Northern Farmer

Saturday evening has almost become a traditional time for me to get a blog typed out being the end of the week and all that. I try to get it out in the time it takes to have one cup of hot tea sitting here at the computer. Sometimes it takes a little longer but not to often. Quite an improvement compared to the slow two fingered typing that I pecked out a few months ago. You were right back then Herrick, a person can get fairly good using the two finger method. Sometimes I don’t even have to look at the keyboard. Getting scary!

Today the second outdoor wood stove is up to “steam” and heating three more buildings. Finally can mark that one off the to do list. About time. The cows are about a half a mile behind the place in a hay field that will be plowed down next spring. They’re spreading over a ton and a half of manure a day out there without us having to clean it up and haul it out. So they’re helping out in that area. Calves are in the home corrals , quieted down from last weeks bawling, they’re doing good so far. They’re kept in corrals made of railroad ties and white oak plank. These corrals are really heavy duty and a person would think that nothing smaller than an elephant could crash through them, but two years ago on a mid week night the calves made an escape I’ll never forget.

We had one pen that held around eighty calves and they were weaned about a week and a half. They were quieted down and getting to know the place. Seemed relaxed and content. I was tired that night from general farm work and also shearing a few sheep that day. Around two in the morning came the call from my folks, “the cattle are out!” I can honestly say these are not my favorite moments in farming. Stumble out of bed and trying to get dressed, almost falling down the steps, look for the truck keys, you get the picture. Get over to dad’s and wonder , what, who, why, where. Dad said he heard some crashing, then quiet, then some more crashing, he looked out their window to see a sea of black five hundred pound critters go running by his house, down the driveway, onto the county road, and vanish into the black gloomy, cloudy, misty night. Meanwhile, my brain still cannot compute the extent of the escape but it wasn’t looking to healthy at the moment. Trying to find my calving spotlight, couldn’t find it, truck is almost out of gas, run over to the farm tank and put a few gallons in quick and see what is going on. Well, once on the road we see that they took a left and headed right down the middle of the tar road going east. You don’t track by hoofprints, but the constant trail of split pea soup that seems to appear when cattle get in the least bit excited. Trailed them one mile till the crossroads with another county tar road, and you know it would be just like them to split the herd in two, one group continuing east with another group heading north. A person doesn’t feel to good when he realizes it. So we continued east another two miles and came upon group one still barely running right in the middle of the tar road. I pushed them off the road into a harvested bean field and watched them till I was satisfied the were just to shot to continue on, and you know, they stayed there the rest of the night.

We backtracked with the truck to the crossroad and headed north but as luck would have it they run out of split pea soup, so after some time we had to give up. Just couldn’t pick up their trail. So we went home , loaded up on coffee and from time to time we’d drive over to the first herd to see if they were out in that field and yup, they were to tired to go anywhere. That was the longest night, waiting for it to start to get light around seven thirty in the morning. At around quarter to six we called two local radio stations that would come on the air at six, and they did an excellent job broadcasting it to the area. By daylight we were out in trucks and a couple of Honda fourwheelers looking for the second herd with not much luck. I came tearing back home with a Honda and Ma waved me in, a farmer called and found herd number two in his pasture, he heard it on the radio and went out looking. One problem though, he had beef cattle in the pasture too, but the two herds didn’t see each other yet, and we did not want them to mix, because they have little of nothing for sorting corrals.

Two Honda’s were sent out to gather herd number one and start them home and in the process meet up with herd number two. One problem though, there was no traffic in the middle of the night, thank the Lord, but traffic was heavy now and the only way home was on the tar. I was on a Honda on the first gather, and them critters were barely moving they were still so tired. As we approached the farm with the rest of the calves we stopped and the calves just stood there,we extracted our calves from the farmers pasture without them mixing with his cows. Now I was sick to my stomach knowing we had to push these cattle home on a heavily traveled county road, knowing we had very little choice. So we started, two Honda’s, two pickups. All of a sudden we picked up another fourwheeler. A farmer seen what was happening and he rode flank on the road.Traffic was approaching and low and behold they accually slowed to a stop and they were smiling, hmmm. The manager of a local co-op drove up with his big old wreck of a car and drove a few hundred yards behind with his flashers on. Things were looking better! Another car joined in way in front with flashers going. Semi’s stopped and pulled over to let us slowly go by. What seemed like an eternity, we finally crested the hill on the road approaching the farm where we’d have to turn them in, I figured that part could be a little tricky, but when we came over the crest there were more people at the intersection to lend a hand on the turn. I still can’t believe it!

Well, them calves were penned up and the corrals fixed and reinforced, we were dead tired from lack of sleep and a bit of stress. We took a tally, and another and another. One short, hmm, where could that bugger be. We went back and couldn’t find any sign of it anywhere so we came in at noon, ate, grabbed a quick nap and as I was heading back I looked at our cows a half a mile away to the west, the opposite direction of the escape and swore I seen a calf way out there with them. We headed out to look and low and behold, that one smart calf had left all the rest during the great escape and went alone through fences and fields, teamed up with it’s happy mother and was content. I said, lets leave that calf out here a few more weeks, it deserves it! And we did.

Well, that took a little longer than one cup of tea.

This entry was posted on Saturday, October 22nd, 2005 at 9:27 pm and is filed under Northern Farmer. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.