Such it life in Canada.
A long time since I have "blogged". Life just gets too busy to sit down and report on it!
We discovered that two calves were born during the night. Neil finds it amusing when he goes out back to check on the herd and it has increased as if by magic!
Babies are doing well - hopefully we will have very few problems this year. It can be grueling on a hot summer day to ensure your calves are thriving and not just laying down getting lethargic. Once that happens, the flies take advantage and start to lay their eggs in the
thick highland cattle fur that the calves have as well. They can do such damage to the
calf's system it they go too long undetected.
A couple of years ago, we had to go out back routinely, find this particular calf, clean it off and cover it with "swat" something to deter the flies. However, day after day, we attended to this calf when I decided to get some of the kids old T Shirts and put them on the calf to help
keep the flies away even better. Every morning we would find the shirt torn to bits but that
was okay. Put on a fresh one!
It worked really well. Anyway, this year we hope we do not have to repeat this process but we are ready if we do!
It is very peaceful out back where the cows roam. The younger calves are very active and love to gang up together. Sometimes it can be a problem. In a group, they are braver and tend to explore outside our fence line. One year they traveled to the neighbour's farm behind us. The gardener was so surprised to see them. He couldn't figure out what they were and his first thought was baby bison. They quickly scampered back to our place but it can be worrisome when you can't find them immediately. We called one group of four "the banditos". They were particularly active!
