Sad day for the little bulls, upgrades, spraying the meadows

Mama’s hoarse calf is still without a voice. Grandpa and I were working on making a small ramp at the loading chute so he could load the bulls this morning to take them to the vet. They will come home steers; sad but necessary. As we were working on that project we did hear the little one try to bawl and it was a pretty pitiful sound indeed. I did not think it too chicken-like but it was definitely something you would expect to emanate from a little bull calf.

We have elected to take the bulls to the vet to be cut because the price they charge for doing the service is very reasonable and they are much more efficient than I would be at the process; besides, Mama hates to see the dogs eat what is cast away from the cutting. Mama set up to have our little heifer vaccinated during the same visit so we will be up to date on all our vet needs for the cattle on our farm and everyone will go in the same trip.

The big steer we are keeping to butcher is running with the herd and Grandpa is not sure we can keep him out of the mix during the loading process. If he does stay with the bunch we will not try too hard to separate him. Grandpa will tell the vet that he came along for the ride. It is the only time he will make a return trip to the farm once loaded.

Grandpa moved the propane tank yesterday. It used to sit by the road but we elected to relocate it closer to the apartment in order to make a more direct run for the gas supply to the shop and apartment. Lee Davis, a licensed plumber in our church, is scheduled to come out Saturday afternoon to make the connections for the gas line. We should have the ditch dug and the line laid to the apartment this afternoon.

I am looking forward to getting the gas and water lines completed. It will clear the way to complete the sheetrock and start installing the kitchen cabinets. Mama is getting really excited now. I still need to take the time to get to IKEA to buy the sink she wants for the kitchen. I have avoided the trip simply due to the time it takes away from the work I am doing to get us to the point of installing the kitchen sink, ergo, needing to make the trip. Besides, I have not decided what kind of counter tops we are going to use.

Yesterday evening Grandpa got the sprayer going and put some AgGrand fertilizer on the upper meadow. I am still impressed with the sprayer he has built for our use. We are trying to get a good feel for just how much it will improve the yield of hay. It is not necessarily an inexpensive treatment but it is far less expensive per acre than any conventional fertilizer. My best guess is that it will run us about $1200 per year to treat the meadows the way we would like to.

Though it will offer a great improvement to the quality of the hay we are able to harvest, whether or not we will get a marketable return on that money is what we are trying to evaluate.