Dance Partner

Meet Moosters Dance Partner

 



He's the horned son of CJS Resta and 'Dance.  We think he's going to make an awesome little bull.  Partner will be for sale this fall when he's weaned.

 

Black, carries red, A2/A2, horned, parentage verified, chondro and PHA free

 

Plus!  He has the sweetest temperament already.  His momma has a beautiful udder, still, at 8 years old. 

 



 

 



Winter - I Mean Spring - in Wyoming

The weather reports were right on target this time.  On Monday, we moved through a weather advisory, to a winter storm watch and finally on to the warning.  We're signed up for the Niobrara County emergency notifications, so the home phone, cell phone, text message and emails rolled in from the county as well.  You'd have to be oblivious to not realize that we were going to get some significant snow.s

With so many calves and a not so big run in area for that many momma Dexters and baby Dexters, we did something we've never done before (but now plan to make a permanent feature):

We cobbled together a gate for our lane and opened the gate from the pasture to our yard and machine shed (where we store all the "spare" hay).  Chris got busy on the tractor and moved bales until we had enough room to fit all the girls and the kids.

Half the crew thought they were getting away with something (and hit the alfalfa bales really hard!), the other half were steadfastly staying in the pasture run in even when the snow started:

We moved them all up to the yard and machine shed.  The calves soon decided that this was the life!



 

And the storm arrived as predicted (for a change!):

 



 

It snowed through Monday night and most of the day Tuesday.  We're well over a foot and the drifts are amazing -- 



 

We woke this morning to a rainbow with the rising sun.  Just beautiful.......  No complaints here.  We're grateful for the moisture that the snow brings to our very needy pastures. 

Now we just have to convince the whole crew to go back where they belong tomorrow!

Another surprise

This year's calving season has been so full of surprise and intrigue.  This week's latest was an unexpected set of twins!  Unfortunately, the little (and I use that word literally) female was stillborn, but the bull calf appears to be doing well as of this writing. 

 



We'd been watching Swallow most of the morning because she was restless and wandering the pasture alone.  I had to run (okay, drive) to town for an appointment, so Chris was in the pasture checking on her when I pulled up to the house.  He met me inside with a serious face and the news that Swallow had calved and that it was dead.  He asked me to come with him to remove the calf because momma was frantically trying to revive it.  Imagine our surprise when we got back to the birthing spot to find a just born second calf!

Poor Swallow.  She was still attempting to revive the first calf,  then she'd rush over to the new one and give him a quick lick.  Since he needed all of momma's attention, we knew that we needed to get the dead calf away, but momma wasn't having any of that either!  Chris finally edged the ATV over the dead twin while Swallow was attending the live one for a moment.  He was able to pull the dead calf underneath and lay her in the back of the ATV.  We backed away and watched as Swallow's confusion left her and she became a momma to one.

The dead twin was a heifer who apparently didn't thrive well in the womb.  She was sunken looking, weighed next to nothing and didn't take a breath after she was born.  Since she was the female twin of a bull, she'd have also been a freemartin (sterile) had she lived.  The horned male will probably be "Swallow's steer" as that will be his destiny and we don't usually give the steers "real" names. 

We're sure hoping the rest of the season is uneventful.  Ten live calves on the ground and five more to go for spring.....we're a few weeks away (I think) from the next one.

Everybody Loves a Good Fight...

This morning, like most every morning, I take a walk to the pasture to check on the girls and the calves.  It's usually early, so the deer and turkeys are often around as well and most of the time, it's live and let live.  Not being a turkey expert, I can still guess that it must be mating season in turkey land.  The boys apparently fight over the girls.

This is what was going on - two males dueling in the pasture.

This is the audience!  They called and kicked dust and generally behaved like a bunch of drunks at a bar fight.  Then they realized that the kids were watching too -- so they ran as far away as fast as they could go!

Still acting like total goofballs, but headed away from the fight.

Several of the girls just couldn't help themselves and had to go take another look.....

All in all it was really an entertaining morning!

***My apologies for the quality of the photos.  Usually I have the camera and my smart phone in my pocket when I go out for my morning walk.  This morning both had lower than low batteries, so I grabbed Chris' not so smart phone.  It did take pictures, so I guess it's not so dumb after all.

It's a very Red spring

We are fortunate this year - so far, all of our new heifers are red.  Not that we won't be happy with a black heifer, but we just Love the little red girls! 

 

 

Born March 18, here's Swing Dance, daughter of Brezes and Dance.  She's red, polled (we think) and a sweet little beauty. 

This little fireball is Moosters RiverDance, daughter of Saphire and Dance.  She's also a great-granddaughter of Brezes (above).  She's only a few days old, but she doesn't stop moving!  And, like her mother, she's really people oriented already. 

This is Meara's FlashDance.  She is a character.  She's built just wonderfully, but even better, she likes us and I swear she has a sense of humor.  Flash is living up to her name as she is truly photogenic as well.

And here's Dance Machine at a little over two weeks old.  He's a stud!  And even better, his test is back from UC Davis - he IS homozygous polled!  I predict that he may be sticking around for a while...

We're still battling winter vs. spring around here.  Back to the deep freeze tomorrow with high winds and a possibility of snow.  We'll be out checking on the herd often.  Swallow is getting very close to calving so we're especially concerned about her.  Spring can just stick around after this - we can hope, right?

Our adventurous heifers

This is our newest heifer, Moosters Tap Dance, red horned daughter of 'Dance and Rally.  This is Tap Dance getting her ride in the ATV because....she managed to get through a 7 strand barbed wire fence.  When I woke up this morning, I could see Rally literally running along the fence line, attempting to climb it.  A look through the binoculars confirmed that there was a calf on the other side of the fence.  Really?  I'm still trying to figure this one out.  That fence line was originally put up to keep goats in.  We didn't find any holes either.

We loaded her up and brought her back to the pasture where all the cattle are supposed to be confined.  Hmmm. 

She's another gorgeous little heifer and all's well that ends well.

Five and counting

Acqua di is doing very well despite her watery beginnings.  She's been joined by (as of yesterday) four more baby Moosters.  Spring must be just around the corner!  We're still on calf watch for a few more - this week, we hope - then the rest of the spring girls will stretch out over the next month or two.

So far,

 

Acqua di and momma Jasmine

 

 

Halo and Moosters Sledge Hammer (son of Moosters Yamaha)

 

 

Meara and her little Moosters Flash Dance (a 'Dance daughter)

 



 

 We have two more (we still need good pictures for the baby albums):  Moosters Square Dance, red horned heifer - daughter of  Thomas' RY Red Roseta, aka Wild Thing and 'Dance and Moosters Dance Machine, black polled bull, son of Dance and Bess.  We're having him tested to see if he might be homozygous. 

 

Toe tapping impatiently for the next babies......