07/09/2024
Everybody, animal and human is glad to have our cattle and sheep out grazing and feeding themselves these days. John has already started making hay so they will be well fed next winter, though. The hay crop has been set back by the strange cold, dry spring followed by the hard frost around Father's Day, but John's cutting the best and the rest will be enjoyed as pasture this summer. With our long winters and no irrigation to get pastures to regrow more easily it does seem like a huge part of our operation revolves around the making of hay all summer and then the feeding of hay all winter.
We are building and moving our temporary fences every few days for the various groups to be in new feed every few days. The animals are doing well and growing nicely. The meat animals get the very best we've got to offer.
A lot of my time during the last of lambing, and since, has been spent on keeping our little flock of bum lambs (bottle fed lambs) going. I kept track for a week and I made 183 scoops of lamb milk replacer, which was 23.25 gallons. For the 3 bottle calves I made 39 scoops (2.5 times bigger approx) which was 19.5 gallons. I had forgotten how much work keeping bummer lambs (and calves) was. My friend Judy has spoiled me the last many years by raising all my problem lambs, but since she is fighting cancer, we decided I should only give her my most severe problems this year and relearn how to raise my orphans myself. Part of the reason I have 10 bum lambs, and Judy has several more, was that we had 15 sets of triplets and most of my ewes can't feed more than twins on the pasture we are able to offer. Sadly we did have several ewes pass away with roughly two week old lambs during the course of lambing. Despite multiple consultations with the vet, and daily antibiotics he suggested, I couldn't get these ewes to turn around and we ended up losing them and taking their lambs into the bummer flock.
Judy lent me two of her lamb feeding buckets, which are easier to clean than the ones I had previously bought, and I've got nearly all the lambs trained to come to the bucket and eat refrigerated milk when they get hungry. I just have to fill the bucket and replace the ice container twice a day, wash the entire set up once a day as well as any individual bottles I used. I easily spend 2-3 hours a day on these young ones.
I say we have 3 bum calves, but the red ones are sharing a 2 yr first calf heifer as their mother and we decided they needed to be supplemented so the mother would be able to breed and calve again as a 3 year old. If she had to solely support twins we feared she would loose too much weight and not cycle. The red calves (1 heifer, 1 steer) drink a bottle each about once a day. The black heifer was part of a set of twins and mom didn't want her, so she is completely bottle fed. She gets 2 gallons of milk a day and would very happily take a third bottle at each feeding if we'd let her. I don't know of a bucket feeding system for calves where they drink cold milk so we use 1/2 gallon bottles for each feeding. Trying to feed 3 calves simultaneously is an art I've decided...sometimes it works, sometimes its a total fiasco of dropped bottles and frustration on both sides Bum calves are so much bigger and when they head but you looking for more milk it really hurts so we try to keep them on the other side of a gate when feeding them. Black Beauty does really enjoy having her neck rubbed I've discovered, and I try to give her attention shortly after she's eaten, when she isn't likely to maul me for more milk. The red calves get their mothers baths and they aren't interested in anything but milk from us humans.
We haven't yet decided when the little darlings are all going to be weaned. Calves and lambs with mothers are fed for at least 5 months and early weaning would be hard on these guys but they are eating up so much time, and milk replacer is crazy expensive these days. Most folks who raise bum lambs/calves get them eating grain so they can replace the milk calories with grain calories as they get weaned. Grain is also a LOT cheaper than milk replacer!! Since we don't keep any grain on the farm, once weaned my little guys will only have what they can graze for themselves for their needs. I need to wait until the younger lambs are at least 8 weeks old to wean them...which would be late July. Judy and I are pretty specific in the brand of milk replacer we will use for the lambs, as Judy has had lambs bloat and die on some of the brands of milk replacer. Unfortunately we recently learned that our standard place to get the bags won't have 50 lb bags anymore so we've been scrambling to find another source. We have another 250 lbs of smaller bags of milk replacer coming from a different store and we are sure hoping it will feed both Judy's and my set of lambs until weaning. Mom is planning to run up to get it which will be so very helpful!
Tomorrow we are giving booster vaccinations to the lambs, and sometime next week we will move ewes and lambs to the Meadow farm where we have more pasture. I have 4 ewes whose lambs are getting formula along with mother's milk and they will probably stay in town where I can get the milk to the lambs more easily. These ewes are mostly quite old (9 or 10 yrs old) and I have one that recovered from mastitis but doesn't make much milk for her lamb due to scar tissue in her udder. So these mama's will hopefully teach my bummers (orphans) how to be sheep so they will be ready to join the flock when they are weaned.
John is working all the hours of the day (plus some of the nights) trying to put up as much hay as he can. Our hired high school kid is getting quite a few hours in driving the rake tractor and he is learning to mow. When I'm not washing bottles, making milk and delivering it I'm trying to help with keeping the fences moved. I have managed to get most of the starts my friend gave me in the ground and most of the potatoes left from last year put out in my garden. I'm growing a fine crop of weeds in several of the beds and I'm not sure if I will squeeze out the time to plant any seeds, like peas this year.
We did take the 4th off and enjoyed time with family and friends. John and I helped the Lions Club grill and sell hamburgers for 3 or 4 hours and then we all hung out with several families that John grew up with for the rest of the afternoon. On Saturday, we had 20 ish people over for Bec's Graduation party. We had a big spread for everyone centered around lamb chops, tri tip and sausages. It was great to have so many people come support our girl. Tom had reason to celebrate too. He has orientation for a new job tomorrow. He won't be using his USU degree but he's excited about having a steady income and benefits. Our friends the Oxarango's came from Emmett to see us, and a combine for sale in the area. We hadn't seen much of them since my father-in-laws funeral back in 2015. They used to live in Soda for 5 months each summer while their sheep flocks grazed in the area until they went to Emmett to run Rochelles family's cattle ranch around 2013. It was great to see their daughter all grown up at 23 too.
It's baby feeding time again so I better go do my "milk maid" duties and sign off here.
We thank you for your friendship and your support of our farm over the last many years. We know you have multiple options to get grass-fed meat these days and we appreciate that you choose to get locally produced meat from our family farm. We look forward to serving you for many years to come.
Best Wishes,
The Lau's
