Hello, trouble…
I had a bad feeling about 425, ever since February 26, when she looked like she would calve any minute… I was so sure I took the rare step of already writing her number in the calving book. A week later she looked overdue and I wrote in comments, “Trouble?” She held off another week, but then gave us a nice heifer (of course, like 70% of the herd this year). Wow, could this be the start of a happy ending?
No, not without more trouble anyway. It has been warm, but not so hot that we see a lot of cows wading deep into the pond, so I was surprised when patrolling the herd to see a cow peering out from just off the dam this week. After a closer look, I shook my head: it figured: 425 had found some trouble after all. She must have slipped off the edge of the dam, but in any case she did not seem able to get out. The forecast called for rain and that would make a lot more trouble…
I buzzed back to the truck and loaded into the 4-wheeler box, then headed the Chevy for home to get the remnants of a lasso. I don’t “rope” cattle any better than the average city person, and what we might call a lariat was a 30-year-old length of stiff hemp that once had a breakaway but now only formed a loop through an improvised knot. It was what I had available so I went back and cast a wide loop 3 feet into the pond.
Success! Now if she will let me pull out the lower end to loop around her muzzle to make a halter…. Repeated head tosses said, “No way, cowboy! Try that again and I will drown myself where I stand!” OK, plan B got her within a foot of shore by taking up slack around a bale-bed arm. Then I opted for a firm pull the last 10 feet with the Chevy. It worked, and I proceeded another 20 feet to safety, then cut the rope off the back of her neck.
Glad to see she was trying to get up already, and boy was her calf looking forward to that. A few minutes later she looked like any other cow, except for that muddy streak on her face. Memo to self: buy new lasso and keep a closer eye on 425 to keep trouble away.
Till next time, we’ll keep on targeting the brand and watch out for slippery slopes. Let’s keep building tomorrow together.
–Steve
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