January 5, A Day of Weaning
It was a Sunday. The weather was beautiful with temperatures in the low 70s. The sun was shining. We had planned to wean calves in December, but we had too much rain. You won’t hear me complaining about rain after the last several years of severe drought. The calves and the momma’s were all in good shape because of the beautiful grass and the rain.
We started the day off with church and then went straight to work. We were very excited because we had just replaced our automatic head gate with a manual head gate on the squeeze chute. The squeeze chute and auto head gate are only one year old, but it turned out that horned cows and calves did not catch in the automatic head gate. Horns hit the mechanism and closed the door of the head gate before their heads went through. And since wagyu are horned, it just didn’t work. We love our new manual head gate and it will be great once we get used to the new handles.
If you know of anyone looking for an automatic head gate that is only one year old, tell them to give me a call.
The more you work with your cattle, the easier they are to work with. Ours are especially docile. The only injuries of the day were in getting used to the location of the new handle on the head gate. Tim hit it so many times in the same exact place on his shoulder that he had a lump and a scrape. I also had an injury. One of our docile cows decided to walk up before I was ready. The gate to the outside was open and the tub gate was closed. I hurriedly tried to open the tub gate and shut the outside gate. In my rush, I hit the tub’s heavy sheeted metal swing gate on the back of my ankle and that hurt. I may have said a word I shouldn’t. The work must go on despite having a bad bruise and swelling on my achilles. Meanwhile the cow just stood there and looked at me as if to say “Hi there. Take your time. I’m not going anywhere.”
All of the momma’s were sad to see their babies get on the trailer, but now they can have a break before the next baby comes along in a few months. We wean when the calves are 6-8 months old. That is when we haul them to our place in Warda where they can also get over missing their mommas. Cows are so nurturing and loving. It takes several days before they stop crying.
Once these babies get over missing their mommas, they will live happily on the pastures at Warda until they are about 18 months old. At that point we bring them home to finish them.
Meanwhile, we go for a visit several times a week. We whistle and they come running to see us because they know they will be getting hay. And we feed them range cubes. Cubes are a good supplement during the winter months. When they get trained to come to our whistle and cubes, they become our friends for the rest of their happy lives.
As you may remember, a tree fell on Tim’s tractor, which makes feeding the cows a little tricky. But we manage. Hope you enjoy the video of our grandkids helping us during feeding time.
Thank you for being with us on our farm journey. May God bless you and your family for supporting our small family farm.
