Summer in September

After an unusually cool summer, here we get a stretch of 80 degree weather. Not that I'm complaining or anything. It is a great finish to the growing season. But, we are still low on rain. The streams and lakes continue to shrink. The watering hole we have in one paddock completely dried up. So my dad took his tractor and scraped out the muck and made it a little deeper. We have water in there once again. It is spring fed. Normally, even though it's shallow, the water stays fresh and clear with very little algae and takes a long time to freeze in winter.

We almost got us a milk cow. It was all set, the only thing we had to do was make a shelter for her and a place to do the milking. Last weekend we went to see her for the first time and Kelli tried her hand at milking the cow. The cow is a Jersey named Tiny. She's called Tiny because her two rear teats are very small. I think it's a funny name but, my family wanted to change the name if we got her because they thought it was insulting to the cow. I think it's funny also, that they think it is insulting. I think it is entirely appropriate, but that's just me. ha, ha..... Anyway, after we saw the cow we saw that she had diarrhea and that she was a little on the skinny side. We know milk cows can be bony but, she seemed excessively so. I could be mistaken but, I think the farmer said she had the diarrhea since June when she went out on pasture. That seems like a long time to me. Our animals often get it too when put on pasture but, tighten up in a week or so, not months. So we have been kind of apprehensive about going into winter with a cow that is thin and has diarrhea.

The story on this particular jersey cow is that another family owns her and they keep her at a farm where the farmer takes care of her and does all the milking. They in turn buy the milk from him, from their own cow. This is his payment for boarding and milking the animal. I guess this is one way of getting around regulations. Plus, they don't have the room for her at their place. The reason Tiny is for sale is because the farmer is wanting to simplify his life some and wants to have one less responsibility.

Well, we went to see the family that owns Tiny and they said if we didn't want her then they would just turn her into hamburger. No big deal because they said they need the meat anyway. They also said that the farmer told them that Tiny is getting harder to milk and is getting more and more impatient. So between the health issues and Tiny possibly developing an attitude problem, we decided to hold off on getting a cow at this time. Which is actually a relief because I have no idea when I'll find the time to put up a shelter and build a milking stanchion.

Earlier I wrote a check and had to look at the date on the calender to remember what day it was. I saw that it was 9-11 and had an instant reaction to the date. I knew it was coming up but, when I wrote it I had instant recall of that day as I'm sure so many people do from that infamous day. I won't go into my personal opinions about 9-11-2001 but, it sure turned our world upside down. We have the seemingly never ending "war on terror". Two seemingly never ending wars in two different countries. And an economy that is in total shambles.

I remember exactly what I was doing and where I was on September 11, 2001 when I first heard the news. So this is my little tribute to that day.

But, back to the subject at hand, summer came and went and is back again in September. 80 degrees is in the forecast for the next several days. Amazing! People every where are talking about it. Cool weather when we should have warm weather and now warm weather when we should have cool. It seems like even the weather is upside down these days.

At least with the warm dry weather it makes setting up and taking down the farm stand more enjoyable. Sales slowed down after Labor Day but, people are still coming. We've turned it to self serve, probably for the rest of the season.

Well, that's all for now.

Until Next Time