Do you want to know how cold it is on the prairies at the moment? Do you really? I don’t really think I can do it justice, but here goes ...
First of all, I’m writing this blog on WordPerfect because, at the moment, I have no access to the Internet. Why? You ask. Well, that would be because with the high winds we had last week - along with the minus 50 windchills - it has vibrated my satellite dish loose enough on the tower that it’s installed on so that it can’t pick up the signal. For a few days the service was intermittent as it wasn’t completely shook loose, so we blamed the service provider and their tower that was experiencing it’s own set of problems, but when they had their end fixed up, and I was completely off access, one of their telephone techies and I finally figured out now the problem was at my end. Unfortunately, by that time the few reasonable days we had were over and the deep freeze was back - riding on high winds. I feel totally disconnected from the world at the moment and hope that it’s fixed by Tuesday night - when the next blizzard is supposed to roll in. For some reason you can’t get someone to climb a sixty foot antenna to adjust a satellite dish at forty below and 50 km/p/h winds. Even if you beg.
So, to keep from going shack wacky, we’ve been keeping ourselves busy trying to keep ahead of the cows in the feed department. At temperatures like this they eat to live. The actual definition of the word calorie is a measuring unit for heat - take away all the diet jargon and that’s what you get - when we eat we take in calories and if we don’t want them as permanent poundage on our hips, we have to burn them off - in heat. Our cows, at forty below zero, are not worried about their figures. Their survival depends on eating and they’ve been doing a fine job of it.
As if that wasn’t enough to keep us out of trouble, Friday night we discovered that the water system from the dugout to the barns was froze up. Again. Just like last year. There was a period of denial - that it had to be a simpler thing to fix - but we both knew in our hearts that we were only dreaming. We didn’t have a whole lot of time to mope about it; Saturday morning out came the big trough, the heating element, the tank on the truck ... and we commenced hauling water for about 110 animals. The wind was vicious so we did the absolutely necessary jobs and hoped Sunday would be better.
All you could say about Sunday was that the wind was down to just a light breeze, but the temperatures were no better. I helped Glen with the chores and then went inside - I have a good, warm ski-doo suit but my face is exposed and I think I’ve come pretty close to freezing my cheeks. They sure burn when I’m outside. Glen did his chores in four different stints, coming in to thaw out every once in a while. He fed nine hay bales and put six new straw bales out for fresh bedding. He also put some old, rotted flax straw bales down where we think the line is frozen. Maybe, if we can keep a fire going there long enough, the heat will work its way down through the frost and the line will thaw out for us.
What makes this even harder to take is that maybe we could have used our experience from last winter to stop it from happening this year. The problem is that the pipe drawing water from the dugout isn’t buried deep enough where it inters the water. On the years where the water level was higher the water covered it, but last winter, and this one, there just isn’t enough to do the job. So why didn’t we pump water from the south dugout into this one last fall? I sure can’t think of a good reason right now. And Glen is kicking himself for not going down and covering the whole area with old bales and straw to keep the frost out. Again, hind sight is 20/20. He’s threatening to up and sell the whole calf crop, but at the age and weight they are at the moment that would be like giving them all away. I think, unless we have a miracle, we will be hauling water twice a day until the snow melts.
With all the rearranging we had to do at the barn so that the different pens of animals could get to the water, two of the bulls ended up where I can see them from the house. Bulls have more testosterone than they know what to do with and usually expend it fighting with other bulls. I looked out this morning and there they were just bull-dozing each other. They were so worked up that at 40 some below zero, they had fought themselves into a sweat, and steam rolled off their backs and formed frost on their coats. I wish I had a closer picture, but I wasn’t crossing the fence to get it.
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