The Farm Life: Week 8

This week I worked a double shift, which means I worked 8 days in a row. I normally work four days a week. By doing this, it gave me the full time farm experience. This was a crazy week with lots of things going on.

For starters, the first day I got back the two herds (breeders and yearlings) where accidentally combined into one herd, thanks to a gate being left open. We had to separate the cattle, which wasn't difficult because the cows cooperated. On a separate day, one of the yearlings escaped outside of the fence. A section of the electric fence was disconnected so we think that is how the cow got out. The funny thing about the situation was that the ear tag on the cow read #007. I quickly opened a gate and herded the cow back inside the fenced area.

We ordered and picked up 50 Cornish cross chicks this week. Unfortunately 25 of them died the next day due to an animal getting inside the brooder, most likely it was a cat. I had to go back to the hatchery again to pick up another batch of chicks. This time we did some more improvements to the brooder and now nothing can get inside of it. I am still working on the second chicken tractor, so that when the Cornish chicks are of age they can be moved outside.

I learned some vet skills this week. A few of the cows are being sold to another farm so we had to give booster shots for De worming and a nasal spray to help protect against shipping fever. I got to do the nasal spray for one of the yearlings. Also this week, one of the cows had difficulty with delivering her calf. After going into labor for 2 hours we tried moving the cow out of the pasture and into the squeeze chute. A strong thunderstorm with heavy rain moved in and we had to get out of the pasture to avoid the lightning. After the storm quickly passed we managed to get the cow out of the pasture and into the squeeze chute. Jeanmarie had called two vets both of which where unavailable to help deliver the calf. Greg and I had to use obstetrical chains to help deliver the calf.

After this eventful week I finished the week out doing a lot of weed whacking along fence lines.