My, How Times Have Changed? Or Have They?

My mother-in-law Marie, Jean Newell Fritzemeyer & Marjorie Giedinghagen

In an old scrapbook, this photo was labeled "3 cooks for cattle round up day."

I didn't wear my apron or my crisp cotton dress for our latest cattle round up day. I may have been the cook, too, but I was breathing in more than soup from the slow cooker ...

Like dust from an old barn's alleyway ...

... and eau de toilette (I know lots of consumers are into "organic" these days. This was organic all right! That's what happens when you're trying to push baby calves into the trailer!

While the trio of cooks from the 1950s were busy putting together a meal, the fellas were rounding up and sorting the cattle.

L to R: Clarence Fritzemeier (Randy's Grandpa) Milton Giedinghagen, Ben Fritzemeyer, Melvin Fritzemeier (my father-in-law) & Harve Fritzemeier. Yes there are two different spellings on Fritzemeier - it's not a typo!

My, how times have changed!

I'm certainly not denigrating the role my mother and mother-in-law fulfilled as farm wives and partners back in the 1950s during the early days of their marriage. The times were different. And I've had reminders of that as I've been reading the final book in my book challenge - a book written in my birth year - 1957. (I'll talk more about the book challenge in another post, but just to name a few differences - making phone calls in a phone booth and a $90 weekly salary as a secretary.)

But even though gender roles during the cattle sorting, working and moving process may be different in 2018 than they were in 1958, for example, some things never change.


Mamas protest from Kim Fritzemeier on Vimeo.

Mama cows still protest being separated from their babies ...

... even if it's only for a short time and even if it's for their baby's own good!

Back when Melvin and Marie were first starting out, they raised horned Herefords.

Today, we still have Hereford blood in our herd, but it's provided by two polled Hereford bulls.

And we've added Angus genetics to our crossbred herd as well.

We still sort the baby calves from the mamas, but it's no longer a men's club doing the separating ... hence the organic matter on my jeans!

Some mamas form "picket lines" and protest when their babies leave for their doctor's appointments.

Mother and calf, 1952

They were just as glad to be reunited then ...

... as now.

 A woman may be the person handing the ear tagger and syringes to the chief cattle "worker" these days. But at many farms, it's probably the woman doing it all herself.

But some things on our Kansas farm haven't changed during the five different generations that have been living and working along the Stafford/Reno County line.

 

And that's the desire to do our job to the best of our abilities and to make a difference in our community - man OR woman!

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And, this morning, it's time for more of that hands-on cattle work. We're moving heifers and bulls. Wish me luck! And Happy May Day!

Breaking Up Is Hard to Do

 

"Do do do

Down dooby doo down down
Comma, comma, down dooby doo down down
Comma, comma, down dooby doo down down
Breaking up is hard to do."

I have a song stuck in my head. If you have the same propensity for "ear worms," you might as well join me in humming that old Neil Sedaka song.

We "broke up" with some of our County Line cattle herd last week. Some of them - like an unusually-marked black and white calf - were harder to say goodbye to than others. I think his mom was the one who got a little riled up as we sorted babies from mamas. I wasn't as sad to see her go.

I'll miss these cute little masked guys, too.  They were among the 11 pair of our first-time mama heifers and their babies that we sold through Central Livestock Sale Barn in South Hutchinson last week. 

"Breaking up is hard to do" when you're sorting, too - at least, sometimes. But it went better than either Randy or I anticipated - even though I have no photographic evidence to prove that! As I've said before, I keep the camera in my pocket while we are actually sorting. It's better to use a sorting stick than a camera shutter while trying to get 1,000-pound-plus animals to move in a particular direction!

Randy had prepared a list of heifer pairs that we were going to keep. It was our first job to get them sorted off into another pen. Reading ear tag numbers on moving targets is always a challenge. But our double-check before we released them into a bigger pen showed that we had successfully completed our mission the first time around.

We then sorted our sell group, too. 

Then it was time to load the babies we were selling into the front of one trailer for their 40-mile trip to the sale barn. We kept the babies separate to prevent them from being inadvertently stepped on by their mamas in the trailer.

 

The moms weren't fans of the separation - even if it was for their babies' health. Their objections included hearty bellows and longing looks into the next pen.

We loaded the mamas into another trailer. Before we made the trek to Hutch, we picked up two pair at our home corrals. They were the final two to produce babies, so they were still in our calving corral. They rode with their babies in the back of the "bus" - so to speak. A partition inside the trailer separated them from the baby calves.

We were almost to the sale barn when we were blocked by a train. I should have brought a book. (I almost always do. I think we were waiting almost as long as it took to drive from home!) Randy ended up turning off the pickup and our "music" included a chorus of mama cow bawls, punctuated by the percussion of train cars banging together in a switching yard and the intermittent clickety-clack as the train cars rolled back and forth in front of us.

At last, we arrived at the sale barn.

We sold the 11 pair because we didn't have enough pasture to accommodate all the new babies and their mamas this summer. This isn't a sale that we do every year. However, we culled fewer older cows last fall. We had fewer babies die during our fairly mild winter - definitely a good thing. And our pastures are struggling anyway because of the lack of rain, so extra cattle on the acres isn't a profitable option. 

Randy chose the heifers and their babies because they would bring the best price, since the new owners would be able to breed them back for a number of years. Cows typically have 8 to 10 years of producing babies. Selling the younger females gives the new owners more chances to breed them back to increase their own herds.

In addition, we begin numbering our heifers and their calves from the beginning - matching them up from the start. We don't give ear tags to other calves until we work them in the spring. So we had a ready-made list of pairs to work from.

Even though our cattle already have ear tag numbers, the sale barn employees applied a white sticker to each of the animals we brought as they went through the chute.

You can see the sale barn number sticker on this baby's rump.

Those numbers help match the animals with the seller.

The babies were ushered through a different lane than their moms.

But they were paired back up and went to their new homes together.

I had a meeting in Stafford, so I wasn't able to go to the sale itself. My assistant photographer used his cell phone to get some photos of the sale ring.

Randy was pleased with the price - $1,710 a pair.

Maybe I'll replace that "Breaking Up Is Hard to Do" song with "We Work Hard for the Money."

Class of 2018: Bovine Edition

This photo taken Sunday, soon after the first baby of 2018 was born.

Welcome to the first arrivals of the Class of 2018! Our heifers were scheduled to begin calving on January 28. But, like human babies, due dates are not dictated by the calendar, but rather Mother Nature.

We have the 24 heifers in a corral near our house to make it easier to check the expectant mamas and with easy access to the calving shed, which we built a couple of years ago to replace a falling-down barn.

By definition, the heifers are expecting their first calves. Once upon a time, they were among the County Line's Class of 2016. Each year, we keep 25 of the female calves born to serve as replacement heifers for our cattle herd. (When the veterinarian did the preg checks in November, one of the 25 was scheduled for a very late arrival date, so she got pulled from the herd.)

We always schedule the heifers to calve first, since they require more frequent checks to make sure they can deliver without problems.

We try to alleviate as many problems as possible by using a bull which is expected to produce a lower birth weight baby. 

A baby girl was the first to arrive on Sunday, January 21. She got the first eartag of the year - No. 800. Each of the babies born during 2018 will get a tag that begins with an "8." As the cattle become "upperclassmen," it's easy to tell at a glance that they were born in 2018. That's especially important for the girls who will stay in our County Line herd. In a couple of years, No. 800 could be delivering a baby herself!

Number 801 is the first boy born this year. He took advantage of the comfier accommodations - hay rolled out in the corral for bedding.

The guys also freshened up the hay in the calving shed. Last night, the guys ran four heifers into the calving shed, mamas who Randy thought looked closer to calving. I always tease Randy about his cattleman prowess. Will a mama in the shed calve, giving credence to his observation skills?

This time, he was right! One of the mamas had a baby overnight - out of the wind and in the warmth provided by body heat in a small shed.

So far, the Class of 2018 consists of four members - all of whom arrived without help from the farmer.

Like that overused phrase from the movie Sunset Boulevard, the calves were "ready for their closeups." However, it won't be long before I'll need a video to keep up with their antics.

The forecast for the rest of the week shows warmer weather, perfect for calving. Let's hope the mamas agree and keep up the good work.