|
Columbia City, Indiana | I copied and pasted this from a facebook post, that's the reason for the explanation for obvious stuff to stocktalk folks. I just thought I'd share it here. If you're offended by my religous beliefs, I DON'T apoogize, lol.
Thought I'd share a very cool thing that happened yesterday. I have this almost pathological insisting need to SEE with my own eyes each new calf suckling it's mother. The majority of the time this happens easily and I can either see it happen or it's obvious that the calf has sucked. But sometimes it's tough to tell, and if the calf doesn't get the first milk, colostrum, it is a certainty that it will die. But if they get that liquid gold, they can be pretty tough to kill. Anyway, I had an old cow with only 1 good eye have her calf Friday morning, and I had not seen him suck. So I got a bottle and got store bought colostrum, not as good as the real thing but better than nothing, and fed him a quart Friday afternoon and again in the dark yesterday morning, I wanted him to get enough to keep him alive but not so much that he was satisfied and stopped looking for the good stuff on his own. Yesterday was a nice day and I was behind on seed deliveries because you can't haul $300 per bag seed corn in the rain for obvious reasons. So I needed to take advantage of the good weather and get some deliveries done, but I had a mile long to do list around here also. And Sarah wanted to go out for a "date night." And I could feel myself getting sick. So anyway, I got home from delivering seed yesterday afternoon and the cow's udder looked like her calf had sucked, but I hadn't SEEN it. He even went #2 when I woke him up from his nap yesterday afternoon, but I needed to SEE him suckle her. I was about going nuts and ready to chase the cow up to the barn and try to get her in the chute and get the calf up there and teach him to suck. I hated the feeling that I was wasting valuable time waiting to see this calf suck. I kept shoving him over by his mom in the right area. I was about to loose it when I just said "Lord, PLEASE let me see this calf suck." Literally as soon as the work "suck" left my mouth, the little dude grabbed on and went to town. It was a pretty great feeling. Sometimes they are pretty good at playing dumb when they have it figured out and you try to force things. I've developed a pretty hands off philosphy in this area from past experience, but sometimes it can be REALLY tough. Sorry for the long post! | |
|
Story from yesterday, happy ending for me...
