The Calmness of Herding Cattle

Herding cattle is a bit like synchronized dancing.  It doesn't involve electric rods or scary sounds or running.  Instead, it takes quiet, gentle movements and in some ways, getting into the minds of the cattle.  I love working with cattle because I love watching the cattle think.  I know which way they are thinking of moving by the movement of their heads.  I can tell if they are tensing their body to start running.  Or if they are aware of you and okay with you or afraid of you. 

A lot of how we herd cattle is in the simplest, smallest movements.  I don't rush around (most of the time) trying to push them here and there and everywhere.  I've found that if I stretch my arms out, I look big and can push a line of cattle in a straight direction.  I've found if I move my right arm in a certain way, I can guide an animal to turn to the left.  I often walk behind a herd of cattle off to the side, so they can see me following them, which keeps them contained in a line walking in one direction. 

But first you have to herd them, slowly, gently into a group.  A group that is moving in the direction you want it to.  I do this through a series of movements behind the outlying cattle, the ones that aren't a part of the group and slowly make them join together in a moving mass.  You might have seen how cattle dogs group cattle or sheep by moving back and forth to keep them in a tight group.  I do the same thing, just a bit slower and calmer. 

This works, 75% of the time.  The other 25% involves stubborn cattle who want to turn towards you and walk in the other direction.  Or the herd is feeling happy because it is cool weather and they just were put out on pasture and they want to run, run, run with their feet kicking in the air in the sassiest free form dance.  In these cases, it is easiest to just take a moment to laugh at their joy and then once again, slowly, calmly, work them back to where they are supposed to be. 

Cattle herd the best when they have been on pasture for a month or two and they know that a downed line and a farmer means there is new grass on the other side.  On those days, they move themselves!  These are the best days, when all I have to do is roll up the electric fence 10 feet and as I am doing that, they are dutifully lining up to walk into the new pasture.  Easy as pie.

When I first started herding cattle, I couldn't get them to budge an inch.  I would spend hours trying to wrangle one animal back into the herd when it made its way off into a different patch of grass.  My dad made it look effortless, but I had to depend on poly wire fencing.  I spent a lot of time watching my dad, how he would move and watching the cattle, how they would respond.  I learned to move with slow, gradual steps instead of rushing, which in the end takes more time when you lose control. For us, being a cattle farmer is about far more than owning cattle.  In our work, we strive to understand how the cattle move and think to make our farm as cattle-friendly as possible, which in the end, makes life a lot easier for us.

A Love Letter to Farming

People often comment that I must have the best life.  I make my own schedule.  I work at home.  I live the idealized life of the perfect homesteader in the Garden of Eden.  And, they are 100% right about 50% of the time.  Just like everything else, farming is exhausting, exhilarating, a kick in the stomach, a flutter of joy, and most of all, something that changes from day to day.

Let me tell you a story…

Eevee was born last July on one of my busiest weekends of the year.  When I found her lying in the pasture, she was perfect, except for her one little leg that wasn’t laying at quite the right angle.  How did it happen?  I don’t know.  She could have fallen wrong as she was born, she could have been stepped on.  As a farmer, I have learned that sometimes my control of a situation is limited and that laying the blame at my own feet in these situations is often pointless.  So, I held her tight, so she wouldn’t move and with the help of my dad and instructions from our vet, we made a cast for her.

I told her that day, “Life is rough, little one.  If you make it, you get a name.”  The prognosis wasn’t good with infection being a real risk. 

So, Eevee and I started a journey.

I spent my first weekend with her, teaching her how to suck on my fingers, so that she would learn to feed from a bottle.  I fed her every two hours to get her to eat and washed her leg daily.

After three days, Eevee came to live in the fenced in yard next to my house and was hopping around energetically on her three legs and cast.  For three months, I washed her leg daily, fed her at least twice a day and gave her meds to beat infection and pain.

There were many days that I thought she wasn’t going to make it.  Not that she ever seemed less than a peppy, happy little calf.  It was my own fear as a farmer that I wasn’t doing enough or that in spite of all my efforts, it wouldn’t be enough.

But it was.  

After approximately 4 weeks in the cast, we took the cast off and Eevee was free!  She still hopped on 3 legs for a while, but then she began to walk and finally run.

There is nothing quite so satisfying as watching a 3 month old calf run like the dickens on a leg that was broken only a short time ago.

At four months old, Eevee joined the rest of the herd with a fully healed leg and a tendency to follow my four-wheeler around the farm regardless of electric fencing.  She is weaned off the bottle and happily living on hay, grass and sunshine.

I check on her often, give her an extra neck rub, and thank my lucky stars that everything I did was enough.

Eevee single-hoofedly taught me more over those months than many of my other animals.  She taught me the power of perseverance, the grace of forgiving my own mistakes, and re-affirmed in my mind the value of caring for my animals and land to foster health and happiness.

And this is why farming is beautiful.  Not because farmers live an idyllic lifestyle…

Because farming is getting down in the dirt, pushing through the hard, loving the land and the animals till they are a part of you, and at the end of the day, being ground, hammered, and formed into a better person by the experiences and nature around you.

I am so lucky to be a farmer.