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Even cows can benefit from having a mobile device. A new collar being developed for cattle ranchers could send cow health updates to farmers’ cellphones. The device could help ranchers save money in the long run, monitoring the health of their animals

This got me to thinking about getting a text message from my cows. I think it would be so cool. What would a cow text?

Gate left open. Cant find our way back in. Hrry Home

Ur late for chores. Where R U?

Betsy in heat. Lookn 4 Bull. bout 2 go thru fence

Pick up oats on ur way home

Dont 4get vet apt @ 2

What do you think a cow would text message? And what apps would they want?

Whoa. What a great time William and I had at the National Cattlemen’s Beef Assoc. convention last week. They had a record number register for this year’s meetings (8200+).  I’ll admit the main reason we decided to attend was because it was in Nashville. William and I love going to Nashville to hear live music and dance a little. Even better if we can join up with some cattle guys at the same time. After driving down Tuesday we had steaks at the Stockyards. It turned out not to be as good as the last time we were there. Wednesday we went to Robert’s Western World and listened to a singer. He was a lot of fun and played some good music.

Later that day, we headed over to Opryland Hotel to register and walked around a little ’til the exhibit hall opened. I took some pictures and made a short video of William for his blog. So the second reason I wanted to go to the NCBA was the exhibit hall. I knew it was going to be gooood and it waaaas. There were food tables scattered throughout with meatballs, fried pickles and okra.

We joined the tweetup at the Angus booth. It was amazing to finally meet many of the guys from twitter. @JPlovescotton @dailycowman @AR_Ranchhand @cowgirljesse @Agwired to name a few. Sorry if I missed someone. Please remind me in the comments. So much fun talking cattle and social media with everyone.

Afterwards we made a bee line to signup at the Beef Magazine booth for free pair of boots before the hall closed. Met Heather and Jamie there and chatted a little bit. We headed back downtown to our hotel and the honky tonks. A funny thing happened on the way. William’s phone rang. I answered it for him. it was the ladies at the Beef Magazine booth calling to say his name was drawn for the boots. Yeah.  William picked out this pair of ostrich Setsons from Roper. Thank you very much Beef Magazine and Roper.

The next day we were signing up for everything; gators, ipads, guitars. Hey, we were on a roll. We stopped at a ton of booths to talk about feed, bulls, fly control, ag colleges ect. William went to a few meetings while I walked around a little and edited some of the pictures I had taken on my phone. Before dinner we went to the MBA reception. There we sat with a couple from Kentucky. Then we met Whitney and Kaity from Missouri Beef Council. That night NCBA had a couple of bands playing. The band on the main stage didn’t play any two step music so quite a few dancers were disappointed. The action was at the karaoke dj. That was fun. Tried to bribe Ryan Goodman to sing a tune but he didn’t want anything to do with that. Guess tweeting his picture wasn’t enough of an incentive.

this guy nailed it

Again we headed down town for better music and found it at Second Fiddle. Excellent band. William and I even met a group from our state there. Had a good time talking to them when we could hear each other. That was our last night. We drove home the next day. We had to get back for 4H steer weigh in. I did miss getting grits at Puckett’s. I can get them next time we’re back in town or when NCBA is back to Nashville in 2014. We’ll definitely be there.

Last Friday was one of those days that has a domino effect for weeks following it. Originally, I was taking the kids to a livestock judging contest. Bill was going to sew some water ways where we just had some tile and terraces put in. But before we left to our activities, our well went dry. Change of plans. We had not had rain since the end of June. So everything was getting crispy. It turned out the cattle got up and all started to drink at the same time. Taking the water away faster than the well could recover. We had to move the cows to another waterer. Which meant that we had to take down part of a fence and add a gate to let them in and out. The ground was so hard that when we were digging the post holes we had to add a bucket of water to soften the dirt. I should add that the temperature was a toasty 104 deg.

Still, we were going to have to haul water. The water spicket in town was broke down. The only other available water for us to use is our irrigation rig 12 miles away. That was too far for us to take the water wagon. So I ran to the farm supply store to get a truck bed tank to put in our Ford 350. On our way to the irrigation rig, the guy from town called and said we could get water from the spout that day but not for a few days after. We filled the water wagon tank. Hauled it to the cattle tanks and our cistern. It took an hour to fill the truck bed tank at the irrigation rig. That was taken down to the well where we moved the cattle to as a back-up.

You might have guessed that since we had a water wagon, we have been dealing with water shortage issues for a while (long while). The well here is not as deep as it needs to be. And with 50+ head of cattle, we need a more reliable water supply. The last 3 or 4 years we have had plenty of rain for our water needs. But as our herd increases so does the water required for them. This week we are having a drilling company come out and look at where we can place a new well. With harvest staring up at the same time, things will be interesting around here. So goes the way of a farm life.

I am dreading the fair this year. We move the cattle in this Friday. After a week of 100 degree weather, I really don’t look forward to hauling, setting up, and sitting with 10 head in it. But my hands have black dye stains, the steers are almost broke, and the heifers get their final clip job tonight. That pretty much means we are set to go. So I just need to suck it up and git-r-done. Thank goodness we just stay overnight and go home. Some of these ridiculous counties still make the cattle stay 4 or 5 days.

Z is taking a bull and a steer. Theo will show a cow/calf pair, steer, and heifer. And Bella is taking two heifers and a steer.

Wish the kids luck showing and that the forecast is wrong.

This is a video I took of my son doing work this spring. He likes listening to his ipod while driving tractors.

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A Week in the Life of My Farm Family

We are a family of 5 (William, me, and 3 kids; 16, 14, & 13 yo). The following is what we did this past week in addition to the daily cattle chores and school work.

Wednesday May 4:

Cultivated ground- 65 acres; planted corn – 170 acres; evening Planning Commission meeting

Thursday May 5:

Helped two heifers have calves; Planted corn – 105 acres; Artificial Inseminated a heifer and cow; Rained; evening Zoning meeting

Friday, May 6:

fields too wet; did book work; washed show heifers; after ground dried planted corn – 15 acres; hauled manure

Saturday, May 7:

cultivated 22 acre field then moved to another field to work gulleys; planted corn in two fields – 90 acres; cleaned the barn; hauled manure

Sunday, May 8: Mother’s Day

After church cultivated 29 acres; planted corn 120 acres

Monday, May 9: Wedding Anniversary

Assisted cow having a calf; planted corn 65 acres; replanted corn on sections of two fields; hauled manure; Artificial inseminated a heifer; went out to eat for anniversary

Tuesday, May 10:

Double disked 30 acres corn stalks where cows over-wintered; planted the field; replanted section of another field; worked on cattle fence; hauled manure; washed show heifers; drained Buttercup’s udder

Wednesday, May 11:

Made 3 trips to pick up more seed corn for replant; replanted on sections of 2 fields; hauled manure; trimmed hair on weaned heifers; washed show heifers; had a rain shower; electricity went out because of storm to the north; went out to eat because couldn’t cook and celebrate finishing corn planting & replant

Thursday, May 12:

Picked up load of soy bean seed; switched planter units over to beans; ect.

Work the Plan

After reading Purdue’s article on disaster preparedness for farms, I got to thinking about how prepared we are for an emergency on our farm. Although Mr. Cain has some great suggestions, he leaves out significant items necessary for almost every farm emergency.

I liked the idea of  creating a plan to discover potential problems that we might not have thought of occurring. With everyone getting involved I can see some coming up with scenarios that others may overlook.

Crop insurance is pretty much a given. When I think of disaster, I think of dealing with the fall-out immediately afterwards as in a tornado, ice storm, or fire. Crop insurance covers loss of yield from drought, flood, green snap, ect. These usually occur over days to months. They’re not what I consider emergencies.

Keeping important files and papers offsite is fundamental. We have files in a security box at the bank and backup files online regularly. Walking through the a pre-planned exercise would be wise in order for everyone on the farm to know what is expected and what to expect.

The one thing that is not mentioned that I believe is vital is a generator. We have had many winters where ice had knocked out the electricity for more than a few days. Having a generator as a backup energy source was crucial for getting through that time period. Not only for the house but the livestock are dependent on us for their water supply. We have a tractor pto hook up for one site of the farm and a Honda 6500 gas generator for the other.

Have you had a farm emergency at your place? How did you handle the situation?

Is the next generation ready?

After we purchased the Big Green Combine, I started reading the John Deere         Furrow magazine that we had been receiving. This month’s issue had five young women on the cover titled “Sisters Take Charge”. I thought it looked interesting. It turned out to be a wonderful story about five sisters who live on a farm in Canada. They lost their parents in a plane accident one summer. In spite of such a devastating blow to the family, the ladies brought the harvest in that fall and continue to run the farming operation.

This got me to thinking about our own situation. If something happened  to William and I, would the three kids be able to carry on with the farming and raising cattle. The answer would be No. Our oldest is 15. At their ages they do not have the abilities nor the experience that would be needed to continue farming without us. The article brought it to our attention how imperative it is for William and I to be intentional with raising our farm kids.

What is important ?

Responsibility

Our kids have grown up knowing that work needs to be done and animals are dependent on us for survival. Some of the lessons have been difficult to learn.  Others need to be repeated and repeated. On this farm we all have jobs we are responsible for. If something isn’t done or done half-ass, another person will have to make up for the work. This is simply not acceptable. As a parent I think instilling personal responsibility in my children is paramount to anything else I will teach.

Education

As I think of all the details that it takes to run a grain and livestock operation, it is daunting. Thankfully they don’t have to learn everything overnight. It will take years. I think they will learn the most by actually doing it hands on. Setting the planter and combine, building fence, keeping records, pulling calves, the list goes on. The age-old way of doing these things along side of us, they will learn exponentially faster than in a book. We also take them to specialized classes such as artificial insemination school and crop scouting programs. In their school work I have added reproductive physiology and agronomy. But mostly they need to know that their farming education is never ending. Though farmers may think it,  they can’t know it all. New technology is coming at us like a freight train. It takes understanding your farm operation to know which information is important to keep up on and which to ignore.

We are parents who want to have the peace of mind that we have made every effort to prepare our farm kids to take the operation over.

Can you handle the truth?

At the Beef Expo last weekend, we had stalls by a young man, Greg, who is getting married this summer, God help him. One morning while waiting for the bulls to finish up eating he called his betrothed and talked for a few minutes. After hanging up Greg looked at me and exasperatedly asked, “Why are women always late. They know the time they are supposed to be there but they are late anyway!”

I asked, “Greg, do you want the truth?” “Yeah”, he said.

My reply, “It’s all priorities. If it is important to the woman she would be there on time. If  it’s not a priority, she will be there when she gets there. It’s as simple as that.”

He didn’t really care for that explanation but didn’t comment either. He put the halter on his bull to start getting him ready for the sale. We never spoke of it again.

So for all you farm guys who have been mystified by this female phenomenon, now you know. Go ahead and tell your lady that you know.  Don’t be fooled when she denies it.

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Bella and I are cleaning where the steers have been lying during the last blizzard. The kids put down straw and hay for them under the lean-to. That was last week. Now the lot the steers are in is a muddy mess. Once we get the bull sold at the Beef Expo this week they will be moved to their new lot. Hopefully the kids will have them “mostly” broke to lead by then.

Like the catchy music? Makes you think of sunny times.