Page 4 - MWC 08-19-2021s

The Midwest Cattleman · August 19, 2021 · P4
Here in a few minutes, I’m
going to walk out to the barn
and when I do the entire herd
of cattle down on the other
end of this eighty-acres is
going to start bawling. This
chorus will start with one
or two, but then the whole
bunch will join in. What’s the
song they’re singing? “It’s
time to move baby!” Now, I
may be on my way to move
them, or I may not, but either
way – it doesn’t matter, they
start singing to me!
For the last two years,
we’ve tried a new ‘twist’ in
raising cattle and grazing.
While several of our neigh-
bors are planting milo to
graze through the winter
months with a lot of success,
our approach has been a lit-
tle more radical. We don’t
have cows through the win-
ter months! It’s custom
grazing… so when the grass
plays out or the snow flies,
the cattle go home. My wife
of forty-two years prefers
this new ‘twist’ because she
wasn’t all that crazy about
sometimes feeding hay or
breaking ice by herself in the
winter anyway.
We all have our prefer-
ences, and when you are
running your own cattle, ex-
cept for the occasions that
the neighbor’s bull choos-
es to visit, you can control
the genetics. You may enjoy
the first cow
looking out over a pasture to bawl when I
of consistent, uniform cattle, come into view
if that’s what you want, and every morning
watch your planned matings when I’m head-
perform from season to sea- ing to the barn.
son. When custom grazing She sounds like
someone else’s cow-calf pairs, a ‘fog-horn’.
that’s not going to be the If you haven’t
case. You go with whatever realized it, these
steps off the trailer. cows are bawl-
We always step them off ing because they
the trailer into a very secure are not really
‘trap’ – with good barbed- all that crazy
wire fence all around, but about ‘green
by the time they’re ready to beans’ and are
move they are all very aware ready for more
of what a single-wire electric ‘ice cream’. One
fence is. Some were here last university pro-
year and already knew the fessor, Jim Ger-
routine, others - here for the rish, used to
first time caught on very fast. say it was ‘ice
I show-up and move that ‘hot’ cream’ and then
wire and they get new grass. the ‘box’. That
I say grass, but really, it’s the may be more ac-
clover that they love. As I curate but either way, when some will be running towards
told my six-year-old grand- they are out of the best stuff, that next new grass paddock.
son who asks questions about they are ready to move. Down in the far corner, will
everything, “They have to eat Now I don’t name cows, be that ‘fog-horn’ cow in her
their ‘green beans’ before but this old ‘fog-horn’ cow de- own personal patch of clover
they get more ‘ice cream’.” cides from time to time that (not where she is supposed to
In every herd there are because I’m running late, she be) leading a chorus of com-
those with a different ‘flight- will just move herself. I’ve plainers, but by the time I
zone’ – some are tame as cats seen her stand flat-footed and get to that reel of poly-wire
and some not so much. With just clear a hotwire. Some- which may be down on the
this system, I’ve found that how, she has also figured out far side- a quarter of a mile or
by day five or six, even the that this is against the rules, more away- she will be there.
most ‘nervous’ cows settle so when she hears the ATV She’ll beat me to it so she
down and relax. start up at the house, she can be first in line. She may
Now I don’t name cows. will ‘relocate’ herself back be the only cow in the world
Especially cows that are not where she is supposed to be that will bawl, jump back
mine. But sometimes there and join the herd. Why? It’s into where she is supposed to
are those that earn a special obvious…. She has got to be be, and meet you halfway…
name. This year we have a first in line going into anoth- all because she sees you and
big cow that looks like her er new paddock! hears you coming.
momma was a ‘black-baldy’ Here in a few minutes, I’m If you could see it all in
and her daddy was a Santa going to walk out to the barn slow-motion, you’d think it
Gertrudis. Her calf looks and head down to move cows. was a scene from a love story.
straight Hereford which is When I come around the end But no, I’m not going to miss
just weird. Although this of the barn on the ATV, I’ll see her when she goes back home.
big cow has never offered to half of the herd walking, but
do anything aggressive, from KwC
day one, she let me know that
she wasn’t at all scared of me. JUG Livestock Waterers
She’s also ‘smart as a whip’! WesLynn Enterprises
Even before I get ready to
move a fence and
open a new pad-
dock, she is al-
ways the cow that
is standing by
the ‘reel’. When
I start rolling up
the poly-wire, she
is always the first Performance Tested for over 25 years
Clean Fresh Water Every Time
cow to ‘squeeze’ Open Bowl Design
behind me into Draw Tube for Natural Drinking Action
the new grass – Feed Trap Keeps Feed out of Water Reservoir
always. I know No Flap, Disks or Balls for animal to move
she has got to be www.weslynn.net Ph: 515-771-6036