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It snowed, snowed, and then snowed some more.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Heifer Number 13

The number 13 is often associated with bad luck, and in heifer #13's case she has had her fair share of the bad luck.

When you look at her she just isn't the best looking cow, she has a double chin, short legs, she walks with her toes turned out and the most unattractive part of her is her butt! I am guessing that in the cow world she would not come in rated as a ten.  In her case though, she has a personality that just makes you love her through all of her short comings.

I first noticed her when I was pushing the heifers up from Willow Creek, I couldn't help but notice her because she is always the last cow in the herd and she is pooping all the time. Out of the 117 heifers that we pushed up Main Canyon past the sink holes, heifer #13 was the only cow that managed to fall into one of them. In fact she was the first heifer that I have ever watched walk into a sink hole, and with her extremely short legs it took a great deal of pushing to get her out of the hole.


Shortly after we got the heifers up to Main Canyon, we noticed that she wasn't doing very well. She was loosing weight and most of her hair was falling out, so I made the decision to bring her in with the bunch that were calving so we could watch her. She made it about 2 days and then she disappeared on afternoon so I went to search for her, I looked everywhere I could think of but couldn't find her anywhere. Finally Jay came to help and we looked in the late calving bunch of heifers but she had just up and vanished........I was feeling pretty bummed about loosing her but when I got off the 4 wheeler to shut the gate, I could hear this mooo mooo. I looked around and in the swampy part of the meadow were most cows DON'T try to cross the creek, there she was stuck up to her belly in the muck and mud. We pulled her out and she was just fine, but only heifer #13 would be that lucky.

This would not be the only time that I would find heifer #13 stuck up to her belly in the swamp, no just this past weekend she was one of three that had tried to wade across another part of the creek that most animals don't even attempt crossing. There were the other 2 heifers that had managed to get themselves stuck to the point that we had to pull them out, but the difference between them and heifer #13 was that with her short legs she has no clearance so that we can get a rope underneath her to pull her out with. We had to pry her out with poles until she could get some clearance and start to wiggle herself out of the muck to the point where we could get a rope around her and pull her out. What was funny about this was that she never stopped eating the entire time, I think she is use to us saving her life and she just knows that we will come along and rescue her out of whatever jam she has managed to get herself into. She is always looking back to see where we are at.
I just hope she makes a good mom to her calf, which I am sure that she will expect us to help her have!!!

Always watching.
Making sure we're coming!


2 comments:

  1. You might have to show her how to give birth. Put her through birthing class.

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    1. Heifer # 13 had her calf, and just like I thought she wasn't about to put forth any effort to have the calf. We had to pull it and it was a big baby boy. It took quite a while for both the heifer and the calf to get up and going, but we turned them out this morning and she has become a good mommy and loves her calf!!!

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