I finally got hay in the shed, cows and calves paired and everyone in the right pasture with enough grass. Time to put the bulls in. I'm a couple weeks behind my 4th of July bull-in target date but at least I won't have to worry about those early April blizzards next spring, Hopefully no using the trailer and a creep gate as a makeshift calf shelter, etc.

So yesterday worked much of the hot day setting up the annual 1/8 mile temporary lane over the ridge, through some trees and tall grass to connect the bull pasture with the corral pasture where the heifers are and also the trailer loading point to take my Fleck bull to my other location and his older cow group. Setting up this lane include chainsaw work to get some fallen trees out of the way as well as repairing some deer damage to the existing fence in some places.

So about 6 pm I'm finally ready to move the bulls. George, the big Fleck bull, active all winter and spring, seems a little slow to get moving.  But he gets going with me walking behind him.  In the lane I see him limping and favoring one rear leg.  Oh now what? I need him breeding cows asap and he doesn't look very mobile.

After a lot of patient walking he makes the trip, goes agreeably through the lane, tub, alley, chute and ramp and onto the trailer. Watching him I thought I have to figure this out or there will be few or no calves from his group next spring.  He spent the night in the trailer (with water and hay) rather than move him to his group.

He is a large heavy bull and not going to just lift his hoof to let a vet work on it.  I called around and thankfully found a vet clinic about an hour away that said they could get him in this morning and have a well equipped cattle handling facility at their clinic. I used this group once in the past but not for some time.

I took George in this morning and a very helpful young, relatively recent UW vet school large-animal grad did a great job on George. They were well equipped which made the job easier and faster (and safer) than I could have imagined.  They had a large tilt table and this young man soon found an small abcess where the front of a rear hoof had broken off, probably recently and in the rocky woods. The vet dressed up all four hooves and cleaned the abcess. George should be up to speed soon.

My main reason for posting this is to say there is hope for young large animal vets. Working in a group with a well equipped facility may be the way of the future, rather then lassoing a cow to a fence post, but at least there are good young vets who like the large animal end of the business. Thank goodness.

Here's a picture of him pressure washing George's hooves before starting work. The total bill was very reasonable. This job would have been much more difficult at my place even in my For-Most 450 chute, etc.

I brought George back and let him out at the other place where he immediately bellowed out to the cows in the cool shade of the trees at the edge of the woods that he was back.

It was about 10 pm last night when I finally got in the house and showered, having had nothing to eat since lunch. Frankly I was not up for a late night bowl of cereal so I took a good 1-1/4" thick Hereford T-bone out of the refrigerator, grilled it on the back porch, steamed some garden broccoli and microwave baked some Farmer's Market Amish red potatoes. Man that was good...along with a couple Miller Lites.  I needed that to remind me why we all work so hard at this!

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IMG072 Fleck bull at the vet 071718 (full).jpg (107KB - 62 downloads)

IMG013 Why we work so hard at this cattle business 071618 (full).jpg (161KB - 59 downloads)