“Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.”
– Wizard of Oz
Hayshed gets a makeover
Our dairy farm now boasts a hay shed roof that spans 20 acres. Bits of it, anyway.
We knew yesterday’s winds were coming, so had shifted the cows, heifers and calves to shelter.
The calves big enough to be weaned in the next couple of weeks were bunkered down in the hay shed when Mother Nature began her renovation work. Thankfully, none of them or the Maremmas who live with them were injured.
Nor were any of the yearlings who could have escaped through crushed fences Alex and I discovered during “border patrol” this morning. We count ourselves very lucky.
Alex aboard the lazy milk maid’s chainsaw
Crikey Marian! Glad to hear no lives were lost during mother natures rampage!
Thanks George, insurance will help restore the shed but nothing would bring back our suckies.
It was “exciting”, wasn’t it? We lost a few limbs (trees that is) with one across a fence. Our first Mother Nature trial! All OK for us, but many others were not so lucky. Hope you get your shed replaced in a timely manner.
Great to hear that everything is okay on the top of the hill, Julie!
Feel for you Marian Lets hope your insurer is supportive and moves fast
Thanks Lynne. They say a builder should call in 24 hours.
Glad to hear you and the livestock are all OK. Yes, Mother Nature can throw some big ones at us. We do get the occasional tornado here as well. One storm dropped a tree on my husbands van, not 30 minutes after he got home. Watched the tree spin in a circle and go down.
Wow. That would be amazing to see. Thank goodness Mr Lavinia was inside!
It was a doozy of a wind wasn’t it? I love your description ”the lazy milk maid’s chainsaw.” 🙂 We only lost the small pop-top off one of our caravans! Nothing by comparison…
You’re lucky to be tucked away in the embrace of the forest there, Kayepea. Sorry about the caravan top, though – hope you can get it fixed without too much fuss. If you need someone to tow it to the Valley, let me know.
Oh wow! We’ve just started to get the winds. August is our windy dry month and the winds have arrived right on cue! I hope it doesn’t get that windy here!
Fingers crossed.
Everything is crossed! Inches of moisture not inches of wind!
So glad that you are okay. Winds like that are just plain horrible. Sorry about your shed though
Are they common up there, Threecollie?
Chuckled when I read about the calves in the shed. Reminded me of our storm induced ‘calf shed de-roofing’ a number of years ago and the bemused look on all the little faces saying “My, it has got very light in here suddenly”. : )
And you were in there at the time? Wow!
Hi Marion.
Just read you bull experience. I was very gung-ho with bulls until one that I could pat in the dairy yard dropped and gored me after I hit him across his neck with a poly stick cause he would not leave his paddock to join the cows – thought I was doing him a favour!!
As the 950kg barrelled me along the ground I thought my only defence was to elbow his nose as there are not many soft bits on a bulls head.
Either it was effective or he decided to stop. I got up and sprinted the 25 mts to the gate, he watched for a few seconds then charged after me – I opened the gate into the cows as I thought it was the best way to handle a bull that had the better of me once. It was 6 am on a Saturday morning with no one else around.
On walking back into the pit I realised that most of my shirt was ripped off, my legs turned to jelly and I literally collapsed on the pit floor, probably from shock.
The bull went to Koonwarra market Monday am but walked to the yards in a group of cows.
The morel of this story is that I have MUCH more respect for bulls now and will only keep them a couple of years as they start to get aggressive around 4 years old AND a 55-60 kg chick with a poly stick is no match for an agro bull!!
max Jelbart
Thank goodness you survived to tell us about it Max!