RIP Rosie

[Nesikep]

Well, I finally picked up my courage and put the old girl down... it's been about -10C (15F ish) for the better part of a week, so it was fun starting up the hoe and getting the hole started... I guess it all went as good as could be hoped for, the other cows were grazing and she was chewing cud, dropped like a stone and the other cows paid no attention to it. Her calf doesn't even seem to miss her. I also weaned the rest of the heifer calves so in a couple days the mothers will go back with the rest of the herd and I can take my week of vacation and see some friends in the city.

Anyhow, it's been a tiring day... here's to Great Grandma... 16 trouble free calves in 17 years, and they just kept getting better. This picture is about 3 years old, she was about 15. I have 4 daughters and hopefully they do even close to as well as her.

 

[denvermartinfarms]

I take it she must have really whent downhill fast from when that picture was taken?

 

[tater74]

I'm sorry you had to do that. I hate to see them suffer too.

 

[inyati13]

She was a good cow. She had a good life. You did a good job by her. Don't get much better for an end.

 

[Nesikep]

Last year she really started to show her age, and we had intended to put her down last fall, but nothing worked out, and she was bred, so we kept her for another year... if she didn't have as much arthritis in her hip I'd have kept her longer... the 5 lbs of grain a week I was feeding her helped a lot I think, but she milked hard and with worn teeth and bad hips, her condition fell to about a 2 or 3 now with the cold weather... Her eyesight was 20/20 still for a bucket, and she'd forget about her arthritis and would come at a brisk but labored walk for treats. Calving time this year was hard on her... she was always a very concerned mother for the first month, so when she had a lively heifer calf who always wanted to run, she couldn't keep up and she'd get upset about it.

 

[denvermartinfarms]

Sorry you had to do it, when there around that long and there that good, they almost become family in a way.

 

[branguscowgirl]

Rest in peace sweet girl. :heart: Sounds like she had a great life.

 

[skyhightree1]

Never a good thing... Sorry.

 

[Nesikep]

Well, hopefully there's no snow and ice in the pasture in the sky. I think none of my animals can complain about the life I try and provide for them while they're here, though the grass is still always greener on the other side of the fence and they do have to eat the sticks after they've browsed around and eaten the leaves off them all. But around our place, they just get called to go to another pasture (they're actually the ones that seem to do the calling), I've learned how to handle them so no one needs to get excited, they get 1 shot a year, and they don't even need to go through the headgate to get it. Her sister (the one that had the stroke this spring) and mother (died 7 years ago at 15) were all really easy to handle as well. It's the only line of cows we have that have never given us a dead calf... they've also never had twins.
Her oldest daughter was the mother of the bull calf I kept for a neighbor.. She's going on 9 years old and is certainly in her prime... raises a 740 lb bull on grass and stays fat doing it.. she's a pretty big cow too though at about 17-1800 lbs, her next oldest daughter was a first timer this year, and did remarkable by nearly keeping up with the old cows, but lost condition doing it, though she's regaining it now. The 3rd oldest will have her first in the spring, and then there's the youngest that's just weaned, and I think she'll look good as a cow.. good length and a straight, wide back.... There's a couple I regret not having kept, and I just have to wonder how they'd look now..

 

[Aaron]

She was in such bad shape, she wasn't even marketable? If she could walk she could bring a few dollars in.

 

[LazyARanch]

Aahhh Aaron... sometimes it's NOT about the money....

 

[Aaron]

Aahhh Aaron... sometimes it's NOT about the money....

Perhaps, but I can't get the companies sending the bills to buy that. ;-)

 

[Nesikep]

We'd just get a bad rap at the sale yard if she went through it... besides, she's had anti-inflamatory drugs not approved for food animals (but somehow approved for humans), and I wouldn't put an animal that's done well by me through what would probably be 15 hours of trucking time to get to a slaughterhouse... She's paid her dues

 

[CKC1586]

We'd just get a bad rap at the sale yard if she went through it... besides, she's had anti-inflamatory drugs not approved for food animals (but somehow approved for humans), and I wouldn't put an animal that's done well by me through what would probably be 15 hours of trucking time to get to a slaughterhouse... She's paid her dues

Good man. :tiphat:

 

[Nesikep]

OK, here are the pictures I took a couple days earlier







And the oldest daughter Caddy (8 years old)


Next oldest daughter Cenci (3 years old)

 

[Nesikep]

And the two granddaughers (both from Caddy)
Chroma, 3 years old


And Prada, going on 2 years... I think she's going to be late calving, which really bugs me... I don't know if she slipped the calf or what... She also likes to poke her head under the electric fence, though she seems to be OK with barbed fences, so if she doesn't shape up, she'll be on a truck when I get a replacement for her. I think she looks pretty good, but she'll have some catching up to do


And here's the daughter (calf 11) that took a 4 hour ride to a new home in the canopy of my truck, and this is how she spent the whole trip.

I think the old girl has done pretty well, Long lives is something that's really hard to select for, since you never know how long a cow will last, but it is valuable since every replacement heifer is money out of your pocket. It took her a while to 'get going' and finish growing herself

Oh, and I just dug up a picture from when we were both a lot younger... this was probably around 14 years ago


Here is the first daughter of hers we kept, Lizzy... She never really developed... she used to have horns, and there were a lot of complications with the dehorning, which I think didn't do her any good. I think she was linebred 3/4 Saler


And here's a pic of Rosie when she was about 10

 

[inyati13]

Nes, thanks for the pics. The one with her head through the window, that is the same one in your avatar, right? Nice close up. Amazing that did not frighten her.

 

[chippie]

Nesikep,
Rosey was a remarkable cow. It is never easy to do the right thing. She was fortunate to have you as an owner and you were fortunate to have her in your life.

 

[melking]

I am so sad for you, but you are the right kind of man to recognize the value and act accordingly.

 

[Nesikep]

It is the same heifer as the one in my avatar. She was a little uneasy with the whole thing at first, but certainly didn't freak out and lose her marbles.

I was talking to a friend of mine last night and was saying that all Rosie's daughters had a special talent to make them liked by anybody... They know just they way to cock their heads to get a petting and it seems to work for them... My friend was comparing them to his dog who knows perfectly well how to cock her head, the right tail-wag, etc to make anyone go "Awww". All of Rosie's (and her sister Tizia's) daughters come running up to me in the field, and it's not (just) because they think it's time for a new pasture, they all just like company... Hang around you and untie your shoelaces... Kama LOVES pulling the velcro size adjustment on my hat, or just takes it by the bill, rips it off my head, and shakes it. Tizia was one of the most alert cows I've ever had, and you'd never think it when you looked at her (she was really calm, big, and a bit lazy), but if she intently stared in a direction, I knew there was something there, and sooner or later I'd see it too. Rosie's mother Josie was really perceptive as well, Once I had her tied up to a tree with a long rope to graze, and my mother went up to her and for some reason she took off and my mother was caught up in the rope, My mother yelled out to her and she stopped in her tracks.

Even as she got old, Rosie kept a certain kind of dignified aire to her