1st day of a really busy month

Help Support CattleToday:

Joined
Oct 12, 2009
Messages
3,740
Reaction score
1,160
Location
Molino Florida
For us the 1st day of December signals not only the celebration of Christmas but breeding season. I was sitting here looking at the calendar this morning trying to figure out how we will get it all done. We started last month on the 19th of November putting CIDR's in the heifers we will remove the CIDRs on Thursday the 3rd. We have a weekend trip planned with our dear friends this coming weekend. I can't tell you how nice it will be to be able to spend some quality time with dear friends. We are scheduled to sort cows on the 8th getting them into groups for AI and ET work. On the 12th we will host our company Christmas party at the farm, however prior to the party we have to put CIDR's in and a GNRH shot to 48 head. Normally we are able to schedule around our Christmas party but with Mike still out (he does all our AI work) we are having our Select Sires rep come to the rescue this year. We sure appreciate that Len is coming to bale us out, but he is swamped this time of year so we are having to work with his schedule, which means we will be breeding all the cows and heifers on the same day. On the 18th we start the set up for the recips the embryologist will be here to flush and implant on 1/3/2016. On the 19th we have to give the heifers a shot, then pull CIDR's from the mature cow group. On the 20th we have the Children's Christmas program at the church (my twin granddaughters will be playing a lamb and a cow as well as angles) after the program we have to give the donor a shot. On the 22nd we will be breeding 85 head of cattle, poor Len is going to be one tired AI tech, normally we AI in two groups so no more than 50 head in a day, I can't imagine how his arm will feel after 85, that evening we have to give donors another shot. The 23rd and 24th donors get a shot in the am and pm. On the 25th yes Christmas day we have to pull CIDR's on the recips then give shots to the donor in the am and pm. On the 26th we remove CIDR's from the donors and give them the rest of their shots. On the 27th the recips get another shot and we breed donors the twins daycare is closed over the holiday so I will be keeping them a few days during the break but that isn't a chore it is a joy! Well that is our December, going to be busy, I can tell you when your trying to work with all these different groups with different protocols you have to depend on your calendar or you can sure make an error. I hate wishing my life away but I will say I will be glad when were done with this breeding season.

gizmom
 
Keeping busy must be your secret to staying young.
 
That sounds like a lot of brain strain planning all that, knowing the dates to breed and then working back. I hate working backwards.
Hope it all goes smooth.
Ken
 
Gimom,
good luck this month.. I wish I had more confidence in my AI abilities but I am SLOW.. I would like to help Len, but I promise Len can handle it.. He will do you a good job.
 
Scott

I asked him several times if he was up to doing this many in a day he said he has done as many as 150 but didn't want a repeat on that number. Mike has been released for light duty as of today so he is going to do the prep for Len. Ronnie Jacob and I will keep the chute loaded and of course I will be bossing everyone around trying to sound important (we both know they won't listen). I will have a big old pot of Taco Soup going if your in the area stop by for lunch on us! Ronnie told me he stopped by and looked at your new bull, you know he doesn't say much but he said that you have yourselves one Heck of a nice one, which is high praise from the boss.

gizmom
 
Gizmom,
Thanks for the invite, but I am afraid I did some poor vacation planning this year. I have less than one day of vacation left til the end of the year, so I will be working..

Tell Ronnie thanks for the kind words. I know he is far from perfect but I hope he is the best one we have gotten from there so far. If we accomplished that he will be just fine for us. A sale that big can get wild at times, it is a whole lot more fun to be a looker than a buyer on days like that..
 
Well Tuesday is the day we have been working toward, final number set up for timed AI is 86 weather forecast 70% chance of rain! What is it they say in show business the show must go on! The down side of timed AI no matter the weather.

Today we start the set up on the recips and the donor cow, so we will be working cows on Christmas eve and Christmas day the joys of the cattle business.

gizmom
 
Well the AI work is done, I have to admit we have never done that many in one day. Started breeding at around 7:30 and were finished and sitting down eating taco soup at 11:30, it could not have gone any smoother. We even had a break in the rain while we were working the cows. Now we have to finish setting up and breeding the donor cow then we flush on the 3rd of January and put eggs into recips. We are almost finished! The new cows arrived yesterday afternoon about 4:00, I was pretty excited to finally get to see them in person instead of just photos. She is every bit as good as I had hoped she would be, and the two flush heifers are actually better looking than their photos so pretty dang happy about this purchase. I will let you know in a couple of years if it works out.

gizmom
 

Latest posts

Top