NORTHWEST ARKANSAS — I am tired today after sitting up with a couple of cows all night. I am thankful they are having calves in the fall instead of a February snow storm, and I still get tired when waiting for those calves to hit the ground.
The trouble was not calves too big; it was cows too fat. I have been doing this long enough to know better, but it sure is hard to ration feed when they are bawling at you and begging.
I try to keep a condition on all the cattle and I want to do what is best for them, especially the ones about to calve. My vet reminded me a month ago to slack off on the feed.
The old cow that was longest calving last night was carrying fat pones around her tail and I felt bad that she was in labor so long. I suspect my average frame score is around 12. Those good cows are easy keepers, too, making it a difficult chore to pull weight off them.
The calf crop hasstarted good; haven’t lost any yet, but we aren’t but about a third of the way through. I know the flies are bad and some scours are seen every day, but the old hides give lots of milk. I listen for coughing and none has appeared as of today.
I talked to the vet about vaccinating for pinkeye and some other maladies that cattle are prone to and he said we might need to. I don’t know exactly how to figure the cost into what seems like such a small net profit. I know the trucking is gonna be sky high this year and might make me want some other poor devil to own them at shipping time.
That’s the rub when you depend on cattle to make your living. The profit is slim to none, and yet a feller has to take care of the herd. The vaccines and even the minerals are cutting into the net because hauling costs are so high for the retailers. We are not immune to hardtimes even when we own our place and have the tractor paid off!
A bad scenario involving a hip-locked calf and your better-than-average cow will cost in the neighborhood of a couple of hundred dollars. She might live and she might not and it is a toss up about getting a live calf. Even if the thing flies like it should, the cow is gonna have to recover and you are going to spend hours making sure the calf sucks and the cow heals. What does that cost you? When it is all said and done, I just don’t know.
I have been riding through the herd about three times a day and Snip is getting in pretty good shape. The exercise doesn’t hurt me any, either. Horseback is a good way for a close look at things and I enjoy it, too.
It is my opinion, and everyone has one, better days are coming and, if they are slow in getting here, we just gotta do our best. I have put the pencil to the paper many times, figured in and out, but the best I can say is just trust the Lord and keep up your end of the deal.
Bill is a pen name used by the Gravette author of this weekly column.
Opinion, Pages 6 on 09/19/2012