Pals

Would You Believe?

Would you believe...

... that these pictures were taken on the same day, only 3 hours apart?

Looks like two different rodeos to me. This last shot is 8 men trying to find the measured out stakes for the barrel racing at our local rodeo. The arena was about 18 inches deep in mud and well, crap. Needless to say, it took awhile for 8 men to find three stakes.

Changes

With the arrival of fall comes many changes.

Changes in the leaves.

Changes in the weather.

Changes in the wardrobe.

Changes in the fruit stand.

Our "grocery store" is being taken over by pumpkins, gords, and small children looking for horse drawn wagon rides.

Happy fall!

Where Babies Come From

Let me start this post off with some background information. We are a heifer raising ranch. We buy cows at a young age, breed them, and sell them before they have their babies because we don't have milking facilities for mama cows and their babies.

Just like people, cows have an average gestation.

Just like people, cows don't always give birth according to their average gestation.

Fortunately for me because I love the babies...

 but unfortunately for the ranch because a "fresh" cow (just gave birth)...

 doesn't bring as much money as a "springer" (a pregnant cow)...

we sometimes have some girls that pop a little bit too soon and we end up with this...

"Why do fresh cows bring less money than springers?" One might ask.

Dairy farmers will pay more for the pregger cows because...

1) They can get the most milk out of that cow as they can start milking as soon as the baby pops. Whereas, a fresh cow that's been milking it's baby for a few days, doesn't have as much milk as she's been feeding her babay for awhile.

Get it? Ok, number 2 -

2) Dairy farmers desire female calves, not male calves. Why? Female calves eventually turn into springers which bring in - what? - more milk. Male calves eventually turn into veal as they can not be milked - duh. A few lucky male calves get to grow up into bulls, and well, I don't think I need to do any explaining there. Therefore, because a female calf is more valuable to a dairy farmer than a male calf, one would pay more for it at auction. Price comparison as a newborn calf? Typically $200 for a female calf and $10-$50 for a male calf.

How does this pay a part in our end of the deal?

Well, if we send a pregnant cow to auction, the sex of her baby is unknown. (Unless she was inseminated with sexed semen, but that's a story for another post - or you could read my college senior project blehhhh). So, since the sex of the baby is unknown (with the high possibility it could be a female calf) and the mama has not popped nor lost any milk, the buyer will pay more for a springer than a fresh cow.

Get it? Or did I just really confuse yall, and now you're craving a big glass of milk? Or veal?

Isn't the baby above so cute though?? And guess what - we got a girl. :)

  Just another day on the ranch.

Beef

Beef.

It's what's for our dinner.

Literally. These are the four steers we have set aside for Texas and I, my mom, and the two guys that work here as well. They go to their new home (a.k.a. our freezer) sometime around December.

Texas and I have the cute little one on the left closest to the camera. I was thinking of naming him until I realized how hard it'd be to send him off to the butcher... unless of course he was named something like Freezer Burn, Medium Rare, or Stewy.

Babies

High school friends + 1.

Someone's having a little girl in August!

90

Can you guess what we made 90 of last night for a BBQ?

I'll give you some hints.

Jalapenos.

Bacon.

Cream Cheese.

Brandin' - Texas Style

Texas dropped in on our branding session this morning

Feel the burn..

Thanks for the help Texas man!! :)

Cute

Pep literally crawled into Stoney's lap.

Also, the total kitten count is....

One!

I Got Mad Skillz

All the new little heifers at our ranch have been running around with this tattoed on their hiney:

Sometimes the girls get really nervous in the chute when I stick 'em with the branding iron, so the end result can come out a little wobbly. Other times, I get girls that come in that must have a high pain tolerance because their little booties come out looking nice and pretty like in the picture above.

Friends

Kittens have popping out of the hay bales like crazy the last few weeks. Must have been all that warm weather a couple months ago.

Stoney has made a new friend.

Mama

Some little kitty is a mama this morning :)

Expecting

Someone is gonna be a momma soon...

Little Peps has us guessing day to day when she will have her little kittens. It must be something in the water here - another wild cat in the hay alley has 5 gray kittens that are just starting to come out and romp around.

This is probably one of my favorite things about living on a ranch. :)

Pep the Gardener

Sorry ya'll for the delay in blogging. I've been busy gardening and keeping up with our flowerbeds.

Thank goodness I have such great help.

Pepe, Peppy, Kitty Kitty, Will You Please Stop Meowing... whatever you wanna call her, she is such great help around the flowerbeds. She helps with the spices, like the peppermint and cilantro above.

She gives me massages, so I don't get sore from gardening.

She's so sweet. Definitely not in the way. At all. Never.

She helps me rake the garden.

She helps me by... well, I honestly have no idea what she's trying to do here. She does make gardening a little more entertaining.

Gardening would not be as fun without little miss Pep. I think she believes life would not be as fun without gardening.

Sometimes 9 Lives Is Not Enough

It's tough being a ranch kitty.

Growing up on a ranch with cats and kittens running around everywhere is so much fun for a 7 year old animal loving girl...

...until she watches a coyote snatch a 5 week old kitten off of a hay bale, or sees a mama cat laying on the side of the road.

Such is life around here - these cats really do need all of their 9 lives to survive out here. As a young girl, I tried sneaking back plenty of kittens to my parents house. I did successfully bring back one about 12 years ago. Wouldn't ya know, that cat is still alive and has defeated all ranch kitty odds of living outside. Long live Alfalfa. :)

While I am now somewhat used to the high turnover rate of cats around here, Texas just got his first "whiff" of outdoor ranch kitty trials and tribulations.

Wednesday was a rough day for ranch kitties and Texas. Bless his heart.

I got a call from my sister early Wednesday morning to check on a "sleeping" kitty in my mom's driveway by the road. She was afraid my mom's old housecat had resurrected just long enough to get hit by a car. Fortunately and unfortunately, it was not my mom's cat that has been gone for over a year. It happened to be a little bobkitty looking male cat that actually took on Tobe's dog a couple weeks ago out in pasture.

RIP Bobkitty.

Later that morning, Texas had to take the tractor drag out of my arena into one of the corrals. He hooked up the drag, and I held the arena gate open for him, so one of the horses wouldn't escape...

Unfortunately, one of the kitties from an old garage litter of ours had been taking a catnap underneath the drag... and I'll just leave it at that.

RIP gray kitty.

When there are so many cats around with heavy machinery and the country road with cars traveling up to 70 mph, we frequently lose ranch kitties. It's a way of life around here, sadly.

This is why my Colorado Rockies kitty has turned into an indoor bug eating machine.

She is much safer inside. She'll likely die of obesity or boredom rather than becoming coyote bait. Or roadkill.

One Big Happy Family

Here's a brain teaser:

Does my cat think she's a dog? Or do our dogs think they're cats??

Nothing Comes Between a Dog and His Jolly Ball

My dog has this...

Problem.

It's called...

...a Jolly Ball.

 I have never seen this dog, or any dog for that matter, so excited to play with this ball.

Every single day.

It's like why he lives.

Because of this ball obsession, I have come to learn that my dog...

...may not be the most coordinated dog.

Nope. Definitely not coordinated.

But at least he's still cute.

TGIF

Well, this post was started on Friday... but life as we know it took over. So, how about we call it TGLWIO. Thank God Last Week Is Over.

This last week and weekend has been a little busy. Just a little. I feel like a 50 year old woman... tired, cranky, menopausal.

Ok, maybe not the last one, but my body does feel like it's been through hell.

Last Monday came and went just like every other day here on the ranch. We branded. Sorted. Checked preg dates. The weather's starting to get a little warmer, so my Texas man is slowly melting...

Tuesday turned into a semi busy day. It started out like every other day. Started branding in the morning, and I went to lunch smelling like cow flesh, smoke, and manure.

Mmmm. Sexy.

Later in the day, my mom got a call from a broker who we know from auctions. He had a buyer coming out from Pennslyvania.

The pair was supposed to arrive at our ranch at 2 p.m. that day to look at some cows. 

2 p.m. turned into 5 p.m.

 5 p.m. turned into 6 p.m.

And they finally showed up around 6:30 p.m. 

Everyone on the ranch was anxiously awaiting the arrival of the cow buying pair, even these two -

Once the fellas arrived, everyone worked out in the pens, going thru cows until dark.

 And after dark.

Pennslyvania man told us he'd be back Thursday to pick out two loads which is approximately 76 Springers..

Springers are Mama Cows for those who have not been following along... :)

We all had an auction down south in Hanford to go to the next day, so that's why they told us they'd be back on Thursday. In the dark, we all headed back to my mom's house for some pizza and a cold one. Or two.

Little did we know, the week of madness had just begun...

Wednesday morning came a little early, more specifically, about 5:20 a.m. I jumped outta bed all bright eyed.

Ha, sike!

After a few cups of joe, I could at least pretend to have my eyelids open.

The herdsman and I filled up the trailer tires with air, packed on 14 Springers (see: ABOVE), picked up my momma, and we were on our way down to Hanford. A nice little three hour jaunt with the cowsies. I drove. I love my new black beast.

When we finally made it to the first livestock yard, we unloaded the mamas, including my own mama, and I got to drive around the auction's little 4 wheel drive cart otherwise known as a "Gator". Since we now had a 30 foot trailer attached to our truck, we couldn't just zip on back to the corrals where the potential new cows would be located.

After looking at the first auction's cows, we headed on over to the next auction down the road. Quite literally, a mile down the road. We checked out what they had to sell over there, and then we giddy up'ed back on over to the first auction which always starts first.

The herdsman and I sat through the sale there to watch our Mamas sell, and then we waited on my phone to ring to know if my Mom bought any cows over at the second auction.

And we waited.

And we waited, for what seemed like eternity. Especially since we drank all the water in our truck, and the auction's kitchen had closed up.

Finally, we heard from my mom, and my uncles dropped her off at the auction we were at.

We didn't bring any new baby cows back, but we did buy the Gator.

Ha, sike!!! We didn't buy the gator, but we did buy 106 new little heifers to bring back home.

So, being that we brought the new rig, and 106 little cows a little bit too much to pack on one semi truckload, I brought some back in our trailer.

So, the madness begins.

It seemed simple enough to pull up to the chute to load the cows. I was, of course, nervous to back up the rig for the first time somewhere other than our ranch in front of a bunch of auction workers..

but they had to make it even more difficult on me by having me back up first in one corner...

and then decide I needed to back up to another corner...

and when they finally decided that I was in the right part of the yard...

they forgot that they had mixed all of our cows together...

which caused a headache because we had to separate 106 of them again...

before 20 of them could be loaded on my trailer...

and the other 86 on the semi...

Ay caramba!

So, after an hour dillydallying around the auction yard in Hanford, we headed back home.

Three hours later, we were all very excited to be back home.

Back home in the comfort of a lighted house, pipes full of water, and dinner on the table...

Ha, ssssiiiiikkkeee!!!!

Texas and my little sister had informed my mom on the way home that our ranch had lost power.

The ranch had conveniently lost power during The Texas Man's cooking hour in which he started cooking for us a delicious meal of:

Chicken Fried Deer Steak

Fresh Broccoli

BBQ Jalapeno Poppers

accompanied by Sam Adams Cherry Wheat beer

When our ranch loses power, we lose the phone, light, internet, and the water. The most important of those being the water because not only are we without water, but so are the cows. We may be able to go a few hours without water, but pregnant mama cows can't!

My mom called PG&E while we were on the road, so she could report the outage. Previous outages have proved to be not a problem for our neighbors who fail to report outages, so it's always my mom to be the one to call in. She figured this way the power would be on by the time we got home which would mean cows, old and new, would have water to drink.

Luckily, the power did come on right about the time we arrived home. We put the cows away, and we all went to bed, happy and full of deer steak.

Ha, sike!!!!!

The power came back on, but for some reason, the water hadn't turned back on. While my mom and the herdsman attempted to get the water turned back on, Texas started back on dinner which he was preparing for all of us.

Unfortuantely, the water problem didn't get better. My mom and the herdsman spent a good 30-45 minutes in the dark trying to turn the water back on. At 8:30 p.m., my mom had to call the "water guy" who came out to fix our situation instantly... and he flicked the "reset" button, and the ranch's water turned back on in a flash.

............

No sike there folks.

Apparently, we had a "brownout" which meant the power didn't fully go off at first, so the water pump had turned itself off to prevent damage. It just needs someone to turn it back on or push the "reset" button inside this handy little box by my house.

Everyone called it quits after that aorund 9 p.m., and Texas and I sent a plate home with my little sister to give to my mom after she got done with the water guy.

Phew. Wednesday, check.

Let Thursday begin!!

We expected the Pennslyvania buyer Thursday morning at 8 a.m. to go through cows to buy. Since he only planned on buying two truckloads, we figured it would take him no more than two hours to pick out some Springers. We set up the Brand Inspection at 10 a.m. with this is mind.

A Brand Inspection is needed everytime we sell a cow, whether it be to an auction or to an outside buyer. Auctions hire their own B.I.'s, so we don't have to worry about calling a B.I. unless we are doing a private sale.

Back to Thursday morning. The buyer showed up late again. Fortunately, only 20 minutes late instead of 4.5 hours.

Anyways, the two hours we had set aside to pick cows turned out to be nowhere near long enough. In fact, the buyer decided to buy three truckloads instead of two which means 116 cows instead of 76. The increase in cows along with the fact that the buyer handpicked every cow out of 300 cows led to our long day. Along with the Brand Inspector, we were out sorting through cows from 8:20 a.m. until about 12:00 p.m. Instead of going to lunch, we all ran around like a teeny bopper in Los Angeles, and we got the cows ready to ship out. By 2 p.m., we had sent out two thirds of the cattle.

Have fun in Pennslyvania girls! While the day was much shorter in length than Wednesday was, it felt just as long if not longer. We barely had time to grab a drink of water in those six hours, nonetheless think.

We spent the rest of the day sleeping. Seriously. All day. Texas and I woke up long enough to feed our animals and ourselves and go back to bed.

Thursday, check.

Friday was a little less hectic with my day starting out by dropping off some cows at the auction in Turlock. The rest of the morning was relatively calm. At 2 p.m., we had the vet come out to take care of shots and legality matters for the other 40 head of Springers waiting to ship to Pennslyvania. After an hour of writing down numbers, ripping off tags, putting on new tags, etc., we were done and just had to wait for the truck to arrive Monday.

Dun dun dunnnnn....

I wish I could say I had a nice, relaxing weekend, but Texas and I had friends come into town that we know from working in Colorado. This is a story for another post, but I can leave you with the knowledge that I can still NOT move after dancing my cowboy boots off on Saturday night for the Oakdale Rodeo.

I thought weekends were for getting rest???

To be continued...

Do you want a tissue?

Seriously... do you want a tissue??

Sooo not lady like.

Seven Months

Help. Someone, please help.

I've got a problem. I'm obsessed with my puppy.

How can you not love a face like this??

He's an old man this month... seven months old.

Please stop. Stop being so cute. I can't get any work done around this place.