Twinkle Toes McGee And Other Unicorns

I cannot fathom how I can live, work and play on the same farm as another human being yet we live on two distinctively different planets. This is a long one folks, grab a cup of coffee and get comfy…

Several days ago as we rushed to get the farm ready for our busy hay season, there were several tasks that needed to be accomplished.

• Move stock trailer across river and position it ready to haul bull
• Move main herd from far, far field
• Transfer herd sire from main herd to show barn
• Load pickup for firewood delivery

The first and foremost in our minds was the need to move the main herd back up The Rabbit Run from their grazing around the far, far field. This field had dried out quicker than the other fields and the grass was no longer growing, we could tell from the yellow tinge as we looked out across the expanse. This field needed to be made into hay and getting the cattle out of the area so we could go in and out of the field without having to open and close gates with each piece of equipment and each load of hay.

Getting the stock trailer was the first problem because I was in charge of opening the logging gate that is the one big enough to swing the stock trailer through. New strings had been put on the gates because the calves had taken to chewing on them making it impossible to release them when needed. The new strings had been put on that morning to secure it, baling twine was wonderful for this closure except that they were tied in loops instead of straight, when I heard Mike and the stock trailer already coming my direction, I rushed to open the gates wide. One loop was long enough to wrap around my foot as I was opening the gate and tripped me. I fell right into a very wet and ripe cow pie on my left side while jambing a pinky on my right hand and skinning my right knee open on a sharp rock. Hobbling on to help with the main herd, I persevered.

Moving the herd was fairly easy since they heard us calling and came running toward the gate. That is with the exception of the cow Nyad that just had her calf and was not yet allowing Dolphin to mingle with the rest of the herd. Mike declared that it was not a big deal, we could get the cow/calf pair after the next task which was moving the herd sire. We have two show cows and three heifers in the show barn area that need breeding and since we were moving the animals around anyway, transferring the sire away from the main herd should not be a big issue. Then we could get back to finding Nyad and Dolphin so they could join the rest of the critters that had already been moved up The Rabbit Run when we went back to the far, far field to retrieve the solar power unit for the electrical fence. So we had a plan.

After moving up The Rabbit Run, the main herd was secured around and inside the barn. We were able to move the herd sire down to his own pen and had the stock trailer in place. Sky High. the sire, moved into the stock trailer easily and Mike was able to drive across the bridge to the county road, in the driveway, through the opened electrical fences where he opened the back of the trailer. Sky High began calling for the females as he was leaving the trailer. We had the barn gates opened so the cows that were far down in the woods came running up to meet the new fella.

Mike drove the pickup and stock trailer back to the yard, had the gates all secured and parked it while the bull with the show animals got friendly. We expected to have time to unhook the trailer after we got Nyad and her baby connected up with the main herd.

Back up the road we went with the Gator. We got the fence power pack into the Gator but had to hunt and hunt for Nyad and her baby Dolphin. We finally found her but could not convince her to move her and her baby across the river toward The Rabbit Run. Mike opted to leave the pair for now assuring that she would want to find the rest of the critters when she was ready to introduce Dolphin.

From the far, far field, up the county road and back to the main herd that was now without the herd sire and not real pleased that we still had them locked in close quarters. We opened the gates and let them out of the barn area and into the new grazing  and went to set the electric fence up to secure the hay field from the herd.

While putting in the power source, Mike spotted Nyad across the field. She HAD moved Dolphin across the river when we  were not watching her! All I had to do was get across the fence and push the pair up the fenceline to The Rabbit Run (which was nearly and 1/8th of a mile through dense understory growth of snowberry, nettles and blackberry vines). Every few hundred feet, Nyad would head down a trail toward the river, I would have to get down to the river before them them and push the pair back up to the path along the fence. When I finally got them up to The Rabbit Run, Nyad with her baby rushed past and headed down along the side of the six acre field. Mike even tromped though the field of tall grass in an effort to get ahead of the pair, but again they outpaced the efforts and went hidden again.

We gave up on moving Nyad and Dolphin but kept the Rabbit Run and barn open so they could as least get close to rejoining the herd when they were ready.

By now it was time to fill the stock tanks with water for the animals near the house and finish the evening chores, but the herd sire was not with the two show cows and three heifers where we expected him to be. We looked in the barn, around the pasture, down in the woods where the show barn animals like to hang out but no bull anywhere. We looked in the bull pen but there was still only the two over there.

Mike saw footprints in the garden. While we were trying to catch up with Nyad and Dolphin, the herd sire decided that he did not want to make friends with new critters and jumped the electric fence, ran through the garden and out the driveway to the county road. We could not see any tracks after the soft dirt of the garden, could not find him or his tracks up and down the county road, did not see any disturbance in the fence line or the brush in the fence line across the road. We were on a mad scramble to find the missing bull, until we noticed him grazing right along with the rest of the main herd. We never did figure out Twinkle Toes and his amazing feat of miraculously getting from one side of the county road to the other and back in with his main herd.

The plan to have the herd sire at the show barn was scrapped and we decided to deal with that after hay season.

Once the evening chores were done, the stock trailer had to be unhooked and the pickup loaded with firewood for the early morning delivery. Bruised, bloody, mucky and tired we loaded until dark when our daughter made it home after a long days work away from the farm and asked how the day went.

Mike and I answered at the same time. “It was great/It was terrible!” Mike told of all the positives we accomplished and I lamented of all the sore muscles, mis-steps and mishaps we had. Different planets indeed!