There's been a lack of....

.......farm spam lately.

In the last few posts I haven't talked about being knee deep in calves, as was the case July through to September.

Yes things have eased a bit on the farm - for me.

I raised 129 calves, I think that may be the most that I have done in my 42 odd years of calf rearing (!!) I can usually count on having somewhere between 115-120.

We weaned the first mob at the beginning of October. When we do this we take them back to the shed (luring them with a feeder of milk, of course). We draft out any that aren't big/old enough. Then the weaning mob all get drenched, vaccinated and are given a copper supplement (vital on our soils). 

About 5 days later, after reducing their milk daily, we lure them out the back to the runoff. They follow the feeder partway out the track, have their final milk feed —

And then we follow them out to their new home —

This mob was weaned last week. You can see how content they are - they didn't come running looking for a milk feed when they heard the bike - a good sign!!!

I'm still feeding 16 - the end of calving is a pain as the calves are spread out - there may be a week without a calf, etc etc, which means the age range within the last mob is quite wide. I probably have 5 I can wean, but it's barely worth it for that number, so they're still on milk until a few more reach the right age/weight. These are the youngest mob, after yesterday's feed —

These are all by an Angus dad crossed with dairy (milking) cows. I love the range of 'black'  we get.

There is a saying, "where there are Livestock, there has to be Dead Stock." Fortunately I didn't usually have many troubles with my calf rearing. Some calves we bring in straight away if Mum appears to have forgotten about them and not fed them. Or if it's been horribly wet and cold. Usually with the freshest colostrum possible, a good rub down, a survival blanket and an old horse neck cover or saddle blanket they are up on their feet in no time, with no ill effects.

I did lose two calves though. One picked up a bug (pneumonia?). I nursed her back to health and she was seemingly well. Out with the big calves on the farm, but I found her dead one morning - about 3 weeks after she had been sick. Another calf got himself stuck under the railings in the calf shed (I didn't know that was possible) and suffered a brain injury. I thought he was coming right, but I also found him dead one morning. But thankfully, those incidents were isolated. I had no cases of scours/diarrhoea, which can devastate calf sheds, so that was pleasing.

One calf that took a lot of nursing turned up on our doorstep (!) one day, when a neighbour found him in one of his paddocks. He was a day or more old and rejected by his mum. He'd not had a feed at all. It was a day of cold and horizontal rain and he had a fever. The neighbour has a small beef herd and isn't set up for hand rearing calves so I took him on.

He was a good strong calf, once we got his temperature down.

His eyes looked really strange and it was soon obvious that he was completely blind. We had a long winded explanation from the vet about how high temperature/fevers can change the proteins in eyes and create problems.

After a few weeks of walking around the outer edge of the pens - guiding himself by bumping into the walls, and having to be taken to the milk feeder, the his eyes started to look more normal and he gradually gained some sight.

I was like a mother hen the day I let him out into the paddock. Again walking around the edges, but seeing enough to get around.

He's doing great now. Here he is having a cuddle with the MOML.

I've decided to try and write a post a day in December....to try and catch up on all the posts I haven't written all year before the new one starts.  So I'll leave this post here and stop scrolling through 100s of calf photos trying to find the cutest one ever.

So, 'til next time, hopefully tomorrow,

Happy stitches, 

Raewyn