A Star is Born

That's our girl Bessie in the top photo.  She's getting dry after her bath and tail trim.  Son Raisin is getting his very first bath ever! and he actually seemed to enjoy it.  No fighting, no kicking - what a boy!  Once they were clean and shiny representatives of the Dexter breed, they got a short ride to Lusk, where Bessie will have a walk on role in The Legend of Rawhide  She'll be playing the part of the milk cow!  A Star is Born. 

And yay!  one of my favorite days of the year.... The arrival of the first load of hay.  These bales are really nice hay, but are 1800 pounds.  Given the drought and the price of hay, we decided we'd better take what we can get this year - size wise.  Our little tractor doesn't care much for them, but with some ingenuity (and a battering ram, more or less) Chris was able to push the bales to the ground, then pick them up with the borrowed forklift.  Takes a bit longer, but it gets done.  The driver was very patient while we got off to a slow start.  A little practice and the remaining bales were soon put away PDQ.

Waiting to see the thunderstorms that we were told to "watch" for....  hope they get here because it means rain! 

Home Again

We're back from the ADCA Annual General Meeting, Show and Sale in Fort Wayne, Indiana.  Look what followed us home!  That's Bar None's Stewie and his mom, Bar None's Luna.  Both are chondro carriers - and yes, we know....we've always had a chondro free herd.  Here's the thing though - Luna is a perfect Dexter in every way.  She's just shorter - and we'll always breed her to our non-chondro bull (or an AI non-chondro bull) and test the offspring.

She has the sweetest personality, milks, shows - the whole package in one little Dexter cow.  Plus she's perfect for show and tell.  It's hard to explain the "difference" in carriers vs. non-carriers, so having one here for showing and telling will really help.  Having a chondro carrier at Moosters is a good thing! So she has short legs - so does Vicki!  'Guess we'll have to change our web page that says we have a chondro free herd. 

The AGM was a great experience, as usual.  Thanks to Linda for putting it all together!

There was food - a barbeque on Thursday evening, plus great catered dinners on Friday and Saturday nights.......

Clean little Dexters..........

Clean big Dexters.............

A judge from New Zealand.....

An auction with a singing auctioneer.......

Awards on Saturday night (we forgot the camera so no pictures of Saturday evening activities).  Loaded up early on Sunday morning and headed home.  It was great to see old friends and make new ones.  Dexter folks are just the best!

A Day in the Meadow

We didn't call ourselves Moosters Meadows for nothing!  Here are pictures from the herd wandering in part of the sub-irrigated meadow along the creek and in the trees (hiding from the deer flies). 

Green is good!  We had a tiny bit of rain this week - nothing to write home about - but rain is rain and we're happy for it.

That's our sweet Meara above with her Belle Fourche Washington calf - Euchee Creek's Red Rider.  He's polled and will be for sale in early fall once he's weaned and halter trained.  He is just gorgeous and one of the two males that will be kept as a bull rather than steered this year.  He's just 3 and a half months old right now! 

Seana in the meadow.  We've kept her 2011 heifer, Carnival Red and can't wait to see her 2012 calf with USommDance as the sire.  Love her look and her temperament!

And just to balance it out a bit - not all of our beauties are red and polled.  This is Moosters Rennie, black horned daughter of Resta and Winchester (she'll carry dun).  She'll truly be black once she loses that baby coat.  Like Rider, she will be for sale early this fall once she is weaned and halter trained.

And last, for today, but certainly not least, is Moosters Red Sky.  Daughter of Wrencesky and USommDance, she has a black nose and is doubled polled.  A very feminine little girl!  She'll be for sale this fall as well.

Here's Yanni!

Given that the AGM Show and Sale begins in 2 weeks, we should be starting to really get prepared to go.  Yanni is in fine form except for one teeny tiny little thing (okay, lots of teeny tiny little things....):  Warts on her chin. 

You can just make them out in this close up.  If cows could have acne, that's what this would look like!  Actually, I had my fingers crossed when we took her to the vet that it was something really simple and easily fixed with a tube of ointment.  No such luck for this year.  He trimmed on them a bit and said that if we were super lucky, they'd disappear quickly (or) if our show karma wasn't too good, then they'd spread and we'd be out for the season with her.  Ugh. 

In the scheme of life, this is just a bump in the road (or on the chin, if you prefer!).  Carnival hasn't been in the same corral, so she may/may not get them regardless of how careful we are with handling.  We decided that taking only one little heifer all the way to Indiana probably wasn't worth the level of effort it takes to get ready to show, so we've scratched both girls from the AGM.  We're still going though....  Wouldn't miss it for anything!

We have just over two months until the next show, so crossing of the fingers is in order.  Yanni looks awesome again this season, so we're sorry that we won't get to show her off.  The warts will clear up sooner or later and she'll be perfectly beautiful again!

****It's interesting to read about the dang warts, too -- some articles suggest that lack of nutrition, missing minerals or stress can bring on the warts.  Trust me, this heifer is so spoiled and stress free that it's not funny!  She eats show feed top dressed with kelp and other goodies,  has county appropriate loose mineral available at all times, quality hay and fresh water.  What more does a show heifer need?!   It's a virus that must run it's course.  At the wrong time of year for us.  Again, in the greater scheme of things, we just shrug our shoulders and move on!  I'll make her a ribbon for cutest heifer with warts in Wyoming!

This is Mulgwen.  She was introduced a few days ago as our final holdout for calving.  We are all sad because her calf was stillborn.  We know it happens; it's a fact of life with cattle that sometimes things just go wrong.  It doesn't make it any easier for her or for her owners.  Just sayin'.

Today's babysitter is Ruby.  That's her dun bull calf, Repeater, right in front of her. 

It's hard to believe that it's been nearly three weeks since the last post.  I think that means we are busy! 

The herd has been "worked" for the season - worming, shots, drawing blood for pregnancy tests for the fall girls, pulling tail hairs and more.  With only the two of us doing the deeds, it takes a few days and lots of moving here and there.  Many bruises, a few pulled muscles and one good conk on the head and we are done!  We won't be doing this again until weaning.  Hurray!

We've decided to sell our marshmallow bull, Gladhour Winchester.  Chris will be taking A.I. classes so that we'll be able to keep only one bull and daughters from that one bull.  Since red seems to be our favorite color, we'll be keeping 'Dance and selling Winchester.  He's three years old, polled and dun. He doesn't carry red.  He is easy going as they come.  Let us know if you'd like a great herd sire.

This is Mulgwen.  She is our last remaining holdout for the spring calving season.  Today she's finally gone off by herself, but we still haven't seen a baby yet.  Anxiously awaiting something!  Anything!  We'd even take another bull calf.  Really. 

Isn't she beautiful?  Once again, our wonderful Fawn has graced us with another heifer!  Last year we posted that Fawn always gives us lovely carbon copies of herself - and it looks like she's done it again.  Based on first "feel" we think this little girl is polled as well (thanks, 'Dance!).  She's a full sister to show girl Yanni.

Two more to go - Belle and Mulgwen.  We keep thinking that Mulgwen should calve soon, but she's making us wait.  Belle has at least another week to go and it could be as long as three.  Then we're done until fall.  It's going to be a busy halter training season this year!

It's time to start thinking about getting Yanni and Carnival ready to go to the ADCA's Show and Sale this year in Fort Wayne, Indiana (they aren't for sale, but we are showing them).  It's a long ride, especially pulling the trailer, but we know we'll stop overnight in Missouri to let the girls (and us) rest for the night.  It's a bit over 20 hours for us to get there, but we think that others are coming even farther than us!  We just turn it into our vacation and enjoy the ride!