insurman
Well-known member
Thought I would share my exciting Fathers Day with everyone..
Central Texas, drought, 100+ everyday and no rain in sight.
Last week Friday I have a second calf cow in labor, 65 -70 lb heifer born early afternoon. By Saturday afternoon cow/calf are back mingling with the other 8 cows and 7 calves (all calves less than 3 weeks old) in that one particular pasture. Sunday morning it is blistering hot and this solid black heifer is curled up in the direct sunlight, 2+ hours later she is still sacked out and everyone else is 30 feet away in the shade under the trees. I decided it was time to wake her up and get her to move along by her momma in the shade (which I have done many times over the years), well that was my mistake on this one..I walk up and just touch the hip of the calf and this is when the fun began.
She popped up, squawked one time and took off like she was shot out of a cannon. This group was in the third pasture from the county road. She went thru 3 sets of barbed wire fencing across the county road, thru the neighbors fence, down that fence line thru another fence then a hard right up a diveway and thru another fence prob close to a half a mile or more away. Not one time did she slow down. I gave chase on foot but really just trying to see where in the hell she went..
Alerted neighbors, got permission to go into properties to look and from noon to dark I went looking by foot 3 different times at about 1.5 hours at a time. Did not find a thing, no sign of it, etc.. The pasture they were in was over a little hill so I brought the momma up to the pasture on the road so that when she finally started hollering for her calf she would be closer to where it went out. At dark I gave up and said to myself that if not back tonight or in the AM then it is gone.
I pulled up early Monday morning and I could not believe that the calf was just standing next to momma like nothing ever happened. She had to go thru three more fences to get back to where she was. The calf is doing great and all seems well.
At almost 59 years of age I cannot ever remember being so damn sore...running, over fencing, thru fencing, walking thru the woods and pastures in 100+ heat and finally today I didn't feel the need to take any Advil.
Needless to say I will give it a real second thought before doing that again.
Central Texas, drought, 100+ everyday and no rain in sight.
Last week Friday I have a second calf cow in labor, 65 -70 lb heifer born early afternoon. By Saturday afternoon cow/calf are back mingling with the other 8 cows and 7 calves (all calves less than 3 weeks old) in that one particular pasture. Sunday morning it is blistering hot and this solid black heifer is curled up in the direct sunlight, 2+ hours later she is still sacked out and everyone else is 30 feet away in the shade under the trees. I decided it was time to wake her up and get her to move along by her momma in the shade (which I have done many times over the years), well that was my mistake on this one..I walk up and just touch the hip of the calf and this is when the fun began.
She popped up, squawked one time and took off like she was shot out of a cannon. This group was in the third pasture from the county road. She went thru 3 sets of barbed wire fencing across the county road, thru the neighbors fence, down that fence line thru another fence then a hard right up a diveway and thru another fence prob close to a half a mile or more away. Not one time did she slow down. I gave chase on foot but really just trying to see where in the hell she went..
Alerted neighbors, got permission to go into properties to look and from noon to dark I went looking by foot 3 different times at about 1.5 hours at a time. Did not find a thing, no sign of it, etc.. The pasture they were in was over a little hill so I brought the momma up to the pasture on the road so that when she finally started hollering for her calf she would be closer to where it went out. At dark I gave up and said to myself that if not back tonight or in the AM then it is gone.
I pulled up early Monday morning and I could not believe that the calf was just standing next to momma like nothing ever happened. She had to go thru three more fences to get back to where she was. The calf is doing great and all seems well.
At almost 59 years of age I cannot ever remember being so damn sore...running, over fencing, thru fencing, walking thru the woods and pastures in 100+ heat and finally today I didn't feel the need to take any Advil.
Needless to say I will give it a real second thought before doing that again.