Friday, February 17, 2017

Diary from Sky Range Ranch - January 18 through February 15, 2017

JANUARY 25 – It was 3 below zero last Wednesday and Andrea took the kids clear to town for school (they missed the bus) then helped me feed cows while Robbie broke ice on the creek for the cows. That afternoon when the kids came home from the bus they helped fill our woodbox. With such cold weather during December and January we’ve gone through a lot of wood! If it ever warms up, we can let the fire go out at night and save a little wood.

The rest of the week was warmer; it never got below zero again, and a couple days the temperature got up to 30 degrees in the afternoon. During the cold weather Ed started chewing up the top poles on her pen fence, so Andrea and I put up a hot wire along the top to keep her from eating up those poles completely.

Emily’s favorite cat Blackie (a uniquely colored cat, with a kink in his tail) that she raised from a baby) went missing from Andrea’s place last year. Later Andrea discovered that a neighbor had enticed the cat into her house and kept him. Blackie is an independent cat, however, and was beating up on the other house cats, and the lady banished him to her garage. Emily went to talk to the neighbor, who reluctantly gave her the cat back. Blackie is now happily living at Emily’s house downtown. Emily took a photo of her cat and grandpa when Lynn stopped by one day at Em’s house.

Lynn & Em's cat

Tuesday was Emily’s 19th birthday. Andrea made lasagna and we all had dinner at her house and celebrated Em’s birthday (and a few more gifts for Sam, as well, whose birthday was January 15). The deep snow has made our driveways challenging, even with the plowing Robbie has done, so Lynn and I didn’t try to drive up to Andrea’s house; Emily and Robert picked us up on their way by, and brought us home again after the birthday dinner.

The elk continue to come into our field, pawing through the snow and eating the rest of our pasture (that our cows would have eating this spring), and eating Alfonso’s haystack along the road. They eat with his cows when his daughter feeds them, and have tried to get in with our young cows to eat at their feeder—except Andrea’s dogs scared them away. We are hoping they won’t get in with our heifers.

Friday morning we finally had a chance to try to shoot an elk (to utilize the tags we bought for the elk depredation hunt) and shot a couple down in our lower field. Here’s a photo of Nick with the elk he shot, at the edge of the field.

Nick's elk

The other elk didn’t die immediately, and went over the hill. It had to be tracked down—and retrieved with a snowmobile—and the scary thing was that by the time Andrea and Robbie found that one a group of wolves was right there on the hillside above her. We realized that the wolves are still hanging around very close to our cattle.

Saturday afternoon Andrea and Robbie took the kids sledding up Carmen Creek with the snowmobile, inner tube and sleds, and they had a lot of fun in spite of the cold temperature. Andrea snapped this photo, but I’m not sure what Charlie is looking at, up in the sky!


kids sledding

On Sunday Michael brought his tractor down to help us load our bales and take big bales around to the heifers and load our feed truck. Here are photos of him taking a bale of alfalfa hay out to the heifer feeder.


Michael taking bale to heifers
putting bale in heifer feeder

This next photo shows Michael cutting the net wrap so we can unwrap it off the bale and get rid of it. Cattle often chew on and actually eat some of the net wrap or strings if you leave them on the bales, and this can cause indigestion and blockage in the stomachs, which can eventually kill the animal. We always remove strings and net wrap and never leave any in the field where the cattle can get at it.

Michael cutting net wrap off bale

Michael brought his tractor that day to move our bales around, because our tractor still has the two elk hanging on the loader, frozen solid—with sheets and tarps over them to keep the magpies and predators from getting at the frozen meat. 

Here’s a photo of Robbie putting more tarps around the elk to protect the meat.

Robbie putting tarps around the elk

It was a nice day, so I took Sprout’s front shoes off (that have been on since last fall) and Michael helped me take her hind shoes off, and I trimmed her feet.

Robbie shoveled the deep snow off the old barn roof (so the weight of the snow won’t collapse the roof) and Charlie shoveled the snow piles away from the barn doors so we can get them open.


Robbie shoveling snow off barn

That afternoon Dani and her friend (who was staying overnight on the weekend) spent some time brushing Ed in her pen, then helped Andrea bring some salt and mineral down for the heifers; they were running out. I fed the kids peanut butter sandwiches for a snack and then they hiked back up to Andrea’s house.

Shooting a couple of the elk that were eating in our field didn’t deter the rest of the herd. Yesterday 25 of them came back again, and 16 elk in another herd were eating at Alfonso’s haystack. 

Robbie used a snow blower to finish removing the snow off our house roof. Several roofs around our area have collapsed with all the weight from 2 feet of heavy snow, and we thought we’d better get some of the weight off our roofs before we get any more snow.

Yesterday we had to take more hay around to various groups of cattle, and needed our tractor, so Andrea, Lynn and Robbie hung the 2 elk in our sick barn shed, to get them off the tractor loader. Today about 25 elk were camped all day on the hill across the creek from our house, and this evening they drifted back down into the field to eat. We have deer netting around our haystacks (flexible plastic mesh—as shown in this photo) to keep the deer out of the stacks, but it’s not strong enough to withstand elk pressure, so we hope the elk don’t try out our haystacks.


deer netting around the stack of round bales


FEBRUARY 2 – We had another siege of sub-zero weather for a few days and had to plug in the feed truck at night so it would start in the mornings. Andrea talked to Alfonso’s daughter (met her along the road down by Alfonso’s haystack) one morning and she told Andrea that her father was coming back from Mexico soon and didn’t believe her regarding how cold it has been. He was angry at his daughter and son-in-law for feeding his cows so much hay while he was gone for the winter. 

Alfonso doesn’t understand that cows need more food in cold weather, and apparently doesn’t appreciate the fact that his cows look better this winter than they ever have. None of them starved to death so far this winter; he lost at least three last year to starvation during the winter when someone else was taking care of them for him and feeding them only 2 or 3 times a week like he instructed.

On Saturday about 30 elk were lounging on the hill above our lower field again. I took some photos of part of the herd—photos taken from our back porch. One young bull was busily itching (maybe lice biting him) and a calf was talking to its napping mom.

elk on hill
elk on hill - bull scratching an itch

They’ve been there nearly every day eating our grass, and another group on the other side of our place, eating on Alfonso’s haystack by the road. The elk have been pretty hungry during the cold weather, too.Sunday morning one of Alfonso’s cows was out on the road, eating on his haystack along with the elk. That evening we had dinner here for Andrea, Robbie and the kids when they came home from their dad’s place.

Monday morning Robbie, Michael and Nick started on the fence rebuilding project for Willow’s pen. They sawed out the old top poles and removed the net wire, and they put up a tall pole to route the electric wire across to my hay shed so they could do away with the electric wire around the old pen. The next day after hauling bales around with the tractor, Robbie used the tractor and loader to lift out the old crab apple tree stump, in pieces. That old tree blew down many years ago and needed to be moved so we can rebuild the fence it smashed. For all those years the big stump took the place of the fence in that corner. I took photos of the old stump pieces a few days later when Robbie and Nick were working on the new fence.

fence project - with old stump in the foreground

It snowed all Tuesday afternoon, and the band bus bringing Charlie and Sam home from an away game didn’t get back until after midnight.

Yesterday was very cold and windy so the guys didn’t work on the fence; they just took a load of posts and poles up into the field for the new fence and put a big pole across the top of Rishiam’s gate into the back yard (and I put a hot wire across the other gate) so that when they pound posts next week he won’t try to jump over a gate if he freaks out.

The wind was blowing big drifts across our driveway by that evening so Robbie plowed through those. Otherwise no one would have been able to drive in or out. It was still snowing this morning when Andrea and Lynn left very early to drive to Idaho Falls for her pain doctor appointment and his arthritis doctor appointment. The roads were a little bad but they got there on time. Robbie helped me feed the cows. 

Lynn’s doctor examined his shoulder (that’s been hurting for several weeks after it popped out of joint and then back in again) and told him some of the attachments are torn and he will probably need surgery. Lynn came home in a fancy sling that helps immobilize the arm and shoulder, so he won’t keep moving it too much and hurting it more. They got home at 9 pm and the temperature had dropped to 5 below zero by then.

A few days ago Emily sliced open her hand (between thumb and first finger) when chopping kindling with a new hatchet her dad gave her for Christmas. She closed the wound with a butterfly bandage, but it got infected and she soaked it in Epsom salts. It’s doing better by today.


FEBRUARY 8 – We are still having problems with deer and elk. Nearly every day the elk have been eating in our field and lounging on the hill above it. I took another photo of some of our “resident elk” camped out on the hill across the creek from our house.

elk on hill across creek

Last Friday morning when I went out to feed the horses I discovered that a bunch of whitetail deer had managed to slither into our haystack below the driveway, by going under the old flatbed truck. The truck is next to the stack and we’d attached netting to it, to keep the deer out of the hay. They’d gotten in there and tore up a bunch of hay, then knocked down the netting to get out. They waste a lot more hay than they eat! We don’t mind so much when they are constantly eating hay with our cows out in the field (because the cows clean up everything the deer don’t eat), but we try to keep the deer out of our haystacks because they pull out bunches of hay and tromp on it, poop on it and waste it. After we got done feeding the cows, Andrea helped me remodel the netting and we wrapped it around the stack in such a manner that the deer can’t get in again. Then she drove the tractor around to our other haystack to get big bales to reload the feed truck.


Andrea taking tractor around to haystack

Saturday morning I went out early to feed the horses—when it was still almost too dark to see anything, and found three elk eating hay from my haystack. A young 2-point bull looked at me like I was some kind of alien and didn’t leave until I ran up to them and started clapping my hands. Several more had been there and were just leaving. They’d eaten and torn up all the bales I had opened and laid out for feeding the horses that morning, and started eating on bales in the hay shed. They also left at least 10 piles of poop in the mess of torn-up hay bales. I chased them out of my stack and up into the field, and then they had a little trouble getting back through all the fences. There were 15 more up on the hill above the road, and it took the group more than an hour, pacing up and down the fences to finally all jump over the fences and leave. This is the first time we’ve ever had elk right here by the house, eating my horse hay.

We’re hoping they don’t come back. The next two nights I turned on all our yard lights including the two on the end of my hay shed, to try to deter them. They didn’t come back into my hay, but a herd of them went in with the young cows the next night and ate hay out of their feeders and left a big mess. We were trying to figure out a way to fence them out of that end of the pasture, but then Mother Nature came to our aid.

The past few days have been warmer—actually above freezing in the afternoons for the first time in many weeks. The snow started settling and getting softer and the elk seem to be staying farther up on the ridges where they may be able to paw through to some grass. Also, Alfonso moved all of his cows from the lower place (since all the hay in his stack along the road is gone now) and took them up to the Gooch place above us—and is feeding them up there. Some of the elk are now coming down into his field to eat with his cows.

We’ve been feeding a lot of extra hay this winter, with all the cold weather. We save a little of the big bale each day for Buffalo Girl when we feed the main bunch of cows. She’s been by herself in the maternity pen all winter, so we take her some hay with the sled. Here’s a photo of Andrea feeding her.

Andrea feeding Buffalo Girl

Michael and Carolyn decided to bring their horses out of Cheney Creek. They have a group of 5 horses on the 320 pasture that they are feeding a little hay to every few days, but they hadn’t seen the 3 horses in Cheney Creek up close for a long time. Those horses have been doing fine, pawing through snow to grass, and could usually be seen every day from a distance. It had been several days since they were in sight on the hills and ridges, however, so Michael and Carolyn got worried about them.

They tried to go across the wild meadow (from the county road) on a 4-wheeler but the snow was so deep it got high-centered and wouldn’t go very well. Michael was walking ahead of it breaking trail and Carolyn was pushing it, but they gave up on that. Carolyn stayed behind, and Michael hiked across the creek and across gopher meadow through crotch-deep snow. Then he had to wade through deep snow on the jeep track up the mountain, and that took a long time. He had to stop and catch his breath frequently, and his heart rate never got below 140 even when he was resting.

He didn’t see any tracks, and no horses, and was beginning to worry that the wolves had got them. He finally found them up near the top ridge—not far from the range fence. Then they didn’t want to follow him back down to the field. He had to take off one of his sweatshirts, put it around Gus’s neck, and lead him down. The mare followed Gus, but the other gelding didn’t come, and Michael had to go back for him. It took 2.5 hours to get the horses to the gate to come down to the field, and Carolyn was starting to worry about him. Gus and TJ (the mare) were in pretty good shape but the other gelding, Clifford, was starting to lose weight; it was time to bring them out of there.

Sunday night I cooked dinner for everyone again, when Andrea brought the kids back home from the weekend with Mark. After dinner Sam washed dishes while Andrea and Dani hiked out to turn on our yardlights. The elk are staying away from our barnyard now, however, so that was the last night we left the lights on.

With the warmer weather, we’ve been letting our fire go out at night (to save wood) and turning off the pellet stove in the livingroom during the day (to save pellets). This winter has been very expensive for heating our homes!

The warm afternoons have been pleasant; the horses often nap in the sunshine or take a nice roll in the snow to itch their backs. Here’s Dottie rolling around in the snow.


Dottie rolling

The blackbirds seem to know when winter has turned a corner. They came back to our creek on Monday—about a week earlier than usual. Yesterday the guys started back to work on Willow’s new pen. Robbie and Nick started tearing out the old hot wires and Michael took the flatbed trailer down to Millers and hauled Sy’s tractor and post-pounder up here. Andrea and I moved Dottie, Ed and Breezy to the pens by the calving barn so they would be farther away from the loud noise of the hydraulic jack-hammer pounder. We didn’t want any of them to freak out and crash into a fence.


Sy plowed the deep snow away from the fenceline. We left the snow there until the last minute, because it served as insulation and the ground underneath was not frozen—even after sub-zero weather that got down to 28 below zero. We wanted to be able to drive those posts and not have to thaw the ground to create post holes. After the snow was cleared away, Sy used the tractor loader to pull the old posts out of the ground, and then set the new posts in the new fence line—making the lane by my hay shed bigger (to make it easier to get in and out of there with the stackwagon) and Willow’s pen a little smaller. With the jack-hammer pounder, Sy set 40 posts in about an hour—with Nick lining them up and Robbie working the chain to pick up and place the posts where they needed to go.

getting post ready
Robbie getting a post in position for Sy to pound
pounding post

Andrea and I stayed out there by Willow and Rashiam to help keep them calm when the pounding started, because it is VERY loud. With our reassurance, and some extra hay to nibble on, those two didn’t get too frantic. After the first few minutes they realized the loud noise wasn’t going to hurt them, and they settled down.

Michael hauled Sy and his tractor back home again, Nick and Robbie got the tops of the posts sawed off and ready for the top poles, and I fed them chili and corn bread for lunch. It was snowing lightly during the post pounding and started snowing harder in the afternoon, so the guys decided to quit for the day. Andrea helped me put Dottie, Ed and Breezy back in their pens.

It snowed all evening and part of today, with 6 inches of new snow. We’re glad we got the posts set yesterday! Michael’s tractor had a flat tire this morning, so he was glad we’d plugged in our tractor (to take hay around to the young cows’ feeders this morning). He brought his feed truck down here so we could load a couple of our bales for him.


FEBRUARY 15 – Thursday and Friday Michael, Nick and Robbie worked on the new fence for Willow’s pen. With the new posts set, first they measured for cutting the poles to fit on top of the posts.

Michael measuring for new fence
Nick and Robbie measuring for the top poles

The got all the poles on the top nailed on, and putting up the net wire (no-climb netting, which has very small spaces so a horse can’t put a foot through it). For Willow, we must have the netting very close to the ground so she can’t reach under it; she always tries to reach through, under or over a fence, and we don’t want her to get herself in trouble. I took photos of the fence progress, and Robbie and Nick splicing some of the netting together before putting it up on the fence.


poles on top of posts
Robbie & Nick splicing netting together
net wire on fence

The weather was warmer the last few days, with a little rain instead of snow. The snow is settling a bit, but still very hard to try to drive through or walk through. The elk are still coming down to the fields. A big herd spent Friday night in the field above Andrea’s house.

Robbie and Michael welded some mesh panel on the bottoms of the two gates they’ll be hanging in Willow’s pen, so there will be no gap under the gates that she can get her head under.

On Saturday Dani helped us feed cows, riding on the feed truck, and also enjoyed pulling the sled to feed Buffalo Girl. 

Dani ready to go help feed cows
Dani pulling sled-full of hay
Dani feeding Buffalo Girl

Sunday was cold again (down to 8 degrees that morning). When Lynn got up that morning he had another bleeding episode—hemorrhage from the colon—passing a large quantity of blood when he thought he was having a bowel movement. This is what happened to him summer before last, during all the stress of our irrigation water problems (the neighbor stealing our water) when we were haying. We had to take him to the hospital for IVs and the doctor sent him on a life flight to St. Patrick’s hospital in Missoula. That was scary and stressful. 

This time he wasn’t as stressed about the bleeding because he knew what it was, and that he wasn’t going to bleed to death. We decided to ride it out and take care of it at home. This was less stress for him than going to the ER and having IVs or being flown to Missoula. We immediately got him started on lots of fluids and electrolytes, drinking Gatorade, and though he was passing toilet bowlfuls of blood about once an hour for 10 hours, he didn’t get to the point where he needed IVs. He kept his color, and normal blood pressure, and ate a little chicken noodle soup and Jello for lunch and supper and didn’t get too weak. By evening the hemorrhage was slowing down; he was only passing blood every couple hours, and then it seemed to stop. He was able to sleep that night without having to get up and go to the bathroom every hour. 

He was supposed to take the kids to the bus Monday morning, but wasn’t quite up to that. Andrea and Robbie drove to Salt Lake Sunday evening; she had an appointment on Monday with a specialist to see if she needs surgery on her neck—the bone spurs and problems that have been putting pressure on nerves. Charlie can’t legally drive without a licensed adult, until he gets his driver’s license later this month) but I let Lynn sleep, and I was doing the morning chores, Michael came down to our place and rode with Charlie and the kids to the bus, then brought the vehicle home. Lynn was able to rest all day, and was doing better by evening, but Michael drove down to Baker and got the kids off the bus. Charlie carried in wood to fill our wood box. He’s been helping carry in the wood several weekends, and some days after school.

Charlie getting the wood
Charlie bringing wood to the house

Bob and Jane stopped by that afternoon with a birthday gift for me (fresh baked bread and some apricot jam she made).

The doctor Andrea went to see had an emergency surgery that day, and wanted to reschedule Andrea’s appointment, but managed to work her in for a brief appointment just ahead of the surgery. The doctor didn’t think the bone spurs in her neck warranted surgery at this point in time, but may eventually. At this point in time she was more worried about her shoulder problem and the way the shoulder contracture is pulling her spine out of line. She referred her to a shoulder specialist, who was supposed to look at her late that afternoon. While she was waiting for that appointment she went to the burn ICU and visited with some of her old nurses and physical therapists who remembered her from the 2 months she spent there 17 years ago. They were very glad to see her.

When she went to her appointment with the shoulder specialist, there was some kind of glitch in the referral and they said it would have to be rescheduled. So she wasn’t able to see that specialist. They were very late leaving Salt Lake to come home, during rush hour traffic, which took awhile. By then Andrea was exhausted so they stopped at Brigham, Utah to spend the night.

Tuesday morning Michael went to the school bus with Andrea’s kids again and brought the car home. Sam and Charlie went with the pep band to play at one of the last basketball games of the season, at South Fremont High School in St. Anthony. Emily, on her way home from work at Tendoy, picked up Dani from the school bus and brought her home to feed the pets and get a change of clothes so she could stay with Emily that night and go to school from Emily’s house. While she was here she took a minute to say hello to her horse. 

Dani petting Willow

Willow is living in one of our calving pens by the house until we get her new fence finished so she can move back to her pen. We had to rebuild the old pen because the fences were deteriorating badly and we needed to use some materials that Willow can’t chew on and destroy. Michael and Nick put chicken wire around the top poles so she won’t be able to chew on them. 

Andrea and Robbie came partway home that morning. They stopped in Blackfoot to visit Robbie’s grandparents, and since they were so close to where the band kids were playing that evening, they stopped to watch the basketball game and hear the pep band. Sam and Charlie have really enjoyed playing in the band this year. They are a very small group, and only part of the band goes on the road trips to play at the away games—and that small group has become very, very good. Each band member has to excel since there are no extra instruments for those parts. They’ve become excellent musicians and sound like a professional band.



Pep band

Andrea and Robbie brought the kids home after the game, and got home about 1 a.m. this morning. Andrea and the kids were really tired this morning when they had to go to the school bus, and Andrea took a nap after she came back from the bus. Then she helped me feed the cows and break ice again on the creek, while Robbie helped Nick and Michael on the fence project. They got Willow’s new pen finished and I put Breezy in it for now, so they can tear down the old fence in her pen. Once they get her pen rebuilt, she and Willow can both go back to their own pens, and our extra calving pen will be free again for calving!


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P.S. If anyone would like to order autographed copies of my latest 3 books, I can be contacted at 208-756-2841 or by e-mail at hsmiththomas@centurytel.net. Details about those books can be seen at the end of some of my previous blogs.

Tuesday, February 7, 2017

Diary from Sky Range Ranch - December 19, 2016 through January 18, 2017

DECEMBER 27Last week was cold and we had to break ice daily on the creek for the cattle to be able to drink. When we tried to start the tractor last Monday it wouldn’t start, even though the engine heater had been plugged in all night. We put the battery charger on it and Robbie cleaned off the battery terminals, and an hour later we were able to get it started—and moved a new big bale out to the heifers’ feeder. The heifers were very silly and goofy and all ran out the gate into the pen next to the horses.

Robbie was closest to rescue them; he was in the tractor and Andrea was farther down the field by their feeder. So Robbie jumped out of the tractor and ran around them. He got ahead of them before they went out the next gate and into the lane. If they’d gotten out that gate they could have gone clear out to the county road before anyone could catch up with them.
 

Then we loaded big bales on the feed truck again, and took a big straw bale up for the cows in the field above the house for bedding, and a bale of straw for the heifers for bedding in this cold weather. The next day it was a little warmer but we had another snowstorm. The snow is getting deep—up to my knees. We are feeding the cows extra hay because they need more feed to keep warm.

cows eating hay
snow is deep except where the cows have been eating

The roads are slippery and treacherous with the new snow on top of ice, so Andrea took me to town for my doctor appointment to take the stitches out of my hand (from removal of the skin growth), and then on our way back home she got a phone call from the school saying Charlie had dropped a weight on his foot in P.E class and the teacher thought his foot was broken. So Andrea took me on home and turned around and went back to town again to take Charlie to the ER to have his foot x-rayed. It didn’t seem to be broken, just badly bruised. The doctor taped a couple of toes together to immobilize the area, and had him wear a special boot, just in case, and told him to elevate the foot and put ice on it for a few days.

That afternoon several Amish riders took a group heifers up the road to Yoders’ little pasture next to our upper place. The wire gate to their hill pasture above the road (where they had their buggy horses this fall) was open, and lying under the snow. Three of the heifers ran up through the gate and one of the cowboys went after them on his horse, not realizing there was a gate lying there. The horse got tangled in the wire, cut its legs, and bucked the rider off—then ran down the road. Michael and Carolyn saw a lot of blood in the snow, so we hope the horse wasn’t cut up too badly.

I started sending out Christmas cards and letters (and I’m still way behind, in getting them all sent). A couple days before Christmas I made personalized T-shirts for everyone in the family and a few friends—drawing horses on most of them and cartoons on a few. This is the standard Christmas present from Grandma in our family. I think I made nearly 20 T-shirts this year. We didn’t have much money for gifts, so I made T-shirts, and Andrea made fudge, and Carolyn made cookies and candy as gifts.

T-shirts from Grandma
I started drawing pictures on T-shirts many years ago. When Lynn and I were first married we often grabbed the wrong T-shirts out of the clean clothes. So I drew horses on mine and tractors on his—and eventually drew pictures on our kids’ T-shirts as well. It became a family tradition at Christmas and birthdays, to get personalized shirts.

Thursday it was 14 below zero in the morning, and never got above zero. Andrea and kids didn’t quite make it to the bus on time, so she let Charlie drive clear to school. He still needs a few more supervised driving hours before he gets his driver’s license.

It was too cold to start the tractor that day so we just loaded little bales on the feed truck for the cows for the next two days. By Friday afternoon, after being plugged in for almost 14 hours, the tractor started and we were able to take big bales around to the young cows, and load the truck again.

With it this cold, we have to leave the faucets dripping in our kitchen sink and bathroom sink, and those cupboard doors open, so the water pipes won’t freeze up. With the water dripping all the time, the kitchen faucets started leaking around their bases, and then we discovered water on the floor. It was leaking down the pipe and under the sink. So we had to put a bucket underneath the sink drain to catch the drips.

On Christmas Eve we had more snow – snowing hard. We had 4 more inches by Christmas morning—on top of our already-deep snow.


deep snow

After chores that morning Lynn and I opened our gifts. Michael and Carolyn gave us cookies, and also gave Lynn a cap and sweatshirt with the new logo for Michael and Son Custom Fencing. Lynn tried them on and posed for a photo.

Lynn in his new hat & sweatshirt

Andrea was busy all morning cooking turkey dinner and getting things ready before she went to town to pick up the kids from Mark (he had them for the first part of Christmas vacation, until 2 p.m. on Christmas day) so Jim helped me feed the cows that morning and fill our wood-box.
We all went to Andrea’s place to watch the kids open their gifts and then I came home to feed the horses before dark—and went back for Christmas dinner in the feed truck—since it had chains on and could make it through the new snow in the driveway. I took photos of the kids by the Christmas tree, and Em, Robert and Charlie lounging on the couch.


Christmas Day - Sam & Dani
kids by the tree
lounging on the couch

Yesterday was clear and cold, below zero again, and Jim helped me break ice out of the horse tubs and feed the cows. Later in the day Andrea and Robbie were able to start the tractor and take hay around, and another feeder for the young cows in the swamp pasture. We can give them two bales at once and not have to fill their feeders as often.

Today it’s actually above zero, but snowing again.


JANUARY 4 Last Wednesday the heifers ran out of hay in their feeder and we fed them some small square bales, and gave the heifers more loose salt and mineral in their salt feeder. The forage grown in this area is short of copper, so the cattle need some copper along with other trace minerals in their mineral mix. Andrea stirred up the salt and mineral together in their salt feeder.

Andrea refilling salt feeder
Andrea mixing the salt and mineral

I’m still slow getting all my Christmas cards and letters sent out—just sending a few each day. It may be Valentine’s Day before I get them all sent!

Andrea’s kids are glad to be here for most of the Christmas vacation, enjoying fun in the snow, and helping with chores and feeding. They also had a couple friends come stay with them overnight. Dani and a friend helped us feed the cows.

Dani & friend helping Andrea feed cows
cows enjoying their hay

Charlie helped Jim shovel the deep snow away from the mailboxes, and then they spent a couple hours shoveling snow out of the pens by the calving barn. The weather is supposed to be really nasty so we wanted to be able to let the heifers into those pens (with the windbreak sides) so they will be able to get out of the wind. We put some bedding in there so they can have a good place to sleep and won’t get so chilled.

Charlie and Jim also shoveled snow off the woodpile tarps. Here’s what it looked like before they shoveled the snow off.

woodpile covered with snow

The phones and internet quit working off and on the past few days, and the phone company has been trying to get that problem fixed. Every other day or so the phones quit working for a few hours.

On Saturday Charlie filled our wood-box again while Andrea helped me feed the cows, then Charlie rode around in the tractor with Robbie to take big bales to all the feeders, and re-load the feed truck—and they took another bale of straw up to the cows for bedding. Even though the temperature never got above zero, the sun was nice that day (and no wind yet) so Andrea held Ed and Dottie for me while I took their front shoes off. I meant to do it sooner; their shoes have been on too long—but I wasn’t able to do it during the 2 weeks my hand was stitched up. If weather is going to be worse for a while, I wanted to get those shoes off before the storm. Nasty, cold windy weather is miserable for human and horses both, trying to take off shoes and trim feet.

Dottie waiting at the gate

Later that afternoon—New Year’s Eve Andrea and Robbie took the girls and some of their friends sledding, and Charlie went up to my brother Rockwell’s place to work on his ham radio.

New Years Day was 13 below zero and warmed up to zero by afternoon. Andrea, Robbie, Emily, Robert and kids went sledding up Carmen Creek and had fun in spite of the cold. Monday felt like a heat wave, up to 15 degrees for a high. Michael brought his tractor down (it started easier that morning than ours would have) and took all the bales around for us, and got some diesel from our barrel). He used a big bale of straw to push the deep snow out of the windbreak corner in the bull pen, so Andrea could put some bedding there—for the bulls to get out of the wind and not freeze their testicles.

Yesterday was really cold again, and the phones weren’t working. The kids missed the bus so Charlie drove to school. He’s getting some good experience driving on winter roads.

We have a lot of snow building up, and icicles hanging down all around the house. Here are photos of some of the icicles.

icicles outside our window
winter window

With the cold weather and deep snow, a group of elk have been coming down to Alfonso’s haystack along the road just below our place. The deer have been eating on that hay all winter, but now the elk have discovered it too.

Today with the cold weather we didn’t even try to start our tractor, and Michael came down again with his tractor to load our hay and carry the big bales around to various feeders. He took a big straw bale home with him, to spread for his cows down along the creek where he’d pushed away the deep snow with the backhoe. They needed a place to get out of the wind, since the only place they’d been able to sleep was in the feed trails; everywhere else has 2 feet of snow. Tonight it’s snowing and windy, so we are glad we’ve given our cattle extra feed and bedding.


JANUARY 12 Most of this past week had sub-zero temperatures, down to 28 below last Thursday. It was so cold that most vehicles would not start, so school was cancelled. I fed horses early (because they were cold and hungry), as soon as it was light enough to see, but didn’t water them until after sun-up, or their water would just freeze up. Andrea and Robbie helped me break ice out of their tubs and water them when it was a little warmer. There were 9 elk at our neighbor’s haystack (just below our place, along the road) that evening.

On Friday Andrea and I took salt and mineral to the cows in the field above the house when we fed their hay, and to the young cows in the swamp pasture across the creek. Then she and Robbie went to town to thaw out Emily’s frozen pipes and put heat tape on them, and put some insulation around them. The little rental house is an old trailer house with no foundation and it gets very cold underneath it.

It’s been very cold, but sunny. The horses and cattle enjoy the sunshine, and I took photos of Ed taking a nap in the sun.

Ed napping in the snow

Michael has had a horrible respiratory infection that settled in his lungs. He went to the doctor and got a prescription for antibiotics--and prednisone to open his airways so he can breathe better.

Our phones and internet quit working again. The phone company had to work on the relay box (down along the highway) in sub-zero weather.

Saturday was very cold again and Andrea’s car wouldn’t start. She and Robbie came down here with Jim in his pickup. He has been spending long hours in the little trailer/shop here, making antler lamps etc. trying to finish several projects before he heads to Tennessee for a job that a fellow wants him to do back there.

It took Robbie more than an hour to chop ice and open up the drinking holes in the creek again for the cows, and the waterway (a spring) in the back pen for the bulls. With it this cold, everything had frozen thick ice overnight. I’ve been feeding the heifers some little grass bales along with their alfalfa hay, to give them more roughage to keep them warm (fermentation/digestion of hay in the rumen creates heat). They require a lot more feed during cold weather.
 
heifers eating some grass hay

That evening there were two big coyotes harassing Alfonso’s cows. Jim and Lynn took a gun down there to try to shoot them but didn’t get a good shot. Alfonso is still in Mexico (he leaves for several months during the winter and he has someone to feed his cows, but no one is around to really look after them). Some of his cows are calving, and their calves will be freezing to death in this weather. The ice on the creek is bad, too; one day Andrea and Robbie took pity on his thirsty cows and broke ice at the creek crossing (where the cows have been walking over the ice), so they could get a drink. At least they are being fed more regularly this winter than last winter, and the cows are not starving to death, like several did last year.

On Sunday Michael brought his tractor down again after he fed his cows and loaded his hay, since ours would not have started. He took a big bale of alfalfa out to the heifers’ feeder, loaded our feed truck, and brought the rest of the plastic net fence around from the haystack (that we didn’t need there this year) to put around the haystack below the lane. The whitetail deer are eating and tearing apart the alfalfa hay and the oat hay and wasting a lot of it, so we put the netting around more of that stack. There’s a broken-legged whitetail fawn that practically lives at that stack, but it can still get to the hay by crawling under the old flatbed 2-ton truck parked at this end of it.

fawn that lives at our haystack
fawn heading back to our haystack
fawn
The whitetail deer eat at the feeders with the heifers, and wander through the barnyard all day (and night) eating off the feed truck and eating any spilled barley hay that we feed the cows. I took photos of them in the driveway, and one photo looks like a stack of deer. One of the young ones got a little nervous as I was taking photos, and went trotting off across the bridge.

whitetail in driveway
young deer taking off

Sunday night I cooked a big dinner here again for when the kids got home from Mark, and Dani made our calving calendar for this coming calving season—writing each cow’s name on the date she is due to calve. Dani loves the cows and always wants to participate in their care and record-keeping. Em and Robert came out for supper, too, and we loaded some wood in their pickup to take home; they are about out of firewood.

The last couple days have been a little warmer; it actually got above zero. It actually thawed a little on Monday and the roads were so slick that school was cancelled; one bus slid off the road, and there was a snow slide on the river road that blocked the road and no buses could get through.

One of Alfonso’s cows had a hay twine caught around her hind foot and also around her head and neck, pulling her head around toward her foot. Jim noticed her along the road as he was driving up the creek that evening coming home from town. The poor cow was pretty helpless. So I called Alfonso’s daughter and left a message on her phone, and the next morning she called me back to thank me and said her husband was up here feeding hay to Alfonso’s cows and would try to find that cow and get the twine off.

Twines are dangerous if left on bales for cows to eat, or left in the field and not gathered up; cattle can get tangled in them and they also eat them. The plastic twine and net wrap that some bales are held together with doesn’t digest; it can plug up a cow (or calf) stomach and kill them.

Tuesday the roads were still very slick, so Andrea and Robbie took the kids to school rather than have them ride the bus. It was warm enough to start our own tractor, and Robbie and Andrea took bales around to feeders and loaded the truck. Then they helped Lynn put new faucets in our kitchen sink where the old ones were leaking.

Even with it warmer, the snow has not melted at all in the fields or barnyard. Here are a few more snow photos. My hay shed has been a big help for many years, keeping most of my horse hay from being water damaged by rain or melting snow.

snow on the fences
Buffalo Girl enjoying the sunshine
my hay shed

Carolyn ended up getting Michael’s respiratory infection and had to go to the doctor yesterday for antibiotics. Andrea and Robbie took the kids to school again (after they didn’t quite make it to the bus on time), which was a good thing because before it got to town, the bus slid off the road and into a snowdrift when it was picking kids up on the hillside subdivision near town.

Another herd of elk has moved into our place from the other side; there were 25 head camped out on the hill above our back field all day yesterday. By evening they were drifting up into the field by Andrea’s house and starting to come down in with the young cows to eat at their feeders. Andrea’s dogs came down and Curly sat in the gateway barking at them, and they didn’t quite get to the feeders.

elk waiting on the hill above our field
elk on hill across from our house

Robbie got the little red pickup working again. This was Nick’s pickup that plunged into Peets’ pond some years back (when Nick was driving it back and forth to high school). Nick had gotten out of it to shut their driveway gate and the emergency brake didn’t hold—and the pickup rolled across the main road, through the fence, and into the pond before he could catch up with it. Lynn and Carolyn pulled it out of the pond with our tractor and Nick borrowed our old car for transportation. The little drowned pickup has been sitting at the upper stackyard all those years, until Robbie towed it down here to work on it. He had to put a heater under it to thaw the frozen water to drain out of the motor, and then got it repaired. He’s been plowing people’s driveways with a 6-wheeler ATV and blade, but it’s had several breakdowns, so he wants to put a bigger plow on the red pickup.

Today was colder, down to zero again, and dropping colder tonight. With the elk ganging up and eating hay (going into the fields with Alfonso’s cows to eat with them, eating his haystacks, and now trying to get in with our cows to eat their hay) we asked the Fish and Game Department what we can do to deter them. Shooting at them doesn’t scare them enough; they just go a little ways up the hill and wait, then come right back. With the cold weather and deep snow they will just stay here and eat our hay, and we can’t afford to feed 40 elk. There is another herd of about 80 that are living in another rancher’s field down on the highway below us.

The Fish and Game is selling a few elk tags for a deprecation hunt—for elk that are in ranchers’ fields. So Andrea, Lynn and Nick went to town today to get their hunting licenses for this year, and elk tags. Maybe if we actually shoot 2 or 3, the elk will be more apt to stay away. We also need the meat. It’s been too cold to butcher our old cow (Buffalo Girl) and Michael’s old cow (which they’d planned to eat) and now they are getting closer to calving again so we’ll probably just calve them out one more time—and eat elk instead, if we can harvest some.

While they were in town, Andrea, Nick and Lynn drove out to Jenelle’s place (Lynn’s younger sister) and took photos of the new fence that Michael, Nick and Robbie built for her a couple months ago. I needed photos for an article I’m writing for a cattle publication, discussing building barbed-wire fences. The snow was so deep, however, it was hard to get good photos. Here are some photos that they took of the fence, and a photo Lynn took of Andrea taking pictures.

Andrea taking photos of fence
Barbed-wire fence in snow
fence at top of a hill


Lynn also took photos looking across at the Continental Divide (Beaverhead Mountains).

view from the road by Jenelle's ranch

This evening when I was doing chores, I started to pull a bale of grass hay out to the heifers with the calf sled (which holds a small bale nicely) but the bottom of the sled had ice on it; when the weather warmed up a couple days ago the snow on the sled—which was upside down—froze to the bottom of it. The icy bottom was too rough to slide and I was having a very hard time pulling it, even on the packed driveway snow. Emily came along about that time, driving up to our place after work, to talk to her Dad and wish him well on his trip to Kentucky. She helped me get the sled out to the field; she pushed while I pulled! The heifers were grateful for the hay.

Nick came along right after that, eager to shoot one of the elk before dark (they were right by the road again, at Alfonso’s haystack) but it was getting too late and cold. We’ll have to wait until the weather is a little warmer for field dressing and skinning an elk, or Andrea’s hands will freeze. She’s our family butcher.


JANUARY 18 More bitterly cold weather. Last Friday Lynn helped me pull the sled out to the field to feed the heifers another bale of grass hay, using his one good arm to pull (his right shoulder is impaired and painful) and I pushed the sled. If the ice ever melts off the bottom of the sled it will pull better!

Here are photos of more new snow. I took pictures of Buffalo Girl eating her hay in a snowstorm.

Buffalo Girl eating her hay in the snow

I also took photos of the snow covering our car and pickup. Lynn hasn’t driven them to town lately. With the bad roads, Andrea has been doing all of our town errands (getting groceries, etc.) and Lynn hasn’t had to try to drive to town. 
 
snow covered vehicles

Jim finished packing his trailer, collected the sacks of meat he stored here in our freezer, and headed out on his trip to Kentucky. The roads are pretty good at our end with the clear, cold weather, but there are some really bad ice storms right now in the eastern part of the country.

Willow tore down her hot wire (nylon tape with little electrified wires in it) at the end of her pen. It’s the barrier that keeps her from fighting the gelding on the other side of the fence) and had it strung out in her pen, eating the end of it! I had to go out there and put it back up before she ingested very much of that wire-laden plastic!

Robbie plowed snow for several people that day, but the plow mounts broke when he hooked a frozen berm. He worked on the plow until late that night, welding some of it back together again. By Saturday morning it was good to go. He had a plowing job up Tower Creek, and while he was here borrowing some chains for his tires I took photos of his “new and improved” snow plow.

red pickup & plow

The next morning Shiloh and Sprout were impatient for breakfast as I fed the other horses on that cold day—running up and down the fence squealing, rearing and kicking at each other. Sprout trashed the new fence between them, kicking holes in the netting and breaking one of the top poles—and also tore down hot wire across the top end of her pen. After Andrea and Robbie helped me break ice out of tubs we put up a hot wire along Sprout’s side of the fence—about 6 feet away from the fence, to keep her from trying to fight with Shiloh.

Saturday morning the temperature was 8 below zero and by Sunday it was 26 below zero. I fed horses early but didn’t water them until after sun-up—after Andrea and Robbie finally got his pickup started and came down to help break ice and feed cows.

Lynn and I made a big potato salad, fruit salad and homemade pizza for dinner that night, for when Andrea and Robbie brought the kids home from their weekend with Mark. It was Sam’s birthday so we gave her a few gifts after supper, and Andrea had made a cake.
 
Sam's birthday cake


Monday it was 26 below zero and school was cancelled. It never got up to zero that day. Charlie came down with Robbie and Andrea and he filled our wood-box while we fed cows. He also helped Andrea load a bunch of little bales from the stackyard to bring to the bulls and to stockpile for when I need to feed extra hay to the heifers and Buffalo Girl. Charlie also shoveled the big piles of snow away from the gates by the lane in case we ever need to close them to move cattle through.

Michael brought his tractor down again yesterday; it was too cold to start ours. It was only 13 below zero, but never got above zero all day. Today it’s warming up a bit; it only got down to 3 below zero last night. We are hoping for warmer weather!