Sunshine on Good Friday

There's an old saying that whatever weather you get on Good Friday is what you'll have for the next forty days. Not very scientific, but we always note what the weather is - and it's usually blowing up a gale. But today is clear with bright sunshine and blue skies, although the temperature leaves a lot to be desired. It's still well below the freezing mark, but the weather guys say that it's supposed to start climbing on Sunday. Let's hope they've got that right.

So far we've only had one calf that didn't get dried off fast enough and ended up with frozen ears. Many farmers have their cows calving in January and February so that the animals they sell in the fall are larger and worth more money, but Glen isn't into babysitting frozen, wet babies at forty below zero so we aim for the end of March. We were supposed to start calving on the 19th of March but somehow a few of the cows jumped the gun. I think we had five babies by then, and since then it's been fast and furious. I think all the first time mothers (heifers) have had their calves - unassisted and doing fine. The older cows don't need as much watching; in fact, Glen is having trouble just trying to keep up with his records of whose is whose because two or three new ones can show up between feedings. He took his record book out with him yesterday to help him sort out Mamas and babies. Our herd sire is a black angus bull and his colouring has come through very well - with the exception of three, all the babies out there are black - and running and jumping and playing together. It's hard to keep track even after they've had their ear tags attached.

This week we've had our daughter-in-law and Jennifer, our two year old grand-daughter staying with us. Grandpa Glen takes her out to the barn when it's time to bottle feed the calf and after the little guy has drained the bottle she lets him suck on her fingers. There are lots of kids who would probably be intiminated by this, but she can't wait to go again. It's a funny feeling - that smooth, warm, slippery mouth sucking on your fingers. All little kids should be able to visit a farm and see the animals.

We still have our last year's calves. Glen says, if he has to, he'll feed the steers out and sell them for butcher in the fall. The heifers we were going to keep anyway to expand our herd. We did ship four of our old cows last week - they were too old to produce another calf and were just costing us feed, so when the neighbour said he was going to take some of his to the auction and had room for some more, Glen sorted these out of the herd and off they went. We got the check for them yesterday - before BSE it would have been over $4,000.00 but not anymore ... $1,250.00 was what we got and we're glad it wasn't less.