Now what?

So baby Fara is finally here!  Since I don't live on a dairy farm, I have to do things a little differently than a lot of people.

                                        

                                                  Loading up to go to the dairy

Fara's dam, Faith, has served her purpose for me.  I was able to show her for a couple of years, but not with much success.  I learned a lot from her, but the best thing about her is getting Fara out of her.

Faith's first milking

Aaahh, three gallons lighter

I made a deal with a dairy to sell Faith.  She is now a full production milk cow.  The owner of the dairy was kind enough to milk her out for us the afternoon after Fara was born.  We got about three gallons of milk to take home to Fara.





I made a funnel out of an upside-down two liter pop bottle with the bottom cut out.  I used it to fill a bottle for Fara with her own mother's milk.





I hand fed her with Faith's milk and kept her in a separate little calf hutch pen for about a day.

Then I hauled my Brown Swiss bull calf (Pretty Boy Floyd) to the sale to make room on the nurse cow, Ayan, for Farrah.  Pretty Boy, which I bought for $150 and put on the nurse cow for a month or so, brought $300.

When I got home from the sale, I brought Fara into the pen and she ran straight to Ayan and started nursing.  Ayan didn't mind at all.  My friend Christy says that Ayan gets the "Mother of the Year Award".  She is the best nurse cow ever.  Farrah is her sixth "orphan" calf since October.  She just takes on whatever comes into the pen.  So we didn't have to wrangle Ayan to get Fara to nurse.  The only thing we had to do was keep Fara in the right place.  She was so excited to be there that she would spaz out and wriggle to her belly or even clear up to her brisket.  She headed to the brisket looking for milk a lot.  It's funny to watch.  So I swing her butt around and get her headed in the right direction again and she's good to go.

Ayan doesn't have to be caught up to let the calves nurse.  She doesn't even have to be at the feed trough to stand still for them.  Like I said, she's the best.