Tuesday night. Been a fairly productive day.
Couldn't get the tire to blow up... don't know if it broke the bead on the inside of the tire... but it wouldn't blow up at all. So I texted DS and asked if he could change it... I had another tire for the car that actually had air in it...
. I can not kneel down and see where to put the small floor jack underneath, that I have, because of the knees... he said he could do it later... I said that I just wanted to drop it off at the co-op tomorrow when we head down to the dr appt...
I left and went to DMV and got plates for the car. Will get them put on tomorrow... I had to wait a bit, but had expected it. Then I went from there to Sharp Shopper and got some stuff... checking on stuff I wanted but nothing available I was looking for except some bread/sandwich rolls... got some canned cat food; new kind... will see if they like it... I have several flats of 24 cans of little friskies canned food that I picked up when they had a bunch... You never know when they have, what.
Got a call that there was a heifer out at the pasture that one was out day before yesterday. They are going right through the hi-tensile wire.... GRRRRR
I do HATE hi-tensile smooth strand wire... especially since the "geniuses" that built it made NO PROVISIONS for electrifying it...
They are going to have to get moved in the next couple days. Plus, the guy where we have 6 other ones, have got to get moved in the next couple days... so we will have to bring them home in the next day or 2.
Got the clothes/jeans hung out...
It was a nice day, sunny, with a light breeze. The jeans will dry pretty fast so will be able to be brought in tomorrow before we go, I hope. Worst comes to worst, they will get brought in after we get back from the dr appts.
I put the cow in, fed the calf a bottle that was half milk from the milk I brought home last friday......had about 5 gallons... will up the milk amount to 3/4 bottle so will get another week out of it... I put it in the big cooler chest in 3 - 2 gal buckets with ice, to keep it good. It is milk from treated cows that had antibiotics, and the mastitis was cleared up but she was waiting for the withdrawal time to be up before they could put it back in the milk tank so it ought to keep good. I have to haul water up there for her tomorrow... there was not much in the trough when I put her in. If we get much rain, it will fill some of the troughs under the drip line of the roof... I need to clean out the few leaves that might be in them... but I am not going to count on it and I do not want to be hauling water if it is raining or just wet and damp on Thursday. Better to get it done tomorrow morning...
Got the mower out and used the sweeper and got 3 full" sweeper's". Got quite a bit of dried grass and leaves off the lawn... more to do but I need to get this all bagged. I did 3 / 50 lb feed bags stuffed... and have to find some more bags... I want to get that picked up before it rains... then deal with more after we get whatever rain we get.... Worked on that and it was getting later... DS called and said did I want to go to the bred cow sale??? I said I figured that he didn't want to go... so it wasn't a big deal... but he said well let's go... So I said okay... I needed to drop the samples off at UPS... I went to the farm, and he was going to take the truck and trailer... and I said I didn't think he wanted to take it since they were probably going to be too high... so we took the explorer... He put his jack and impact wrench on the truck to come change the tire after the sale...
Cattle were mostly pretty high... No, we didn't buy any. There were 2 or 3 that we might have bought... older smooth mouth cows or broken mouth cows... so bad teeth deal old cows... but they brought over cull cow/pound price... $13-1600 each. They were preg 5-7 months... No calves on them.
The rest.... OMG.... sold several pairs... groups of 3 and 4 and 5...their calves were 150 to 300 lbs.... some cows were actually confirmed bred back 2-3 months... like the cows we just preg checked that were avg 4 months with their 300 lb calves... Cows were in the 1200-1400 lb average... and were in very good shape...
HOW does $3950/ PER PAIR ???? for the top selling group.... MOST were in the 2800-3500 range....
Bred heifers were nearly all over $2000.... bred 3-6 months for different groups... many were in the 2300-2700. range.
Cows checked preg only 2 months were bringing more than cull cow price... 12-1300 lb cows were bringing $14-1800 a head...
Why people would pay those prices for cows that will not calve until next summer... and not have a saleable size calf for 18 months... is way beyond me..... and no calf on them to sell now...
Many did not have much/any udder.... so it was not like they were cows that had just had calves weaned off of them... these are cows with dry udders of no size.... so who knows when they last had a calf... some of the heifers that were sold looked "older"... they were saying 2 years... they were "old" 2 yr olds...
Yes, the cows with calves were nice... most were 4-8 yrs old so good for a few more calves at least. BUT.... holy cow.... too costly for our pocketbook....
So, we got home about 8:30... dropped DS at the farm where I picked him up.... he followed me up to the house and got the tire changed pretty quickly.... it is in the explorer so we can drop it off at the co-op to get it fixed. I will check the air in the other tires and will have to get the feed out so I can put the meters and all in the forester...for Thursday late aft test.... Have to see when the mechanic's shop, can put the outback on the schedule to get the wheel bearing done. I will use the forester for a work vehicle for awhile.. But I will have to take and get a couple metal cans for feed, to put it in them... guess I will keep it here at the house in the shed so there is no chance that anything can get it in at the nurse cow barn... and just take a bucket up there to feed the cow.... the holsteins are going to come here after they get dehorned and bangs vacc to eat some of the grass here... they will respect the electric netting or even just a couple strands... and I will have some fencing up eventually on the perimeter...
Concerning that,,, DS wants to come here this weekend to look at the where posts are going to go... where I might want gates... he is going to get the guy to drive a couple posts across the road where the fence goes down around the corner on the dirt road... where several tractor trailers that are not supposed to be on that road... have taken out the corner several times... instead of coming down to a 90 degree corner... DS is going to back it up a few feet do 2 45 degree angles... and put several BIG BOULDERS on the outside of the fence so any big trucks that take the corner and tear things up... will be tearing up their vehicle... We get tired of fixing it... and right now have several gate/corral panels to make the "corner" since the last 2 or 3 times we have rebuilt it, it has been torn up by a big truck... This is not a truck route... and they tear it down, bent T-posts... wood posts broken off or laid over... fence destroyed... and we are tired of it... cows get out and all that... and we keep fixing it... It is outside the "right of way" for the road... we will lose about 100 ft of grass but it will be worth it...
I got the plants back in the house on the shelves... but just covered the spider plants with 2 tarps... they are in hanging pots so the hanger is holding it up off the plant leaves... I also got the squash plants recovered with the small homemade "hoop shelter" I made for it... I forgot to take water out to them... so will have to do that...
Time to get the cattle panels down from the tomato plants the whole garden needs to be bush hogged off with the tall stalks of the sunflowers and all the weeds need to be shredded... maybe the calves will push/break it all down once they get moved here. I will be giving them the garden and all that area with all the grass around it to clean up too.
So, tomorrow, water for the cow in the lot, clean out the water troughs of what few leaves and junk might be in them.... bring the clothes in off the line; get the leaves/grass in bags and all in under the carport, get the tractor put in there too, so it doesn't get wet.... drop tire off ....call the mechanic shop...
Need to go to Rural King for feed while we are down there too... I am on the last bag and now with the cow... I will be going through more... it is $2-3.00 a 50 lb bag cheaper there... I mix the 12% and the 15 % together... can't get it delivered in bulk for those kind of prices; much as it would be nice to have it in my feed bin to not have to handle the bags all the time... at least I can use them for leaf/grass collection.
There are still quite a few leaves on the maple tree at the house... If we get much rain, they will not be near as nice but can go in the gardens to protect the plants, like around the area where the peony plants are... and make mulch for the garden... and if they dry out enough to rake... can go in the calf hutches for when they are here... just for some bedding... and then get moved around......so tomorrow is "crunch day to get the nicest ones bagged for winter chicken house use...
Got a couple texts back... going to test the 200 cow herd on Friday... have to set up meters there also... then do the herd that I helped get the program in their computer that does the "herd shares" , next Thurs eve and Fri morning... have to drop off the meters Wed or Thurs morning so they can run them through their sanitizer before milking Thurs aft. Still have a couple more to contact for testing next week or the next week, just before Thanksgiving.
Going in to get a shower and go to bed...
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