The first chores of grass season

Do you know what the hardest thing for me as a farmer is? Waiting to put the cattle out on grass for the first time in spring. I held off as long as I could this year, but with new babies being born, last week was our first week on grass. For the first few weeks, the cattle always have a few cakes of hay to eat along with the lush clover because spring grass is so rich! Cattle can be at risk for bloating during these early spring days and the fibrous structure of the hay helps to prevent that from happening.

We are two calves into to our calving season this year! We always have some early bird mamas, but it looks like we are gearing up for another bunch of calves in one day with how some of our cows are filling up with milk. The easiest way to tell if a cow is soon to calve is how swollen her udder is. There are at least four cows that are looking like they could calve any day.

I’ve been working hard at checking the trees in our silvopasture and making sure everything is ready to go for another grazing season. Some of the trees needed new shelters to protect their bark from being chewed on by the cattle. Others needed to be replanted. Overall our success rate has been really high for this planting of trees and it is always exciting to watch the leaves pop out in these warm days. Shade is just around the corner for our cattle and a number of our willows and populars will provide dappled shade this year!

Spring always has a long list of chores that happen every year:

• Fence repairs

• Water hose repairs

• Waterer repairs

• Triming/cleaning of brush

  The warm weather and an audiobook always make work light.