Look how much of the ice and snow had melted into puddles on the ground by yesterday afternoon.
All night it blew hard, by this morning the remaining ice and snow is gone. As I write, the temperature is 56F/13C, by midnight this will have dropped to 17F/-8C. On the way through tonight, the wind will glide around to the North and the temperatures will spirit the falling rain into falling ice and freeze the puddles of rain already fallen Tomorrow the ice will be laid out in a pretty sheet once more and we will be skating through the chores again.
Days like this I am glad I don’t have bees anymore.
I have been milking Del daily since I returned from New Zealand. Initially, she milked nothing at all, just the tiniest of spray from each quarter. tt is way too early in her milking arc to be drying up. Her calf was sluggish when I arrived home. Sleeping too much. She is still slower than the others. Now Del is milking about just under gallon a day and last night I pushed her baby out of the creep and she went straight to her mother and began to feed loudly and with a little more enthusiasm.
After much observation and thought I have surmised that in the bad cold that settled down in here while I was away (as low as -20 for days) the calf began to struggle physically. It is possible that she was almost overcome by the cold and stopped feeding from her mother. Del almost dried up because her lethargic baby had stopped eating. This will have given Del some trouble. I am surprised she did not go mastitic but her milk is clean now. Who knows what she has overcome.
Now the calves are eating grain, (I seldom give calves grain at all but this baby needs to build up fast in this weather), Del has begun to recover her milk and baby is getting some milk to drink again. Next, I look forward to seeing this calf running about the fields. I think that we almost lost her in that cold. The temperatures are dropping again so I will be watching her closely and will continue to milk Del to even out her production.
My pig lady was in yesterday and she actually lost a calf to that cold and was grateful she only lost one.
This is the last day above freezing for a week or so which means I have to finish cleaning out the barn today, fill all the water troughs and get in the fresh straw for bedding for the next cold spell. A good hard working day.
I hope you have a lovely day.
celi
WEATHER:
The Kitchen's Garden 
22 responses to “SLUSH”
oh my…good save with Del and the calf. You have such instinctive skills with your animals. Be safe…no slipping allowed!
Farming can be so difficult to work with. You cannot travel or make plans because all of your work is weather dependent. You cannot say “I will be at this place on this weekend in March”, no matter how far in advance you plan it, because that may be your only dry weekend to plant your cold weather crops in time. And if you make extensive plans, you can be sure that nature will make things difficult while you are gone. It’s tough.
Winter can be so harsh. We don’t think about the harshness of it living on a farm. Please stay warm my friend and safe! XOXO – Bacon
I just can’t imagine it being that cold Celi … poor wee calf. The last photo is super!
You’re home, that’s probably what made things better for mama cow and baby.