Auction Day

I've realized that I will be spending a lot of my time at auctions. Driving to auctions. Looking at cows. Sitting on wooden seats. Listening to men talk extremely fast. Seeing lots of old men. Looking at more cows. Going through cows. Getting run over by cows. Seeing more old men. Spending lots of money. Making lots of money. Driving home from auctions.

This week, I've been to five different auction yards. Sat through two auctions. Watched my mom buy a lot of heifers. So exciting to see the buy and sell process. It's even more fun to be a part of this industry that is very much dominated by men. Besides another woman who was busy entertaining her 2 year old daughter in the auction room, my mom and I were the only ladies out of 75 people. In other words, my mom and I hung out with 73 men. I don't think many of them expected my mom to buy up lot after lot of heifers. Nice ones. The auctioneer tipped his hat to my mom, and by association, me too.

 "Let's tip our hats to the ladies buying some nice heifers today."

Is it really that surprising that women can stand their own in the dairy industry? I mean, we are all, supposedly, shopaholics and good at getting what we want...

Here's the breakdown of yesterday afternoon.

Loading up 93 heifers at the auction yard to take home.

Getting ready to send off 37 springers (mamas with babies about to pop out)



We'll miss ya! $$$

Adios mamas!!

All in a hard days work. Our herdsman that comes with us to buy cows worked 5:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. without stopping once to eat or take a break. I tried to force a granola bar down him, but he refused.

On tap for next week:

The Mexicans are coming! Quite literally, they are from Mexico and always buy a lot of cows from us. It's a family of 19 brothers and their 80+ year old dad.

Potentially another buyer coming to look at cows later in the week.

And of course, auctions. Auctions. Auctions.