Life With a Cow

Life with Sassafras has definitely been an adventure. In the first week I was accidentally whacked with her horns as she tried to get flies (I'm glad they aren't sharp!), stomped on, temporarily blinded by her tail time and again, and squished underneath her before she realized she was on top of me. Oh, and I forgot to mention being chased across the pasture because she wanted to "play". The bucket was kicked over or she put her foot in it more often than not. Once she even managed to put both feet in it - that milk went to the chickens!

I've had to learn that cows are not horses. If she doesn't want to go, she will stop and will not budge until she decides to. If she wants to go a different direction, she is going that way and the only thing I can do is hang on to the rope for dear life and run (yes, run) after her until she decides to stop. I've come to appreciate her steadiness, though. At week three we had a big storm and it was pouring down rain. Deafening thunder and a bolt of lightning directly overhead made me jump out of my shoes and the horses scatter in all directions, but Sassafras calmly stood there like nothing had happened, wondering what was the matter with the rest of us.

My hands were taking seemingly forever to get used to milking, and after three weeks milking was still taking me 1-2 hours. Daddy bought a milking machine for when I leave town and I started using it part of the time. The break really helped my hands. I continue to milk by hand part of the time and I'll probably go back to milking completely by hand in the fall, but for now the machine has been a big blessing!

She is giving about 2 1/2 gallons a day now, half of what she was producing when I bought her, but that is all I can use anyway until I really get into cheese making. She will probably increase in production as I get better at milking and figure out the best diet for her.

After five months of looking, I finally found some Corriente steers. Sassafras has been easier to handle now that she has buddies to play with and is getting all that energy out of her system.

I had expected her to go into heat last Sunday and thought I had missed it, but last night I went out to milk and to my surprise she was in heat! I must have gotten the date wrong on the last one. The A.I. technician came out this morning and bred her to a Brown Swiss bull. If the breeding takes, we'll have a calf late June.