The Bovine Bugle

Cold snap means cows take a dip

A cold cow gets treatment to prevent frostbite and other problems.

The three-day cold snap really drove the chill into everyone and everything. During sub-zero temperatures like we had the past three mornings, we take extra steps to make sure the cows stay healthy. We feed extra forage to help the cows keep their bodies warm, we make sure the freestalls have plenty of dry sawdust, and we even have a special teat dip we use when we dip the teats after milking.

We normally dip all four teats of the cow after milking with a liquid containing a germicide. This kills bacteria on the teats and helps maintain udder health between milkings. When the temperature drops below 30 degrees F we switch from a liquid dip to a powder dip. This powder contains a germicide, but just as important is the drying action of the powder. It dries all moisture on the teat. When the cow leaves the milking parlor and goes out into the freestalls where the temperature may be well below zero, she won't be in danger of getting frostbite on the ends of her teats. Before the powder became available several years ago, we would have several cases every winter of cows with frostbite on the very ends of their teats. This would make it difficult to milk the cow and almost always ended with the cow having a case of mastitis.

Our open-style barn is great for the health of the cow, and with precautions like the powder dip the cows survive the cold snaps just fine.

--Jonathan (left), Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont
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Ask the cows! Inquiring minds want to know

We know that lots of our Bovine Bugle readers have a keen interest in farming, dairy farming and organic food production. That's why we've just added "Ask the Farmer" to this site.

If you have a question you've been dying to have answered, just click here and your question will be answered in an email back to you, plus it will appear on this site for all to see. You can even send your answer in by using voice mail, if your computer is appropriately equipped.

We'll get your question to farmer Jonathan, the cows, an expert at Stonyfield Farm, or someone in the field of organics.

And you think YOU'RE cold?!

Frigid Artic air moved in to the area overnight and temperatures this morning were hovering around -20 F. It made for pretty frosty conditions around the farm, but everything started and ran okay. Many of the cows had frosty faces, and where their breath blew against the plywood front of the freestalls they made a ring of frost on the wood. The stalls were a challenge to clean with the manure freezing to the concrete curb.

We broke out the cross country skis a couple of days ago, and this morning after finishing chores Karen, Yukon, and I headed out for a ski. I think Yukon is more excited about going out skiing than we are about it. The conditions aren't too bad, and Ben has been out skiing before school the past two mornings so the trail has been well packed and hardened by the sub-zero weather. The conditions should get even better if we get the snow they are predicting for this weekend. We found one area where beavers had built up an old dam and flooded part of our ski trail. If the temperatures stay cold, the flooded area will hopefully freeze hard enough so that we can ski on it and we can make our usual loop around the farm.

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--Jonathan (left), Howmars Farm
(with Yukon)
Franklin, Vermont

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Much too cool for the pool

The thermometer doesn't tell lies on a December morning in northern Vermont.

Yesterday we had the first below zero morning of the winter. To prepare the day before, we covered up all the openings in the barns to make sure the cold couldn't get in, we filled heaters with kerosene to have them ready for the morning, and we put both tractors inside the horsebarn so we could plug them in when morning rolled around.

The breath of the cows came out in great puffs of steam as they lounged in the freestalls while we cleaned the stalls this morning. With all the preparations from the night before, everything at the barn went pretty smoothly. Jack Frost had been hard at work on the windows in the milkhouse. The heaters all ran so it was pleasant while milking the cows, no pipes were frozen, and the tractors started easily. It was good preparation for the months of cold weather to come.

Doors to the milk barn, frosted over.

While I scraped the barn, a red-tailed hawk landed in a pine tree just a couple hundred feet from the barnyard. Twice it left its perch, circled near the compost windrow, and then landed back in the pine tree. The third time it swooped I lost sight of it. I spotted it on a fence post part way down the grazing strip, and I think it had a mouse in one of its claws. It then flew off to a snag near the brook that it uses often. The hawk was beautiful circling in the brilliant morning sun. I'm glad it got some breakfast!!

The backyard pool doesn't seem like a good choice today.

It may be cold, but it's pretty!

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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Christmas tree lot is ready for business

As you may have guessed from yesterday's post, we'll be spending the next couple of weekends we will be spending in our Christmas tree field hoping to sell some of our sheared balsam firs and spruces. We haven't been open to sell trees for the last three years, so we are pretty excited. Getting ready for business last weekend took up a large share of the previous week.

Monday I called for gravel to fix up the parking area near the Christmas trees. Tuesday they delivered two loads of nice, stony gravel and I spread that around with the loader tractor. The unseasonably warm day, near 60 degrees, had finished melting the snow from last week and made the job of working on the parking area much easier. We trimmed brush that had grown up along the woods road over the past three years so that customers riding in the wagon to the trees wouldn't get whipped in the face by a branch or young sapling. And since our signs from three years ago were flaked and peeling, or being used for other things ( a wheelbarrow ramp), we had to make some new ones.

I've cleaned some lumber out of the small wagon we use to give rides, fastened the signs to a 2x4 frame, put new blades on the bow saws, and we're ready! We needed that dusting of snow again to make the trees look pretty!

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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The Christmas tree crew sets up camp

Saturday morning we loaded the wagon with tools, signs, kids, and Yukon (the dog) and headed down the road to the Christmas trees. We plant the seedlings in an old hayfield behind my brother's house, about a 1/4 mile from our house and the barns. We went prepared to stay until 4 that afternoon.

We put out our signs near the parking area, and then drove up the woods road to the site in the trees where we set up camp. Our campsite is an over grown stonepile on the edge of the hayfield, about a 1/3 of the way up the field of planted trees. We unloaded the tools, cleaned up the campfire area, and then collected wood for the fire. Soon we had the fire going, just in time for the arrival of Karen with lunch. Hot dogs always taste best roasted over an open fire.

We kept ourselves busy building up the firewood pile, knocking snow off the marketable trees, and trimming brush and branches in and around the Christmas trees.

Above: Yukon gets worn out by the end of the long day waiting for Tree-buying customers!

My brother's girls, Emily and Maddy, came up with their dad and helped stoke the campfire and played with my boys in the woods surrounding the Christmas trees. We did sell one tree around 3:30 in the afternoon. The boys helped the customers load the tree into the wagon, and we gave them a ride back to the parking area where we loaded the tree into the back of their truck. Christmas tree season had begun!!

--Jonathan, Howmars Farm
Franklin, Vermont

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Every dog will have his day, even on Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving has come and gone, and we all had fun visiting and playing with the relatives and we all ate too much. Over 30 of our turkeys made it onto the tables of families celebrating here in Vermont, and one even made it out to Michigan. I had a call from one of my customers, and she wanted another turkey to use fairly soon. I told her I could drop it off the next night on my way to choir practice.

The next night I was greeted at the door by Sung Hee, Wylie, and their dog, Pushkin. They have purchased our turkeys, beef, and chickens for the past couple of years. We talked about Thanksgiving, the melting snow, the skiing at Jay Peak, and the secure feeling a full freezer and a big woodpile gives you heading into a northern Vermont winter. Sung Hee mentioned how even Pushkin had enjoyed some turkey at Thanksgiving. When she said that she had a picture of Pushkin trying to make off with the turkey carcass I told her she had to e-mail it to me to use in my blog. Pushkin did not look happy when he was caught red-handed.

It's nice to have customers like Sung Hee and Wylie that appreciate what we do, and who make it fun to have a chance to visit with them when we drop off some of our products or when they come to the farm to buy something.

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Jonathan (left), Howmars Farm
(with Yukon, a very good dog)
Franklin, Vermont