Thursday, March 31, 2011

March weather

Okay so March has definately been gloomy rainy wet and cold, and snowy! Above is looking out from our house. This was the typical scene in March. Just cold overcast. SO, because it does get rainy and snowy and wet, there are things that we need to be mindful of. Things that we normally would never think about in PD, because it NEVER rained in the desert.



Take the cushions off the chairs


Cover the hay. If hay gets wet, it gets moldy and it will make animals die. Except for Cows. Cows have 4 stomachs so they can eat anything. (in case you were wondering)


Look at the chickens, they are hiding from the wind inside the goat shelter.


And in case you didn't see this pic of me on fb, this is what I look like the whole winter. Scarves/coats/furry hats are a must.

Sunday, March 13, 2011

Cows





Okay I know. We are seriously farm geeks. So we got cows. Not for milking. We got meat cows. So in the cow world: castrated cows are called steer. And the ones that still have their manhood, those are the bulls...the mean bulls! Female cows are literally called heifers. HAHAHA! Seriously, so when someone calls you a heifer, they are literally calling you a cow. HA.

We got 2 baby Holstein Steer. There are many different breeds of cows. Holstein is just a random breed well known for backyard farming and being generally easy to raise.

Cows are usually sold at $1.00 or $1.50 / lb. These cows are 5 months old and are around 300 lbs each. We bought them from a guy that just kind of needed to sell them so we got them for a good price. A full grown cow that is ready to go to slaughter is usually around 1200 lbs. And they are usually about a year and a half. So we will raise these guys for about a year....hopefully we don't get too attached!
Hank meeting the cows for the first time. He's our official animal checker.



They have about an acre and a half fenced off to roam freely right now. Eventually, we are going to fence off this 5 acre area in our yard and have the cows there. Then we will put the goats where the cows are now. We love that we can have happy roaming animals!