One abnormally warm spring day in 2013 I got off work early and decided it would be a great afternoon for a hike. I could hike the hundred acres around the ranch and check the cows that were grazing in various smaller groups of their choosing. I had cabin fever which was ironic as I spent half my time at my office downtown and the other outside or in the barns of the ranch. Calving season had just concluded so I was not allotted much time for sleeping and eating. It a rancher’s joke about calving season although at time feels really—real!
By chance this was just a few days after the new shiny green calf table arrived on the ranch. Never having a calf table before to treat the calves in a more orderly way, there was much excitement over using it the first time. Spring banding, brands and vaccines—immunizations not hormones—would be so much easier. The upcoming Saturday would be its unveiling. Of course, it first had to be placed and anchored. Except as of this day, it was still being mulled over as to where it should be in the chute area without completely re-designing the 100-year-old chute system. It had been moved several times seeking out that harmonious place.
For those that don’t know what a calf table is for, it’s a much smaller version of a cattle squeeze. Once you have squeezed the calf in to prevent it from moving but not tight enough to harm it, you can pull the unit unto its side and then the calf is in a flat position on their side. This may sound bad but think of it as an exam table for the calves. It brings it to just above the knee height of most adults which is easier to work on the animal and the bars have springs so you can release one to six of them to work on the animal without obstruction.
The calves are generally worked up and anxious being without their cow moms who are in the adjoining pen and can kick and thrash about. Placing them in the calf table and then turning them on their sides relaxes them and it is safer for them and the humans working on them. Of course, like any tool you must work with them awhile before you get the swing of how it works. This was quite comical in the first year of using the calf table. After that first year its placement was key on having a pen around it for all the calves that escaped while we were trying to secure them.
I set out on my hike, and I noticed a handful of calves and their cow moms up in the tree line where the wild turkeys were following close behind them. I will leave it to your imagination as to what the turkeys were eating while in close pursuit of the cows. I followed the path alongside the creek and enjoyed the first signs of Spring. The daffodils in a wide variety of types were busting out everywhere and the tulip blades were just peeking through the ground. Unfortunately, the tulips would forever look like that because the deer at the flower buds the minute they began to blossom. For some reason, the deer did not like the daffodils or irises.
The creek was brimming right to the top of the bank and the cattails were still green with light green buds on the top. As I came to the sharp bend in the creek and looked up ahead to the natural valley and hillside beyond there were the rest of the cows lounging on beds of green luscious grass while chewing their cud. It was a picture-perfect sight, and I took out my camera and began snapping pictures. When I had a few dozen snapshots of the beauty I began to leisurely walk back down the same path I had followed in. I did not have to turn around to notice that the cows were following me. It was early enough in the spring that the pastures did not fill their tummy’s yet, and they still depended on me to throw them out some hay each day.
Back at the barn I had finished throwing out a bale of alfalfa and as I did each feeding time examined each cow. I learned early on that this was the best way of preventing something small from becoming a full-fledged issue. The cows looked fine, the bull was in good form, the steers were getting fat and sassy and the calves looked healthy and spry. Then I did a double take. Tuffy, one of the calves, had a large scrape on his rump, and it was starting to form a patch over what looked to be a rather large gash.
I called Richard and luck would have it he was making his way down the ranch’s driveway. He commented that if I could get Tuffy up to the chute area we could look at it there. He could not conceal the pleasure in his voice at being given an excuse to able to use that new calf table. Sometimes there is a fine line between a piece of equipment and a big toy.
As luck would have it Tuffy’s cow mom was a favorite, sweet, and docile cow, Noel, and it was not difficult to separate them out from the herd and make my way with them through the barnyard and up to the chute area. A little grain in a coffee can does wonders for persuading the cows from time to time. I am an amateur cow whisperer after all, and I need a few sneaky tricks to work the cows on my own.
We positioned the calf table at the end of the long chute that would normally lead them into a stock trailer but instead the calf would walk right into the calf table and the cow mom being too large to fit in to would just stand on the other side and offer comfort to her calf without getting in the way. This could not be a permanent placing unless we were never to trailer the cows off the property again. But for the first time it worked rather well although slightly off balance due to the uneven ground below it. It worked like a charm. Tuffy walked down the chute first with Noel behind him and we locked him into the calf table and rolled him to his side like we were pros. I think we were both feeling a little smug with our instant success at maneuvering the calf and calf table on our own without the whole team there.
To exam Tuffy’s rump we lowered two of the side bars and in doing so was perfectly centered and easy to see his scape. Richard began feeling around the odd shaped scrape and then directly on it with a look of puzzlement on his face. I inquired how bad was it. Tuffy didn’t seemed bothered by the examination. Richard said he did not know what it was. Something seemed off about what we thought was an injury. Then he felt some more all around the scraped area then putting his fingernails slightly under it. He shook his head and said it was not a scrape at all. It was a thick piece of pitch that was stuck to his hide. Try as we might with several different home remedies, we could not get the pitch of his hide. In the end we just had to leave the pitch there and hope it eventually fell off. We were rather thankful that nothing was wrong with Tuffy.
Then we had the dilemma of how to release Tuffy back to his cow mom. She was behind him and would not back up. If we up righted him and then let him proceed through the front of the calf squeeze, he would be free as a bird on the outside of the barnyard. Obviously, we had not given this placement of the calf table as much thought as we should have. In the end we let him free and hoped he wanted back with his cow mom more than freedom. Yes, cow mom, Noel, won. He was a momma’s boy. When Tuffy went to the livestock sale six months later he still had a piece of pitch stuck to his rump.
As for me, I will never forget the first time we used the calf table but after hundreds of calves through it I honestly do not remember the last time we used it or why… I do remember to carry the WD40 and a can of yellow jacket repellent each time we head to use the calf table because it’s always squeaky and rusty from sitting outside exposed to the elements and the tubes are wonderfully warm and succulent for sustaining the yellow jackets.