The Mother of The Year award goes to.......

....the little red frizzle hen! I had no idea over the years of putting up with her extreme broodiness, what a conscientious mother she would be. This was not something she took lightly, once she accepted the chicks, which was a bit dicey at first, she threw herself into motherhood.

All day long they are outside, catching flies, scratching for bugs, it's nearly impossible to get a good photo of them as they are constantly on the move. The chicks are growing fast but she has no thoughts of rejoining the ranks of the single hens, she loves her babies.

After a few skirmishes with other hens, I integrated the little red hen and her three chicks with the rest of the flock. Just to be on the safe side, she gathers her brood up on the rock right outside the chicken coop at night ......

.....waiting for the rest of the chickens to enter the coop.....

....the four feathered family members slip through the gate into their former pen, from there into the coop.....

.....where they hop up into a cozy nest for the night!

What better way to keep three active chicks corralled and out of trouble?

Have I ever mentioned that Murphy is SO SMART??!

I bought this foot operated dog waterer last summer for Mollie because she always wanted to drink from hoses as I was running around watering plants. She never got the hang of it.

Enter Murphy, I showed her once....

....and she is a pro.

At first she was so excited she dug at the waterer and moved it around until I thought I was going to have to bolt it to the concrete. But the novelty of it soon wore off and she uses it just for drinking, not for playing.

The trick to this waterer is to have it in the shade, otherwise the water in the hose would get hot, it works perfectly on the front step and provides her a cool, fresh drink whenever Murphy wants one.

It's funny to watch Mollie try to get a drink while Murphy is holding down the foot pedal, sometimes Murphy obliges her and sometimes she steps off and Mollie searches for the water. "It was just here a moment ago!"

I'm telling you, that Murphy is one smart puppy and I fear I'm losing her to the charms of Bruce....

First Mollie, now Murphy....sigh......

Fancy and Francine go to pasture

It was time for Fancy and our miracle calf to go to the pasture with the others, we'd had some storms blow through and the sun and green grass was calling. Francine wasn't sure about the loose footing in the dirt lot, she'd only been on cement.

 If you put your tail in the air, it provides ballast.

Francine, Bruce thinks her name is a little pretentious but I'm planting the seed in his mind that she's going to be an excellent future cow. I also have the backing of Mark, our vet, when he came out to make a house call.

But, as my sister in law, Jean, says, "I digress..." Francine wasn't sure about this whole trip business.... 

"Where are we going??"

"I'm tired, can you carry me?"

Suddenly Francine spots the open gate and the green expanse of grass ahead and kicks it into high gear. 

Then it's her mother's turn to whine....

"Will you slow down, I did just give birth a few days ago!"

And they are safely in the pasture.....

"EWWWW! What is that thing on the ground??"

"It's a cow pie, what do you think it is, you silly girl."

Francine has to let off a little water of her own...

....and they head off to explore under the trees.

Our brave herding dog, Murphy, is feeling very good about herself, despite the fact that she did all her herding from the safety of the other side of the fence.

"You two go on and don't come back again or else....!"

A wrest of nens!

Last Saturday my friend, Kim, came over and we went to Leo's shop and built a couple of wren houses but the most fun was junking them up, Bruce thought we were nuts but we loved them.

We would never win any awards in woodworking but decided the wrens wouldn't be so critical.

I had an old porch post I rescued from the chicken house that Bruce was going to demolish and wanted to use it. Most of the time I muddle through stuff by myself but this would involve cutting and drilling metal so enlisted Bruce's help. He fashioned two angle irons at the bottom to sink into the ground so I didn't have to bury the post and leveled off the top so the bird house sat more or less level. I was excited to have it done and promptly took it home to set it up.

I actually did a little more decorating, I found some wooden letters in Leo's shop so used the 'F' for French and 2 - 'V's' to make a 'W' for Wrens, French Wrens. That way the other birds knew who the house was for. I lost most of my grapes this winter so cut the vines and screwed them on all four sides of the post for Heavenly Blue morning glories to climb on. I planted the morning glories and some fall asters to finish the job.

I love it and wondered how long it would be before I had tenants.

As it ended up, not long at all! The next day I was firing up the grill when I heard some excited twittering and a pair of wrens were checking out the new digs!

"Why honey, it's a brand new house, just what we've been looking for!!"

"It's even licensed by the Department of Agriculture, State of Iowa. This is an upscale neighborhood!"

"I'll check out the interior."

"Quite nice and roomy too! See what you think, honey."

"You are right, it is licensed by the Dept of Ag, State of Iowa. The wrens down the block don't have one!"

"Well, I approve but you better get building, I'm feeling very full these days."

Her mate listened and promptly began to haul building material in, but putting a long stick in a little hole took some finesse.

"Hmmmm, can't go straight in....."

".....maybe if I tilt a little to the side....."

"....dang it, dropped the stick but luckily it landed on the platform, the house builder thought of everything."

"Got it!"

"Whoa! Watch, honey, while I get this bad boy inside!"

"I'm the Man!!"

And so the building went on, non-stop, all day except for a short siesta after dinner. This morning bright and early, they were in and out. For the first time, I saw both birds in the house at the same time and I can only imagine the conversation, "I told you I wanted the couch against the east wall!! You never listen to me!"

If you are wondering about the title, long ago, when I lived at Whiting, I had a nest of wrens build in the tree right off my deck. I was so excited that when I went to work, I blurted out to Lori, "I have a Wrest of Nens!!" She looked at me, I looked at her, we both fell to the floor laughing uncontrollably.

Sometimes it doesn't take much to set me off.

Farm lesson #276, Never wear clean clothes on a cattle working day!

It's cattle working day on the farm, something to look forward to and yet dread as we hope all will go smoothly. Probably the worst job is separating the cows from calves, this is the cacophony that greeted me when I arrived to help.

Kind of gets on your nerves, huh?

We always have a great crew, when they aren't at their job stations, they also make a great fence.

Clayton, the vet, is kind of cute, don't you think?

The fat cattle were the first to go through the chute, the air was thick with apprehension.

"No good can come of this!"

Clayton and Brian, the vet tech, make a good pair as they give the works to one of our future cows.

Bruce's job was to keep cattle moving through the alley way into the chute, but not too close together.

Because this can happen when you are following too close to your herd mate.

"Oh man, why did you say you were going to poop!!"

Some cows go into the chute and get on their knees, this cow knelt down before she went inside.....

 

The Pit-chicken from hell.

The little red hen has been going about her business, raising her family of 3, in the east apartment with attached outdoor patio off the chicken coop. She taught her babies that when people appear, they usually are bearing treats and to scurry to the fence and look really cute.

Yesterday the little red hen was pacing the fence and muttering to herself, it was clear she was ready to introduce her family to the outside world so I opened the gate. She didn't hesitate but hopped the board at the bottom of the pen, calling her chicks to "Come Quickly!" Like the good little soldiers they are, they each hopped over the board and set to work pecking at anything green and scratching furiously at the earth.''

I waited nearby because the other chickens were around and I didn't know what they might do with the munchkins busily working over anything in their path. A few hens wanted a closer look but were not threatening.

The babies were reveling in their new found freedom, no fences in sight.

Then they discovered the hallowed dusting ground and set to work scratching, rolling and throwing dirt around.

All was going well until some words were exchanged between the little red hen and the grey hen, who, by the way, has never raised a child of her own. She shouldn't have been so critical!

I was hoping the little red hen would kick her butt but she was hopelessly outmatched and, with the dogs very interested in the fight, I scooped up the grey hen and gave the little red hen the chance to retreat. She huffily gathered her babies around her and marched them back to their pen.

I'm sure she used that a lesson, "Children, sometimes you just need to ignore rude chickens, especially when they are bigger than you are."

Our miracle baby!

Two years ago we got a big surprise when our heifer, #41 had her calf, a Hereford! Her daddy is half Angus and half Hereford but all the cows are Angus so we never expected this.

New born baby, still wet and sticky.

Who couldn't love a face like this? I immediately christened her 'Fancy' and made it known that I would settle for nothing less than a future cow. Luckily Bruce agreed.

This is Fancy last fall with her grown up #9 ear tag, pregnant and in with the rest of the cows, she is just as gentle as she looks.

Fancy at the maternity gate, "Oohing and Aahing" over the first new baby of the year.

All our heifers were supposed to calve in March but Louie didn't get the job done on time. That is why he had to suffer the indignities at the vet office one Saturday morning that was chronicled in an earlier blog post.

One by one the heifers all had their babies except the one who apparently did not get bred and only Fancy was left. She finally started making a bag but nothing made us think a birth was imminent.

Yesterday after dinner, Bruce and I went to Cherokee to get fishing licenses and advance tickets to the rodeo. He asked if I needed to go anywhere else, I could have gone to the store but didn't feel like it, we still have milk and that's the most important. I brought the loader home with me that morning while he was golfing to do some cleanup. Bruce said he wanted it sometime that afternoon because he needed to clean the yard where the remaining pregnant cows and 3 bulls were. I told him to go ahead and take the loader home, I'd use it later, so he left with it. I no more stepped into the house and the phone rang, it was Bruce.

"Come NOW! Fancy's in labor and in trouble!"

Have you heard of the personality test, Retriever, Lion and something else? Our niece, Christine was telling us about it, she said she is the Retriever because when someone says, "GO!", she goes, she does not stop and ask why or ponder the situation. 

I must also be a retriever because I'm not even sure I shut the phone off and was out the door without even a "Goodday Mate." My Fancy was in trouble!

She was laying in a pile of corn stalks, panting rapidly, it was hot out and obviously she had been trying for some time. We got her in the barn and brought out the calving jack. Bruce was trying to get the OB chains on the feet and he could tell it was a huge calf. He found one foot and then the nose with the tongue hanging out appeared. He groaned, "I think it's dead." There is nothing more demoralizing than pulling a dead calf, we have done it once this year. He finally found the other foot but there wasn't much room and Fancy had gone down which made it harder. He finally got the chains to stay on both feet, I positioned the jack and he started cranking, the calf slowly emerged and I saw the tongue straighten, I hoped it wasn't just a reflex. Bruce was working the jack as fast as he could, I helped, it seemed like we weren't getting anywhere when suddenly the hips appeared and she was out.

I cleared her nose of the sack and some fluid ran out, Bruce said to tickle it with a straw, he was busy removing the chains. Fancy was still down and had no intention of getting up. The calf sneezed and took a breath, then another, she rolled her eyes and sucked her swollen tongue into her mouth.

THANK YOU, LORD!!!!

We carried her out of the way into a pile of shucks and went back to Fancy. He opened the headgate but she still had no desire to get up. I rubbed her head, she smelled my arm, which was covered in her baby's fluid and licked me, that was a good sign. I took all the ob stuff out to clean it up and when I got back, Bruce had Fancy up and she was smelling the calf and "M,M,M,M-ing," just what we want to hear.

That calf was amazing, for that tough a birth, she was so alert and within 5 minutes she was struggling to sit up on her chest. Fancy was intent on cleaning her up and making her respectable for all the visitors she was sure would be coming later.

With gifts.

We looked in both of them several times that afternoon and by evening the baby was up and nursing and took a big dump, a great sign that things were moving. This morning baby #9 has her own ear tag, is clean and shiny was a newly minted coin.

And very sweet!

This is the calf puller, the first time a vet came to our house for a difficult birth and unloaded this out of his truck, I went to the house. I didn't want to be anywhere near when he used it, it looked like an instrument of torture. I have come to accept it and I even used it myself once when Bruce wasn't home and everything has it's place.

The 'U' shaped iron goes behind the cow's back end for something to pull against, the blue end is the jack, it is usually about 18 inches or so from the 'U' iron, the OB chains are laying there and hook to that piece sticking out on the left side. When everything is in place, you jack slowly but firmly with the blue lever. This calf was so big, Bruce was at the end of the jack when she finally came out, the end of the line!

Amazing.

It saved this beautiful calf, she is a girl so I'm already thinking she should be a future cow, and our lovely Fancy, neither seem any worse for wear after all that drama.

But we were haunted with the 'what if's'?

What if we'd decided to dink around in town?

What if I'd insisted on keeping the tractor here when we got home?

What if Bruce was not so focused on cleaning their yard?

I truly believe these were no accidents, that God had a hand in guiding us yesterday. We were where we were supposed to be.

Thank you, God.