Checking Those Tats

Two more bulls have been sold from the bull pen of potential herd sires. We had been stalling, for quite some time, finishing up with the tattoo process on all the bulls. It is not a hard job, but it seemed like other tasks seemed to pop up and command our full attention and we just never got around to the process. Now that the bulls are selling, we have to get this job done now since tattoos are required for permanent identification.

When I use the word process it is because this task has so many steps to accomplish the job. Before beginning, the show barn has to be prepared by moving the two feeder heifers. (This is where the extra segmenting gates positioned throughout the  feeding area of the barn come in helpful). The heifers are gated for access to the back one-third of their feeding area and are still able to go outside to their barnyard if they wish. A second set of gates are locked giving the barn a twelve foot dead space between the heifers and the bulls once we move the guys into the show barn. With the dead space there is less likely a chance that the bulls will get riled up by being within touching distance of a female.

Once the show barn has been set up, the bulls can be moved from their usual penned area of the far side of the bull barn to the closer pasture. After being moved into the closer pasture, the gates are opened and the bulls move into another pasture where they run to the show barn in anticipation of seeing other animals and specifically females. (These year-old bulls act very much like randy teenagers at this age and they are powered by strong hormones).

When they get inside the barn we can lock the gates so they are secure in their own pen with the dead space on one side and the whole middle hay storage space between them and the show cows with heifers. Normally the next step is to lock the bulls into a feeding head gate (stanchion). This is where we encountered an issue. We had waited too long to  get this job done and some of the bulls have grown too big to allow their fat necks to be secured inside the head gates with the latch. One bull in particular was the problem so we had to put a halter on him with a long rope that was attached to the back of a tractor so we could hold his head while we tattooed his ears.

All the bulls got their tattoos done easily with minimal trauma since the head gates hold them firm for the inking. The one bull we had to put the halter and long rope on was quickly released after tattooing  so he did not get worked up and rewarded for being such brave critters. They all got a ration of grain before we separated the two bulls that were sold from the group, before reversing the multi-pasture process of moving the remaining bulls through the three pastures to their own pen and yard.

The two sold bulls were transferred to the stock-trailer and delivered to a farm south of Hillsboro.

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I am so pleased to announce that MaryJane Nordgren has made her new book available to the public! Click here for your copy of Nandria’s War.