The Bovine Bugle

Stock tanks or skating rinks: keeping the livestock watered in subzero weather

After lunch today I schlepped the water hose from the milkhouse, across the road, and into the stock tank for the older group of heifers/steers. Another one of the joys that these cold, cold days of late January/early February bring is keeping the stock tanks for the young stock outside from turning into skating rinks. The older group gets their tank filled every other day. The younger group, housed on the same side of the road as the dairy barn, has water run to their tank twice a day.

Dawn helps hold the water hose as it fills
up her tank.

As soon as the older group hears the gate chain clang against the metal gate, they descend on the stock tank to slurp up the water as it starts running in. I usually hang around for a few minutes as it starts filling to make sure the over zealous animals don't knock the hose out of the tank. Today Dawn was giving me a hand by holding the hose with her mouth. While this tank filled I went to check the other tank used by the younger group.

No ice please. An ax is essential equipment in making sure
the heifers and young stock get their water.

The other stock tank is just outside the young stock barn. It had plenty of water but an inch and a half of ice on top was preventing the animals from getting to the water. I had brought the ax along, and in a minute I had a nice opening chopped in the tank and the heifers and steers could drink to their hearts content. In the meantime, the stock tank across the road had filled up to the top. I drained the hose as I coiled it up heading back to the milkhouse. This would keep the hose from freezing up as it sits in the cold corner of the milkhouse waiting for its next trip across the road. With more subzero temps forecast for the rest of the week, I think we had better keep the ax handy.

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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Tatoos and pregnancy tests on clinic day

Vet Kevin tatoos the ear of one young calf,
while another checks his work.

It was herd clinic day here at Howmars Farm, and we had 9 cows to check, some calves to vaccinate, and a bull calf that needed to be steered. We had chores done and the animals all sorted by 8:30 a.m., the usual time Dr. Steve gets here. We were surprised when one of Steve's associates, Dr. Kevin Tobey, pulled into the barn driveway. He was here to do the clinic for Steve, who had to attend a conference today.

We hadn't seen Kevin for awhile, so it was nice to chat with him as we went about checking the cows for pregnancies and vaccinating the heifer calves. Kevin, like myself, is a graduate of the University of Maine at Orono. I think he started at UMaine the fall after I graduated. In Steve and Kevin's practice there is another vet, Pete Averil, that also attended UMaine while I was going there. I enjoy talking with the two of them about school memories.

Clinic went very well with most of the cows checked being pregnant and the fresh cows checked cycling normally with no problems. We vaccinated and tatooed 6 heifer calves ranging in age from 4 to 6 months. One of the calves was a Red Angus heifer born in July. Kevin also had to put an ear tag in her ear to show she had been vaccinated. A little before 10 we were done, Dr. Kevin had scrubbed up his equipment and boots (bio-security is very important), and he was on his way to his next client.

Below: Vet Kevin gives his boots a steam bath
before leaving the farm, a necessary precaution.

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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Fighting the cold to keep the girls fed

Son Ben and his grandmother work to feed the younger
members of the herd on an extremely cold January day.

Another cold morning. So cold that my dog, Yukon, who usually goes out for a few minutes before I go to the barn around 4:30 AM, just stuck his nose out the door and quickly turned around and curled back up on his bed. The temperature was 26 below, but everything was fine and working in the barn. As soon as Dad came in to relieve me from milking, I went and started the loader tractor we use to bring in round bales. While I brought in the round bales, Ben and Grandma cleaned free stalls and fed and watered the younger stock.

The cows eat about 3 bales a day. We feed two bales of first-cut in the bale rings in the barnyard everyday, and every four days or so we put 4 bales of second-cut inside the barn behind the feed bunk. The bales in the bale rings are easy to feed. We just remove the plastic wrap and the net wrap that is underneath the plastic, and place the bales in side the rings. The cows do the rest.

Left: the round bales are delivered to the yard. Right: Jonathan works with a chainsaw to loosen up the frozen, packed hey in the bales.

The bales inside the barn take a little more work. After placing the bales in the barn, we cut and peel back the plastic and net wrap. Then, using one of our chainsaws, we cut the bales down to the center of the bale. The bales then unfold, and we feed them with a pitch fork. On a cold morning like this, with fingers freezing and hydraulic hoses so stiff you can hardly get them connected, it makes me wish we were still feeding just the old-fashioned square bales.

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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When it's 20 below in the barn...

After enjoying last Thursday's 50+ degree temperatures, we spent this morning working in temperatures around -20 F and they never went above zero all day. Back near the end of December, Emily asked how the cows do in such cold temperatures. The fact is they do just fine, but we do take extra precautions to make sure of that.

We built the current dairy barn in 1970 and it hasn't really been changed since then. The east facing side is totally open and has been since we built it. Farmers probably thought my dad was crazy building this steel structure and leaving so much of it open. Our vets have always said this open environment is extremely healthy for the cows. They get outside for exercise and sunshine everyday if they want to. The temperature swings of this winter would have been difficult to manage in a traditional closed-in barn, but with our setup the cows have done fine.

During extreme cold weather we make sure to keep the stalls well bedded, to give the cows an extra feeding of hay inside the barn, and to put down some corse material on the concrete alleys for better footing for the cows. As long as the cows have shelter and can get out of the wind, they do just fine in the cool temperatures. We also use a powdered teat dip after milking instead of the liquid dip when the temperatures go below 20F. This powder dries up the small amount of moisture left on the teat ends which could lead to frostbite and mastitis problems in the extreme cold weather.

So even on this very chilly morning, the cows are out in the barnyard eating round bales, and once the frozen manure is scraped from the barn they line up along the open side of the barn to soak up the sunshine.

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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Excoooose me, Jon, your gate is open

Before going to bed at night, I usually go down to the barn to check that everything is set for the night. Last night Yukon and I stepped out into the below zero night air around 10 PM. As we walked to the barn, Yukon let out a few barks but I told him to be quiet, that nothing was wrong. I heard a cow moo as I opened the barn door, and I thought, where did that come from?

Left:Onyx, the Gate Keeper

Everything was fine in the barn. The doors were all latched, the water was turned off, the feed bunk was full of hay, and anywhere that cold air could come in was plugged up. Since it was supposed to drop to -20F overnight, I wanted everthing shut tight. I opened the door to leave the barn, letting Yukon out first, and then I stepped out and came face to face with a cow! Onyx, a cow that appeared in a blog back in September, was waiting in front of the barn to tell me I had forgotten to shut the gate. Must be she was what Yukon was woofing at as we went to the barn. I herded her around the corner of the barn, back through the gate, and into the barnyard. I could see a few heads turning inside the barn, watching what was going on.

I'm happy Onyx was the only one out wandering around. If it had been a warm summer's night, probably the whole herd would have been running wild around the place. I guess it was just too cold for the cows to be nosy tonight.

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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Helping Dad on an afternoon-off from school

Noah slides a bag of sawdust off the truck and to his dad.

The weather forecast was calling for more freezing rain today as the boys boarded the bus for school. We were a little nervous about them going, but none of the other schools in the area had cancelled classes to avoid trouble getting the kids home in the afternoon. We finished morning chores, and not long after we had gotten into the house the elementary school called to say that the kids were being sent home at lunchtime. No afternoon kindergarten for Noah, and Justin and Ben would be home soon. What would the boys do all afternoon?

I had the perfect job for them; bedding the freestalls. We were still unable to get a dump truck load of sawdust, so I had picked up a pickup truck load of bagged sawdust at McCuin's. It's more expensive than bulk sawdust but right now we don't have a choice. Each bag of sawdust holds 2.8 cubic feet. I backed the truck into the end of the barn, and then we went to work. Noah and Justin handed and slid the bags of sawdust to me at the tailgate. I loaded 6 bags at a time into the wheelbarrow, pushed the wheelbarrow along the back of the freestalls, and tossed one bag of sawdust into each stall. Ben went along with his knife opening the bags and dumping the contents into the front of the stall. From start to finish it took us about an hour to do the 40 stalls.

Ben gets the job of spreading new sawdust in the freestalls.

The freezing rain was starting to accumulate as we headed back up to the house for a break before afternoon milking. The boys had made the job of bedding the stalls a lot easier for me. An afternoon or day off from school doesn't mean sitting in front of the TV watching a movie or playing video games the whole time. Just like when I was growing up, time off from school meant some extra time to help my parents with some chore on the farm. But, just as my parents did, we always find time to do some fun stuff, too.

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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Sights around the farm on a dazzling winter day

The snowstorm that went through last night left 4-5 inches of new white stuff on the ground. After working all morning and getting Noah off to kindergarten, Karen and I couldn't resist the temptation any longer. We quickly strapped on our skis and headed out to the fields. The sunshine was dazzling on the new snow. The cows were crowded around the bale feeders in the barnyard, munching on the hay in the frosty air. The twins, Charlie and Dandee, stood in the gateway giving us a good look over.

We circled through the fields that the cows graze during the summer, checking for signs of wildlife on the fresh snow. There were numerous airholes in the snow made by mice as they tunneled along just under the surface. As we came up by the compost windrow we are currently building, we saw the red-tailed hawk that hangs around the farm take off from a tall white pine. We spied a spot in the snow where the hawk had landed to snag a mouse. Note the wing marks in the snow.

The hawk's wings make marks in the new snow.

We crossed the road, skied below my parent's house, and up into the meadow where the older heifer/steer group is overwintering. Several deer had crossed the meadow at the far end, leaving tracks in the snow. As we approached the house and the end of our outing, the heifers and steers looked over at us as we passed their bale feeder. They looked like they were wondering what were those things on our feet and where was their pail of grain.

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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Got a beautiful baby or toddler in your house? You have just 16 days left to enter him or her in the YoBaby Cover Baby Contest.

The kids have "fun" with Aunt Patty

It's always nice when all the family is here visiting over the holidays. Catching up on the news, sharing meals, and playing together is always great fun. My older sister, Patty, usually manages to motivate the kids into doing some kind of farmwork. Today it was cleaning calf pens with my son, Justin, and his cousin, Zach. Noah was laying low due to a bout with pneumonia, so the three amigos were operating one short today.

Justin and Zach grumbled quite a bit, but they did as their aunt asked. Justin thought that if he cleaned pens that he should get out of doing regular young stock chores later that afternoon. He's always looking to make a deal. I checked in on them once. They were doing well, but had a little trouble moving the calves back into their pens once they were cleaned. At one point, one of the calves ducked between Justin and Zach and took off on a run around the young stock barn. She was quickly corraled and put back where she belonged.

Later, Patty said the boys had done a great job. They worked really well once they got started on the project. Now let's see.....what else do I need done?...

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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Can you teach the cows to skate?

A pretty good ice storm swept through here Sunday afternoon and evening. It left a pretty good coating of ice on everything, and the strong winds that went along with the storm took down several branches from the sugar maple trees lining the road . By this morning the temperatures had warmed up some and melted the ice off the car and truck, but the ground and the road still had a good covering of the slippery stuff. The opening of school was delayed two hours, so the boys didn't have to rush around to be ready for the usual 7:15 AM pick up time.

The ice made for tricky walking out to the grain feeders of the two groups of young stock outside. The heifers and steers gingerly picked their way across the slick ground to the feeders and their breakfast. The barnyard for the milk cows wasn't too bad, but the cows didn't want to venture down the sloped entrance to the barnyard and out into the pastures this morning. The walking was just too slippery.

This morning's slick conditions made me vow to put the chains on my two-wheel drive tractor that I use to haul the compost material. For both loads this morning, I had to use our four-wheel drive tractor to pull the other tractor and loaded dump trailer out of the loading area and into the lane leading to the compost windrow. The two-wheel drive tractor would just sit and spin both rear tires, unable to pull the load.

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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A "moo-ooo-oon-light " walk in the snow

This evening, at the end of milking, I went out in the freestall area of the barn to take down the boards we use to pen the cows up for milking. The barn was almost totally empty, with only a few cows crowded around one of the stock tanks to get a drink of water. Usually by this time the cows are waiting at the feed bunk for their evening feeding of second-cut baleage. I walked out to the barnyard to see what was going on.

By the light of the nearly-full moon, I could see almost the entire milking herd out in the snow covered pastures. I usually leave the barnyard gate open through the day in case the cows want to wander around the pasture, getting some excercise and just nosing around. Not many had been out in the pasture during the day today, but for some reason they all wanted to be out there tonight. What drew them out there tonight I don't know. I hadn't seen the barn and barnyard that empty since grazing season. Maybe the cows were out wandering in the pastures, wishing it was a moonlit night in June with lush, green grass to munch on under to moon's soft gaze.

I like seeing the cows out in the pastures, even when the pastures are covered with snow. I'm sure mentally and physically it's good for them, and it's good for us, too. You just have to be careful where you ski the next day or you may ski right through a cow flop!

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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