wheel bearing went out of the roller so I just had to flag J to Richland.

"Hey, could you come help me fence?  I need one more hand."  Sure, who needs more than ten minutes at home?  This time Junior went to the crate and Kobe went fencing.  R was stringing out a new wire and needed some help.  I thought I'd just be there for a minute but then he wanted me to start clipping the wire to the posts at one end while he started on the other.  Then it started to rain a little, then harder.  Then we ran out of clips and came home. 

Kobe went home, Junior is taking another nap, and I am having some tea to warm up.  Tomorrow we get to pull things out of cow vaginas (probably in the rain) so stay tuned!

Head 'Em up, Moooove 'Em Out!

We had 2 !/2 inches of rain through Thursday and Friday and that meant no farming.  No farming meant cow work all weekend.  The first order of business was moving our bulls (again) to make room for our replacement heifers.  I swear those poor bulls are going to get dizzy, but at least they know where they're going.  Next up was moving the heifers home to start our synchronization process to get them ready to AI.  We had to move them a couple of miles and it went really smoothly with M and R on the 4-wheelers and me in the Jeep watching gates.

We had a quick lunch at R's house and then had to move our cows and calves from home east to near where the heifers had been.  Usually the hardest part of that move is right at the start and through the first gate, but that went just fine.  We normally try to stop them there and let them pair up some before we continue on.  M was opening and closing gates and didn't get there fast enough and the lead pairs were in a hurry.  We ended up with some calves at the back who couldn't find their mamas and kept turning back until M couldn't hold them by himself.  I went to tell R to close the next gate so that they could group up, but I was too late as the lead bunch was already a quarter mile past the gate.  We were having no luck with the calves so had to bring the whole bunch back and try again.  Some of those calves we had to chase back three times and were really afraid of getting them too played out.  There was still one holdout by the first gate and Bob the fencer, who had come along to help, thought it would be a good idea to try to rope it.  R got it by a leg while Bob tried to rope it and R somehow got a good kick to the man parts and went down.  He probably didn't appreciate the rest of us laughing at him.  That was the end of that and we finally managed to chase the calf to the rest of the herd and got them all moving again and to their final destination.  M stayed there for awhile to move mineral tubs and keep an eye on the calves while R and his girlfriend and I went to R's house to make supper.  R swears it was the worst move ever, but M says he has a short memory.

After supper M and I went to take a grain truck to J who was seeding north of where we had moved the cows.  He and C had picked up a demo tractor and drill to finish the last 900 acres of seeding.  There were still some lone calves when we went by on the way up to the field, but only one or two when we came back.  Sadly, they'll only stay there for a few days before we'll move them again.

I woke up Sunday morning thinking of a lazy Sunday then realized that wasn't going to happen.  We had to bring in the heifers and give them shots and insert a CIDR device into their vaginas.  Yep, all sorts of fun in the cow business!  The device is silicone impregnated with progesterone.  In ten days we have to run them all through again and pull them out.  We enlisted R's girlfriend to help, and she did great.  She works as a medical assistant in a clinic so isn't fazed by this stuff.  She has a 4-year-old boy and we also had our 15-year-old cousin helping.  We're thinking they got quite the education, and we're interested to find out what the 4-year-old has to say about his weekend when he goes back to daycare today!  He was just in his glory playing in the mud and water in the corral.  I bet he smelled good by the time we were done!

Everyone was played out by the time we ran 121 head through, but our day was far from over.  Jared, R, J and I headed to Opheim so J could finish seeding there and move his tractor home while Jared and R brought trucks and I pulled an auger back.  M was seeding here while we were doing that.

When I got back I went to check the heifers and found one out.  She was right by the gate wanting back in so I opened it and she was just about through when she spooked and ran the other way.  I made one attempt to get her back in and then gave up.  R got her in when he got back.

There was rain in the forecast so J was going to seed into the night and M was up at 4:00 am to go out.  He got a few hours in before the rain set in.  It should be a lazy Monday since it is raining, but I have to catch up on laundry and bills.  Sigh........

Riding the Range

We've had a few days of rain so the farming duties are put on hold for the time being.  That means it's time to catch up on our ranching duties.  It was high time to get the few stragglers out of the calving pasture, especially since they weren't staying in very well.  Most of them belong to a friend so we got them all in and had him come and check them and decide what he wanted to do with them.  We had a few that were good at preg checking time but had apparently lost their calves somewhere along the line.  Some of those we decided to keep so hauled them to pasture.  Our friend had eleven left to calve and four of those were open.  M and R hauled the other seven over to Opheim where he has some of his other cows.  They will be calving on their own, whenever and however.  We've run out of time and interest.

It was interesting getting the trailer to the barn and back out again with the mud.  I was having flashbacks to the days when we were trying to haul out pairs this spring.  It would be nice to do it on a dry day!  We had to use the tractor to pull the pickup and trailer away from the barn, but after getting out of the yard it was smooth sailing.

This morning R was over early to get the good trailer to take a load of cows to Glasgow to the sale.  I went along to double check the numbers of the cows he was taking.  It took some maneuvering again to get the trailer to the barn, and the tractor was again required to get out of the yard.

I've been determined to get my mower out of storage and back to my house so I can cut my grass before it requires a swather so M said he'd get it loaded up today.  First we had to replace the battery and then he suggested that we ride out on the 4-wheelers and check the cows and take mineral out.  As we were heading to the first pasture I noticed some animals in our neighbor's adjoining pasture.  We weren't sure if they were the neighbor's or if some of ours had jumped the fence.  We delivered our mineral and found a neighbor's heifer in with our cows so from there we went to check out the other animals we could see.  There were nine more of the neighbor's heifers running the fence line between their pasture and ours.  Since there were only nine we were pretty sure they weren't supposed to be there.  M called the neighbor and sure enough they weren't supposed to be there.  But, all the gates were open between that pasture and their place because "I didn't think they'd go that far".  Really?!?  And, he'd maybe find time tomorrow to get them out.  We know how that goes because he had two pair in another of our pastures for at least three days; until we opened the gate and they walked out onto the road.  He was going to get them out when he had time, but he hasn't fixed his side of the fence in two years so we weren't holding our breath that he'd get to it.

We delivered more mineral and filled up the cattle oiler.  While M was doing that I was watching the calves.  I saw one of my cows, and her baby looked good and healthy.  There was one curious calf that was checking out the 4-wheeler and then came up to me and was licking and biting at my pants.  Not sure what that was about, but it was pretty funny.  From there we checked more fence, and I found two of our cows and their calves out.  I met up with M and we went back to get them in, and they were nowhere to be found.  M thinks I was hallucinating, but apparently we have a couple of fence crawlers.  Actually, he could see where they had been bedded down on the wrong side of the fence, and we found the loose wires in a coulee where they probably got out.

M was worried about the neighbor's heifers jumping in with our cows so I suggested that we give them a little chase so we did.  We chased them to the first gate on their way back home and closed it so hopefully, they won't be back too soon.  It just gets so frustrating when your range management depends on your neighbor's or your neighbor's lack of management.  I always tell M that he's too nice when dealing with the irresponsibility of others.  The old saying is "good fences make good neighbors". 

By the time we got back home R was already back from Glasgow.  I finally got my mower home and M mowed the backyard while I made lunch, and then I mowed the front this afternoon.  There is more rain in the forecast so I was really hoping I could get it done today.

I did enjoy riding the range with the sweet peas in bloom and the bluebells starting to show up.  I think I spent more time looking at the flowers than the cows.

Time Out!

Time out, your work has been interrupted.......for life.  It's been a bit crazy around here, but we took some time out for some important life events.  R graduated from Western Dakota Technical Institute in Fire Science last Saturday in Rapid City.  Every few days he'd ask if his dad was going to come so I knew how important it was to him.  M wouldn't commit for the longest time until some unfortunate events occurred, and we were physically and mentally exhausted.  I finally told him he had to go if only to get some rest and relaxation.  It helped that we had a rain shower the night before we were planning to leave.  We did our cow chores and hit the road on Friday morning, graduation was Saturday, and he headed home on Sunday.

When R started his program there were 36 in his class.  By the beginning of the second year there were 14.  At the beginning of the last semester there were 12 and only 6 graduated.  Some failed a class during the last semester and some didn't take a required class.  How do you let that happen?  We were very proud of how R applied himself and excelled.  We could see how he had grown up every time he came home.

While M was on his way home, M's aunt, uncle, cousins, girlfriend and I were busy cleaning his apartment and moving him out.  It wasn't as bad as it could have been and didn't take as long as I thought it might when I first walked in.  He had two roommates but one was one of those who had failed a class and didn't graduate so had left town on Friday.  The other was on his way to a job in Idaho.  At least for now, R is ready to be back to his cows, and we are very happy to have him back!  His auntie might be in deep depression without him, however.

We headed home on Monday morning hoping to make it back for the other big event in our lives....the birth of our first grandchild.  K was scheduled to be induced that morning.  We thought about going home by way of Glasgow, but when we got to the point where we had to decide which way we were going, nothing much was happening so we came home.  R wanted to get the trailer home so he could start to unload his stuff.  We got home about 6, and I headed to Glasgow about 8 so I wouldn't have to drive in the dark.

Sawyer Grace made her appearance at 1:56 am on May 21 to a welcoming party of K's parents and sister, her best friend and me.  We were all on pins and needles when we knew her arrival was imminent.   I cried when I heard her first cry and found out that she was a she!  It seemed like forever until we got to see her, and she was so delicate and beautiful.

Sawyer, about an hour old

J had a motel room but stayed at the hospital, but I went there and went to bed about 4:20 am, 22 hours after I had gotten up.  I started getting texts and calls about 6:30 so didn't get much sleep.  I went back to the hospital to see the new family before I came home.  I was hoping to get a nap, but that didn't happen.

Such a little angel!

J took the day off and then brought K and the baby home on Wednesday before heading back to the field.  He has been seeding at the place that is the fartherest away, unfortunately, so spent a couple of nights in the tractor, poor guy.  We can see the end so it can't come soon enough.  We had rain again last night and tonight so everyone can take a breath.  I really don't know how the guys do what they do day after day with little rest.  I don't go as hard or fast as they do, and I'm exhausted.  I'm hoping that one of these days the dark circles under my eyes will disappear!