Diary from Sky Range Ranch - June 21 through July 22, 2017

JULY 1 – We had hot, windy weather but didn’t get started with haying quite as soon as we’d hoped. It took awhile to get all the machinery ready.

Andrea and I made a long ride on Sprout and Dottie last Wednesday after I trimmed Willow’s feet. We checked some of the troughs on the range and Andrea got Crawley trough working again; the spring-box had plugged up again. I held her horse while she took off the spring-box lid and unplugged the holes so water could run into the spring-box.

Andrea uncovering the spring-box so she can unplug the intake holes

Then we rode on up the ridge and I took another photo from the ridge above Crawley, looking out over the valley.

Andrea on ridge above Crawley trough

A couple days later we rode up Baker Creek on the high range and were pleased to see that the little creek is still running a strong trickle in spite of the hot weather, and the grass in the canyon is still green. Many years by now it’s fairly dry.

Andrea riding up Baker Creek on high range

It was so wet this spring that there are wild iris growing in one of the meadows in Baker Creek and they are blooming now.

riding past a patch of wild iris

We stopped at the trough near the head of Baker Creek (the lower Cat trough) and Sprout got a drink. We were pleased to see that our pipe/splice fix from two years ago is still holding together and that trough is still working!

Sprout drinking at Lower Cat trough

Then we took a swing through upper Basco before going back into the middle range to come home. I took a photo of Andrea as we headed down toward the Basco Trough but when we got down to that trough we discovered that the in-pipe was split and no water was going into the trough. 

Upper Basco

The next day was cooler and very windy; it only got up to 70 degrees. Andrea turned off a couple of our ditches to start drying up those fields for cutting hay. That evening she and Robbie went to town to watch Dani’s soccer game. Dani has enjoyed playing soccer this year; she’s the only left-footed kicker on their team and she makes a fair share of the team’s goal points.

Dani playing soccer

On Friday Dani’s friend Sekoya was here for the day and helped us move our cows down to the field from the hill pasture. Dani rode Ed, I rode Dottie, and the rest of the crew (Andrea, Lynn, Charlie and Sekoya) were “foot soldiers” going up the road on 4-wheelers to head the cows the right direction when they came down off the mountain, and going ahead of them to block various “wrong directions” on the way home. Our cows move very easily, but the calves don’t always know the way if it’s somewhere they’ve never been before.

After we got them moved and the horses unsaddled, Dani jumped on Ed bareback to ride her back to her pen. Dani is pleased that she’s now tall enough to swing up onto Ed’s back just holding onto her mane.

Dani riding bareback on Ed

Charlie and Robbie changed the oil in the swather and got it ready to go. Andrea and the girls put up a fake hot wire across the stackyard and we put Buffalo Girl and calf and George and his mom in the upper end of the stackyard to eat the tall grass before we stack hay in there.

Saturday I checked on the cows in their pasture and patched the fence in the brush by the creek, where trees had fallen over it and mashed it down. I put a few branches in the hole and tied them there with twine until we can fix the fence for real. We don’t want our cows crawling through into the neighbor’s field.

Lynn put air in the swather tires that morning and cut the hay on heifer hill and the field below it. Charlie drove up to Rocky’s place for the ham radio gathering, and enjoyed talking to people all around the country. He has his own radio now.

Michael and Carolyn brought their trailer down—to bring the yearling bull we bought from them and to haul their 2-year-old bull home (that we wintered here in the corral with our 2-year-old bull). Their bull didn’t want to go into the alleyway to get in the trailer, and ran by us several times. Michael finally had to let their yearling bull out of the trailer (that came along as company for our yearling bull) and then load the two together. The yearling he hauled here for us was not happy in the back corral with our 2-year-old bull and crashed over the jackfence into a side pen. Andrea and I patched the fence and the little bull settled down with his new buddy.

The next few days were hot (good hay-drying weather). We had to work on the little John Deere tractor (the one we turn hay with) to get it started. Robbie and Lynn worked on it and Andrea and kids helped me move the rest of my hay out of the hay shed so we can put new hay in it. We made a stack over by Sprout and Shiloh’s pen and by Willow and Breezy’s pen, and tarped those stacks. 

Tarped stack by Sprout's pen

Tarped stacks by Willow and Breezy's pens

The kids also helped bring the water troughs home from the hill pasture on the flatbed truck, and the girls helped me get the tall grass away from the hot wire along the horse pasture and field next to it so we could turn that hot wire back on again without it shorting out. We put the cows in the field above the horse pasture and turned the bull out with them, and put the 10 heifers in the orchard and put the yearling bull out with them.

Monday Dottie wasn’t feeling well—a little dull and not eating much hay. I took her temperature but it was normal. She wasn’t colicky, just dull. I put her in the front yard to eat grass but she only nibbled at it—not her usual greedy self at all. She wasn’t passing much manure, and what she did pass was firm and dry. I had our vet come out to check her because I was afraid she was impacted. She still had good gut sounds, however, and the vet thought maybe she had ulcers—and ordered some ulcer medication, but also took some blood tests.

Andrea baled heifer hill that evening, just ahead of a rain storm, and Robbie took the stackwagon up there and got it hauled. The last load wasn’t a full load so we just parked the stackwagon under my hayshed. We had a hard rain and some terrible wind. It blew some of the windrows away on the field below heifer hill, and piled the hay against the fence.

I put Dottie in the calving pen in front of the house for two nights, under the yard light, so I could watch her. She didn’t eat much, was periodically uncomfortable, but never down and out colicky. Her blood test results were all normal, but she didn’t have much appetite, wasn’t passing very much manure, and was eating dirt. She finally started passing manure normally by the 3rd day and then was back to normal. I gave her ulcer medication for 4 days, but by then she seemed to be doing fine again. I’m not really sure what ailed her, but it was good to see her feeling well and eating with her usual vigor.

Dottie feeling better - eating her hay again

Some of the bales we hauled from heifer hill were damp and we didn’t put them in my haystack because they would heat up and might burn the stack. We opened them up so they could dry out instead of heating, and not mold, and I’ll feed those first. 

We had more rain showers on Wednesday so we weren’t able to turn or bale hay. By yesterday afternoon the hay had dried out enough again to turn it (so it would dry more fully) and today Andrea got it all baled. Lynn turned the hay in the field below the lane, in hopes we can bale it tomorrow.


JULY 13 – Last week we baled and hauled the rest of our hay, filling my hay shed and stacking the rest of it in the stackyard across the creek (to feed the cows next winter). Robbie worked on the stackwagon a little more and put more teeth in the baler. We managed to get through this haying season without any major machinery breakdowns. All of our equipment is getting old (like us!). We bought the stackwagon (used) nearly 20 years ago and all of our tractors are more than 40 years old.

When Robbie took the stackwagon down to the back field to start hauling hay (while Andrea was finishing the baling), he got stuck; there’s a muddy area where you pull into the field. But since it wasn’t loaded with hay yet (which would have been several more tons of weight) and only one front tire was down in the mud, Lynn was able to pull it out with the little tractor (with the turner rake on it) and we didn’t have to use the big tractor Andrea was baling with.

Some of the hay from the field below the lane was a little wet when we baled it, so we opened up those bales over by Sprout and Shiloh’s pens, and I will feed those before I start feeding the tarped stacks or hay from my hay shed. 

wet bales opened up and spread out to dry

We finished the haying Thursday evening. Andrea was baling the last of it and Robbie hauled it (and Lynn stacked it in my hay shed). I cooked a big supper for the whole family and got chores done, and Charlie brought the girls home from their week with their dad, since everyone here was too busy to go to town to get them. It’s handy that Charlie has a pickup and a driver’s license! Emily stopped here on her way home from work and joined us for supper.

Friday it got up to 95 degrees, with threat of thundershowers. Sam and Lynn helped me tarp the two loads of hay sticking out from under my shed. 

tarped hay at the end of the shed

We moved the heifers and yearling bull to a new pasture and put the cows and their bull down to the pasture part of the field below the lane.

Saturday was very hot, with thunderstorms and lightning. This made it more risky for the 199 marathon runners doing the 50 K and about 100 runners doing the 100 K run along the continental divide across the valley from us. This is the most rugged terrain of any marathon in the world, and people from all over the world come to try it. With the heat this year, and high altitude, many of them didn’t finish. Local people helped with the check points along the ridge; Andrea, Robbie and the girls helped with the first checkpoint for the 50 K run (manned by the cross-country/track team and coaches). Grandson Nick had been preparing all spring and summer to run in it again (like he did last year) but he fell several times and hurt his feet and legs (suffering from tendonitis) and had to pull out of the run.

Here at the ranch we had a lot of lighting, rain and horrible wind that afternoon. The wind really tested our tarping job on my little haystacks. I’m glad we had them tarped or the top bales would have been soaked.

Heather and Gregory sent us a cute photo of baby Joseph wearing one of the little shirts Andrea gave him.

Baby Joseph

Sunday morning about 25 range cow pairs came over the hill and headed down into Alfonso’s hayfield but he saw them in time to head them off. Then he saddled his horse and took them back to the range. The gate in Baker Creek (between low range and middle range) was open and they’d come down through it, and came home.

Robbie and Michael put a new weir in one of our ditches and cemented it in so that it will work properly and not wash out or shift (and read wrong) like it has in the past. Nick was laid up for a couple days with his tendonitis and micro-fractures in his feet, so Michael used the backhoe to do the digging to install the weir.

With the hot weather our creek is steadily dropping, but we are trying to keep juggling and adjusting the water so that the 1st right (Jack), at the mouth of the creek doesn’t get short and call for water. Last year, with the manipulations by Bob Loucks (who did everything he could to get our water shut off or cut down early—putting our creek into regulation earlier than it ever had been, for no reason) the water master came out many times, and cost us all a lot of money. Alfonso decided to try to work with us this year instead of against us, cooperating on the use of our shared ditches. That way we can try to keep the water going longer, and not have the water master come out as much. He and Andrea also decided to not have a lateral water master on our shared ditches (which will also save money). So far, we’re getting by ok, trying to work together, and Jack hasn’t been short of water yet.

On Monday Nick started helping Michael and Robbie again on their custom fencing projects, even though his feet are still very sore. It’s just going to take a lot of time for them to heal.

We have a young doe with a fawn and an older doe with twin fawns living here 
and they often wander through the yard and barnyard. I snapped this photo as the mom and two babies went past the house and across the bridge.

doe & fawns

Emily has been busy making plans for her wedding; she and Sam and Dani went to Idaho Falls on Monday to get some of the things she needed. The girls are going to be in the wedding party as bridesmaid and flower girl. 

That afternoon Michael and Carolyn moved their cows down from the 320-acre mountain pasture, bringing them down to the green fields on the upper place. There’s still grass on the mountain, but it’s drying out and no longer high enough protein content so it was time to bring the cattle down. The calves will gain more weight (and the cows will milk better) on the green feed. This year their fields are still green because they haven’t had to shut off their irrigation water yet. Last year Bob Loucks, with his manipulations trying to shut their water off, had succeeded in making them turn off their water early, and their fields were dry—which cost a lot of money in lost weight gain on their calves. Mr. Loucks hurt himself by doing that, however, because his trespass water development (up into our place, to add more water to the system that supplies his house water a quarter mile away) also dried up; there was no sub-water coming into his system from our place. He’s also never understood that if we keep the irrigation water going at the top of the creek (our upper place) it is reused multiple times on down the creek and also helps keep the groundwater “full” so the creek doesn’t drop so fast in late summer.

On Tuesday Charlie’s best friend Cayson was here for the day, and the two of them moved the electric fence along the ditch pasture—taking out the steel posts and moving the fence out into the cut part of the field so the tall grass won’t short out the fence. Now we’ll be ready to put the cows back there when they run out of grass below the lane.

Today Andrea made 4 big pans of lasagna for Emily’s wedding dinner and put them in our freezer. Robbie, Nick and Michael started working on one of Alfonso’s ditches that needs a new headgate and weir. Then Robbie helped Art Turner (who owns the 15 acre piece that Loucks rents for horse pasture, who comes here for a month each summer with his camper trailer) with his well pump. It quit working last week and Robbie and Andrea helped him pull it up out of the well. He got a new one and Robbie helped him install it, and now Art and his wife have water again.

Andrea helped create a hot wire fence so we could put Buffalo Girl, George’s mom and their calves in the tall grass behind the barn, to eat that down before we park all our haying equipment back there again for winter.

I made a special card for Emily for her wedding gift, using a couple of old photos of her when she was not quite 3 years old.

JULY 22 – Last Saturday we moved the cows to new pasture and Jim brought his trailer out here to park it near the shop he created in the old trailer house. He’s moved back here from the job he had in Kentucky and will be staying with Emily and Robert or at Andrea’s house, and working here in his shop.

Andrea found a huge rattlesnake in one of our ditches when she was irrigating. We have lots of snakes this year.

On Sunday when our Amish neighbors were hurrying down the road to go to church at the Amish place around the hill, their buggy wheel came off, so one of the guys came to get some bolts from us to fix the wheel.

Robbie helped Michael finish the cement base for the new headgate and weir they put in for Alfonso’s ditch below our place.

Carolyn put together a spreadsheet showing how much the water master cost per trip out here (how expensive Gary was last year compared with the former watermasters during the past 3 years). Gary came up the creek last week-- the first time this year-- checking weirs for no reason; the creek is not short of water yet—there is plenty for Jack’s 1st right-- but Jack and Bob are eager to put us in regulation.

It was a sad day last week when Michael and Carolyn had to put down their old dog Tuff. He was 13 years old and dying of cancer. Tuff was one of their best cowdogs through the years and was just a pup in 2003 when he and his littermate Tiny helped rescue all their cows off the range just ahead of a terrible fire.

Here’s a photo taken several years ago of Baxter (Tuff’s younger brother) and Tuffy following granddaughter Heather’s horse on a range ride.

Baxter & Tuffy

Monday evening Mike Boyott came by from Tennessee to visit us. He is a professional photographer and took photos here at our ranch in the early 1980’s for the New Holland News cover and my article on calving.

Sam and Dani have been helping Emily make decorations for the wedding. 

Tuesday night a cow was bawling just before we went to bed. Andrea and I hiked up to the swamp pasture with flashlights to see what the problem was and found that Rosalee had a big udder. We brought her and her calf down to corral thinking the calf might be sick, but he was bawling too (very hungry). The next morning in the daylight we could see that the cow had mud caked on her udder from going through the deep bogs, and her udder was sore. She wouldn’t let him suckle. So we put her in the headcatch, washed off the thick mud, milked her out, and put vaseline on her teats but she still wouldn’t let him nurse. By the next morning, however, her udder wasn’t so sore. The calf had nursed and all was good, so we let them back up with the other cows and moved the herd to the next pasture.

Ned and Pam got here that evening from Texas. They flew to Salt Lake the night before, then rented a car and drove here, staying with Andrea for several days. That evening we all had dinner at Andrea’s place.

Charlie went up to Michael and Carolyn’s to get instructions for feeding the dogs and house-sitting at night while they and Nick are gone to Canada. They left early yesterday morning and will be gone a few days visiting Heather and Gregory and celebrating their first wedding anniversary. 

Yesterday Andrea helped us move the heifers and bull to the post pile pasture and put Buffalo Girl and calf and George and his mama on the ditchbank pasture above the horse pasture. Pam and Ned helped Andrea and Sam make a bunch of salads and desserts for Emily’s wedding dinner. Lynn and I made a huge potato salad. Robbie, Charlie and Jim loaded up 22 bales of hay from our stackyard and took them to Kolemans to create benches (with boards over them) for the outdoor wedding, then they all went to the Elks Hall in the evening to decorate it for the wedding dinner.

Emily’s friend Audra (best friends since they were in kindergarten, and they played hockey together for many years) came for the wedding to be her maid of honor, and then learned that her boyfriend Tristan had been in a serious accident. He was a truck driver, and his truck got broadsided by a big milk tanker truck—and Tristan was life-flighted to a hospital in Boise. Audra left immediately to drive to Boise to be with him, but he died before she got there. Yesterday she drove back here, bravely going ahead with her promise to Emily to be her maid of honor.

Today was Emily’s wedding and we were grateful for good weather. Even though it was hot, it was not windy, and there were no lightning storms like we’ve had many afternoons lately. The decorations were lovely and Em was dazzling in her beautiful dress. Jim walked her down the grassy “aisle” and Emily’s friend Jeremy did the wedding ceremony.

Jim bringing Em down the aisle 

Em & Robert

Here’s another photo of the newly married couple, and Jeremy, who married them, and Audra, the maid of honor:

married

Here are candid shots of grandpa Lynn giving Em a hug, and a proud papa (Jim).

Em & grandpa

Jim & Em

After the wedding, Lynn and I hurried home to do chores and heat up one of the big frozen lasagna pans from our freezer, and took a lot of the food in our pickup for the dinner that evening at the Elks Hall. Pam and Ned helped with the food preparations in the kitchen. 

Here are photos taken just before the dinner, of Emily and Robert, and Emily and her dad, Jim.

Robert & Emily

Emily & her dad

It was a lovely wedding, a wonderful dinner, with dancing afterward. Here are photos of Em and Robert on their first dance, and photos of Em dancing with her dad:

Em & Robert dancing

Em & Robert

Em dancing with her dad

Jim & his daughter Em

Partway through the dancing they cut their cake:

the cake, made by good friend Anita

Robert & Em cutting the cake

Lynn and I brought home leftover food to put in our refrigerator, and brought Charlie home to house-sit at Michael’s place. Everyone was exhausted, but grateful for a wonderful day.

Diary from Sky Range Ranch - April 24 through May 26, 2017

May 2 – A week ago Monday, LillyAnn started calving. We put her in the calving pen and that left Gemini Cricket all by herself in the maternity pen. Andrea got #47 (Sugar Bear, the dry cow that lost her premature calf in February) in from the field to put with Gemini Cricket—the last heifer—so she wouldn’t go nuts all by herself.

Then we put Deerling and calf (Little Miss Firecracker Lulu) down in the big pen below the barn to get used to a bigger place. The calf ran around silly and the cow was goofy, but they seem to be still somewhat bonded.

It was raining that afternoon so we put LillyAnn in the barn to calve. She had a big red bull calf. He was slow to get up, however, and only nursed one teat a little bit when he did nurse. By the time he was 12 hours old he was nursing better, but weak and wobbly. He had diarrhea by noon the next day, when we put the pair out of the barn, so we gave him an oral antibiotic. This was a perfect example of how important it is for calves to receive an adequate amount of colostrum within the first 2 or 3 hours of birth, to get the necessary antibodies against these scour “bugs”. He was sick and off feed through the rest of that day but the medication turned things around and by 5 a.m. the next morning he was doing much better.

Carolyn brought their feed truck down to our place after we fed our cows, to get a big straw bale. Andrea loaded our feed truck again with the tractor and used it to put a bale of straw on Carolyn’s truck to take home for their foaling pen. Carolyn’s old mare Thelma (in her mid-20’s) is due to foal any time and they need a clean, dry place for her. With all the rain and snow we’ve had, all the pens and corrals are a sea of mud--and it was snowing again by that evening.

Thursday morning we had about an inch of new snow. The mud was deep again, making it difficult to drive up to the field to feed our cows. The nights are still so cold that we have to plug the tractor in for a few hours before it will start, for loading hay.

On sunny days, however, the grass is starting to grow and the leaves are coming out on the trees. Here’s a photo of the heifers grazing in the field below the lane.

heifers grazing, leaves starting on trees

On Friday Gemini Cricket finally calved. Andrea, Robbie and kids were gone for the weekend—for Charlie’s band and choir trip. Their choir got first place in the multi-state school competition and the band was third place in their competition.

Lynn and I put the heifer in the barn to calve, and put Sugar Bear (the dry cow) in the next stall, to keep her company. Gemini calved very quickly and easily without any help but the sac around the calf didn’t break. The young mama just lay there and didn’t bother to get up. I had to go into the stall and break the sac and get the calf breathing. When Gemini finally got up she wasn’t at all interested in the calf (a lot like Deerling’s attitude, with her calf). When I checked back awhile later, Gemini was still ignoring the calf; he was lying at one end of the stall and she was standing at the other. So I put some alfalfa hay right by the calf and sprinkled some “calf claim” powder on him—a flavorful, good-smelling mixture that’s supposed to encourage a cow to lick the calf.

When I checked back an hour later she was standing by him and had eaten the alfalfa and licked him a little, but when he got up and tried to go toward her udder she bunted him with her head and kicked him and knocked him down. So I moved them into the larger stall at the other side of the barn, where I could put the calf behind a panel where he would be safe from getting kicked.

I thawed and warmed up the pint of colostrum that Andrea milked out of Buffalo Girl earlier this spring when she calved, and fed it to the hungry baby. After chores that evening, Michael and Carolyn came down to help Lynn and me put the ornery young cow in the headcatch where we could restrain her and lie a hind leg back so she couldn’t kick us or the calf, and I helped the calf suckle his mom.

Later that evening Carolyn called to tell us that young Heather was having her baby and Gregory had taken her to the hospital. Lynn and I stayed up and waited for news of the birth, and I fed our calf another bottle at 1:30 a.m. Heather had her baby about that same time. They named him Joseph Michael Eppich. He weighed 8 pounds, 11 ounces, and has lots of hair. The Monkey (Gregory’s nickname for the unborn baby) has arrived!

Heather and baby Joseph Michael Eppich

Saturday morning Nick came down and helped me feed cows (since Andrea was gone, and Lynn’s shoulder is still bad). Carolyn came down as we finished feeding, and the two of them helped me put Gemini in the headcatch again so we could help her calf suckle. We tried first to just let the calf out of his corner to go to her, and he went to her udder to try to nurse but she kicked him really hard, so we put her in the headcatch.

Lynn did the chores at Andrea’s house; he is feeding the dogs and cats while she and the kids are gone. Michael and Carolyn helped us put Gemini in the headcatch again at evening chores to suckle the calf, and I fed him a bottle at 1:30 a.m.

Nick came down Sunday morning to help me feed hay to the cows, then he helped me and Lynn put Gemini in the headcatch. She’s getting a little more at ease with the routine (we feed her some alfalfa hay to eat while the calf is nursing) and we didn’t have to tie her leg back that time; she didn’t try to kick the calf. We thought maybe she was having a change of heart and let her loose before he finished nursing, and she started kicking him again, so we had to put her back in the headcatch.

Andrea and crew started home that afternoon. Charlie’s choir group went to hear the Mormon Tabernacle Choir that morning and Charlie came home on the bus with the other Legacy Choir kids and band group.

Heather and her new baby were able to go home from the hospital that day; both are doing well. Carolyn and her mom plan to go to Canada in a few days to see that baby boy.

baby Joseph Michael

Sunday afternoon Michael and Carolyn built a windbreak for Thelma on one side of her pen, in case she foals in stormy weather, and hooked up a light so they can see the pen from the house. That evening they came down to help us suckle Gemini’s calf again, and Michael named him George. I am still feeding the calf an extra bottle about midnight, since the cow isn’t giving a lot of milk and the calf can’t go that long between meals. Andrea and kids got home from Utah a little after midnight.

Monday morning Andrea helped me put Gemini in the headcatch. She no longer kicks at the calf, but she still won’t let him nurse unless she’s restrained in the headcatch. That evening we put her in the headcatch one last time and then left the pair out of the barn and put them in separate pens next to the barn—and finally were able to put Sugar Bear (the baby sitter cow who has been in the adjacent barn stall all this time to keep Gemini company) back to the field.

Heather sent us more photos of baby Joseph, including a photo of their young dog Dude checking out the new kid.

Heather & baby

Baby JM sleeping

This morning Carolyn and her mom left early to drive to Canada to stay a few days with Heather and Gregory and the new baby. We will check on Thelma a few times during the day while Michael and Nick are gone on their fencing jobs, and they will check on the mare during the nights.

Andrea helped me with Gemini and George—the first nursing with the cow not restrained in the headcatch. We fed her some good alfalfa hay in the corner of her pen and let George out the gate to go nurse. She didn’t try to run off and we were able to make her stay there and eat hay while the calf nursed, then we put him back in his own pen. We put them together again this evening for nursing, with supervision. The cow is still a bit nasty and doesn’t want him to nurse, but he got it accomplished.

Heather sent photos of baby with Grandma Carolyn, and a photo taken the first time she took baby Joseph out to meet the horses.

Baby & grandma Carolyn

Baby meets horses

May 13 – Last Wednesday I was able to supervise Gemini and her calf by myself; she finally stands in her corner eating her hay and behaves while George nurses—as long as someone is there to keep her from running off. This makes it to where I can put them together first thing in the morning and again at evening chores so the nursing sessions are about 12 hours apart.

Gemini & George in their separate pens

Lynn went to town that day to get the mail and groceries and he bought a bunch of baby stuff (more diapers, some cute little shirts and suits, and a back/front pack for Heather to carry Monkey around in) for Michael to take up to Canada this weekend. Andrea and Lynn take turns checking on Thelma during the day and Michael and Nick check her at night. No foal yet.

After school today Charlie rode his motorcycle over the hill below our place and I took photos of him as he came home.

Charlie coming home

Charlie's motorcycle

Thursday was cold in the morning but the temperature got up to 80 degrees in the afternoon, and the creek is very high. Sam had severe abdominal pain so Andrea took her to the ER. The doctor thought at first it was appendicitis but it wasn’t. They gave her some medication for the pain but never did figure out the cause.

Friday Andrea helped Alfonso clean the ditch that goes through our place and on down toward his field so he can have some of the water.

My brother Rockwell gave me a bunch of Emily Binning’s cookbooks. Emily was our neighbor and dear friend who passed away in 2010 (cancer). Many years before that, she put together a cookbook of favorite recipes—her own and those of her friends and family members--and had them copied and bound in a red cover. When her husband Gordon sold their little place (at the upper end of our ranch) to David and Rosina Yoder, there was a box of those cookbooks left in the house. Rosina gave them to my brother, realizing that he knew Emily and might know of people who would like one of those books. I gave some to Andrea and her kids for sentimental reasons (Emily took care of my kids a lot when they were little, while Lynn and I were busy haying or riding to move or roundup range cattle, and Emily taught Andrea how to can vegetables, make lasagna and many other good things). We took one to Barb Peets (her daughter had several recipes and photos in that book) and one to Michael to take with the baby stuff to Heather in Canada. Emily was a very special person; we shall always remember her with love.

Emily Binning

Last week I dug a lot of the poppies out of our front yard for Rock and Bev. They want to plant some around their new house up the creek. These poppies hold memories for Rocky because there were some of them blooming at the little cabin (next to the old outhouse) we spent summers in as children, and also some at the old house on the upper place when Dad bought that ranch. There were a lot of poppies along the front yard of the old log house here on our place when we moved in, and over the years they took over the whole yard. Here is a photo of what it looked like some years ago before we started trying to get rid of them and have a yard again!

Poppies in our front yard

Last weekend we had thunderstorms and hard rain. Our creek is very high and dangerous (we can’t walk across it, and don’t want any cattle trying to cross it) and rivers flooding. Michael left early Saturday morning to drive to Canada. Nick was doing their chores and feeding. He harrowed their fields Sunday afternoon and had a hard time getting across the creek with the big tractor; the water was up over the front wheels.

When Michael arrived at Heather and Gregory’s farm he got to meet his new grandson for the first time.

Michael & grandson

Emily brought the kids out here for supper after she got them from Mark; Andrea and Robbie went to his folks place near Idaho Falls so Robbie could help his dad work on a truck, and hadn’t made it home yet.

Monday was the baptism of baby Joseph Michael in Canada. Michael, Carolyn and Carolyn’s mom were there for the ceremony, and Heather’s best friends from high school and college were there, as well. Heather sent us photos, and included a photo of baby Joseph sleeping with Daddy Gregory.

after the baptism

happy family

Gregory & baby sleeping

While Michael was gone, Robbie helped Nick work on some of the ditches on the upper place. They finished fixing the weir and headgate that they helped Michael install earlier, to more accurately measure the water they send down to Barb Peets for her share of the irrigation water. 

the new weir

Michael and Carolyn drove home on Tuesday and got home late that night.

Tuesday morning I got up at 4 a.m. to work on several articles (with approaching deadlines) and the power went off for 2 hours. Since I couldn’t use the computer, with no electricity, I did a little proof-reading by candlelight (Storey is doing a new edition of my Guide to Raising Beef Cattle and I am still working on those revisions and updates).

That morning when I did chores I was finally able to leave Gemini and George together for the first time. She doesn’t let him nurse whenever he wants, but she isn’t as aggressively mean to him. They can live together, and she lets him nurse when I feed her alfalfa hay at chore time.

LillyAnny (daughter of LillyAnn) has been reaching over the netting (sticking her head between the netting and the strands of barbed-wire above it, stretching and mashing down the fence in the field above house. The cows are tired of eating hay and are starting to reach through the fence wherever they can, for green grass, now that the grass is finally growing. I spent a couple mornings and evenings tying up the netting that the cows are mashing down, so they can’t reach over it and mash it.

I took photos of some of the cows and calves, including Buffalo Girl and her calf by the water trough.

Buffalo Girl & calf

And a photo of some of the calves drinking at the trough and rubbing on the old stump we took out when we rebuilt the fence.

calves drinking

Here are a few more photos taken while I was out looking at the cows and calves:

Merrinina & calf lounging around

Zorra Rose (a first-calf mama)

Deerling and calf—they finally became a pair after Deerling was such a bad mother for the first month after she calved

Star Fire’s calf reaching around to try to get to an itchy tail

A couple nights ago Lynn and I watched an interesting DVD that was sent to me by a lady I interviewed for an article about the roping/branding clinics she and her husband put on. Their clinics teach people how to handle cattle during branding with the least stress, and how to improve their roping and horsemanship skills.

Charlie has been spending evenings and weekends working on the 1968 pickup we got from Velma Ravndal in the early 1980’s. She and her husband bought it new, to pull their horse trailer (they raised Arabian horses), and she drove it several years after her husband died. She boarded her last few horses here at our ranch, and came out as often as she could, to ride with us, until she could no longer rider or drive. We bought the pickup from her, and drove it several years, but it has been sitting in our barnyard a long time. Charlie wants it, and has been working on getting it functional again. It’s a good project for him as he learns more about motors and develops mechanic skills.

Gemini is finally letting her calf nurse whenever he wants to. Yesterday we tagged and banded him. We also discovered LillyAnn’s calf lame with footrot when we fed the cows. We brought him and his mom in from field, captured him in the headcatch chute by the barn and gave him antibiotic injections, then put him and his mom in the pen below the barn.

Lynn and Andrea hiked around fence between us and range, to see if the elk did much damage last winter when they were coming in and out every day. Later in the day we had hard rain and strong wind and it changed to snow by this morning.

Gemini was angry, cold and wet this morning and wouldn’t let George nurse until I fed her alfalfa. LillyAnn’s calf is much better, no longer lame.

With the snow and mud it was too slippery to take the tractor down to the heifer feeder so we took them some little bales on the 4-wheeler to put in their feeder. 

May 26 – Sunday last week we put up another hot wire to keep the heifers in the upper end of their pasture so the rest of that pasture can start growing. We put their feeder right below the gate so we can get to it with the tractor and not get stuck trying to take hay bales down through the mud. 

this location for the heifer’s feeder didn’t work after the ground got boggy, and we had to move it

That afternoon we went to Darrel Bagley’s memorial service at the Cowboy Church up at Lemhi. Darrel (and his wife Traudy) have been good friends for a long time. Darrel had a ranch in Colorado many years ago (and lost his hands and forearms—and much of his eyesight) in a dynamite accident one winter. When he bought a ranch here in our valley in 1969 and was raising cattle and horses, we got acquainted with him, and his wife Traudy (whom he met and married after he moved here with his son and daughter). We often visited with them when our kids were little, and our kids were awed and inspired by his determination to continue doing everything in spite of what most people would consider serious handicaps. Darrel was able to do his ranch work, ride, rope, saddle and bridle his horse, take care of cattle, etc. with his hooks, and never let this inconvenience slow him down. Later he and Traudy moved to a ranch in Nebraska, and then to a ranch in Oregon, but we always kept in touch. He was having me write his biography (using a tape recorder for our phone conversations) to have it for his kids, grandkids and great-grandkids.

Sunday evening Charlie and Robbie got the Velma truck running for the first time. That was an exciting accomplishment for Charlie.

Carolyn’s mare Thelma foaled Sunday night at 11 p.m. Carolyn heard her whinny and ran out to the pen, and discovered that the foal was stuck. She had to straighten one leg and then it was born quickly – a nice colt. It was soon up and nursing.
   

Thelma's day-old foal

Monday afternoon Traudy Bagley stopped by and we had a good visit before she had to drive back to Oregon. We decided that we’ll finish Darrel’s biography and have his kids help fill in some of the gaps in the final chapter.

Tuesday Lynn had another GI tract bleed, but not as serious as the one he had 2 years ago. He didn’t want to go to the hospital; he just rested all day and drank lots of water and Gatorade. Andrea helped me feed cows before she drove to Idaho Falls with Emily to get some things Emily wants for the up-coming wedding in July.

I patched more of the fence in the field above the house where cows keep reaching through and mashing down the netting.

Dani now has soccer practice after school. Her team appreciates her skills; she is quick, and also their only left-footed kicker.

It rained for several days and we had 4 inches of new snow Wednesday morning—on Lynn’s birthday-- and very cold all day. I plugged in the tractor that morning so it would start later, to take a bale to heifers. It barely started, however, and just before that we noticed the heifers had gone through the hot wire out into hayfield, so we know the electricity in the barn wasn’t working. All the rain, leaking through the barn roof, shorted out a light socket and blew a fuse. We had to by-pass that spot to get the electricity working again.

Thursday was still very cold and we started a fire in the woodstove. That evening was Sam’s 8th grade graduation ceremony.

Friday the kids helped Lynn move everything out of the first stalls in the old sick barn, and Robbie welded a couple gates together—to take the place of a metal panel we “borrowed” from one stall when we rebuilt Willow’s pen and needed a gate.

Saturday we brought the cows in from the field above house, sorted off their calves and put them in the sick barn, and vaccinated the cows. Sam helped me fill the syringes: 

Sam filled syringes

While we had Panda in the chute for her vaccinations, we dehorned her. Actually she knocked the horn shell off her smaller horn (hitting it on the side of the chute) and Robbie sawed off the longer horn that she jabs the other cows with.

Robbie dehorning Panda

Then, to stop the blooding, we tied a baling twine tight around her poll, just under the horn stubs, putting pressure on those arteries that are near the surface. To make it tighter, we tied another twine over the top of her head to pull the back and front of that loop closer together. This always works to stop the spurting blood. Large horns have a large blood supply and we didn’t want her to bleed excessively.

the baling twine tourniquet stopped the bleeding

Before we started branding the calves, we brought George and his mother (Gemini Cricket) around from the 2nd day pens and branded and vaccinated George, then put them back to their pen, then branded/vaccinated all the calves. Dani and Sam pushed the calves into the little hold pen and into the calf chute/tilt table for branding.

girls pushing calves into the chute

Dani pushing a calf into the calf table chute

Lynn clipped the calves before branding, to remove any long hair that would make it take longer to burn through and do a nice brand. Clipping speeds the process and the branding iron doesn’t have to stay on as long, minimizing pain for the calf.

Lynn clipping the brand area

Andrea branded the calves while Robbie held the hind legs to hold them still.

Andrea branding while Robbie holds the calf's legs

A few of the calves had horns, so Lynn and Andrea dehorned those.

Lynn and Andrea dehorning a calf

Then we put the calves and their mothers back up to the field above the house. Charlie, Sam and Dani helped with all the sorting and vaccinating, then we all had lunch here. After lunch we fed the heifers below the lane and Andrea and Robbie set a steel post in the fence above house where the old fence is leaning (old wood post broken off).

Sunday Andrea and Robbie helped feed, then went up to Michael and Carolyn’s place to help them and Nick brand calves and vaccinate their cows and move them up to the 160-acre hill pasture. This got the cattle away from the creek, which is treacherously high right now; they don’t want any of the calves drowning trying to cross the creek.

Later that afternoon Michael and Carolyn brought their trailer down and helped us vaccinate the bulls, and vaccinate and brisket tag all the heifers. Then we sorted off their 7 heifers, which they hauled to the upper place and put with their cows and calves on the hill pasture. We put our 9 heifers in the upper swamp pasture above the corrals; they are happy to be on green grass and no longer eating hay! Andrea and Robbie set 3 steel posts in the cross-fence to help strengthen it where it’s been leaning over.

On Monday Robbie went to help Michael and Nick again on one of their custom fencing projects. Our weather is warming up; it actually got above 70 degrees on Tuesday. We got the cows in from the field above the house, sorted Panda off and put her in the headcatch by the barn and took the tourniquet twine off her head, then put the cows and calves in the lower swamp pasture—no longer feeding hay!

Andrea and Carolyn went to 4th of July Creek to put wood sealer on one of the fences Michael, Nick and Robbie built. I got Dottie out of her pen for first time this spring to brush her and clean her feet.

I am still working on my book revision for 4th edition (Storey’s Guide to Raising Beef Cattle).

Wednesday was cold and windy. George was bawling and hungry when I went out to do morning chores. He had shimmied between the gate and gate post at some point during the night and was in next pen, and couldn’t get back to his mama. He was very happy when I opened the gate for him!

Charlie drove the Velma truck to school to show his friends that he got it running again, and to have his dad help him adjust the carburetor after school. Andrea irrigated and helped Alfonso get some stray range cows out of his lower field. Then she hurried to town for Sam’s high school orientation after school, and awards ceremony. Charlie sang national anthem at the assembly.

Yesterday Andrea took the kids to school early for Dani’s field trip then she and Carolyn put another coat of wood sealer on the fence at 4th of July Creek. Charlie and Sam’s spring concert (band and chorus) was that evening. It rained in the night and there was new snow on the mountains this morning.

This afternoon I trimmed Dottie’s front feet, and Andrea and I made our first ride of the season, on Sprout and Dottie. This evening Andrea and Robbie took the kids to the car races at the Fair Grounds and Charlie was asked to sing the national anthem. That kid has a great voice and people enjoy hearing him sing.