We had a bit of snow on Thanksgiving Day but that quickly went away. October 12 I brought the mares and foals home from the home native pasture so that we could start the weaning process. We put the mares and foals in separate pens with a slab fence between them and with a few panels at the gate to make a dead space so that no one could put their head through and nurse.
We put the foals with the old gelding, Juan the Sailor, so that they have a calming influence. After about three days of separation, we let the mares out on the home half section to graze.
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October 14 we rounded up the cows at the pasture and brought home our replacement heifers so that they could be weaned. We also loaded up our sale calves and hauled them to Provost for the sale on Friday. It all went very smoothly and we are very happy with our calves this year.
On October 16 I started working with the foals to refresh their halter training skills. They all lead, tie, load in the trailer and have their feet trimmed before they head off to their new homes.
Wind startled the fillies
October 25 was a very hard day for our family. It had been very windy and the wind startled three fillies that were still in the corral. In all their running around they knocked down old Juan. Gregory and I worked for hours to try to get him back up, but nothing worked. We finally admitted that it was time and we had Joseph and James say their goodbyes, and then we put the old boy down. We laid him to rest beside his old friend Classy on the east side of the home half under some trees. He will be greatly missed.
The next several days were spent putting up John’s solar panels on the north side of the yard. We were short of manpower but got it done eventually. John hopes that the panels will help with the farm power bill.
After the solar panels were up, we had to trench in the power cable from the box by the house and across the yard to the panels. We used the old Ditch Witch that John had purchased years ago. We have used it for several projects including when we put in the power for the water bowls in the back corral. It was slow going across the yard as the dirt was very dry and packed. There was also the occasional rock to deal with. When we were done, Gregory and John had a good tractor bucket full of soil.
November 7 we took the day off from the solar panel project and after church we went to Maidstone to select the bred heifers that we were purchasing from David and Maxine Mitchell of Riverbridge Herefords. It is always an enjoyable experience to see the Mitchell cattle and operation and it was very hard to pick just five out of the 10 heifers that were available so we bought six instead. David delivered our heifers a couple of days later.
Our pastures at Landis have been getting quite short thanks to the lack of fall moisture and we felt we had made it last as long as we could. We looked at the weather forecast and decided to get the heifers and maybe one load of cows home on Sunday after church.
I took my good horse Danny and the horse trailer and Gregory took the Mack truck and the cow trailer. The heifers were so easy to round up. They jumped right on the trailer and while Gregory took them home. I took the trailer and Danny over to the other pasture to round up the cows. The cows were in two separate groups but without too much effort we go them together and into the corral by the time Gregory got back. After that it was just a matter of loading them onto the trailer. Everything went so well that we actually ended up being able to bring all the cows home that day. The last load had to get on the trailer in pitch black but they did it without a fuss.
By Tuesday we were very happy to have the cows home. The crazy wind blew all night and in the morning the snow started and it was a blizzard all day long.
