LATE MARCH-EARLY APRIL 2013

MARCH 24, 2013 – Last week Andrea and I led the fillies a few times, taking them through the deep snow in the pen where we would soon put the pregnant cows for calving. Tromping around in the snow broke the crust and it started melting on the warmer afternoons. We want to get rid of the snow before the cows have to go in there.

Andrea had a breathing test at the hospital that Tuesday and the therapist gave her medication to help open her airways. Andrea reacted to the medication and her heart started beating wildly and very erratic, so the therapist took her to the ER for a CT scan—the doctor discovered that she has a prolapsed valve in her heart that wasn’t working correctly. But it soon quit doing the spasmodic pumping and settled back to normal.

That Thursday Andrea and Lynn both went to hospitals in Montana (Lynn in Hamilton and Andrea in Missoula) for echo stress tests, to check their hearts, and they both did ok. Rick helped me feed the cows while they were gone.

On Friday it was another long day for Andrea; she drove to Idaho Falls for her monthly appointment with the pain management specialist—on her way to Pocatello to take Dani and Sam to Sam’s regional dance competition. Sam’s group won first place and will get to compete at the national dance competition in Utah in May.



On Saturday Andrea and I finally had a chance to lead the two fillies again, and took them about a mile on the jeep road over the low range. I also trimmed Sprout’s feet; they had grown too long over winter.

A week ago today we had fresh snow and windy, cold weather. Emily had severe breathing problems and pneumonia; Andrea took her to the ER where they put her on oxygen and gave her antibiotics. Lynn and I stopped after church to check on her at the hospital. Andrea brought her home later in the afternoon, with an oxygen machine. Now, a week later, Emily is doing much better.

Our cold, stormy weather lasted several days. We sorted out the cows that looked closest to calving and put them in the horse pasture and maternity pen near the house where we can start watching them more closely. Dani helped me make this year’s calving calendar (for April) showing the dates when each cow is due to calve. We have actual due dates on some of them, from their breeding dates, and estimates on the other cows’ due dates from the veterinarian’s preg-checking.

A couple days ago it was very cold, with new snow and ice on the porch, and Lynn slipped and fell down when he went out that morning to do chores. Fortunately he just bruised his arms and twisted his back a little, and didn’t land on the back of his head.

It’s still cold (12 degrees F. this morning). We started “training” the 2-year-old heifers so they will be easy to put in the barn for calving if the weather is bad when they calve. We lured them into the hold pen with hay, and then gently herded them to the pen in front of the barn, where the doors were all open, with alfalfa hay inside. We put them into the barn, and even though a couple of them were reluctant to go in, they stayed in awhile after they found out there were “treats” to eat.



Today we put the heifers into that pen for the second time and they all went into the barn on their own—to eat alfalfa—without having to be pushed. This afternoon after we got home from church Andrea and I led the fillies about 4 miles (down to the back road at Baker and back). Along the way, we worked on their responsiveness to voice commands for walk, trot and whoa.

APRIL 2 – We started saddling Spotty Dottie. She was scared and jumpy at first, so we’re working on getting her used to having the saddle put on and off, and all the sensations of having the stirrups moving, etc. and are now able to lead her around with the saddle on.

Last Monday Andrea and I rode Ed and Breezy for their first time this spring, after we trimmed and smoothed their long feet. We rode about 12 miles, down and around the road to where our new neighbors (the 3 Amish families) live, on the old Maurer place. The next day we rode again, a shorter ride over the low range. We had to carefully pick our route; there is still a lot of snow and mud, making the hillsides very slippery.

When we got home we gave Sprout some ground work in the new corral Michael helped us build last fall, since the ground is fairly dry there, with good footing. Sprout is feeling sassy and obnoxious after her LONG vacation (after going lame in July and being laid off for 9 months), and she tried to rear and strike and pull away from Andrea while being led. She pulled Andrea’s shoulder pretty badly, but didn’t get clear away from her. Andrea made her work awhile at the walk and trot.

On Wednesday we brought the rest of the cows down from the field and put them into the horse pasture for closer watching; almost all of them are starting to develop some udder. The kids were home from school for spring break and helped move the cows, and then hiked along with Andrea and me leading the fillies a couple miles down the road and back. When we got home, I put front shoes on Ed, then Andrea and I rode Ed and Breezy a few miles—around the old McCormick ranch (soft fields without rocks) and then home through the low range. We need to put a lot of miles on these horses before the kids start riding them again, and we need fairly soft footing until we get their shoes on.

While we rode, the kids helped Lynn. They played by the haystack while he loaded 8 big round bales (alfalfa/grass) on our 2 ton truck, and went with him when he took the hay up to the stackyard on the upper place. Carolyn unloaded it up there, for their cows.

We’ve started trying to get Sprout back to work again, and into a better attitude. Andrea led her about a mile down the road and back, with me riding alongside on Ed. The next day—Thursday--I put hind shoes on Ed and then we made a short ride—Andrea on Sprout, Dani on Breezy, and me on Ed, leading Breezy. Andrea has been riding Sprout every day since, taking longer and harder rides, and hoping that eventually Sprout will quit trying to buck. She’s a totally different horse this spring than when we bought her at the horse sale a year ago as an underweight, lazy, mellow 6-year-old that we thought might make a kids’ horse. She’s gained about 300 pounds, an inch or more in height, and has a more aggressive, selfish attitude after her 9 months off work.

Granddaughter Heather got home from college for her spring break and Michael drove home from North Dakota that same day. He’ll be taking some time off from his truck-driving job and doing some work here.

Rick helped Lynn spread some straw in our calving barn stalls and put a little in one of the calving pens; it looks like several cows could calve any time now—and the weather hasn’t been very nice yet for calving outdoors.

On Friday young Heather rode with Andrea and me. She brought her saddle and rode Breezy. It was Sprout’s 2nd ride this spring and we went several miles across the big fields of the McCormick Ranch and up through our low range, trying to stick to areas with the fewest rocks. We hadn’t gotten very far when Sprout started bucking, but Andrea was able to control her and spin her around until she quit trying. She jumped around a few more times along the way, but Andrea kept her from bucking very hard.

Later, as we started up the old jeep road into our low range pasture and went through a gully, Sprout started bucking again when she went up the other side of the gully. She got really mad because Andrea wouldn’t let her buck, and started hopping backward down the hill. I had been following her on Ed, and just started down into the gully as Sprout began jumping around and hopping backward toward us. I swung Ed out of the way just as Sprout kicked out in anger with her hind feet—and her legs are so long that she connected with my leg. She hit me with both hind feet, one on my shin bone just below the knee and the other just above my ankle. My first thought as the excruciating pain hit—thank goodness she doesn’t have shoes on yet!

My leg immediately started to swell, but it didn’t seem broken. I could put full weight on it, in the stirrup. We continued our ride home, another 2 miles (during which Sprout tried a few more times to buck Andrea off, but didn’t succeed). As we put our horses away, I was able to hobble around in spite of the pain. I knew I should elevate the leg and put ice on it, but we had unexpected company arrive at that point. So I simply applied DMSO liberally over my lower leg, which by then was twice the size it should be, and turning purple. The DMSO helped slow down the swelling and ease the pain, and I managed to keep going a few more hours before putting ice on it.

We visited with our friends and showed them the 2 fillies. Young Heather started working with Willow and Dottie to desensitize them to the saddle blanket over their backs and neck and all over their bodies. Andrea also led Dottie around with the saddle on while she talked to our friends.



Then I was scurrying around to feed everyone lunch. After they left I did put ice on the leg and elevated it, which helped ease the pain a bit more.

After having ice packs on it all night the pain was bearable, and I managed to do chores, and we rode again to put more miles on Sprout. Young Heather rode Breezy again and we rode more than 4 hours—taking a different route through the Old McCormick Ranch and out through the far end of our low range and down to the back road, where we stopped to tell a neighbor about a place in his new fence that the elk have torn down. We also talked briefly with his hired man who was driving tractor, harrowing a field. When he started the tractor up again, Sprout used that as an excuse to try bucking again, but Andrea spun her around a few times both directions and got that notion out of her head. We continued on through a few more fields and out to the highway. A group of horses across the highway came trotting over to the fence and Sprout blew up again. After Andrea got her under control we traveled ½ mile along the highway to Baker—a cluster of houses along the road to our creek--where Sprout used barking dogs as another excuse to try to buck, even though she is normally at ease with dogs.



When we got home we worked briefly with the fillies again. Then Freddy (one of our older cows) started calving and we put her in the calving pen. About the time she started getting serious about labor, at 9 p.m., a cold wind started blowing, so we put her in the barn to calve. She had a nice black bull.



Freddy is getting old and her udder is sagging. Her big bull calf was so tall that he couldn’t figure out how to bend his head down low enough to get on a teat, so Andrea and I quietly helped him nurse. I rubbed his hind end and helped keep him pointed in the right direction while Andrea slipped a teat in his mouth. Freddy always has a lot of milk, so Andrea milked a little of the extra into a small pitcher—in case we might need it for an emergency. About the time we finished helping Freddy’s calf nurse, Rosalie started calving, so we put her in the barn also, and she had a bull calf at 2 a.m. Sunday morning.

Lynn and Emily went to church but Andrea and I stayed home to watch the cows. Michael and young Heather came about noon. Michael worked on our tractor problem (it started making strange noises when Lynn was harrowing the day before). Heather helped us work with the 2 fillies again, desensitizing Dottie more fully to the saddle, patiently moving the stirrups and flapping the saddle strings—to try to get Dottie over her skittishness.



After lunch Andrea and I rode Sprout and Ed on a fast ride (lots of trotting), doing the loop around the field and range backward. Going past the neighbor’s field of young cows and calves, we saw a very strange cow. At first glance it looked like she had a black and white hat or a skunk on her head. On closer look, it was obvious that this “thing” was part of the cow—some kind of hair-covered growth attached to the back of her head or top of her neck—and it flopped around whenever she moved her head. It was so unusual that Andrea took pictures of it with her cell phone.





That night our first heifer calved. She had a little heifer, with a quick easy birth. I hope the rest of them are born that easy!

Yesterday one of the pregnant cows, Lilly Annie, was dull and not eating, so we brought her into a pen to watch her more closely and to see if she is passing manure. She is due to calve in 3 weeks, so we hope her problem is not serious. We had our vet come out and check her. He checked her rectally and said her digestive tract is working fine, and the calf is alive, but she felt very hot. So we gave her antibiotics and some Banamine to help lower her fever and help her feel better. She started eating and drinking again after the pain-killer kicked in and reduced her fever.

Today she was dull again and not eating, so we put her in the chute and checked her temperature. It was 106, which is really high for a cow, so we gave her more Banamine, which helped perk her up. We talked to our vet and he said that with a fever that high, it might be a viral infection, in which case the antibiotics may not be very useful, but the Banamine can help her ride it out and make her feel better so she’ll continue eating and drinking.

Michael came down for a couple hours and put shoes on Sprout and Breezy. Now we can do some longer, harder rides—which will help get Sprout back into a better working attitude again—without risk of a stone bruise or tender feet.

LATE WINTER 2013

Late Winter (February-March) 2013

FEBRUARY 23 – Last Saturday Rick and Sam came down on the 4-wheeler to help me feed the cows. Sam enjoyed riding around in the feed truck. Rick fed the bulls on their way home. Lynn was doing better that morning, so the heart doctor in Missoula released him from the hospital mid-day, and Andrea drove him home. They got back to Salmon just before the pharmacy closed and were able to pick up his new prescriptions. I cooked a big supper and fed everyone here, and Lynn went to bed early. He was very tired.

He had some chest pain in the night but it eased off, and he slept almost all day Sunday. Andrea, Rick and kids went to church, and later that day Andrea used the tractor to load another big square bale onto our feed truck, and brought a couple big bales around for the heifers.

On Monday there was no school, so Charlie came down early with Andrea, and practiced driving the feed truck for his first time. It was very cold that morning, which made his first attempt more challenging, with the snow still deep and crusted. Charlie had to go a little faster than he should have, to avoid getting stuck in the deep snow. Andrea and I were feeding the big bale off the back, so we had it to hang onto when the truck lurched through the snow.



It reminded me of when our kids were small and used to drive the jeep for Lynn to feed; he had to be very agile and balance himself through the bumps and lurches, and try to land on his feet when the kid popped the clutch and threw him off the back of the jeep. We were a lot more limber back in those days! Our current feed truck (a 1973 Chevrolet) is an automatic, which makes it a little easier for a young driver. Charlie actually did very well driving it, considering the challenging conditions.

We talked awhile on the phone with Michael later that day. He’s been driving truck in North Dakota in some horrible weather and bad roads. In the afternoon Lynn took a short walk to the end of our driveway and back. He’s supposed to walk every day.

On Wednesday we let Lynn drive the feed truck. He was becoming restless and frustrated not being able to help with chores and feeding. But he’s not supposed to lift anything heavy or do strenuous things for awhile yet.

Thursday Andrea took Lynn to town to have a checkup with his doctor here, and helped Lynn do all the town errands and get the groceries. When they got home, Andrea started the tractor and took a big bale up to Carolyn’s place on our feed truck for their old horses, and Carolyn unloaded it with their tractor. Then Andrea loaded more hay on our truck.

Afterward, we noticed that our neighbor Alfonzo had put all his cattle in the little field right below our place, so Andrea and I quickly moved our heifers because Alfonzo still has bulls with his cows. We didn’t want bulls right through the fence from our heifers or the bulls might try to come through the fence. We don’t want the heifers bred this early in the year. Andrea and I called the heifers; they followed us out of the field (our gentle heifers lead better than they drive). We put them into the orchard and horse pasture.

That afternoon Lynn and I went to visit our new Amish neighbors and get better acquainted, and take them a couple sets of my dad’s books. They had found one of his old books in the local library and wanted to buy a set for themselves and one set for a relative. Dad’s little books of short sermons (he called them “meditations from the high country”) have been very popular ever since they were first published many years ago. He used simple stories from the ranch and from his many other experiences to illustrate God’s love. A few years before my father died, I helped him get those 4 books reprinted (By the River of No Return, Wild Rivers and Mountain Trails, Sagebrush Seed, and The Open Gate), and I still have a batch of these books available for people who want them.

Carolyn has been sick a few days with a nasty infection she picked up at the vet clinic where she works—after helping treat several young calves that were brought in with serious diarrhea. In spite of intensive care, the vet couldn’t save those calves. The young man who works there cleaning kennels also got sick, and was so ill he had to be in the hospital for IV fluids. Yesterday Carolyn needed to go to town to pick up Michael’s prescription medications to send to him, but still didn’t feel well enough to leave home. So Andrea got the medications for her—and packaged them up to send with one of the other truck drivers who is heading back to North Dakota today.

Rick and Andrea are still helping us feed cows, though Lynn drives the truck and is hiking a little farther every day. Today Rick and Andrea also went up to Carolyn’s house and hauled a bunch of wood for her and stacked it by the house.

MARCH 3 – Our neighbor Alfonzo finally moved his cattle (and bulls) out of the little field next to ours, so it was safe to put our heifers back in their winter place with the heated water tank. Andrea and Rick are still feeding our cows, and Lynn drives the truck. Last weekend Emily came down and drove the truck, then helped with the fillies. She caught Dottie, fed Dottie her “treat” (a few pellets) and worked with her a little.






Then Andrea and Em led Willow and Dottie for a short walk up to the end of the driveway and back. We need to start leading them again, now that the road not so icy—and get back to their lessons. After the leading, Em held Dottie for me while I trimmed her feet.



Last Monday Lynn drove the tractor for the first time since his heart procedure, to load the big bales. He also brought another big bale around for the bulls in the corral.

Carolyn talked to Michael a few days ago and told us he’d had some wild experiences with the bad roads in North Dakota. One shortcut the dispatcher told him to take was not much more than a jeep track, and very slippery, steep, and narrow, but he managed to get safely down that hill.

Andrea took Emily to the doctor on Friday and discovered that Em is borderline diabetic. She’ll have to start watching her diet and also get some regular exercise besides hockey (which is only a winter sport, here).

That afternoon Emily and a friend, Andrea and I took the fillies for a long walk down the road and back, more than a mile. Yesterday we all went for a hike again and took the fillies even farther. Willow and Dottie are feeling silly and frisky and need to get back into some regular lessons and good manners again.

I was watching Breezy most of the day. She seemed a little dull, lying around a lot. When I fed her in the evening she wasn’t interested in eating. She took a few bites of hay, and lay down again. By dark she was no better, and still hadn’t touched her hay. Andrea and I gave her an injection of Banamine (an anti-inflammatory drug that is helpful to relieve the pain of colic) and put her in the side pen next to the house where I could watch her during the night--and turned on the light at this end of my hay shed. It shines into the 2 calving pens by the house.

Breezy was feeling better within 20 minutes after the injection, and began eating hay. I checked on her several times during the night and she was fine. This morning I put her back in her own pen, and she had no more episodes of discomfort.

Today was very windy, so we didn’t lead the fillies, and Lynn didn’t take his daily walk; he just hiked to the end of the driveway this evening while I fed the horses.

MARCH 12 – Last week Michael and other truckers in North Dakota were stranded at their truck yard by a blizzard, with 4-foot snowdrifts. The man trying to plow them out made one pass by the trucks but the snow immediately blew right back in and filled that slot. So Michael stayed in his truck all night with the motor running; it was too cold to shut it off or it would never start again. He hoped he wouldn’t run out of diesel before they got plowed out. The wind quit the next day, so they were able to plow the yard and get the trucks free.

Andrea and I took the fillies for longer daily hikes last week. We went down the road a couple miles and back, then up the road 1 ½ miles and back. We thought the mud had dried up enough in the jeep track to the low range to lead them over that hill, so one day we tried to go up that “road” but didn’t get very far. It was wetter and deeper than we thought—with gooey mud sticking to our boots. The snow is still too deep to leave the road, so we’ll have to wait for warmer weather to venture over the hills again like we were doing last fall.

Last Wednesday Andrea took Sam to the doctor to get her knees checked again—they’ve been swollen and painful off and on—but we still don’t know what’s causing the problem. Lynn took two of the kids’ saddles to Jeff Minor for repairs before the kids start riding again this spring.

On Saturday Andrea and I took the fillies on another long walk up the road, then we trimmed Rubbie’s and Veggie’s long feet when we got home. Those old horses’ feet hadn’t been trimmed since last fall. I trimmed off the extra hoof growth with the hoof nippers and Andrea smoothed them with the rasp.

Our weather warmed up yesterday--it was the first time it hasn’t dropped well below freezing at night. The snow is settling, and if it stays warm we may have some run-off and flooding. Lynn checked the ditch above our calving pasture and maternity pen (the old orchard) to make sure the little headgates he put in last year were shut off. We don’t want those pens and pasture flooding just before we put the cows in there for calving! Our little herd is due to start calving in early April, but the bull we’ve been using sires calves with short gestation. His calves last year came a week to 10 days early, on average, so we will probably be sorting out the heavies to bring down here in another week or so.

LATE WINTER

Late January - Early February 2013

JANUARY 27 – We had a couple weeks of cold weather (down to minus 15 degrees F. or lower, every night). The old cow with the frozen calf we thawed out is enjoying life in our pen by the barn, where she gets pampered with all the hay she can eat, and some good alfalfa. Her calf is not very lively; it gets up to nurse but spends most of its time sleeping in the deep bedding, trying to keep warm. The calf (named Popsicle) has been dull and grinding her teeth (a sign of gut pain), so for a couple days we gave her some keopectate—squirted into her mouth--to coat and sooth the gut. She’s doing better now, and eating quite a bit of hay even though she’s only 2 weeks old.

Chores take longer every morning, breaking ice on the creek for the cows and in the bull pen, and getting ice out of all the horse tubs. In the cold weather 2 of my plastic tubs were so brittle they broke when I was thumping ice out of them, and I had to replace them.





In the cold weather Breezy and the 2 fillies have been chewing up the pole fence between them, in a few places where they could reach between the electric wires and get to the poles. One night they chewed a pole completely in two. The next morning Rick helped Lynn put a new pole there, and rearranged the electric wires so the horses can’t reach the fence.

Andrea took Emily to her hockey tournament at Sun Valley and we took care of the other kids while she was gone. Dani went with Lynn and me up to Michael and Carolyn’s house to take the blankets off their two old horses (Molly and Chance) and put wood in their stove. On the days Carolyn works, she has to leave before daylight, and in this cold weather that’s too early to take the blankets off those horses.

When Andrea and Emily got back from their hockey trip we had a belated birthday celebration at our house for Sam (who just turned 10) and Emily (turned 15). Charlie is starting to learn how to play the trombone in band class at school, and he played happy birthday for the girls on his trombone.





I was asked to write one of the chapters for a new book on wolves (looking at the wolf problems in North America). That book will be coming out later this year, so I’ve been trying to write a little on that chapter every day in between my other article deadlines and chores. I had a doctor appointment on Tuesday for a checkup and pneumonia shot, and the doctor also tried to freeze off some big plantar warts (on the balls of both feet) that I’ve had for nearly 40 years. Even heavily bandaged and with double socks on, it’s painful to walk!

The last few days the weather has been warmer. Rick and Andrea chopped through the thick ice on the creek in Fozzy’s pen and re-established his water hole—and dug out some gravel from the creek bottom, to spread on the slippery bank so he will be brave enough to step down to the creek. Now I don’t have to carry him water in buckets anymore. The ice was almost a foot thick and I’d given up on trying to keep that water hole open during our 2 weeks of cold weather.

This weekend Andrea took Charlie to his hockey tournament in Sun Valley.



Last night we had a blizzard and a nasty wind, so before we went to bed Lynn and I put the old cow and her calf in the barn. They were happy to get out of the cold, wet snow. It was very obvious that the old cow has been in a barn before. She watched us open the doors and as soon as I opened the gate from her gate she headed right for the barn! Some of the cows that Michael and Carolyn bought last spring are wild, but not this one. She is very much at ease with human handling.





This morning we had 8 inches of new snow. Emily helped me shovel out part of the pen before we put the cow and calf back out of the barn. We also moved our yearling heifers to the field below the lane and set up their heated water tank so we won’t have to keep breaking ice for them through the rest of the winter. Lynn tried to start our middle-size tractor to plow our driveways but the diesel gelled up again and he had to drain more gunk out of the tank. He got it running again and was able to finish plowing driveways.

We should have plenty of snow in the mountains for a good water supply this summer. Two of the Amish young men (our new neighbors) hiked up the mountain behind our place last week on snowshoes, exploring where the old Harmony Mine was located before it burned up in our 2003 fire. They decided to go farther, and hiked clear to the top, to see the old Forest Service Lookout. When they got up there, they poked a long stick down through the snow to measure the depth, and it was more than 6 feet—and that was before our latest snowstorm!

FEBRUARY 8 – The old cow with the rescued calf (Popsicle) isn’t milking very well and her calf is still very thin. We tried to feed the calf a supplemental bottle last week but she didn’t want it. For a few nights during the cold, stormy weather we continued to put the pair in the barn at nights, and back out in their pen during the day.

With the deep snow, the elk are coming down into the fields. About 30 head have been going into our neighbor’s alfalfa stack every night. The snow made our driveway a wonderful place for the grandkids to sled; there’s enough slope that they can get up plenty of speed and go shooting clear across the bridge.

Michael drove home from North Dakota last Tuesday, and got here at 3 a.m. the next morning. The day after he got home, another cow calved, in their herd in our lower field, but at least the weather was warmer this time, and the calf is doing fine. While Michael is home, he is trying to get caught up on all the urgent things that need to be done during these few days.

Last week our tractor was finally ready to come home, after several weeks of repair work, following the wreck. It looks much better than the day Andrea took this picture of it being towed to the repair shop.



The total cost of fixing it was more than $8000, so we had to borrow money to pay that bill. It’s good to have it home again. Lynn uses it to load the big bales onto our feed truck. Michael bought more hay for their cows, and borrowed a flatbed trailer to haul it—and used our tractor to load the hay. He and Carolyn hauled several loads of hay to the upper stackyard, and on the last trip Lynn went with them to drive our tractor home.

While Michael was home we borrowed a friend’s heavy-duty transport trailer and hauled our wrecked flatbed trailer to be fixed. Even though it was “totaled” in the wreck, a friend who is an expert welder thought he could straighten out the twisted frame and tongue and fix it.

Two days ago Michael and Carolyn lured their cows and calves up to our corrals with the tractor and bale processor and fed them in the hold pen so they could be sorted and hauled the next morning. The county truck sanded our road so it wouldn’t be so slippery. Early yesterday morning Michael and a friend brought their trailers and hauled 3 loads of cattle (some cull cows and last summer’s calves) down to a neighbor’s place to load them on a semi-truck to haul to the sale at Butte, Montana.

Andrea took me to town yesterday for a treadmill stress test at the hospital, ordered by our local doctor because of my chest pain and fatigue. The doctor said I did ok on it and he thinks my heart is fine, so I’ll just keep exercising and not worry about my heart. When we got home, Michael and Carolyn were vaccinating their remaining cows and calves, and Andrea helped them.



This morning Michael and Carolyn hauled those cows and calves to the upper place, putting the main herd in the field above the corrals and the 3 cows with young calves in the Wild Meadow. They were able to vaccinate the old gentle cow and Popsicle right in the pen by the barn before they took that pair around to the main corral to load up. It was good to see that little calf finally feeling good enough to run and buck when they went to the big corral. On the second load of cattle, Michael’s pickup spun out going up our steep slippery driveway; he had to back down the driveway, and put chains on the pickup.

While they were hauling their 5th load, Lynn and I lured our small herd of cows down through the field from heifer hill with our feed truck—a bit of a challenge, with the deep snow. Michael and Carolyn helped us vaccinate and delouse our cows, and then they ate lunch here with us.



Rick helped Lynn put chains on our feed truck before we tried to feed our cows in the field above our house; the snow is still about a foot deep and very dense.

FEBRUARY 16 – Last Saturday Lynn helped Michael haul 2 loads of our round bales of alfalfa hay up to the upper stackyard, to mix with the grass hay Michael bought. This will give Carolyn enough hay to feed their cows up on the upper place while Michael is gone. On Sunday Michael and Carolyn hung a gate (the one between their stackyard and field) so it will be easier for Carolyn to open and close when she’s feeding the cows. Michael left early Monday morning to drive back to North Dakota for his job driving trucks.

Michael also bought some alfalfa hay in big square bales, from a rancher near Leadore, 50 miles away. That rancher delivered it on Monday (two loads), and Lynn unloaded it here in our barnyard. Fortunately we didn’t have any new snow and the hay trucks were able to drive back up our driveway without a problem. We will trade some hay with Michael, since our round bales work better in his bale processor, and these new square bales can be fed more easily off our feed truck.

With Michael and Carolyn’s cows on the upper place again, and their driveway partly thawed and not so slippery and treacherous for driving the big tractor back and forth to their house to plug in at night, Carolyn is able to feed their cows up there now. The days are getting longer, so she can get them fed before she goes to work in the mornings—on the days she works at the vet clinic—and doesn’t need Lynn to feed them.

On Tuesday Lynn and I both went to town to see the doctor—me for another freeze treatment of my plantar warts (it is going to take several applications to kill them, so I’ll be hobbling around with sore feet again) and Lynn to ask about stronger medication for his asthma attacks in the mornings. For the past 3 weeks or so, ever since our cold weather, he often gets a sudden tightness in his throat that tends to shut off his breathing, and a pain in his chest and left shoulder. The inhaler he uses for asthma (that the doctor prescribed last fall after his breathing became impaired from the thick smoke we had to breathe all summer) helps a little, but not enough.

The doctor changed his respiratory medication to something stronger, but she was concerned that this was more than just a respiratory problem. She scheduled an appointment for him to see a heart specialist in Missoula on Thursday and have a test where they put a dye in the heart and send a probe up through an artery in the groin, to go inside the heart and take a look.

After we got home from the doctor, Lynn used our tractor to move all the hay bales up through the corrals and into our main stackyard where they will be safe from the deer and elk. We have tall elk panels around that stackyard.

On Wednesday we talked to Michael briefly on the phone while he was driving truck in North Dakota. They put him right back to work; some of their drivers had quit and he’d been driving for 27 hours with only a couple short naps. In the afternoon Lynn went to town for our mail and groceries, and to pick up his new asthma medication, and on the way home he got our flatbed trailer, all fixed. It looks as good as new. The welder who fixed it used an ingenious way to straighten out all the warps and twists. He also used some reinforcing metal and says it’s stronger than it was before.




Rick and Andrea took Rick’s wood-splitter up to Carolyn’s house and split the rest of her wood; it looks like she’ll have enough now to last through winter, and she won’t have to split any while Michael is gone.

Early Thursday morning Andrea drove Lynn to his appointment with the doctor at St. Patrick’s Hospital in Missoula (a 4 hour drive). Carolyn and Rick helped me feed our cows that morning. Andrea called to say that the doctor didn’t start on Lynn until late morning, and the procedure lasted all afternoon. She took a photo of Lynn resting and waiting at the doctor’s office, keeping warm under a blanket she’s been making.



The doctor scraped out some plaque buildup in the lower heart chambers, and then put stents in some of the major blocked arteries to open them back up. The first stent collapsed (and Lynn had a minor heart attack when that happened) and the doctor redid it, and put in 2 more. There was one more blocked artery but it was smaller and farther out on the branching network, and the doctor couldn’t reach it, but thought Lynn would probably be ok on that one. The 3 major arteries were the big concern.

It was a rough day for Lynn and he was dizzy and sick to his stomach after the procedure—which took twice as long as the doctor had anticipated--so they kept him in the hospital overnight. He also had a big hematoma/blood clot at his groin where the blood leaked from the artery they’d used for getting up into the heart. There were clamps on it to keep it contained. Andrea stayed with him, and took a photo of him wearing his cap in bed because his head was cold.

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Meanwhile, here at home, I drove down to the bus to pick up Andrea’s kids after school. They helped me do chores and feed the horses and heifers. I fed them all supper when Rick got home from the woods with his load of firewood. He goes to the woods as often as possible to cut firewood to sell. He has a lot of customers right now because the weather has been so cold and people have been burning more wood than usual.

Yesterday morning Rick helped me feed our cows, before he went to the woods again. I talked to Lynn on the phone mid-morning and he felt much better. The blood clot had resolved, and the doctor released him from the hospital. Then Andrea called again about an hour later. She started to bring him home, but hadn’t gotten out of Missoula when Lynn suddenly became very sick and dizzy again. So she took him back to the hospital and the doctor decided to keep him there another day. They put him on IV fluids and gave him more anti-nausea medication. By last night he was able to keep food down again.

Rick helped me feed our cows again this morning, and when we talked to Andrea on the phone she said they would be coming home today. So hopefully all goes well and Lynn will actually make it home today!

JANUARY 2013

JANUARY 1, 2013 – With the cold stormy weather in late December, we decided not to wean Michael and Carolyn’s summer-born calves. They would do better if we left them on their mothers awhile longer (and didn’t stress them by weaning in nasty weather), since those cows won’t be calving until May and later. We preg-checked and vaccinated the cows here in our corral, and vaccinated the calves, while Michael was home from North Dakota briefly from his truck-driving job, and his kids were still home from college to help. Nick and young Heather brought all the cows up to the chute.



I fed everybody lunch here after they got done working cattle. We put their cows and calves down in our lower field. Carolyn, Lynn and Andrea can feed them here, with the round bale processor, while Michael is in North Dakota.

Thursday before Christmas we all had supper here (Andrea and her kids and Rick, Michael and Carolyn and kids). The next day Lynn and Michael went to town to meet with the Farm Bureau Insurance claims adjuster. She assessed the damage on our flatbed trailer (which was totaled in the slide off the road upside down on December 14). She said the insurance might pay the equivalent of what a used trailer of that age might be worth, but will pay only $1000 toward fixing our John Deere tractor—which needs extensive repairs after that wreck. The damage to Michael’s pickup bed will be fully covered, however. The day after Christmas he drove it to Blackfoot, Idaho where the old box bed was removed and a new flatbed put on it.

A few days earlier, Michael and Lynn brought down a truck-load of big round bales from the upper stack, and Michael strategically placed more round bales in our hold pen, to make it easier for Lynn and Carolyn to load them into the bale processor to feed. Lynn and Carolyn took turns several days, going with Michael in his tractor to feed the cows, having practice lessons running the bale processor. It pulls behind the tractor and chews up the big bale and puts it out the back end in a windrow as you drive along. Carolyn will feed the cows most days and Lynn will feed them on the days Carolyn works at the vet clinic.

Emily’s dad, Jim Daine, came to spend a couple days with Andrea and kids for Christmas. We had a simple Christmas dinner here at our house with homemade pizza. Andrea’s other kids were at Mark’s place for Christmas this year. We had another celebration when the kids got home, opening their gifts at Andrea’s house.





Dani was delighted to get a set of grooming tools, which she’s eager to try out on the horses.



The morning after he got his pickup fixed, Michael left early to drive straight through to North Dakota, back to his job driving trucks. He hauled 20 new truck tires back there, for the outfit he’s working for.

Since our big tractor is still in the shop downtown being repaired, Rick and Andrea helped Lynn put a hay fork loader on our smaller tractor, so we can load big bales. Lynn brought some big alfalfa bales around to my horse stackyard, for feeding our heifers in the field above my hayshed.

We’ve been feeding the 2 Morgan fillies a little grain and some alfalfa pellets during the cold weather. We give most of the supplemental feed to the weanling Willow—who needs the extra nutrients to grow--and only a handful of pellets to Spotty Dottie because she’s fat and doesn’t need the extra energy. She simply gets a little treat so she doesn’t feel jealous and grumpy when we feed Willow. Andrea and I have been leading the fillies up or down the road a few times, but not as regularly as when the weather was nicer. Emily and Andrea led them a couple of times.



JANUARY 10 – Lynn did chores for one of our neighbors for two weeks while they were visiting their children and grandchildren in California. The weather got really cold and froze the water line into their house, but Lynn was able to get it thawed out.

We are breaking ice daily at the creek for the cows. Last Wednesday when Lynn started our tractor to move some big bales, the diesel gelled up in the tractor. We apparently didn’t have enough Power Service in the mix to keep it fluid at this cold temperature.

On Sunday Emily went with Lynn and me to feed our cows and had her first practice session driving our feed truck. While she was driving, I took photos of the cows, and one photo of Maggie—Dani’s favorite old cow.





While we were on Heifer Hill feeding, a friend of Rick’s drove in that driveway in a little car, and spun out. Lynn didn’t have a chain or rope to pull the car, so he tied the baling twines together from the bales we’d just fed, to pull the car up out of the driveway.

Later that morning, grandson Nick stopped by. Lynn helped him install a new toolbox in the bed of his pickup, and then Nick drove back to college in Iowa. Young Heather went back to Helena, Montana last week for her final semester at Carroll College. She’ll be graduating in May.

After Carolyn fed their cows Monday, she took the tractor and processor back up the creek to feed their horses on the wild meadow the next morning (she feeds them a big bale every 3 days) and to bring more grass bales down here. She got the horses fed, but when she backed up to another big bale to load into the processor, that bale was frozen to the ground and didn’t move—breaking the processor and smashing one of the hydraulic hose ends. She noticed it leaking fluid, so she turned off the tractor and hiked back to her house to call us on the phone.

Andrea helped Lynn and Carolyn jack up the processor to where they could work on it enough to safely bring it down here, and carefully fed off the bale in it. By then the day was warmer, and the ice on our driveway too slippery to take the tractor/processor back up it, to take to our local welder/repair man to fix. So we fed their cows some of our small bales, with our feed truck, to finish their feeding for the day. Early the next morning Lynn and Carolyn took the tractor/processor to be fixed, and Andrea and Carolyn fed the cows some little bales again with our feed truck.

Today it warmed up and snowed 6 more inches. Lynn used our little tractor this evening to plow our driveway and Andrea’s driveway and he hopes to plow Michael and Carolyn’s driveway in the morning.





JANUARY 17 – Last Friday it was Lynn’s turn to feed cows with the processor, since Carolyn had to work at the vet clinic. When Lynn pulled out into the field he found a newborn calf. Most of the cows Michael and Carolyn bought last summer had very young calves at side or were ready to calve, but a few of them had large calves and 3 of them probably had a chance to breed before they were sold. When our vet preg-checked the cows a few weeks ago he said this old cow, number 206, would probably calve in January but the other two wouldn’t calve until April.

It was cold and windy when Lynn found the new calf, but 206 probably calved in the brush where the cows were bedding, which would have given some protection from the wind. The new calf was dry, and had nursed its mother. Later that morning Rick helped Lynn adjust the processor to blow hay out the side, and they spread an extra bale of grass hay into the edge of the brush, to give the cows and calves more bedding in the cold weather.

Andrea took Emily to her hockey tournament in Kalispell, Montana Friday through Sunday. Their team won all 4 games, for the first time ever. Emily made several of the winning shots.



Saturday morning it was 12 below zero. It took awhile to break ice out of all the horse tubs and to chop open the water holes in the creek ice. We fed all the cows extra hay, to give them more calories to withstand the cold weather. Carolyn had to leave for work early in the morning so she left the blankets on Molly and Chance (their two skinny old horses) because it was still cold. Lynn and I drove up there late morning to take off the blankets and to put more wood in Carolyn’s stove.

It was cold again on Sunday. When Lynn and Carolyn fed cows that morning, they discovered another newborn calf—from one of the cows that was supposed to calve in April. The calf was cold but seemed ok, and had nursed at least one teat. After sub-zero weather for a couple more days, however, it wasn’t doing as well as the older calf. When Andrea and Carolyn fed the cows on Tuesday they saw the younger calf lying on the old feed trail, on its back, stuck between 2 big frozen manure piles. The calf looked dead, but twitched its hind leg when they approached with the tractor and processor.

They jumped out, with an ax-handle for a weapon in case the mother cow was aggressive, and grabbed the calf. The cow was worried but didn’t attack them. It was a big calf, about 90 pounds--about all Andrea could lift while Carolyn held off the cow. Then Andrea handed the calf to Carolyn and climbed up into the tractor, grabbing the front legs of the calf as Carolyn handed it up and pushed on the back end. They got it into the cab, finished feeding (not much room in the tractor!) and brought it to the house.

We spent the rest of the day thawing out that calf. She must have been stuck on her back quite awhile. Perhaps a cow knocked her down or rooted her out of the way, rolling her between the frozen manure piles. Her body temperature was below 80 Fahrenheit; too low to register on my thermometer. Her feet were stiff and frozen so Carolyn and Andrea used hot water to try to thaw them out. We lay the calf on blankets by the wood stove with an electric heating pad under her, and used a hair dryer to warm her back, continuing to use warm water on her cold feet.





I injected dextrose under her skin in several places. After we started warming her, we tubed her with 1 ½ quarts of warm water with powdered colostrum mixed in. By this stage in her life (3 days old) she wouldn’t be able to absorb the antibodies from the colostrum, but we thought this mix might give her more energy than regular milk replacer. Lynn inserted a nasogastric tube into her nostril, and down to her stomach, and Carolyn poured the energy-rich mixture into the funnel for the tube feeding.





The calf probably hadn’t nursed her mother since the day before; she was dehydrated and didn’t urinate until evening when we gave her another quart and a half of colostrum mix. By that time her temperature was rising, up to 99 degrees (normal for a calf is 101.5) and she was strong enough to stand.

Lynn, Carolyn and Charlie (who was here doing homework after school) took the calf to Carolyn’s house to stay in their basement by the wood stove. Carolyn fed the calf a bottle at 2 a.m. and again at 8 a.m. She stayed home from work yesterday, and after she and Andrea fed the cows, they put the calf back out with its mother. Lynn and I were outside feeding the 2 fillies their grain when I heard Andrea yelling, so he went to see what was happening and I led both fillies back to their pen. The cow was kicking at the calf, and wouldn’t let it nurse—smelling it and hitting it with her head. Perhaps the calf smelled different after we’d taken care of it for more than 24 hours, thawing its feet. Andrea and Carolyn realized the calf needed more help, and they were bringing the pair to the barnyard.

Once we got the pair into the corral the cow was very upset and more worried about the calf, and she let it nurse. We could see she had a very sore hind teat—the end was raw from frostbite. So we put the pair in a small pen by our barn where we can monitor them. We shoveled snow away from the windbreak side, and bedded along it with hay. The old cow is smart and acts like she’s been handled on foot before; she made herself at home in the pen and was not upset about being confined.

She’s an old cow, without much milk, but we can pamper her here. Andrea and Carolyn brought her a little alfalfa hay from the big bale by my hay stack and the cow was eagerly eating it. When they went back again to check on the pair, the cow looked at them, sniffed the ground, and looked at them again, as if to say, “Where’s some more of that alfalfa hay?” She is not as wild as some of the other cows Michael bought; she acts like she’s accustomed to being cared for by people. This morning (15 below zero again) the calf was cold, but nursing, so we won’t have to raise it on a bottle.

EARLY WINTER 2012

NOVEMBER 26 – Andrea and I have been working with the young fillies every day, leading them, tying them, and feeding the weanling (Willow) a little grain and alfalfa pellets. Since she is still growing, she needs more nutrition than her older sister, especially during cold weather.



On weekends the grandkids like to help with the fillies. The cats like to help, too.





Last week our neighbor Alfonzo branded, vaccinated and weaned some of his late calves. Two riders from the Miller family (one of our new Amish neighbors from the 3 families that bought the Maurer place around the hill from us) came over the hills to help with the branding. One young man rode through our place, unsure of how to get to Alfonzo’s place from the back side. His 17-year-old sister came along later, following his horse’s tracks in the mud, but she couldn’t close the tight wire gate. We saw her up on the hill struggling with the gate, so Lynn drove up there on his 4-wheeler and helped her shut it. He showed her an easier gate (out of the old Gooch place that Alfonzo is leasing) for the next time they come riding across the hills.

Last Tuesday Lynn took a box of supplies to town to send to Michael in North Dakota—his prescription medicines and warm socks from Carolyn, and 2 more boxes of Adapt energy drinks. Those help keep him awake and alert when he’s driving truck nearly 24 hours a day.

We had rain and mud, and then the weather changed to snow and cold. The ice rink in town is solidly frozen and the kids are finally playing hockey. Charlie is doing hockey this year, and Emily is helping him practice.




We started feeding our cows on Heifer Hill (and 10 pair of Michael’s cows on our lower pasture) a liquid protein/mineral supplement to augment their dry pasture. Granddaughter Heather came home briefly from Carroll College for Thanksgiving. Lynn and I ate homemade pizza with her and Carolyn. Andrea and kids had dinner with Rick’s family. Yesterday we had another Thanksgiving dinner at Andrea’s house—inviting Lynn’s sister Jenelle and Emily’s dad Jim, who came from Montana.

DECEMBER 10 – A week ago we butchered Rishira, Andrea’s 17-year-old cow. She’s had 16 calves but wasn’t pregnant this fall. Andrea and Lynn were skinning her (with the carcass hanging from the tractor loader) when our up-the-creek neighbor Gordon Binning phoned to tell us that Michael and Carolyn’s horses were in his place. A tree had fallen down across the fence, smashing it down, and the horses walked over it. Carolyn was at work at the vet clinic in town so Lynn and I drove up there and helped Gordon put the horses back into their proper pasture. We rescued one mare that was trapped in the thick brush along the fence.

A couple days later Lynn helped Carolyn move the horses to our 160-acre mountain pasture, where they can paw through the snow to grass. He and Carolyn set steel posts and fixed Gordon’s fence where the tree knocked it down.

Andrea cut and wrapped meat for several days. We ordered an electric meat grinder and after it arrived Andrea got all the hamburger ground. The buckets of meat chunks stayed cold in her little travel trailer; she had to bring them in the house to thaw before she could grind the meat.

On Saturday Alfonzo hired another neighbor with a backhoe and finally got a weir put into the ditch that waters his lower fields. This will make it easier to measure water use next summer when the creek gets low.

On Sunday Lynn and I watched one of Emily’s hockey tournament games after church. Their little team won a couple of games this weekend. Emily is becoming an excellent hockey player.





The motor in Rick’s old wood-hauling pickup blew up so Andrea towed his pickup home with her truck. Lynn used our tractor and loader to help Rick take the motor out and put a different motor (from one of Michael’s old pickups) into it. Rick worked on it a few days and got it running again. He used 2 of our old post-hole oven barrels set on top of one another for a stove to warm his hands in the cold weather.
Michael drove home from North Dakota. He’ll have 12 days off from his truck driving job, hoping to get some urgent projects done at home. The roads were bad, with storms and ice. Coming through Montana he hit a patch of ice and went off the road. Fortunately the car didn’t roll; it just tore a tire off. Michael was able to change the tire and drive home, getting here at 4 a.m. yesterday morning.

With the cold windy weather Lynn helped Andrea made a windbreak shelter for her dogs. This afternoon Michael helped Lynn clean up the battery terminals on our big tractor so it will start better. They’ll be using it to haul hay.

DECEMBER 17 – On Tuesday Michael loaded our tractor on our flatbed trailer and hauled it north of town where he’s been pasturing cattle on Michael Phillips’ place. He bought some hay from him and we helped haul it home. Lynn borrowed another trailer, but it had a damaged spring and it broke during the first trip and we couldn’t use it for any more loads.

The next day Michael and Carolyn gathered their cattle off that pasture. Bringing them along the slippery road to sort and load at Jenelle’s corral, one old cow slipped and fell down the 20-foot bank, and landed upside down against the fence. She was on her back for 45 minutes while they went to get a tractor. They pulled her back up onto the road with a horse and the tractor—with a chain around her front end and rope around her hind feet. The cow was able to get up and they got her to the corral and into a trailer with a load of calves.

With friends, they made 2 trips with 4 trailers to haul their cows and calves home to our upper place. It snowed 4 inches before noon and our creek road was slippery in spite of being sanded earlier that morning. One of the loaded trailers nearly went off the edge of the road when the pickup tires spun out. The driver had to back up into the snowy edge of the road to get enough traction to get up the grade. They got the cows and calves safely hauled, and then Michael hauled yearlings to the sale at Butte, Montana.

The cow that fell down the bank was able to walk off the trailer but collapsed out in the field and couldn’t get up. They decided to butcher her and Andrea offered to do it because Michael and Carolyn didn’t have time.

Friday morning Michael hauled another load of hay, unloaded it at the upper place with his tractor, and used the tractor to put the carcass of the crippled cow on our flatbed feed truck after Andrea shot her. He went for the last load of hay while Lynn and Andrea gutted and skinned the cow at our place. They discovered that the cow had a broken hip.

It started snowing again after Michael went back to get our tractor—after hauling the last load of hay. He planned to use the tractor here at our house to load alfalfa bales to take up the creek--to mix with the grass hay for his cows. But as Andrea and Lynn were hurrying to cover the hanging cow carcass with sheets and a tarp during the snowstorm, I got a phone call from Michael.

The tractor and trailer had slid off the same slippery road where the cow fell off, but thankfully off the other side, which wasn’t such a huge drop-off. Fortunately the trailer popped off the hitch as it twisted over the bank, and didn’t drag the pickup down with it! The flatbed trailer was totally wrecked, with our big tractor still chained to it, still running, with one side of the cab smashed in. Michael carefully crawled down into cab and shut it off.



We called a wrecker and Lynn drove out there, but it was dark by then and everyone decided to wait until morning. In the daylight, with a wrecker and another tractor they were able to flip the flatbed trailer off our tractor and pull it up onto the road, then carefully pulled the tractor back over onto its wheels and pulled it up, too.





The wrecker towed the tractor to a repair shop. Hopefully the motor isn’t ruined (all the oil ran out of it). We are thankful that Michael and granddaughter Heather are safe. The tailgate was torn off the pickup and the hitch in the bed was destroyed, but the pickup didn’t go over the bank upside down.

Without that tractor to load our hay for feeding this winter, and with Carolyn having to feed their cows by herself (Michael will be in North Dakota), driving their tractor up and down their steep and slippery driveway to plug in every night, we decided to combine forces. Michael and Carolyn brought their cattle down to our place yesterday (to be preg-checked and vaccinated this morning), and will keep their cattle here this winter. We’ll all work together to get the cows fed—thankful that our family is still intact and only a cow, vehicles, tractor and flat-bed trailer have been damaged by the slippery roads!