There's not much like it

Life yearning for itself.?ÿ Watching the perpetuation of our fellow creatures tells quite the story, eh?

Those little boogers can gain strength quick.?ÿ You mentioned the calf butting their mother's udder to drop the milk and it reminded me of a not-so-pleasant encounter I had with a hungry calf.?ÿ

I was friends with a family that kept a small dairy operation and use to hang out there just to help out.?ÿ I was bottle feeding one of their calves and he emptied the bottle.?ÿ Silly me, I turned to my friend to ask if there was another full bottle somewhere.?ÿ Just as I turned the calf decided to bring his nose up hard right between my legs, apparently wanting me to drop more milk...nearly dropped me to my knees.

My 'udder' was sore for three days.?ÿ?ÿ

@paden-cash I've never been butted in the "udder" but I have had a few run ins with cattle.?ÿ When I was in high school I would have a show steer every year.?ÿ They're a lot of work and you spend a lot of time with them.?ÿ The barn where I kept my show steers had a relatively low gate that they could jump over if they wished.?ÿ I nailed a 2X12 over the top of the gate just high enough for them to squeeze under.?ÿ As I was leading a steer out one morning I was leaning over to latch the gate when the steer decided it was time to mess with me.?ÿ He placed the top of his head under my butt and lifted, pretty quickly.?ÿ I was lifted and flipped over the 2X12 and landed in the manure covered floor of the barn.?ÿ I jumped up ready to yell at him but he just looked at me with those big brown innocent eyes and I just couldn't help but laugh.

Andy

My grandpa had cattle when I was little and I got to watch him interact with those ol gals on the regular. He'd pull the truck out into the pasture, honk the horn 2 times and start calling "she boss". Those ol girls would come running! It was a fascinating thing to watch.

When I was older, I helped de-horn some cattle, which is the messiest thing I've probably ever taken part in, and we had to pull a calf. The mother wasn't giving any effort to give birth with her calf who's feet were showing. I'm not sure of all the specifics but for some reason the calf wouldn't come and the mom wasn't pushing. (The calf may have been breach). Either way, we had a heck of a time pulling the calf and in turn injured the mother. The calf did survive but the mother did not. We couldn't get her to walk after the calf was out. Was a sad day but I learned a lot.

Way back about 1986 had a situation much like that.?ÿ Just me and my girlfriend at the time to do the work.?ÿ The cow had worked so long she had given up.?ÿ Pushed her into a shed and tied her to a post.?ÿ Got out the pullers and began the whole messy job.?ÿ About that time two hunters came walking up who had witnessed my predicament.?ÿ One of them was a veterinarian, believe it or not.?ÿ He jumped in and helped.?ÿ The calf came out easy enough and the cow was fine.?ÿ But the calf would not breathe no matter how much rubbing we did.?ÿ He grabbed it by the hind feet and began to spin in circles as best he could.?ÿ That helped clear crud out of the throat and opened up the wind pipe.?ÿ Suddenly, the calf was breathing fine.?ÿ A little heifer.?ÿ Grew up to be a great-grandma cow in the herd.?ÿ I was so thankful to the hunter/vet but he wouldn't take a penny.?ÿ I had heard of doing the spinning thing but had never had to do it.

I spent a lot of time on grandparents farm in Kansas. I was young and watching the de-horning and castrating of young bulls. The best view was standing next to a red ant hill. I ended up bitten everywhere from the chest on down and spent the evening in the bath tub covered in calamine lotion.

I'm wearing oversized galoshes in the saturated corral with approximately 1 foot of urine and manure. My foot gets stuck by the suction, I fall forward and I'm up to my elbows in manure/urine with my nose 2 inches from the muck, screaming for my Grandpa to come rescue me.

Squirltech it wasn't "She Boss" but rather "Huuummmm BOYS!" that caused the herd to come running for the fresh bales of alfalfa.

@lurker

You were anointed well. ???œ ???œ?ÿ

For the red ant hills you must have been somewhere in the western half of the State.

I've heard a wide variety of calls that different farmers have used to call the cows.

Yuuuuuuuuuuuup

Soo boss soo boss soo boss

Moooooooooooooooooooooo

Come ooooooooooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

ShoooooWasheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

In my case, they hear my old rattletrap flat bed before I come over the hill and head towards the feed bunks.

@holy-cow?ÿ I was born in Wichita but the ants and the farm were in Anthony, Harper County. My Grandpa decided to breed over the winter since he had some downtime (winter wheat crop). Well there were 3 calves born in a blizzard and to keep them from freezing to death, we brought them into the house for 2 weeks and bottle fed them. That was the last time he tried to breed over the winter.

Anthony is close to the Gypsum Hill country.?ÿ I can believe there were plenty of red ant hills.?ÿ I thought I was going to do a project in Harper once about 1995 but ate lunch in Anthony at one of those little diners on a Sunday where a stranger soon figures out he is sitting in someone local's favorite seat.?ÿ Chatted with the locals to sort of make up for being an intruder.

Anthony is only about 45 miles from Alva, Oklahoma where ancestors of Paden Cash made their presence known.?ÿ That was after their time in Protection, Kansas about 85 miles straight west of Anthony.

All funny cattle stories. I quite fondly recall my time (1970's) renting a house on a dairy farm while going to surveying school. Oh like getting up in the middle of night during a thunderstorm to find the hole in the fence and heard those beasts back through it. Nothing like that.?ÿ Or how about the times of being jolted out of a stuper to assist the vet when they had to untwist a stomach; the stench of cow gas as the incision is made, ugh. How about the bleeting of dozens of calves at 6am, hungry for a bottle when its -35 and they are penned just outside your bedroom window. Mosquitoes, flys, dead things lying around awaiting the rendering truck.?ÿ Farm life. Ugh, you guys can have it.?ÿ?ÿ

"Mosquitoes, flys, dead things lying around ".............waiting for the cops to show up.

Sounds like the bad side of town in many cities.

?ÿ

My fifth grade teacher lived across the road from one of our pastures.?ÿ One morning I noticed she was being particularly unpleasant towards me.?ÿ I eventually asked why she seemed irritated.?ÿ She said some of our cattle had got out in the night, moseyed into her yard, directly outside her bedroom window, then started bellowing for the calves to come join them about 30 minutes earlier than her normal time to get up.

Then there are times like this morning.?ÿ Was sitting right here working on the computer when I looked over the screen and out the window to see a couple of cows walking towards my left.?ÿ Uh, that isn't supposed to happen because they were my cows and should have been nearly a half mile away instead of in the yard.?ÿ The only reason they were going left, I figured, was the neighbor's dogs must have seen them and barked in protest.?ÿ So, I don my wintery apparel and head out the door ready to push them back slowly in hopes they would show me where they escaped.?ÿ As I was loading a few bags of feed on the flatbed truck my phone rang.?ÿ It was my wife telling me that our nearest neighbor had called to report that his sister, who lives in the next house in that direction, had some cattle around her house. Took off to see if that was two head or a dozen as we had moved 19 mama cows away from their calves on Saturday.?ÿ Typically, if one gets out, the others follow.?ÿ Turned out it was only three more but getting them back was going to be a fun exercise as they were in a field far too muddy for me to drive on with the truck.?ÿ As I finally lured them to within a few hundred feet of where I needed them to come out a gate and cross the road they decided I was no fun and they should take off across a different muddy field.?ÿ Fortunately, my neighbor came roaring up on a four-wheeler (mine's in the shop) and took after them.?ÿ Within ten minutes we had two of them on property and one had jumped her fence and ended up with about a dozen of her heifers.?ÿ No big deal.?ÿ I spent a total of two hours finding, driving and feeding cows as a reward for their return to the correct location.?ÿ In the late afternoon, I hooked on the cattle trailer and loaded up the one on the neighbor's farm.?ÿ She is especially upset with me.?ÿ She is still in the trailer.?ÿ No nighttime milk and cookies and a soft pillow for her head in there.?ÿ She will get to rejoin the others tomorrow after I have securely fixed the bad spot in the fence.?ÿ I have a truck parked in that spot now.

Meanwhile, all of the calves without mamas seem to not particularly care.?ÿ Most were weaned naturally but those who were still dining at mama's place seem to be doing fine, so far.

Did ya hear about the farmer who went out to feed his prize ?ÿbull the day before the County Fair and found heƒ??d turned up cross-eyed. In a panic, he called the vet who came out and examined the bull. He took a chunk of garden hose and stuffed one end up where the sun donƒ??t shine and blew real hard on the other end. It took a few tries but finally the bulls eyes stayed straight.

The morning of the fair, the farmer went out only to find the bulls eyes were crossed again. Not too worried, he took a chunk of garden hose and did what the vet had done. He gave it all he was worth but couldnƒ??t get the bulls eyes to stay straight. His hired hand offered to give it a try... he pulled the hose out, turned it around and blew like crazy. It took a bunch of tries but the bulls eyes finally straightened out. The farmer gave the hired hand a big ole pat on the back but he asked why heƒ??d turned the hose around. The ole boy replied ƒ??well ya didnƒ??t think I was gonna put my lips on it after you did, did ya??ƒ?

I hereby promise to NEVER attempt such a thing on a bull.?ÿ In fact, I do my darndest to never stand directly behind any cow or bull.?ÿ I have witnessed how far they can squirt watery, green manure when overeating on fresh, green grass in the Spring.?ÿ It's much further than you would guess.

@holy-cow

When we used to wean calves we spent a lot of time beefing up the fences and gates beforehand to try to eliminate escapes, but it seemed like there was always at least one. ?ÿCows went to the creek bottom about 1/2 mile away. The calves stayed in the barn lot for a few days. ?ÿFinally figured out if we just left the cows in the field next to the lot where they could see the calves, they tended to stay put.?ÿ

And usually if you have a rogue caught in the trailer, the next stop ought to be the sale barn. ????