Another Case Of Catching Up

Good heavens I am behind again.  Details of the house tend to get lost with other things more important but last night we hosted our card party group.  Getting house and food in order along with our regular life creates its own challenges.  The good news is the house is clean and the evening was quite enjoyable.  Now I will catch up....

Thursday-We started the day with a trucker coming for 2 cull cows.  One had an extra large udder due to the support ligament failure and one was a cow we couldn't get pregnant.  Neither were paying for their own feed so it was time for them to leave.  The pasture is now done so the cows are in the barn for the winter.  Bruce is working through the feeding challenges that come with the changes of corn silage from a new silo, extra haylage now that there is no grass in their rations and trying to figure out what amount of feed the cows will eat.  Judging by the bulk tank numbers, the cows aren't exactly excited about the recent changes.  We tested milk, knowing that the production numbers weren't going to be what they should be.  We will get the SCC information and were able to get the cull cow information.  We now know we have 1 more cow that can leave.  When we test milk we attach meters between the milker and pipeline to measure production.  Our tester then enters these amounts into his laptop computer and also takes a milk sample.  From this sample we will get the fat, SCC, protein and production information.  When we are done a print out is created with initial information.  The complete test information will arrive in 3-4 days.

Friday-After milking we let the cows out in to the yard so we could watch them and get some exercise.  They were ready to go out to pasture and were quite confused when they saw us walking home for breakfast.  We had assumed that they would be able to find their stalls easily when we let them back in since they had been going in and out all summer. As usual, the cows didn't read the manual.  Their first challenge was at the door where they are basically used to coming in single file.  With everyone right outside the door it was more crowded when everyone wanted to come in and they had to turn the correct direction amongst that traffic.  The second  challenge was they are used to brand new feed when they come in.  Bruce had fed them for the day before milking and had swept up what they had pushed away.  Some of the cows went into their stanchions and then backed out thinking they would find something better in another stall.  This caused more problems since the cow who actually belonged in that stall would stand on the alley and block traffic.  Eventually they all managed to get where they belonged  but it was obviously not without problems first.  While I spent the day getting ready for company Bruce did feeding early and had started milking before I got to the barn.  We were out of the barn nice and early.

Saturday-We let the cows out into the yard again while we ate breakfast.  They came back in to their stalls a little better today.  Like anything, they will get used to the new system.  Bruce spent the day cleaning the steer yard.  He now has one of the yards officially cleaned.  Tonight Joe and I milked while Bruce got some feeding done.  For a change of pace I had Joe move all the milkers and I prepped and post dipped.  We have a cow with a sore quarter that Bruce treated this morning so other than having a special needs cow again milking seemed to go pretty quickly and both Bruce and I were in the house by 9:15!