Another awesome week in Fitness, Farm, and Life! Read on for more!
Fitness
This week started off strong, but we were really busy over the weekend, so I really tapered off on Friday-Sunday. February 18- 30 minute dance workout on YouTube February 19- 35 Minutes virtual ride on Rouvy! February 20- 30 minutes dance routine for Shape Up Montana challenge! February 21- 45 minutes treadmill walking. Sometimes I watch movies or tv shows. I have to say that the climax of Thelma and Louise really kept me walking! Such a great movie!
Recognize this unforgettable scene?!
February 22- Rest. February 23- Drive to Bozeman. Rest day. February 24- Drive from Bozeman. Rest day.
This week for Shape Up Montana, our weekly challenge was to complete the "Shape Up Jam" dance and submit a video of the dance. I did it. My video is ridiculously bad, as are my dancing skills. If you want a laugh, here it is:
Farm-
We are nearly ready to start calving season. Our "due date" is March 1, so we could actually start any day. Jeff spent the week preparing the corrals and doing other chores in advance of calving. Then on Friday, he and a friend of ours sorted our animals into groups: older cows, young cows/heifers, and late-calvers. We also have a separate pen for our bulls, and another for the yearlings. It remains frigidly cold with highs in the single digits below zero and lows in the -20s or worse. Horrible weather for calving. We are hoping the cows will hold off until it warms up even a little bit!
Hello, girls! This is the yearling pen.
Life
We took a quick overnight trip to Bozeman for a family gathering. It was nice to get together, even if it was brief. It was a lot of car time for Genevieve, but overall, she handled it pretty well!
Traveling to Bozeman! She's just too much with those pigtails!
I also just finished reading Becoming by Michelle Obama. I don't normally read a lot of biographies/autobiographies, but I really enjoyed this book. She is someone I think we can all learn from in terms of making the best out of every situation, positive mindset, encouraging others, and much more. If you haven't read this book, I would highly recommend it, regardless of your politics. To be honest, it's much more about her as a person than it is about politics anyway. It is especially eye opening to read about life from the viewpoint of an African-American woman, as her experience was vastly different from mine.
That's all for this week! Have a great week, everyone!
Reviewing Fitness, Farm, and Life in the latest installment of Weekly Review Posts! Check it out!
Fitness
Now three weeks into Track Season, I'm needing to adjust my schedule a bit to fit in runs and workouts, since I don't get home from practice until around 6:30 most days. I try to fit in at least two runs over the weekend (thank God for 4-day school week and 3-day weekends every week!), and have been making it a habit to get up early before school once or twice a week for a treadmill run. Not ideal for someone who really loves to sleep, but I can make it work.
This past Saturday, we also had a little All-Comers 5K Fun Run/Walk in Rudyard, which I organized, and you can read about IN THIS POST. Overall, I was really happy with the turnout and it seemed like people had fun.
Here's the week in review: March 20-26 Sunday- 1 mile walk, 4 mile run
I took this photo on the 4-mile run. I ran along the edge of our neighbor's winter wheat field for one mile. You can see it is starting to come up!
Monday- complete rest Tuesday- 50 minutes yoga (15 min)/core(15 min)/stretching(20 min) Wednesday- 2.7 mile treadmill run before school Thursday- 45 minutes yoga Friday- complete rest Saturday- 5K Fun Run in town
Year-to-Date Running: 131.8 miles Walking/Hiking: 35.2 miles Yoga: 595 min CC-Ski: 500 min / 14.1 miles (since I started tracking mileage on 1/17) Alpine Ski: 3 days Mountain bike: 10 miles
Farm
I wrote a nicely detailed blog post on what happens when we have twin calves born on the farm, which you can read HERE. Otherwise, we are actually starting to shift our mindset toward spring seeding and preparations for that. Our farm purchased a new disc recently, which is an implement used to turn up soil and break ground. We'll primarily be using this on our organic fields. Jeff and Tom have already begun servicing it up to prepare it for work, and I helped Jeff with it a bit, too. Soon, they'll move on to a pre-work tune up of the air drill, which is the farm implement we use to plant our crops.
Disc, unfolded and in the midst of maintenance.
Jeff, doing work.
This is what the air-drill looks like, all folded up.
Also, the obsessive weather-watching has begun. We are really due for some moisture, as we've had hardly any in 2016. Last year was so dry and draughty, we are in very deep need of a turnaround. Hoping that we get some soon.
Life
Friday evening Jeff and I watched the Cyclones take on Virginia in a Sweet 16 March Madness battle. My parents were actually at the game. The Cyclones lost, and I was sad. But, it would have been an upset if they had won and Virginia played really well. I was glad that I had watched, and especially because it was the last game for Georges Niang as a Cyclone. We had four great years of watching some outstanding basketball from that guy.
For Easter, Jeff and I went to our little neighborhood country church for service and then spent the afternoon on a long 16 mile bike ride before heading to town for a late-afternoon Easter Dinner and a walk with Tom and Carol. Pretty simple day, but wonderful to appreciate life in the sunshine and nice weather, and with family.
This weekend, we plan to make an appearance at the Montana Farmers Union Young Producers Conference. Saturday is also my first track meet with our 2016 team of tracksters, in Cut Bank. It will be a BUSY weekend! :)
This is a photo of my Father-In-Law, Tom, overlooking some of our pasture.
Have you been hankering for a glimpse into the life of the rancher during calving!? This time of year, we are quite the bovine maternity ward round here! In this post, you'll learn all about the extra special circumstances of when cows have twins. Special thanks to Jeff for helping me write this post and making sure I had my facts correct. Enjoy!
As I mentioned in my previous post, overall, everything is going very smoothly with the calving operation this year. The weather has been agreeable to late-night and early-morning walk-throughs, and we've had relatively few issues with the birthing process in our cows. Sure, we've had to assist in a few births by helping turn a calf who was coming backwards or even "pulling" a few to help the cow. That's pretty typical.
We've only had a few calves die, which is also good. Each year there are a few who get sick or are born with some sort of issue and just don't make it. Obviously, we do everything we can to help the calves and their mamas, but sometimes there's just nothing left to do.
And then there are the twins. We can usually count on one or two sets of twins born every year. While it is a good thing to have twins in a sense because, hey, we just got two-for-the-price-of-one, it can also place added stress on the mama cow. Typically, a cow produces enough milk to raise one calf, so twins can really put a strain on her ability to give the best nutrition to both calves. Also, sometimes the births themselves are much higher stress and almost always require assistance, or even a trip to the vet. This year, we had three sets of twins. Sort of.
Our most recent set of twins. Keep reading to find out how they're doing!
When Jeff and I were gone to Minneapolis a few weeks ago, Jeff received a call from those manning the calving operation - Tom and our friend Jim - that we had lost a calf. It had been born dead. Not to worry, however, because the very next animal that calved had twins. They were able to "graft" one of the twin calves onto the cow who had lost her calf. Very serendipitous. Because the twins were born so soon after the other calf had died, the grafting took easily-- the mama who had lost her calf accepted one of the twins as her own calf, after a brief "warming-up" period.
A few weeks later, there was a cow who started acting really funny in the pen. She would stomp around, act a little territorial, and then began trying to claim the newborn calves of other cows. It's not unusual for a cow to have the first pangs of contractions, and look around, finding another cow's newborn calf, and confuse it for her own, thinking she had given birth. This cow did that with several others' calves. She showed signs of nearing calving, but hadn't given birth yet. For a whole day, she could consistently be found causing a ruckus. We knew she was close to calving but something just wasn't right about her.
Finally, she started the actual calving process. Only, it was taking her quite some time and she was making very little progress. Jeff eventually went in to investigate, you know, going shoulder deep to feel around inside the animal. What he felt was what he thought were twins, but who were tangled up together inside. He and Tom attempted to sort them out but couldn't make progress at it. They called the vet, who instructed them to load up the cow and take her to town to be checked out. The vet ended up doing a C-section to get the calves out, but they both were dead. The vet's opinion was that one of the calves had probably died a week ago or more, and the other one may have been fine but it was tangled up with its dead twin, so the cow couldn't birth him correctly. Ultimately, there was nothing we could have done. Jeff loaded up the cow and took her home, stitches up the side of her belly.
So, this is what a post- C-section cow looks like.
Again, serendipity would have it, that very shortly after this incident, another cow, actually a heifer, gave birth to twins. They are the two tiniest calves I have ever seen! One of them was quite weak, and was definitely not acting as lively as a calf should when it is first born. We thought for sure we'd lose him. Jeff and Tom piped some colostrum down him since he wasn't able to stand and suck on his own, and hoped for the best, but didn't really think he'd make it through the night, he was so weak. We all sort of agreed that with the teeny tiny size of these two calves and the way the one was sort of developmentally lagging, it seemed like they had maybe been born prematurely.
The next morning, on my early morning check, I couldn't bring myself to look in the barn to check on these twins. I just didn't want to start my day by finding a dead calf. But, fortune was on our side. Jeff called me later and said the calf was acting a bit more perky. The colostrum had done it's job and really seemed to be helping. The calf would make it after all! Both twin calves now seemed to be doing fine.
One of the twins with their birth mama.
She gives him a sniff...
...and lets him suck.
She's a heifer, so she's not quite all the way to being a full-sized cow. The calf could fit completely under her belly.
Gives you an idea of how small they were.
Only problem with these twins is that, having been born to a heifer, she has a very small bag (udder). In other words, she does not have much milk, even for two tiny calves. So, the idea light bulb struck that we could try to make a pair out of one of these twin calves and the c-section mama who had lost both of hers. We'd have our work cut out for us, though, as it had been two days since she had given birth via c-section to the dead calves. The longer you wait, the harder it can be to graft a calf. Add to the mix that she had become very nervous around humans and in enclosed spaces. I chalked this up to her having the traumatic experience of the entire c-section ordeal, but opinions are mixed on this. She also could just be a nervous sort of cow.
It took several days of locking her in a feeding chute in the calving barn and bringing the twin calf up to suck while she was penned in. Jeff and Tom tried everything they could think of to try to get her to claim him. She would let the twin nurse, but would never act like she had any interest in actually raising him. At times, she'd kick at him to keep him from nursing, but mostly the calf was getting fed. It just didn't seem like she would accept and raise him as her own, although the fact that he was able to nurse gave us some hope. Tom has always said in the past that if a calf can nurse enough from a cow so her milk passes all the way through him, and her scent/hormones are on his "hind end," the cow will then almost always take the calf. In this case, she'd sniff the calf, but never had any inkling of wanting to actually mother it, and always just escaped the barn immediately rather than trying to keep the calf with her.
Here's the c-section cow locked in the feeding chute so that the calf could nurse.
We had talked about different options. He could be a bottle calf that *guess who* would probably get to feed every day. Or, he could go to the neighbor's herd, who had just lost a calf of their own. Without settling on anything, we just kept trying to make it a pair with what we had, as futile as it felt at times.
Then one morning, probably fed up with the battle of wills between himself and the cow, Jeff just decided to go for it. He pushed the young, tiny calf out of the barn and into one of the larger pens. The cow immediately walked up to the calf and began licking him off and mooing at him-- as if she had just birthed him right then and there. Like, "Hey! I've been looking for you for over a week! Where have you been?!" Just like that, in spite of all of our best efforts, the pair was made.
Here's a short video Jeff took of the cow and calf-
Now, every time I go out to do my walk-throughs, I check in on this man-made pair. Pretty much without fail, that cow is within two feet of the calf. She does not let him get away and appears to be very doting. Who knew!
So, that gives a glimpse into what goes on during calving, and especially the drama that can come with twins. I am proud of the attention and care given to our animals. Also, I think there's a lesson in there somewhere about an animal's will and instinct. People can try to influence their behaviors, but animals gonna be animals in the end. They'll do it their own way.
And just for fun... A friend of mine tagged me on Facebook with this cartoon. What do you think?!
Yep. So, I missed my Weekly Review post from last week, so this week it's a DOUBLE WHAMMY of Fitness, Farm, and Life comin' at ya!
Abby and Harvey enjoying a wade while out for a hike.
Fitness
So, let's cut right to the chase and get on to it. Shape Up Montana continues on. We're about half way through that. Our team continues to move along and make progress. I feel good about the likelihood of making my goal of scoring 600 points in three months. Right now I'm at 345, with about six weeks to go. I'm scoring on average 49 points each week, and with Track Season having started, my miles are likely to be going up.
Otherwise, just trying to stay consistent with running, strength work and yoga. If anything's been lacking over the past two weeks, I'd say it's my floor exercises/strength stuff. Much of my running the past few weeks has been on the treadmill, mostly due to high wind.
March 6-12
Sunday- 5 miles of walking on pedometer, 3 miles running on treadmill (This is the day I met up with Jessie in Minneapolis for a walk with Matilda, and I had some more walking around MOA-- read here! Monday- Complete rest. (travel) Tuesday- 2.2 mile run Wednesday- 30 minutes yoga Thursday- 3 mile treadmill run Friday- 2 mile walk, 45 min yoga Saturday- 6.3 mile trail run with Jeff
March 13-19 Sunday- rest, walking and cleaning around the house. Monday- 4 mile treadmill interval workout run Tuesday- rest/30 minutes of stretching Wednesday- 2.5 mile treadmill run, 1.5 mile walk Thursday- complete rest. Friday- 30 minutes dance workout (kicked my butt!), and 3 mile treadmill run Saturday- 45 minutes of yoga
YTD Stats Running: 122 miles Walking/Hiking: 34.2 miles Yoga: 535 min CC-Ski: 500 min / 14.1 miles (since I started tracking mileage on 1/17) Alpine Ski: 3 days Mountain bike: 10 miles
Farming
We continue with calving. It's been the major news, of course, of the past month or so. At this point, I think we are about 80% through with around 20 cows yet to calve. Overall, it's been pretty smooth this year. The weather has been warm and dry, which is good for calving even if it's shaping up for a potentially stressful crop year. I have to say, I haven't minded that it hasn't been -20 for any of my early morning checks. Hell, it's only been in single digits once. We haven't at all had to worry about getting calves inside or dried off right away for fear of frostbite. As I said, it has been a pretty smooth calving season. I am working on another post right now with some more detail about a few situations that have come up, so stay on the lookout for that to come out later this week.
I love it when the calves really resemble their mamas. :)
Life
Other news in my world is that track season started on March 15. This is my fourth year as an Assistant Coach at our local high school. It's always an adjustment to add the extra time away from home into my day as the season gets underway, but Coaching is something that I've found I truly love. Big, big thanks goes out to my husband, Jeff, and family for their support and encouragement. I know they make adjustments and sacrifices to allow me to continue Coaching, too. Our first meet is coming up on April 2. I'm looking forward to seeing how we do. We have good numbers this year, so that's always good and makes a big difference, especially in Class C.
Two of our North Star student-athletes in a drill to work on strength and acceleration.
I'd be remiss if I didn't bring up March Madness and the Tournament. We are a very sports-driven household so the Tournament is big doings for us every year. Jeff and I participated in a few light-duty bracket gambling shenanigans with friends (I'm pretty sure we're already guaranteed not to win any money back, so there's that...) and filled out our inter-family competition brackets-- Jeff, Tom, and I. As of now, Tom is in the lead with 32 correct picks. I'm next with 31. Jeff is third with 30. However, it's still anyone's game.
Mostly, I'm very excited that my home-town team, Iowa State Cyclones, have made it to the Sweet 16 to play Virginia on Friday evening. Last I checked, the Cyclones were a 5-point underdog. However, they went into the tournament with somewhat of a chip on their shoulder and have been playing very good basketball--peaking at the right time. Virginia better not be overlooking the Cyclones! It's going to be a helluva game!
If you'd like to read more on the Cyclones, here's an interesting feature article on one of their Senior stars- Jameel McKay, from The DesMoines Register: For McKay, Mom and Prohm Know Best . There's a really wonderful line in there that appears a couple times- "Your attitude is your altitude." Good advice!
So, how's your bracket doing?
Do you think your "attitude is your altitude?"
Stay tuned for next week's weekly review of fitness, farm, and life right here on the blog!
A young and curious calf gets close to investigate Harvey!
Thanks to everyone who read my previous post, my 400th blog post! Today, I'll be announcing the winner of the Giveaway that I did. But first, I want to write about the week that was in another Weekly Review blog post!
Fitness
This past week was a bit of a slowdown as it was bookended with travel. It can be very difficult to get in time for fitness when traveling, but I did make an attempt a few times. I focused largely on trying to get steps on my pedometer this week.
Shape Up Montana continues. Our team is ranked 27 out of almost 250 teams, so I feel really good about that. The teams I am coordinating at school are really kicking butt, too. Our top team is actually in 3rd place in the overall competition, which is AMAZING, and the other two are 23rd and 24th. I am so proud of all of them for being in the top 25!
Here's how my week actually broke down- Sunday- Drive home from Bozeman. 3 mile pasture hike with Jeff.
I think pasture hikes are Harvey's favorite form of exercise!
Monday- 20 minutes HIIT, 3 mile treadmill run Tuesday- 2 mile walk, 20 min yoga Wednesday- 3 mile treadmill run Thursday- rest. (travel) Friday- rest. (travel) Saturday- 30 minutes core and 15 min elliptical
Wow... what a slow week. Only six miles of running and only 20 minutes of yoga. Lots of walking. That counts for something, too, though I guess. I plan to pick it up a little this next week!
YTD through March 5 Running: 97.95 miles Walking/Hiking: 25.7 miles Yoga: 415 min CC-Ski: 500 min / 14.1 miles (since I started tracking mileage on 1/17) Alpine Ski: 3 days Mountain bike: 10 miles
Farm
We really started calving in full swing last week. In a 24 hour period on February 29 and March 1, we had eleven calves! During calving, people take turns walking through the corrals and checking on the cows, watching for signs of imminent birth and/or distress. If a cow is in active labor, we usually just keep an eye on her and hope that she can have the calf on her own. If she takes an inordinate amount of time, or of we notice feet are coming out backwards, or anything else that's not right, then we may try to go in and help her out or pull the calf. We have had very few cases where we've had to help pull a calf this year, so that's good.
My time to check the cows has been the first-thing-in-the morning shift. I wake up a little earlier than normal and walk out there between 5:45 and 6:30 a.m. depending on the day. Jeff typically goes out at bedtime and then in the middle of the night between 2 and 3:00 a.m. Jeff and Tom split duties during the day. For the overnight checks, we leave notes to each other if there's something to watch out for or a particular cow who is "thinking about it," as we say.
I find that I actually really like starting my day with this little walk. I also like that I'm looking for new life. It's kind of an uplifting thought and a nice way to bring some optimism into the beginning of the day. My pedometer is also happy to start the day right off with some steps! ;)
Life
Jeff and I were in Minneapolis for the National Farmers Union Convention. I really enjoyed the opportunity to see some close friends I have made in this organization and to get caught up on policy and goings-on. I'll write more about the Convention in a separate post. Otherwise, calving is really the main excitement of our lives right now. Also, for me, Track Season starts very soon!! Less than a week away!
Giveaway Results
ICYMI, the previous post was my 400th blog post and I celebrated with a little giveaway! Congratulations to Adria- you are the randomly selected winner of a copy of Hattie Big Sky! You'll receive your book very soon! :)
Thanks for tuning in, everyone! Check back soon for a post about my trip to Minneapolis!
Can you believe we're already done with February?! Here we are with my eighth Weekly Review of 2016! Read on to see how the week went in Fitness, Farming, and Life!
Just loved the clouds!
Fitness
We've now covered four weeks of Shape Up Montana. I really haven't written much about SUM yet this year, so maybe I'll dedicate another post specifically to it soon. This week, I started off with another 10K training run that didn't go so well. With about 1.5 miles to go, my hip and knee all of a sudden started to hurt very badly and I had to walk/jog the rest of the way in. That meant the rest of the week I spent considerable time stretching and doing things that weren't too stressful for the knee. Yes, I did do a couple more running workouts, but they were at very slow pace, with no incline, and included lots of walking. I'm frustrated that I keep having bouts with this hip/knee thing.
Vizsla selfie after one of our runs!
Jeff and I also went for our first bike ride of 2016! We did an easy 10-mile loop "around the block" where we live. I should say that the first 5 miles were easy but as soon as we turned south, we were headed into a strong SW wind for the remainder of the ride. The wind had DEFINITELY picked up from when we left the house. The last 2 miles in particular were pretty much head-on into the wind and were very miserable. All the same, it felt good to use my biking muscles.
Lastly, I was in Bozeman over the weekend and my sister-in-law and I tried a yoga class at a studio downtown called Your Yoga. The class was called Weekend Restore and was very restful. It was sort of a Yin Yoga style class-- not too many poses, none too stressful, held for a long time. I think it was just what my hip, knee, and lower back needed. I felt very "zen" by the end of the hour. Your Yoga had a ton of classes listed and classes cost $10. I'm definitely going to keep this studio in mind for future visits to Bozeman! Here are the stats from the week: Sunday- 6.2 mile run Monday- 1.2 mile walk, 50 minutes stretching. Tuesday- complete rest. Wednesday- 2.7 mile treadmill run before school Thursday- 3.2 mile easy run in the afternoon after a day of working cows, also 45 minutes of core and hip strengthening exercises Friday- 10 mile mountain bike ride on gravel roads! Saturday- 60 minutes yin yoga
And, YTD through February 28: 2016 Year to Date, through 2/28/16 Running: 91.95 miles Walking/Hiking: 20.7 miles Yoga: 395 min CC-Ski: 500 min / 14.1 miles (since I started tracking mileage on 1/17) Alpine Ski: 3 days NEW CATEGORY--Mountain bike: 10 miles!
Harvey basking in the sun outside the corrals.
Abby trots up to say hello! She can't resist an opportunity for kisses.
Farm
After Jeff and I spent a day last week prepping for calving, the action is now starting to ramp up. As of this morning when I did the morning check, we had 9 calves. That means we have 87 to go, still. The weather continues to be pretty good and warm, so that means we don't have to do too many overnight checks. Jeff goes out at about 10 p.m. and then at around 2:00 a.m. Then, I get up a little earlier than I normally would and do a check at around 6:00 a.m. before getting ready for school. This morning was my first morning check. It's kind of a nice way to greet the day-- with a short walk, looking for newborn animals.
This calf was about five minutes old when this picture was taken!
Life
Yes, I was traveling again over this past weekend. I was in Bozeman for the baby shower of a good friend. My sister-in-law Katie planned it and held it at her house. The party was baseball-themed and was very cute. Katie did an excellent job planning and executing the event, and the Mama-to-be seemed very pleased, too! She got a lot of nice gifts. :)
The mother to be with some of her gifts and some of Katie's homemade decorations! Photo credit: Katie Strissel
A big highlight Saturday night was the MSU Bobcats Women's Basketball game I attended with Tom and Carol. It was a hugely exciting back-and-forth game against the Idaho State Bengals. The Bobcats hit a couple of key 3's to send it to overtime tied at 66, and then momentum carried them through a late surge from ISU to finally come away with the victory 82-80. It was possibly the most exciting basketball game I have EVER attended!! Here's a game recap from the MSU Bobcats website, in case you'd like to read more detail: Late Game Heroics Give Bobcats Win Over Bengals On Senior Night.
Tied at 66 -- headed to OVERTIME!
Montana Class C Divisional Basketball Tournament was also held over the weekend in Great Falls. Interestingly, the Class C Girls Divisional Championship game between Belt and Box Elder drew 2500 fans in Great Falls while the MSU Bobcat Women's Game drew 2100 in Bozeman. People really love their Class C hoops in this state!
Looking ahead this week, Jeff and I are both off to the Twin Cities for the National Farmers Union Convention March 4-8. Looking forward to connecting with friends form across the country and talking about farming!
Peanut, our last remaining cat, enjoying some evening sunshine on the porch post.
REMINDER-- The NEXT POST will be my 400th post and I'll be switching the URL to the new Prairie Sun Life link!!! Be on the watch for that!
Yesterday, I stayed home from school to help Jeff with some work on the farm. I have a bunch of use'em or lose'em personal days I need to use before the schoolyear ends, and we had lots to do to get ready for calving. Our tasks for the day included tagging our first calves, sorting all the expecting cows and heifers into groups in the corrals, feeding bales, and hauling hay.
Our first step was tagging the three calves that had already been born.
We corralled the three pairs of mamas and calves in a small pen, then one by one Jeff would bring a calf to the ground and I would attempt to hold it down. Jeff would then use a scale tape to get an approximate weight of each calf, check for horns that might be starting to grow, and prep and install the ear tag. We had one bull calf that had to be banded, too. This process went pretty smoothly and without incident. One mama cow came up and really sniffed me pretty intensely while I was holding her calf down, but she wasn't aggressive at all.
Next, we trailed the rest of the herd of cows into the corrals and began the sorting process. This also went overall very smoothly. Jeff had lured them into the corrals with a bale of hay and then we trapped them. We took groups of about 20 animals at a time into our sorting lane and split them off into groups of "experienced cows," and "young cows." It's nice to keep them separate because the young cows- heifers and second-time calvers- are the ones who are more likely to need assistance with calving. It makes walking through the bunches and doing checks a little easier.
Once we had split the two groups apart, we further split the older cows up, sorting out animals we thought would be calving later on in the season. No need to include the in the big group being checked all the time if they're not going to go for a while anyway. Plus, it's nice to separate them out for the sake of space. Too many animals in a pen can lead to confusion and chaos. As calves are born, we'll tag them and kick the pairs out into the larger calving pen and eventually will move some of the late-calvers into the main calving pen in their place.
If only we could have the cows self-sort by filling out a form like this...
Photo from my friend Adria, who I think found it on Facebook. Let's ignore that the wrong version of "your" was used in this poster. I suppose cows don't know the difference anyway...
The entire sorting process took about two hours. Then, Jeff used a tractor to put hay bales in the feeders in each pen. I helped by opening/closing gates and cutting twine off the bales.
Almost ready to drop a bale into this feeder. Don't worry-- the cows will get their heads out of the way!
Munching on fresh eats!
Again, the cow sorting process went really well. Sometimes sorting animals can be tense and stressful. They're pretty large creatures and at times can be stubborn. While our animals are really pretty tame and used to being around people, they still are animals and can be unpredictable. Additionally, sometimes it's hard for someone who hasn't grown up around animals to learn the best ways to move and interact in the corrals. Likewise, it can be hard for people who HAVE grown up with that experience to communicate clearly to a novice what it is exactly that they want or need that person to do. We only had a few brief moments of snapping at each other, and that was usually because one of us didn't hear what the other had said, or misinterpreted. Jeff complimented me and said that he could tell that I've learned a lot and my instincts around the cows have improved. That made me feel good. :)
Later in the day, I saw this from PinkTractor.com on Facebook...
I can't imagine that statistic is anywhere close to true. Yes, there are moments when people get hot and say things they wouldn't normally say when they're stressed, sorting cows. I tend to be more optimistic about it and would like to think that working through a stressful time might actually make a marriage stronger.
When we ended our time in the corrals, we were both smiling.
Jeff snapped this photo of me. Thanks, Jeff!
After the cow sorting and feeding process, Jeff and I had a little lunch and set about our afternoon task of hauling some hay from our former yard at Stan's over here to the corrals. I wasn't as involved in this process, but I did help a bit with shuttling vehicles. Notably, the red truck. Of course, Harvey wouldn't be denied an opportunity to ride along!
As for the rest of this weekend, I'm off to Bozeman for a baby shower, leaving Jeff at home alone. We've had four calves so far (there was another one born yesterday afternoon after our day of sorting- I guess we jostled one loose!) but it doesn't look like too many more are imminent. The weather's going to be good, too, so Jeff should be OK on his own.
As for a re-launch of the blog with new URL, I'm thinking that will happen within two to three posts. I think I'd like to coincide it with my 400th blog post. This is post 398, I believe. Stay tuned!
Time to finish off another Weekly Recap! Taking a look back at February 14-20.
Cows on a hilltop against a dusky horizon.
Fitness
After a super fun weekend of skiing and shenanigans in Bozeman, I was looking forward to getting in some good runs. My mileage for the week wasn't super high, but I feel good about sticking with it. The #RunLoveChallenge is over, but I hinted last week at a few running-specific goals I have on my mind. So, here they are:
I'm getting a lot of use out of my trail shoes and my Oiselle KC Tights lately!
Goal #1-- Run a sub 25:00 5K sometime in 2016. I don't exactly have a race picked out for this, but I will be running a Virtual 5K through Shape Up Montana in about a month. I plan to race it hard and use it as a check-in to where I'm at. I feel good about at least getting a 5K PR already. I plan to continue incorporating some speedwork and hill training to try to reach my aggressive time goal. Right now my PR is 26:10, so we're looking at a drop of over a minute in the 5K.
Goal #2-- PR at 10K distance in 2016. I don't have a specific time goal for this PR as I do in the 5K, but I would like to try to continue to get better at this distance. I think with all the training I plan to do for the 5K, time drop in 10K should come naturally. I'm also planning to continue lengthening my long runs to get up to 7, 8, or 9 miles in effort to help with 10K training. Considering I've never run more than 6.7 miles at once, this seems a little daunting, but I'm confident I can do it.
Goal #3-- Continue exploring trails on the farm. I've really been enjoying trail running through the pastures and fields on the farm and I want to continue to build routes to do that. I feel SO LUCKY to have access to all this wonderful landscape right outside my door! I mean, seriously-- cows, creek crossings, cliffs, teepee rings... what's not to love?
Stepping stones across Sage Creek through our pasture.
If you look really carefully, you can sort of see the rock outline of a teepee ring.
We have one pasture that has over 100 teepee rings in it. They're subtle, but they're there.
What are your fitness goals for the coming months/year? Never too late to start one!
Another view of Sage Creek from a hike Jeff and I took.
Here are the weekly stats for February 14-20: Sunday- Complete rest day. Driving home from Bozeman. Monday- 4 mile interval run on treadmill. Tuesday- 30 minutes yoga. Wednesday- 3.7 mile pasture run. Thursday- 25 minutes core work, 20 min yoga Friday- 15 minute HIIT, 3 mile treadmill run, 2.6 mile hike with Jeff. Saturday- 1.2 mile walk.
And here's YTD through February 20: 2016 Year to Date, through 2/20/16 Running: 79.85 miles Walking/Hiking: 19.5 miles Yoga: 335 min CC-Ski: 500 min / 14.1 miles (since I started tracking mileage on 1/17) Alpine Ski: 3 days
Can you see Harvey? :)
Farm
If you missed my recap of the Montana Farmers Union Women's Conference, you can read it HERE. On the farm, we continue to make preparations for calving and expect the first calves to drop any day. Our official Due Date is March 1, but there are always some that come early. I'm excited- calving is my favorite season on the farm! This year, we'll have between 95 and 100 calves born. If you like photos of baby animals, then definitely stay tuned to the blog and to my Instagram (@katie.r.bangs) because soon both channels will be inundated!
The cow on the left looks especially pregnant---very round belly!
A little dark, but this is my current favorite cow.
Life
Again, thanks for noticing my awesome blog re-design! (Thanks, Joellyn!) I plan to re-launch the blog very soon with a new URL. The new site will be www.prairiesunlife.blogspot.com. Still using the free Blogger domain. I'm not making any money off my blog, so no need to ditch the free platform. I'll be announcing the new launch on Facebook and Instagram, so be sure you're friends with me and/or following so you don't miss it!
Also, this week in the Pulse Pledge challenge, Jeff and I made one of our very favorite recipes- Moroccan Steak Salad! It's a beautiful, delicious salad with steak strips, arugula, chickpeas, couscous, apricots, and a homemade dressing. SO GOOD! I've been trying to coordinate my Pulse Pledge meals with eating beef, and this recipe always hits it out of the park! If you're interested in the recipe, let me know and I'll share.
See the chickpeas in there? Moroccan Steak Salad! A favorite recipe in our house!
So, that's the week of February 14-20 in Fitness, Farm, and Life! How was your week? What's coming up this week that you're excited for?
Can you believe it's Thursday and I'm actually posting my Thankful Thursday post ON THURSDAY? That hasn't happened in a few weeks! Yay me!
I was doing some research yesterday at work on coming up with age-appropriate thought provoking questions to get teenagers to think and I came across the blog post/website whose link is listed above this photo. I really did think the images were nice and the questions really did make me think. Click on the link below to see the whole thing. I'm probably going to start subscribing to that blog because I'm always on the lookout for more positive-thinking messages.
Anyway, I thought the image below was particularly apt for a Thankful Thursday.
So... Do you celebrate the things you have? (Or do you bemoan the things you don't have?)
I have a really wonderful husband, the best dog ever, wonderful family and friends, a nice place to live, a good job, excellent health... the list could go on and on. Sometimes thinking about what we wish we had or wish we had done differently really only serves to downplay what we already DO have that really is pretty good. This strain of negativity can come from comparing ourselves to others, or simply failing to recognize the good that already is all around us. Today, challenge yourself to make a list or to think about what's going really well in your life and be glad for those things. Practice gratitude.
A few other things I want to specifically call out and say Thanks for--
1) Hospitality
Jeff and I have been crashing Tom and Carol's house for the past six weeks or so during the calving season. We've been lounging on their furniture, working out in their basement, eating all of their food, using up precious internet bandwidth, and just generally taking up space. I'm sure they're ready to have the house to themselves again. But I've never heard any complaints. In fact, it's been nothing but hospitality, fellowship and generosity from T and C. I thank them for hosting us, and for getting the coffee ready each night or morning.
2) Friendship
As always, I appreciate the friendship of Stephanie, even in this time when she's figuring out what's next. She always has a smile on her face and a welcoming comment. I know that all of our days are brightened by having her around. She certainly is a hard worker, and Jeff and Tom have both commented on her positive attitude and can-do spirit. And her pies are outstanding.
This is a slice of coconut cream pie that Stennie recently made. So good!
3) Peace Pilgrim.
Lastly, again while doing some research for an activity at school, I came across this quote: "If we knew how powerful our thoughts were, we would never again have another negative thought." ~ Peace Pilgrim Her methods might be a little out there for most of us, but her message and purpose is clear. That quote is something that resonated with me because, well, I don't need any help being negative, and I've seen the effect negativity has had on my own life in the past. That's why I started doing Thankful Thursday. I'm trying to change my own thought patterns for the better. I hope that you keep checking in on Thursdays and I hope that you're making efforts to be more positive, too.
Have a great weekend, everyone! What are you thankful for this week?
