Things that can go wrong on the farm..

We've been crazy busy around here. Seems every time I turn around there's more baby something popping out!!

Wanna hear some farm drama??

Brownie was our first cow to calve this year. She was bred to a mini Jersey (I do the artificial insemination myself). After several sleepless nights of waking to check on her, I didn’t check on a Friday night and, of course, Saturday morning she had a heifer calf walking around. Figures, right?!

But that’s OK! I was glad they were both doing great and that she had a heifer. SO cute, small, and pretty!

Her name is Cocoa!

Well then, next up was Taffy, or so we thought. Everyone knows Taffy, our mini Jersey! AKA, Taffy-the-turd LOL.

But Candy was in the race. We didn't have an exact breeding date for Candy as Red-Bull, as we call him, bred her. But she started dripping milk so I was sure it was time. Few days later, no calf and she was just not herself, not eating and she's not known for missing a meal.

She's also FAT, which in turn created another problem.. Candy ended up getting Ketosis, pregnancy toxemia. Long story short, she was too fat, couldn't eat enough to keep up with growing baby demands. It's just a viscous cycle... We pulled her through with some high energy/high calorie supplements. She finally calved about a week later. But we weren't out of the woods yet.

While we were waiting for Candy to calve, Taffy popped out a little heifer calf in the neighbors pasture! You wanna talk about tiny, OMG!! 21 inches tall at birth, and SO SO adorable!

I mean, that face!!

So then, just a few days after Taffy had baby Apple (don't you love that name?? Apple, get it? Taffy Apple ;)

Candy went into labor. But after pushing for over an hour I checked her. Yep, everything in order, 2 front hooves and a nose ready to come out. Another 30 min of pushing and still no progress. So Scott helped me pull a pretty large bull calf. Both mom and baby were doing great! But Candy still had ketosis issues, I had to give her a Dextrose IV and tube her high energy supplements daily. I think she's finally in the clear, Thank you God!!

Next up, Malibu. (You thought I was done didn't ya?? HAHA!)

She went right on her due date. Hoping to video tape the birth, but I was at work.

9:30AM no calf

1PM calf

Everything great with her and her heifer calf. Until the next day. Malibu went down with Milk Fever!

Scott caught it when she was in the wobbly stage. I came home from work to check her and get advice from the vet (our vet is not making farm calls because of medical issues so I was on my own). Milk Fever is a severe calcium deficiency, mostly because Mal is a ridiculous milker. She produces so much that even though we gave her a tube of calcium right after calving it wasn't enough!

So I had to give Malibu a calcium IV, which can actually kill them if you give it too fast. Yay, right??

All is well though. Mal was up within 10 min after the IV eating and drinking! Thank you again Lord, because I couldn't do all these things without the knowledge you've given me!!

This all happened in the span of less than 2 weeks! Whew, I'm emotionally beat!

But all these adorable faces make it worth while. They are behind the farmstore if you want to take a peak :)

And Malibu's baby is for sale. Full size purebred Jersey if you're looking for a future milk cow (hint hint)

We still have 1 more heifer to calve next month (they're called heifers until they have a calf or 2)!

With all these calves being born, that means we have an abundance of milk! Like, seriously, get over here and buy some milk! The pigs aren't complaining though, that's how we have the best tasting pork and chicken around. They get fed the extra milk.

We have enough that we can separate cream and have thick delicious cream for sale in the store. Use it for whipping cream, in-your-coffee-cream, or just scoop it out with a spoon and eat it cream, I won't tell!

What to do with all this milk and cream?? There's plenty of recipes in our blog, but, in this heat, ICE CREAM of course!

Next month, more baby goats.. Can I get a nap yet??