It's Cold Here!

I know for most of the nation that 34 isn't really cold, but for here it is. It has been averaging 34 degrees here for over a week. This has created problems for us. We can handle keeping the water flowing so all of our critters can drink, we can even handle going out and feeding in the rain, but what we can't handle is our babies dieing.
We have baby lambs out in the field. Most of them are about 2 months old and I love to watch them jump and play. They aren't used to snow. We have had snow off and on for the last 2 weeks culminating in about 4 inches! These babies are still with their moms and nursing frequently. They have been getting cold and lose those precious reserves rapidly then they can't keep up with their mamas.
We find them in the snow and bring them into the house and try to save them. Our hospital is a bathroom that is in the (long) process of being remodeled. Most have died... But the last 2 have been successful! They have recovered enough to jump out of the bathtub! It is really gratifying to finally save some.

As I was driving up our drive yesterday I saw something which compelled me to call my mom even though I was only a few feet away from the front door.

"Hello?"

"Hello," said I. "Why is there a grizzly bear in the turnout?"

It wasn't a grizzly bear, which I knew. But it sure looked like one. The biggest bull I had ever seen was pacing nervously back and forth in the turnout that didn't currently house any of our animals. I thought. My mom explained briefly on the phone. Lil' bit explained more later.

It seems that the neighbor's bull had escaped and had been running around in the street. So lil' bit ran out to the street just as a truck plowed down and managed to miss the bull (whose name happens to be "Sammy," apparently). My sister and I have already made friends with this bull. Last summer he chased us through the back field and treed us and my friend (who was pretty unhappy with the whole thing, I must admit). But in retrospect we realized that he had wanted cookies. Sammy is friendly and sweet and scary. He's the kind of cow that would kill you by accident and then apologize.

Anyway, there lil' bit was, calmly herding Sammy back down his drive with two sticks. "Really, Elly May," she told me later, "with a cow this size, you don't make him do anything. you just hope he agrees with your ideas." Sammy turned back into the streets again, so lil'bit finally decided to herd him down our drive where we have a gate to block his escape. She told me that people were slamming on their brakes and leaning out their car windows with deep concern.

"Oh my goodness! Are you alright honey? Do you need help?"

I guess you can't blame them. Lil' bit lives up to her name. She's very petite for a 14 year old and looks more fragile than she is. These people haven't ever seen her carrying 50lb bags of feed.

My darling sister assured all of the bystanders that she was fine and could handle this enormous animal. And she did, calmly encouraging him to go up our drive. My dad came out and together they convinced him that the best course of action was to wander into the turnout, which was where I found him, pacing nervously around and snorting, as I returned from classes.

The next day the neighbors came to retrieve their bull and we haven't seen him since and life on the funny farm has returned to normal. Whatever that is.

Putting my education to good use

This morning I was headed out the door towards classes at my university when I realized I had forgotten to complete an assignment for my microbiology lab. I grabbed my environmental sampling kit and tried to remember the instructions. My professor had briefly explained what to do last week, so I figured I remembered it pretty well. I took my RODAC plate and squished it onto the bathroom counter. But what should I use my wet swab culture on?

Obviously, being a rancher, I went to the most obvious: the animals. I opened up the door to my rabbit's cage and swabbed his nose. Then on my way down to the gate I stopped at the barn and dashed in to our quarantined sheep. I rubbed their back ends with the swab. I concluded this sampling by attacking the two turkeys perched on the fence.

None of this would have been a big deal except that I read the instructions later and realized we were supposed to sample four of the same type of items, like four pens, or forks, or something. Oops. I wrote "Farm animals 1-4" on my lab notebook.

This was right before when my professor made her announcement. Over the last week she had been contacted by a news crew hoping to do a show on environmental sampling. So, she concluded "next week there will be a tv crew in lab with cameras talking to you about your samples and what you sampled to get your results."

I have this vision of holding up my agar plate and announcing that I sampled "Sheep butts."