COWS WITH SENSE OF HUMOR

What do I expect when it gets -25 °C outside? I expect lots of inconvenience, frozen water pipes and water bowls, in my end of the barn,  bawling calves waiting impatiently for their warm milk,  longer work hours, cold hand and feet.

Yesterday morning was just such a day but I was also expecting a cow to calve during the night. So early, I made a point to go check on her first thing in the morning. I really thought that she was ready to calve and I could have bet my winter farm jacket that she would calve during the night.

Instead, I found #391 in the next pen with twin calves by her side and cow  #322 cooing for those calves.   #391 was milked but only gave 4 pints of milk...

 I called my son Vaughan to come  check #322 to see if she was needing help to calve.  After an inspection, he couldn't feel any calf and called the vet to come check her up.  I was so sure she would calve during the night.......

 I won't bore you with the details of my work but on returning for the evening feeding, I found yet another large  baby bull calf in with #391 and the twins...  Again I call my son. The vet never came so we realized that #322 must have had her butts against the other pen and the calves squeezed under the fence as they were born and #391 cleaned then up and claimed them as her own.. It was a tight squeeze  under the gate because there was lots of bedding in those pens.

The mystery was solved and I'm overrun by calves still...

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Christmas came and the family was all here except my oldest daughter Nicole who was vacationing in Greece and then in Istanbul Turkey during the Holidays. We all missed here very much.

Here are some photos of the family at play. The house was full of happy laughter. Sorry, I didn't took photos of the dinner again this year. I promise that next year I'll make a point of taking photos of the meal.

Daniel and James watching a Thomas DVD.
Notice the focus on both these boys.

Mama and Daddy are setting up the gingerbread on the special tray, getting it ready to set before James help decorate it.

James is a great help and is getting a pro at placing candies in the frosting.

James  did a super deluxe job on this gingerbread house.
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Daniel and James are trying their new game.

A new train track bought secondhand on Kjiji

Another Kjiji find. The boys just loved it and played with it for hours.

James just loves his Christmas stocking full of good things.

Daniel is finding some toys in his stocking too.He take one toy out at a time and plays with it before going to the next item. Just wait till he finds out there are chocolates in there...

Family are arriving for the day.

Jackie and younger Nicole showing us their new silk wrap and Simon on the left, Bill in the background.

We'er in the kitchen sampling a very expensive type of coffee sent by my daughter Nicole when she was travelling to Indonesia earlier. Kopi Luwak coffee.  I'm still very reserved on this coffee  but it was the experience that counts. Maybe if I drank this type of coffee I'd grow a bit taller.  See how puny I am.  
That's Bill, Jackie, myself and Joe trying this civet cat poop coffee. It tasted rather smooth but a bit too expensive for my ordinary taste. Thanks Nicole for the experience.

James and Daniel love their alphabet and numbers gifts, Daniel knows his numbers but refuses to say seven, maybe because it has two syllables.

Mira chose to sit down and drink the Kopi Luwak coffee.  She's a good sport.

We ate the big Christmas meal and went directly to the present game while we digested the yummy feast. The present game is starting and George is the one calling the cards, Notice the table full of small gifts. My great grandson Cyprus is getting right into the fun.

Everyone is waiting their turn to have their card called so they can go chose a gift.

Even the little kids are playing the game but have alphabets instead of cards. James knows his alphabet and he wins from a pile of gifts for kiddies.

Jackie is choosing a gift while Cyprus looks at me.

Poor Cyprus, spilled some juice all over his shirt before the present game.

Those beautiful golden locks belongs to Jordyn, Cyprus's mother.

It's time to disassemble the race track and train track  without breaking anything for the long trip home.....

Of course the traditional post Christmas puzzle. An Audubon bird puzzle. Thanks jackie...

Christmas was relaxed, full of laughter and fun and best off all, family. Nicole we missed you this year but I'm glad we didn't had to worry about you making your flight to Toronto and then over the Atlantic like last year. That was brutal.

Thanks for visiting and leaving a comment. They show that you care enough to bother.
JB

I'M FREE FROM BLOGGER JAIL

It's been a while since my last post and I'm glad to be back. Thanks to all those who cheered me on when I was locked up. Yes, I felt like I had done some terrible deed when I wasn't looking and that's why I was locked out of my Gmail account,  but thankfully my daughter Jackie came to my rescue and bailed me out.
I think that perhaps the server was slow and my impatience didn't help and then the computer got confused and so Google got confused too and locked me out as I kept trying and I had to wait 24 hours to try again and I was making the same mistake again..   Chapter closed.....

I've have an old cow that was due to calve on the 7th of November and she had difficulty walking and my husband brought her in the calving pen last Thursday. On Friday she couldn't get up and the vet said to give her calcium, which  my husband did with no improvement then the vet came and said that her calf was alive and he treated her. Saturday there was no improvement so the vet came  and couldn't determine if the calf was alive as the cow was down so he couldn't check. All this time the cow was unable to get up but ate and drank well and pooped too. I've had to fork tons of bedding hay to keep her pen as clean as possible. Yesterday the vet gave her some injection to induce her labor and my husband repeated the injection last night. This morning her water broke at about 10 o'clock and still no calf. Late this afternoon my son came to pull the calf with a chain and there was another water bag and  he broke it. I told him that her water had broken in the morning so he realized that she was having twins. At this point we could see two feet and as I'm holding the chains I saw the hooves twitch so I knew that this one was alive. As soon as the head is out I cleared the membrane and the bull calf is pulled out and I clean the mucus from his mouth and nostrils as it's trying to breath on its own.

Then the chain is attached to the other feet and it too is pulled with the pulley and the same mucus clearing is done. This one is a heifer, therefore a freemartin  She will be sterile as the male testosterone are intermixed with her hormone. They will both be sold.

Here my son and two young helpers treating the mother cow in her neck vein. Her head has to be tied so she doesn't move. My grandson was also at the farm today  to witness these birth but was picked up before this shot was taken. They were shadowing a farmer for career day. I'm not sure what title the school uses  for this project. Kids have a day off from school to see what it's like to shadow some worker all day.

I've been in the pen with this cow feeding her and  giving her water  without fear because she couldn't get up  but she let me care for the calves right beside her head without pushing me. She was licking them and seem totally unconcerned about my presence. Luckily I had saved some cholostrum milk  from the last cow that calved to feed them. I got home at 7:00 pm from work.

I know that Halloween is passed but I wanted to show you some pictures that my daughter sent me  of my grandson.

                            Little prince in his day care tiger outfit doing tiger pushups.

                            Little Tiger just being cute.

                       Another pushup

                   Little tiger showing his big teeth. This is where I just cracked up...

This is his Halloween  costume that my daughter made . It's Wookie from Star War.  He went to an office  staff party accompanied with his dad and again won best costumes this year and $100.00 gift certificate. 

This is my son in law in his Solo costume  from Star War that my daughter made this year. Now I'm off to comment on some blogs that I didn't get around to visit yet. 

Thanks for dropping in and please leave a comment.

SOMETIMES, TWO IS NOT BETTER THAN ONE

It seems that I'm loosing ground with blogging.  My posts are getting further and further apart as life seems to get busier and busier especially in the summer. Did I just say summer?

Monday morning I walked in the barn and nothing new to report. I fed the girls and put some fresh bedding for that cow that just didn't want to calve and she just laid down on the fresh hay. She was checked the day before and the breeder said there was an error on the due date. She was due on the 27th of June.  OK... that explains things.

When I returned to the barn around 4:30 pm, I saw a calf laying beside the cow in the birthing pen. I called my son to tell him that #291 just calved and I walked to the milk parlor get milk ready for the other calves. When I returned I proceeded to give grain to the heifers and I saw another calf on the other side of the cow. So I called my son again to let him know that she had twins.  A bigger heifer and a smaller bull. Both will have to go as we don't keep the bulls and there a good chance that the heifer calf is sterile. The cow was treated and the calves moved to their little pens. The first one was all cleaned but the last one was only half cleaned. Mama was too tired to finish the job so I put a jacket on the trembling smaller wet calf.  Both are doing well but Mama misses her babies.  She comes by the nursery often and moo for her babies.

Today was hot outside and I decided that I better take some pictures of my vegetable garden as I promised and I took lots of flower pictures too. I think that the light was too bright as some of my photos are a bit washed out.

Thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment.  JB

Monday Already

The week went by so fast, it makes my head spin... I didn't blog on Saturday and Sunday as my daughter was getting married and things got busy with family outing and work etc...  On Saturday afternoon after I left for the wedding, one of the expectant heifer decided to give birth and lost her calf because it came out backward. When I arrived home from the wedding reception later that evening I went to the barn to check on the heifers and I saw two feet poking out of the heifer. I called my son and told him that she was calving. My son said," No mom, that heifer has already calved. " I said " Well I know what I'm seeing right now and it's two feet sticking out of the heifer" My son is usually never in a rush for anything but he got there pronto and it's a good thing he did because the twin calf would have died if he didn't pulled it out in a hurry because he was coming out backward too.

Still waiting for another heifer and a cow to calve and they both are overdue too.

Today I finally got some binding for my rugs so I have no excuse to not finish them.  JB