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A spring morn update….
….and the grass is a long time coming. We’re keeping the main herd in this sacrifice pasture and continuing to feed hay. Just because we miscalculated we can’t ask the cows to pay for our mistake! Not only isn’t there enough yet, but this early the grass is “washy”…not as nutrient rich. On the other hand, you can’t see it but there is a beautiful stand of clover coming along. We estimate in a few weeks we’ll be able to move the herd to begin our serious rotational grazing. The steer calf in the picture is half English…the full English cow sharing the hay was calved at Thistle Hill and…
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Bribery update…
A few years ago, on an introductory trip to meet our partners in England, Church was given a wonderful gift by his grandmother: the right to select any heifer he wanted from the Ashott-Barton herd. The young cow he selected—-without any prompting from me—was from the Bribery line which I had long coveted. Because of import restrictions against live animals, we bred the heifer in England and shipped the frozen embryos to Thistle Hill. Five months later, here’s the result:
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Surprise…
The oldest cow in our herd at 16, M180, greeted us with a bull calf. Baby is an 82 pound bull calf by an English bull, TDA Highwayman. M180 was purchased from Lakota ranch years ago and has produced a string of nice calves. She preg checked open and gave no sign she was expecting. In fact, she had been at the top of the list in our discussion of potential culls. Back to the drawing board. And did you notice the new green grass now that the snow has melted? David
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An inspection tour…
…the new management took me around to check on our cows the other day. With my usual impeccable timing, we were right in the middle of a blizzard. Carolyn and Church got a close look but I stayed in the car, which promptly got stuck in the snow. But the main herd looked great…featuring a beautiful calf crop staring a Tulip youngster from England who is going to make a major impact soon. It is personally rewarding to see the farm, which was founded almost 75 years ago, doing so well under the next generations. PS: they sent a 4-wheel for me and a tractor for the car! David
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Young cattleman of the year….
…if you’ll permit a proud Grandpa to brag. Grandson Church has just been named one of the 12 outstanding young cattlemen of the year by the leading grass fed organization in the country. The Grass Fed Exchange will salute the 12 young men and women at their annual meeting in Santa Rosa, California in April. The Grass Fed Exchange is an organization of regenerative farmers, processors and food experts dedicated to producing the highest quality meat and dairy products on grass. Each year they give full fellowships to promising young men and women starting out in the field of sustainable grass farming. Church manages our Thistle Hill herd of 34…
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The joy of farming….
Grandson Church is taking a post graduate course in biology this winter…and a course on everything else here at the farm. It’s easy enough rolling out the hay and makes for a nice picture but…but… The trick is to get the tractor started in zero temps and the bale positioned with the plastic wrapping off so the clamps grab it at the mid-point so the hay rolls out in an even line. The cows clearly look forward to their breakfast-almost-in-bed and you can see a calf or two moving in for a bite. What the young ones really like is sleeping in the hay instead of the frozen ground! The…
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An early morning stroll…
…with her new baby boy. THF 18 is 13 years old now and still performing beautifully. She is out of the Guardsman line that the Enghs brought into the breed to improve milking. Technically he was a Milking Devon and so also brought long legs into the breed. Guardsman later went on to Leonor Creek. This bull calf weighed 75 pounds and Church uses a hook on our pickup to hold up the newborns. (Why back in my day we lifted the scale head high to see the dial without any new-fangled gimmicks!) 😀 The sire was TDA Cutcombe…one of our traditional English Devon bulls. Again note the deep ruby…
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Let the real test begin…
…in the final analysis it’s not the bull…nor the pedigree…but the calves. Cutcombe represents one of the first second generation all English animals born in America. Sired by Ashott Barton Millennium falcon and out of TDA 4. We hope to see his deep ruby red coat show up in his upcoming calves. And Cutcombe’s first calves are due any day now.
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Buddy is in the house!
Thanks to son Church Matthews on several levels. To explain: “Buddy” is this two-week old calf, a twin rejected by his mother that we brought into the garage and bottle-fed. In addition to being orphaned, he also had a serious infection that had crippled him and left him mostly blind. That required we “break protocol” and use antibiotics. Several days ago, we put him outside in a protected pen and permitted some of our nursing cows to visit….hoping for an “adoption”. It didn’t happen. And now, with up to three-feet of snow in our forecast this weekend, we decided we needed him where we could be sure we could get…