Farm Tour

We've had a couple of impromptu farm tours lately.  On Saturday our well guy brought out his 2 middle school aged grandkids.  I think they are from PA and hadn't seen a dairy before.  I enjoy showing people our farm.  We take a lot of pride in what we do and it's nice to show it to others.  Cole was super excited.  He is probably our best tour guide.  He took them around, explaining what everything was and they helped him feed calves.

On Sunday we had another group.  A band from CA playing for the Veteran's Association were in town and wanted to see a dairy.  They were all in their 20s and 30s and were absolutely fascinated by the farm.  This is my target group.  I enjoy dispelling some of the misconceptions about dairying that a lot of people have.  To be honest, it makes me a little nervous to have people take pictures and video of our farm.  Not that we have anything to hide, but others see things differently than I do.  But this group was absolutely fascinated by everything and I'm sure that they will portray their pictures and videos the same way.  So if you ever want to tour a dairy, or know someone who does, let me know!

Skilled Trades

A friend of mine posted this video on Facebook a couple of weeks ago.  There is an awful lot of truth in it.

Both Pat and I have college degrees.  I hope my kids go to college after high school.  However, I know a lot of kids that don't or go to a technical college.  Does that mean they aren't as smart as the rest of us?  Of course not.  Maybe they struggled in school, but I bet they are a lot better at other things, like welding, electrical work, plumbing, etc.  Staying at home and being married to a dairy farmer sometimes makes people believe we are uneducated.  I hate it when people talk down to me.  Just because a person works with their hands does not mean they don't have to use their head also.  These skilled laborers are vital.  A few years ago our furnace crapped out on Christmas Day during a really nasty snow storm.  Our plumbing and heating guy was here by 8AM that morning.  Next time your toilet backs up or your furnace craps out or you need new tires on your car, remember to thank those people and be grateful for the skills they have that you lack.

Hired Help

A few days before Shelby was born, our herdsman of 4 years, put in his 2 week notice.  We didn't know it was coming, but it wasn't entirely unexpected either.  Randy was a good milker, but his attitude had gone drastically down hill.  It's not easy to work with the same person 7 days a week, 365 days a year, so we knew it wouldn't last forever.  At any rate, we were left with trying to find a replacement, and quickly since I was going to be laid up and unable to help.  Needless to say, the timing wasn't great, but it was time for Randy to move on.

Pat started the job search with an ad on craigslist.  He got a few phone calls in the first few days, but it turned out his parents ran into a fellow dairyman and neighbor the day Randy quit.  He suggested a local guy and Pat called around to his former employer to get his phone number.  Everyone who knew him said J was a good worker, had a nice family, etc.  Pat's parents met him that week (we were in the hospital having a baby that day) and seemed impressed.  He seemed like a nice guy, good worker, and better yet, he'd never milked cows.  Now, most jobs would like you to have experience, but dairy farmers prefer you don't.  Every farm has a different routine for milking cows and if you are set in one routine, it's hard to switch to another, that's why no experience is sometimes best.  That way we can teach you the way we want you to milk cows.  It may seem like a silly thing that doesn't matter, but it's huge in the land of milking.  One simple step can drastically change the somatic cell count of your milk.  A lower SCC means a higher milk price for us.

I digress.  J was to start on Randy's last day.  Only thing, he didn't show up in the morning.  Pat tried to call him, but couldn't get through.  He came Monday night and said he had been helping move some furniture and couldn't get out of bed Monday morning.  His cell was out of minutes, yada, yada, yada.  Tuesday morning he called in sick, but he kept showing up in the evenings.  I think he showed up a couple of mornings the first week but then was gone for the weekend.  This obviously wasn't going to work.  We tried for another week to give him the benefit of the doubt, but he never came through for us.  So we called another local guy that had called while we were trying to work with J.  He's showed up every morning and evening so far.  We also have a high school kid that started that wants all the hours he can get.  Hopefully things are straightened out now.

Milking cows is not a glamorous job.  You don't get weekends off.  You have to start early in the morning and go later in the evening (but you get a really long lunch break :).  It's dirty.  It's smelly. Even with all of the cons, we truly enjoy what we do and take a lot of pride in the product we produce.  We just hope our employees do the same.

Pig Farmers

Every summer we raise some kind of bird.  Pat claims it's for the boys, but I'm the one that does the daily chores.  The last couple of years we've been late getting birds so they don't have them readily available and I have to order them.  Ordering means you have to get a minimum of 25 birds.  We don't go through that many chickens in a year, even between us and Pat's parents we don't use up 25 chickens.  This year I said that if we had to order chickens we weren't doing birds.  At first Pat wasn't in agreement.  The next morning, however, he was very agreeable.  He walked in the door and told me it was ok if we didn't do birds.  I looked at him and said "so what are we doing?"  It would be way too easy to not do anything.  So what are we doing?  Pigs...

 We started out with the idea of 4 pigs, one for each family.  Well, if you get 4 pigs you may as well get 10. We could probably get rid of 10.  Well if you do 10, you may as well do 20.  So Pat set out looking for someone to sell us 20 baby pigs.  The problem?  They come in groups and no one wants to sell less than 50.  So we ended up with 55 pigs and sold 5 to a neighbor.  We'll butcher some for ourselves  and some family and friends, and the rest will go to the sale barn when they are finished.  The boys think it's great.  Granted, they are pretty cute, for a while anyway.  Pat even gave their hog farm a name: COTA KASH farms.  COle, TAte, KAra (Pat's neice), and SHelby.  The money from the pigs will be split among the kids.  If nothing else, it's a great way to get a start on college tuition!

I also broke down and got some birds.  Just 10.  I picked them up today.  Hopefully they survive Tate's handling.  He's not afraid to pick them up this year, but he doesn't quite understand not to squeeze or grab them by the wing.

Pink Slime

Unless you've been living under a rock, I'm sure you've heard the big controversy over pink slime. This whole thing just enrages me. People are so far removed from knowing where their food comes from, yet believe they know best. This is equivalent to me telling you I don't like what you do or how you do it so I'm going to tell you how I think it should be done and then I'm going to spin the truth so that what you do and how you do it look not only irresponsible, but dangerous to me and the rest of the world. Talk about biting the hand that feeds you. The worst part is, that people lost their jobs over this. All because some celebrity chef and mainstream news reporter said it's bad. Don't bother to find the facts, if the media says it's true, it must be true. When did we stop caring? When did we decide that the media knows best and everyone else must be conspiring against us? I'm sure that BPI's intent was to make a product that would harm everyone just to get rich and all those people working in the plant just went along with it because they didn't have a conscience. Does that really sound logical? Our country needs to start thinking for themselves and turning off the news. They've proven time and time again that they don't check facts, why should this controversy be any different. If you want the facts on pink slime, here is an excellent source. I've said it before and I'll say it again. I think it's important to know where your food comes from. You should question it. I encourage it, but go straight to the source, not the internet, not facebook, and not the news. They are all looking for a story, not facts.

Cole's Obsession

I think I've mentioned before about Cole's obsession with putting up barn cameras. He's been saving every penny he finds so he can buy a camera. We looked into security cameras, but they wouldn't work due to the range and the cold. So we kind of gave up on it. We tried to tell him it wouldn't work, but he just couldn't let it go. It got really annoying. Then we got our taxes done and it turns out the dairy got a bit of a refund. Grandpa, being the sucker that he is, decided we should spend that money on, yep, you guessed it, a barn camera. So a couple of weeks ago the guys took some old cows to the sale barn and stopped at a vet supply store. Low and behold, the perfect camera. They had to order it and Pat told him it would be there the following Tuesday. I was hoping it wouldn't come via UPS since that truck doesn't usually come until about 5. I don't know if I could have survived the day without that camera. Luckily, it came via Speedy and was here by about 9AM. That left me just a few hours to listen to the incessant question, "When are we going to do the camera?" It actually wasn't too bad to put up, from what I hear. The best part, it works!

A few years ago, Pat's parents had bought a camera but they could never get it to work quite right. It certainly makes life a little easier, especially in the winter. Instead of Pat having to go out before bed to check the maternity cows, he just has to look at a screen.

In the first couple of days we had it running, we actually had a couple of cows calve. Unfortunately we missed them both. One happened while we were getting ready for school. The other was late in the afternoon when the lighting is bad and she was back in the corner.

This is what hangs in my kitchen. Aren't you jealous you don't get to watch cows calve while you are eating breakfast?

Farmers Feeding...Pancakes

So, it's not really Friday. I've been getting sick about once a week for the last month and for some reason it seems to hit Thursday or Friday. You'd think I'm in my first trimester instead of my last. So without further ado, your Friday on the Farm...

Last Sunday our local FFA chapter had their annual pancake breakfast. Anytime we can go somewhere close for Sunday lunch that I don't have to cook, we're there. Even though Pat grew up on the farm, he was never a part of FFA at his school. I wasn't either. However, I fully expect my kids to at least try it when they get to be in 7th grade. Our school has a pretty strong ag program, which is unusual for a small school. It shouldn't be, but with budget cuts, the ag program is typically one of the first to go. At our school, they've worked hard to keep it.

Anywhoozle, while we were at the pancake breakfast, Pat was talking to one of the dad's who is involved with the FFA alumni group at our school. He was working hard at trying to get Pat involved. One of the things that a lot of kids don't have experience with is artificial insemination (AI). Pat being the sucker, I mean, good guy that he is, he told him to give him a call when they have their next meeting. I think it'll be good for Pat to be involved at school, especially with a group of kids who are interested in agriculture. A lot of the kids in FFA don't have much experience with dairy at all and I think it's really important to educate. If we get a chance to do that while they are in high school, then when they become adults they will be able to educate others.

Inspection Time

Part of life on the dairy is being inspected. Since we produce a food product, we have to be inspected at least twice a year by the state inspector. We don't know when he's coming, typically it's in the January and July range, although it varies. This year we were also inspected by a federal inspector. He comes as part of an inspection of our milk plant. We were told he'd be here last Monday. I think he showed up on Friday.

The inspectors check things like the cleanliness of our milking equipment and parlor and a whole host of other things that you would think wouldn't matter, but do. They go through all our medications and make sure everything is labeled and that we don't have any medications in our barn that could be given to a lactating cow that shouldn't. We have to keep those medications (for steers, calves, etc.) in another location. Then of course there are the nit picky things like is the window on our screen door between the parlor and milk house closed? That's the one we usually get written up for. We typically leave it open for air flow reasons. Anywhoodle, we scored a 99 out of 100 which is as high as you can get. They will always find something to complain about. Our 1 point deduction actually came because the lean-to over the part of our bulk tank that is outside, was dirty. It used to be outside, but we were having water issues, so we covered it. Now it's random storage and is technically not part of the inspector's area to inspect. Oh well. If that's the worst he can find, good! My father-in-law actually cleaned it the other day.

We take a lot of pride in the cleanliness of our dairy. We've had a lot of people tell us it's the cleanest one they've seen. Our parlor and milking equipment gets cleaned after every milking. It takes time, but it's an important part of producing a quality product.

Ugh!

Apparently I spoke too soon last week about how well my calves are doing. That or I should have done some serious knocking on wood after I wrote it. This past weekend I lost not 1, but 2 heifer calves. I'm just disgusted. I hate losing calves, and heifer calves even more so. Especially since we've been really low on heifers. We had something like 8 bulls in a row and finally got a string of 3 of heifers and lost 2 of them. Not good odds.

At any rate, I still don't know what happened. One went off feed Saturday morning, but she seemed fine. Sometimes when we have a cold snap and I increase the energy supplement, the younger calves go off feed. It just gets to be too filling and they aren't hungry. As long as they eat something, I'll let them go without treatment for a feeding or two (and if it's not horribly cold). She did the same thing Saturday night, but she was still getting up. Her ears were still perky (sick calves tend to have droopy ears), and her eyes were still bright. Sunday morning she was dead. Sunday morning I had another one start the same thing. She'd get up and eat, but wouldn't finish her milk. I figured I'd wait her out and see how she would do that night. Same thing. So I treated her. She was a little smelly, which is a sign of scours, but her pen was dry and her butt wasn't too messy, but rather than let her go, I gave her some antibiotic and an electrolyte treatment. Pat and his Dad moved her into the warming hut for the night. We have one enclosed pen that we used to use for newborns until they added on to the maternity barn. Pat had to call to find out which calf was sick because she looked perfectly healthy. Monday morning, she was dead. I spent a good chunk of time on the phone with our vet and our nutritionist Monday morning trying to figure out what was going on and how to fix it. Everyone is pretty stumped. They gave me ideas of things to try. Our nutritionist thinks that because of the mild temps, there may be some bugs going around that normally wouldn't appear because of the cold. I'm just hoping I don't have to experiment with anything.

I once read somewhere that when losing an animal stops bugging you, it's time to get out. All of our animals matter. I may not cry about it, but I spend a lot of time thinking about what I could have missed or done differently and what I can do to keep it from happening again. Death is a part of life, but I still don't like it!

It's Here.

January that is. The snow has blown in along with sub zero temps. Our cows don't mind the cold. They actually stay pretty warm in the barns. This week was the first time the manure in the barns froze solid. The calves are usually the ones with problems. So far our calves have dealt with the cold pretty well. We've had a few newborns in the last week, but our new maternity barn gives us a nice place to let them dry off before we have to move them outside. We've had one staying in the maternity barn the last few days since it's been so cold.

A few years ago we had a lot of trouble with calves. It seemed like they were fine, then they'd go off feed, we'd try everything, and they'd die. What was happening was they were actually starving to death and we didn't know it. They just weren't getting enough calories from the milk replacer they were on. Adding more milk replacer added more protein, but that just gave them scours (diarrhea). When we finally figured it out, we started adding an energy supplement when the temps dipped below freezing. We haven't had a problem since. Working with animals is kind of like working with babies. They can't tell you what is wrong. The difference is there are a lot more diagnostic tools for humans than animals. But we don't give up even when we are stumped.

January???

Sorry for the bloggy hiatus. I can't guarantee this is the end of it, but I'll try harder!

We had a brown Christmas. To be honest, I would've liked some snow, and so would the boys. However, highs in the upper 50s in January? I'll take it! Yesterday was gorgeous. Normally this time of year it is miserable out, but there are still things that have to get done. Yesterday, Pat and I spent the morning moving and vaccinating heifers. Normally that job would have waited for a rare 20 degree day in January. Instead we were out there without coats, hats, and gloves. It was wonderful! We also weaned some of my baby calves out of their huts and into group housing. I was glad to be rid of them. Our calf huts have seen better days, but are still functional. The fronts slide on and off being held on with joist brackets. Over time, the wood fronts have worn down the the brackets have bent with use. A couple of years ago I replaced a bunch of the brackets, which helped, but because the wood is worn down so much, it still didn't solve the problem. When the calves get bigger, they can lift up the fronts and push them out. We've lost calves a couple of times when they've made their escape (they always come back). One of the huts was so bad that the calf could just push on the front and it would come free. He got his legs and head caught a couple of times and did some somersaults. If you've never seen calf acrobatics, it's pretty amusing. With the weather being as gorgeous as it was yesterday, Pat spent the afternoon fixing my huts! Almost all of them are fixed now, except for 5 that are currently in use.

Which brings me to my next point. I am down to 6 calves! This is the lowest I have been in a long time. Normally this time of year we seem to have about 20 or so. The reason is that we calved heavy in November and only had 4 in the month of December. Weather plays a huge role in reproduction. If you go back 9-10 months, I would guess that February was cold and miserable and January, not quite as bad. I expect our spring calving (April/May) to be light also due to the miserable heat in July. It always seems to go in spurts, but we never seem to run out of calves, or chores to do!

Freemartin

I apologize for the confusion about freemartins. I thought I'd explained that and I probably should have linked to that post, but I'm lazy. So this Friday, our lesson will be about freemartins.

There is an excellent article that goes in to specifics here, but for those of you who just want the basics, I'll explain. A freemartin is the female of a set of male-female twins. During their development in utero, their hormones mix, making the female infertile. Since over 90% of these females will be infertile, they are typically raised as feeder cattle from birth. Some farmers keep them and check them at breeding age (typically 14 months), but it is rare to get one that can be bred. It is more expensive to raise a heifer than a bull/steer, so knowing that a female is a freemartin saves money in the long run. However, since we are unsure, it's better to err on the side of caution as a heifer makes more money in the long run.

So there is today's lesson! I had no idea what a freemartin was when I was dating Pat.

One of These Is Not Like The Other

Now that you have that song in your head...

We've had a lot of twins this past year. It's starting to slow down, finally, but twins come with problems. Yes, there are the typical difficult birth, etc. problems, but we've had a couple of unusual problems. Below are 3 calves, in order of birth. The first one was born 2 days before the last 2. First problem? These 3 calves are from 2 mothers. Which 2 would you guess are twins?

Second problem? The last one is a bull calf, which means one of the heifers is a free martin and no good. But which one? Unfortunately, this is the second time we've had this problem within about a month of each other. We'll raise both heifers as heifers and find out in about a year which one is good or not. Welcome to life on a farm!!!

Child Labor

Yesterday, I was paging through the the Farm Journal and I came across an article about proposed changes to Child Labor laws. This is what I read.

"The proposed changes prohitibt children under the age of 18 from working with animals in pesticide handling, timber operations, manure pits, and storage bins. They also prohibit youths at grain elevators, grain bins, silos, feedlots, stockyards, livestock exchanges, and livestock auctions.

Children under the age of 16 would be prohibited from operating most power-driven equipment as well as connecting or disconnecting an implement or any part of the machine. All youths would be prohibited from using electronic devices while operating equipment as well."

Now, I agree that revisions probably need to be made. The last revisions were done in 1970 and the world has changed just a bit since then. Here's my major problem: our country depends on agriculture, yet these labor laws leave us no way to draw interest from a younger generation.

In high school, our youth are encouraged to try out careers of interest. Want to go into the medical field? Intern at a hospital for a summer. Want to be a journalist? Work for the local newspaper. Want to try farming? Sorry, you have to be 18.

In our area, non-agriculture jobs for high-schoolers is pretty limited. Without being able to work with animals or at the local elevator, they are limited to the gas station and hardware store or having to commute to work in retail.

Agriculture can be a dangerous place to be. Large machinery + large animals + teenagers can be a recipe for disaster. However, if taught and supervised properly, it can be a very rewarding job for a high school kid. We've employed high school kids on our farm for years, long before I came into the picture. We have never advertised for help, taken applications, or conducted interviews. We have always had kids approach us about milking cows. Some are better at it than others, and some enjoy it more than others, but every single one of them has stuck with it until they graduated. Maybe they learned that dairy farming isn't for them, but they all learn the value of hard work and the time and effort we put in to caring for our animals and producing a quality and safe product.

My question is this: is 18 that much different than 16? So they have 2 more years of growing, but are they as easily taught as a 16 year old? The older they get, the more they know, and the less they have to take instruction from others. It's really not about 2 years as much as it is about common sense. You have to know the kids working for you and what they are capable of. In this day and age everything is about time, but if we slow down just a bit to teach proper safety, to show the proper way to do things, and explain the dangers, maybe we can avoid some of the tragic accidents that happen. Changing the law to 18 is really just about changing statistics. Now the kids getting hurt fall into the adult category and that's not really changing anything.

These laws don't apply to farm owners' children, which is probably where the majority of farm accidents happen. Having 2 young boys, 1 of which would live in the tractor if I let him, safety is very important to us. Our boys have been around cows and machinery since the day they came home from the hospital. That doesn't mean we get lax on safety. Our boys don't go into the cow yard alone. They know to stop and look whenever they hear machinery on the move. Most importantly, we created a safe place for them to play. Our backyard is fenced and they know that they can go play in there whenever they want. We are very lucky. Our oldest child is very cautious and is teaching his less than cautious brother good safety habits. We still try to be vigilant. The moment you aren't is when accidents happen.

I encourage you to comment on the proposed changes. Go to www.regulations.gov and identify your comments as RIN 1235-AA06. You have until November 1st. The whole article is linked at the beginning of my post.

Shocking!

It's very dry here. We've gotten a few sprinkles this morning so I left my car outside hoping for rain. The dryness has been great for getting the crops out of the field, although they are much drier than is optimal. This is the first year that anyone in the area can remember harvesting all of their soybeans without being interrupted by rain. We finished up our soybean crop on Tuesday and started taking out corn Wednesday afternoon. The combine broke down yesterday afternoon, so they spent that time fixing and headed back out this morning. We're hoping to get our corn out before the wind knocks it all down.

One of the biggest issues here has been fire. In the past week nearly every fire department in the area has been called out for a field or combine fire at least once. The process of combining builds up a lot of static electricity. Throw in heat, dry air, and wind, and you have a recipe for fire. In fact one area dealership called all their customers and told them to start dragging chains behind the combine to dispel some of the static electricity.

A few months ago, I would have laughed if someone suggested we'd be praying for rain this year. Now, we are doing everything we can to get it to rain. We've left equipment and bales in the field. About the only thing we haven't done is wash the car!

What Happened to Friday?

Oops, so much for my Fridays on the Farm goal. In my defense, it was a very busy day. So busy, I didn't even get a nap. Ya, I know!

So your farm update. This past week brought the start of soybean harvest. With the heat, wind, and no rain, things are drying down very quickly, almost too quickly. When harvesting crops, they allow for a certain percentage of moisture. Too wet, they dock points, too dry, they dock points. Usually too dry is not much of an issue, this year it is. The crop isn't great due to the early September frost and the super dry weather. It is what it is, that's farming!

We crop farm with Pat's dad and his uncle. Last night I was helping them move equipment from one field to the next. We're starting to look like big time farmers with 2 combines, semis, and a grain cart. It sure gets the job done faster.

Fridays on the Farm

I realize my posts have been very few and far between. I am determined to do better (at least for today:). In an effort to keep my blog slightly more organized, I am going to try a feature I call:

Wait for it...

Fridays on the Farm.

Bet you didn't guess that!

So every Friday (or at least every Friday that I get to it) I will post a bit of an update on our farm or tackle some agricultural issue that puts me on my soap box. Aren't you excited? Are there any of you left anyway?

For today, I'll give you an update of what we've been doing the last month around the farm. August and September are always busy months for us. August brings the 4th and final crop of hay for the year. We do 2 things with our hay. We chop it and bag it to make haylage. Haylage is fermented alfalfa. Due to the cows multiple stomachs and complicated digestive system, they like fermented food. That's keeping it overly simple. We bag as much of the first and second crops of hay that we can. We use the third crop of hay to fill our quota for the year and usually bale dry hay from the 4th crop and whatever doesn't fill a bag from the previous 3. The hay is sealed in the bags and needs at least 6 weeks to ferment before we can use it.

These are bags of silage (haylage bags are the same).

We chopped our silage a little over a week ago. Silage is chopped corn, stalk, husk, cob, and all. Silage time is much busier than hay. We get 4 crops of hay to make enough feed for our cows for a year, but silage is done in one shot. It took us about 3-4 12 hour days to get the silage put up for the year. (When I say us, what I mean is 6 guys chopping, hauling, and bagging, and my MIL and me making dinner).

Now that all the hay and silage is put up for the year, the wagons are cleaned, greased, and put away, it's time to focus on corn and soybeans. Pat has been busy working on his new grain storage bin.

A crew of guys came and put it up in about a day and a half. Pat has been busy working on the augers to put the corn in and to take it out. The corn stored in the bin will be used throughout the year for feeding. They will auger it out, run it through a roller mill to break up the corn, and use it for feed along with ground corn, dry hay, haylage, and silage. The goal is to harvest the corn for the bin, starting Sunday.

After that we may get a bit of a break while the soybeans die off and dry down. Of course, that break will be used to haul manure and catch up on maintenance of everything else that's been neglected for the last month.

In the meantime, the 4 1/3 of us will be heading out tonight for a much needed trip out of town. The boys and I are in desperate need of some better fitting clothes. I'm already wearing my one pair of "fat" pants and I think I only have 2 pairs of maternity jeans. Well, I'm off to pack!