There has been a lot of activity since show day. Entei has realized that the entire middle of the barn is his, so he's claimed it and spends a lot of time just hanging out in the barn. I moved his feeder inside and he's quite happy about it. A few days ago when checking the bred cows, one of my former show heifers was acting strange. Since we haven't had the best weather and pamper our cows a bit, I walked her into a stall in the barn, and several hours later, she had a 63lbs heifer. Biscuit's new calf is named Fantina and is solid light red just like the mother. Biscuit is a beefmaster and the sire is the red angus that Etherion doesn't get along with. Entei has been very interested in them and has been hanging out near there stall ever since the baby was born. Biscuit doesn't seem to mind him being around, so he hasn't been kicked out of the barn.

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We never could find the supplement for Entei, but we know a place that definitely has it and is open until noon on Saturday, so he's getting his thing tomorrow morning and a bag of Appetite Express to make sure he keeps his eating game up. I'm considering getting him the show feed I was giving my previous steer, but getting to the place that sells it is a big hassle. He seems to really like what he's eating and gets a leaf of alfalfa every day, so he may be good to go as is.

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I trim the feet on our horses and have done a lot of trimming this week. Last night, I was trimming a front foot on my older QH mare when a friend called me. My friend shows goats, and she had just gotten back from a goat show and found that one of her former show does had kidded. It took a minute to find the kid because the doe had broken out of her pen, but they found it being cleaned up by the LGDs. The baby was fine and almost totally clean, but the momma was mad and refused to take it. My friend asked if I wanted another bottle baby, and the answer is always yes. Now I have this super nice commercial boer doeling in the house. We had gotten some colostrum from Biscuit since she has a huge bag and could be used as a milk cow if she wasn't kicky, so we had fresh colostrum plus a power lamb and kid colostrum replacer. The slightly wet baby I received last night has had a good amount of colostrum.

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We have 1 bred doe goat and 3 cows that are going to calve in the next few weeks, so I'm hoping to stay on this girl streak and get more heifers and doelings. I'm also getting a new horse/stock trailer in the next couple of weeks, so I'll post pictures of that when we get it, plus we're looking at getting a lead line pony around 13ish hands. Something big enough to be friends with my hateful older pony, but small enough to not scare little children. There's a slaughter sale I'm going to Monday night that often has things like small to large ponys and drafts go through, so I might get the opposite of what I need and get a team of drafts. I never know what I'm buying at a sale until I bid on it. There's also a slight chance of going to a goat sale Tuesday, so maybe new goats are on the way. I'm expanding my goat herd a lot this year and switching some things around, so my mean 20 year old pony needs a new pasture buddy. She hates being alone, but is mean to minis and gets picked on by our QHs, so she's getting a friend her same size that I can occasionally lead my little cousins around on. In general, there's going to be a sudden rise in the animal population here since we already had plans to get a couple of buck goats, so I might have a lot of talk about in the next few weeks

Today was quite the day. My steer got his supplement and the better feed on Saturday. He eats the feed fine, but he won't eat the supplement off the top. If I offer it to him in my hand, he dives for it and eats it happily. He's just picky, but I don't mind spending the extra minute with him to make sure he eats it. Entei also has no interest in escaping. I fed the animals early today and left open his gate, which leads to the road, for over an hour. He was just chilling in the barn and occasionally venturing out to see what I was up to, but he never really goes near the gate even when there's feed near it. He's also decided to be a lot more friendly. He was good to catch and groom before, but now, he follows me around a bit and lets me catch him anywhere.

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One of my horses, a 7 year old 15.3hh QH mare, got a lesson in roping and dragging calves. One of our calves refuses to repect the fence between her and her mother, and her mother refuses to respect the fences and stay away from the calf, so we went out and roped this previously long weaned heifer and took her across our property to live with the sheep in a pen she can't escape from. The horse, Leilani, took it very well. She never spooked and didn't hesitate to lean forward and pull. She's learning to do all the ranch horse things right now, so this made a great lesson for her.

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We went to the horse sale today and saw a big variety of horses. Over 100 went through. The most impressive horses I saw were bucking stock, and one of them weighed over 1300lbs. That thing was a good 16.2hh and had huge feet and a giant head, but when he trotted, wow. He was the smoothest mover ever and just floated out of the ring. There were a few super cute ponies and an appaloosa gelding I would have bought if he had been sound. What I did buy was a 2 year old broke 13.2hh paint filly, a tiny paint mini stallion that looked to be about 2, some misc new and used tack, and a 16ft stock trailer that's ready to hit the road. Of course, we took the car, but we buy calves at that salebarn all the time and know the office staff, so we're going back to pick up the ponies and the trailer on Wednesday. This salebarn has insurance on everything that goes through, so if it turns out that the trailer was stolen or something, we wouldn't be out what we paid for it. Another example of their insurance is that if a cow gets injured between the time it gets off the trailer and when it gets in the ring, the salebarn buys that cow for the average price of cattle in its category. They're super nice people to work with and we've bought a lot of bottle calves and a few strange cattle there. I've had 4 former show heifers that came from that salebarn and have even sold a few calves there.

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With 3 of the items on our check list aquired, a trailer, a mini, and a 12 to 14hh pony, I now only have to look for 2 good goats and tack to fit the pony. I got 2 super cool bridles, but they're both way too big. These would fit my stallion and his big head. I'm going to have to get a new saddle pad online because both of my pads are for horses with longer backs and there are no decent pony pads in any tack shops near by. I've been looking, so I'm going to just bite the bullet and get some things online. I wanted to get a set of sport boots anyway, so this just gives me an excuse to get them.

Last night we went to the goat auction and got 2 goats. 2 are old bred nigerian dwarf does and one is a just weaned nubian doeling. The nubian is blind in one eye, but she's very sweet and pretty well made and he price was right, so I'm happy with her. The first goat went pretty cheap, and then my mom drove up the price and bought the next 2, which seemed to set the mood for the rest of the sale. Overall, it was a good time and I like the goats we got.

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We brought home the trailer and the ponys today. We just got back with them about 45 minutes ago. The trailer is super solid. Barely any surface rust, good floor, all the doors work as they should, and the lights work, but 3 of the clearance lights are burnt out. It had a cattle on the floor, which isn't uncommon since cow people use those to give the cows some traction, but it wasn't secured, so we had to wire it up to the side of the trailer for the journey home. It's a 16×5×6 WW trailer, and while it isn't a big as I wanted (6×6.5 or 6×7), it's big enough for the short trips we bought it for. It pulled great on an up and down road with sharp turns to get home. It was honestly such a steal of a deal, and if we wanted, we could flip it fast and add to the budget for the kind of trailer we really wanted.

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One of the ponies is a grullo paint stallion. He's not halter broke, but not mean. I think he's about 37 inches tall. No idea how old he is. He's decent made and in good shape. The little monster probably won't be too bad to tame down and we got a halter put on him before he got out of the trailer. It was hard to get him in and out and through the barn to his new pen, but he's less of a jerk than my last 2 mini studs, and they were super handled. One had been shown when he was younger and the other was broke enough to put a small child on and turn them loose. Overall, I think he's pretty and decent looking and will be a nice little pasture ornament until I get a chance to work with him.

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The bigger one is about 13.2. She's the one I'll be adding pictures of. She was put in a stall in the other barn overnight so she can meet the rest of the herd without getting beat up. She's very gentle. Halter broke, loads and unloads nice, let me pick up her front foot in the dark, and was ridden through the ring at the sale by the man who gets paid to ride for people that can't been there. She's a 2 year old with 60 days of riding. The pictures suck since it was pitch black in the barn and I couldn't get a good angle. She's got a nice chest, good straight legs, and pretty markings. She has a good little compact body and her topline is filled in better than it looked when we bid on her. Tomorrow, I'll saddle her up and lunge her and see what she's like, but my first impression was pretty good.

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I rode the new filly around yesterday and she wasn't bad. She had no idea how to lunge. She stood great to tack up and was ok to get on. She power walks and steers by a weird hybrid of plowreining and neckreining. It takes a verbal Woah to have her stop. She will begrudgingly trot only with a lot of bumps from my heels. I think she's used to spurs. The first time I asked her to trot, she went three strides and tried to buck. It was easier to sit through her buck than my stallion's lope, and he's smooth. She just barely put any effort into it. The entire time I rode her, she acted like she was waiting for me to haul off and slap her. She's very touchy about her back end, but doesn't kick. She's just a nervous girl all around. I did have a small victory after I rode her though. When I opened the gate to take her out of the pasture where we had ridden around, she rubbed her head on me and wanted to be petted. She looks bay roan in the sunlight and I can't wait to see her shed off when the weather warms up.

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We went to yet another auction last night and I got the shorthorns a new toy. They sold a used but solid cattle trimming chute for 10% of its new price, so of course, we jumped at the chance to get it. It's just missing the floor, but it's such an easy fix. All we need to do is lay down a sheet of plywood and put a mat over it. It collapses down nicely and everything. We had taken the car, but a friend of ours offered to haul the chute for us since he didn't get the llamas he wanted, so we got the chute and a super cute calf delivered. He was one of only 2 calves that were in decent shape. I think he weighs 250lbs. He's a hairy, clubby little black blaze faced calf and he's half tame. He's absolutely adorable and I'm hoping he doesn't hate me for haltering him and dragging him from the trailer to the pen. The goal for him is to get him halter broke, started on feed, fitted to show, and sell him as a show steer prospect. He may end up being Entei's eating buddy.

There has been a sudden shift in the weather. Temperatures took a nose dive and it's sort of wet. The weather is only going to get worse and we're supposed to have high temps close to 0°F. The shorthorn boys are loving the cold weather. Since they're super fat and have a fair amount of hair, they start feeling overheated at around 80°F, especially Etherion. The little guy is very happy because because he just got a bigger pen, a new round bale, and and 2 cows as company. The guy delivering hay to us saw him when he was over and loves the little white rascal. I say little, but he weighs between 800 and 850 pounds. I haven't messed with him very much in the last month, but when he was groomed on Saturday morning, he just stood in his pen for me to fix him up. There's places he can't reach to scratch and he loves getting brushed.

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Entei is loving the cold weather. It's also helped him pick up his eating game. He's eating around 35 pounds of show feed per day, plus a pound of Champion Drive, a skinny leaf of alfalfa, a fat leaf of oat hay, and as much mixed grass hay as he wants. The chonker is occupying a 12×20 stall in the barn to keep his feet out of the rain. He doesn't mind being stalled and does get most of the day out in the yard to run around and eat. He is gaining weight rapidly. I can see him filling out more and more. I think he weighs 875 to 900 right now, so I have hope that he'll make it to 1000 by mid March. Entei has been being the sweetest boy lately too. I can catch him wherever to take him into the barn, then set him free for grooming time. He stands wherever I leave him because he knows I'm getting the brushes out and he loves to be brushed. He gets his whole body combed with a fluffer comb, then once over with a bristle brush, then again with the comb. Then, I crouch by his back end and reach under and around his legs to fluff up his leg hair. He gets his belly brushed and seems to enjoy it. Surprisingly, he stands better when I'm brushing his back legs than his fronts. And when it comes time to comb his tail, he holds his tail up.

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Entei is about to get kicked out of the barn and go back to the pen he was in when I started this thread. That pen is pretty good sized, has a round bale and a half, and has a decent roof. The plan is to move my stallion from his pen next door to a stall in our other barn, move the calves in Entei's old pen to the stallion's pen, and send Entei back to our cows can have the middle of the barn. 3 of them are ready to calve at any second and 2 have tiny calves, and with a low of -15 next monday, they need the barn space. We just ordered a couple of stock tank heaters online for our biggest water troughs. The forecast says we should get over 2 feet of snow Sunday night and Monday, so we're going to need to be able to keep the water defrosted. This weather sucks because we were supposed to go out of state yesterday for lambs and cow vaccines, but that trip is going to be 2 weeks away now. There's also a horse 200 miles away that I want to buy, but my truck has 2 wheel drive and not even an act of god could get us to drive that thing more than 20 miles right now. We have hay to last 2 weeks and a neighbor with a tractor that can move it for us, plus about 3 weeks worth of grain, so we dont need to leave for feed until the weather clears up. I feel kind of bad about sending Entei to the other side of the barn from where he's been stalled, but I think he'll like getting the exercise and he doesn't seem bothered by the cold in the slightest. He was very happy and playful durring his grooming tonight, but stood perfectly like he's been doing lately. He acts like everything is fine despite having icicles in his whiskers. Etherion also seems totally fine with the extreme cold. He's a little irritated that his water keeps freezing over, but once he's had the ice cracked and taken out, he's happy. One of my heifers, a 21 month old jersey, is not having a good time with the cold, so she got a horse blanket put on yesterday and looked like a much happier cow today. I'm pray that our pregnant animals, 3 cows, a sheep, a goat, and a horse, wait until the weather warms up to have their babies. If they don't though, I have blankets for foals and calves and small dog sweaters for kids and lambs on hand. I just bought a new bottle baby boer doeling yesterday, and even though she's in the house, she's wearing a sweater. There's 3 young goats in the garage, plus my 3 bottle babies in the house. We're going to look through our cages tomorrow and try to arrange to bring our lionhead rabbits into the garage by Friday evening. Overall, everything absolutelt sucks, but my shorthorn boys don't care and are business as usual. They just don't like the frozen ground.

I had a fun little Valentine's day incident. Went out at 10:30 p.m. to check on the bred cows. Right now, we're having the lowest temps in our area in the last hundred years. It was about 5 below 0°F with wind out of the north, and while that's not impressive temperatures to a lot of people, it's cold to me and my animals that have spent our entire lives here. When I went to check the cows, I found 5 of the 6 inside the barn. The missing cow likes to lay on the south side of a round bale at the far end of the pen. I found her there, along with a half frozen calf. I thought he was dead. Little guy wasnt moving and was coated in ice on the side facing up. The cow, who was bottle raised, halter broke, and super friendly. Stood up and tried to attack me. I didn't appreciate her attitude, so I went back to the barn, called my mom out to help me, and got my show stick and a halter. With the help of the stick, I got the halter on her and led her to a post, using the stick to keep her at a distance from me. The cow, who's name is Beasty, was tied up while my mom arrived and I carried this half dead, stiff and frozen bull calf up to the barn. We shut he gate in the barn and I went back out to untie Beasty, and with the calf removed, she was much calmer. This is a place that doesn't snow at all some years, and I had to carry this 70ish lbs bull calf a quarter mile uphill against the wind through 8 inches of snow. Not how I wanted to spend Valentines day.

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The calf's mom is a black motley face cow. Dad was a red angus. My mom thought he was white markings on his face thanks to the coating of ice he had, but once he was thawed out, he's solid red. The little dude was put on beach towels in the living room near the fireplace and had 2 small heaters pointed at him, plus vigorous rubbing with another towel. He slowly went from laying flat out to sitting up. His ears and tail were frozen stiff, so they were dunked in lukewarm water and slowly loosened up. His nose was very red from being frozen, so we named him Frostbite. At 1 a.m. he didn't seem able to stand up, so we ventured back out to milk his mom for colostrum. Milking went about as well as it can with a beef cow and no chute, but he got half a bottle of the good stuff. It only took him a moment to figure out how to eat, and when I took the bottle away to see how much he had drank, he smoothly stood up and looked around. Frostbite laid back down on his beach towels and slept soundly through the night.

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This morning, we woke up to him standing by my mom's bed and mooing. He and Beasty were reunited in a stall this morning, and while she wants him, he can't seem to figure out how to nurse from her. His back end also looks a little off to me. He doesn't walk great, which is why they're stalled. There's a fair chance that he'll end up a bottle calf and that the cow will end up at the sale. She's an October of 2017 and this is her first calf. I think she's already had too many chances, and now that she almost let her calf freeze when she had a 16×40 roof to go under, I'd rather sell her and get a feeder steer. If we do end up bottling Frostbite, we may end up grafting him onto our Jersey that could calve any day. She needs at least one extra calf, but probably 2.

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The stall they were put in is the one Entei was occupying. He's been intching to get out and stay out, and running back and forth with him on the halter has not satisfied him. He's way happier and way hungrier when he's out walking around. With the snow and wind stopping for the night, he's getting to be out in the yard. He was extremely excited about being set free. The cold doesn't bother him at all with as fat and fluffy as he is. He's not the happiest camper about having to break the ice every time he wants a drink, but he loves running and bucking in the snow. Etherion has about the same opinion of the weather. I'm thinking about reuniting them since I want to get the bull eating more feed again, and if that happens, I'll have to feed Entei his Champion Drive in a bucket. That stuff was expensive and I don't want Etherion eating it since he doesn't need it.

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I have plans to go see 2 animals this weekend if they arent sold by then. One on Saturday and one on Sunday. If I get there and they don't have any obvious major problems, I'll be bringing them home. I'm really hoping no one else can come before me because these are pretty close to exactly want I wanted. The thing I'm more afraid of missing out on is a good red yearling billy goat 40 miles away. He's pretty much everything I wanted. The only thing I would change would be his color, but he's still a color I like. I didn't want red headed, and he's not red headed. Dapples would have been nice, but I can't afford to be that picky lol. There's just not a lot like him around and I'm afraid that someone else may snatch him if they can get there sooner. The guy agreed to meet on Saturday, but people aren't always true to their word. The thing I plan to see Sunday is an appendix AQHA mare 200 miles away. She has fantastic breeding and did run on the track, but in her 3 starts, she only beat 1 horse. She sucked on the track, but she's the perfect height, build, and bloodline to make a barrel horse out of. There are also cow dealers in her area, so we might pick up some weanlings on the way back. The mare is in the middle of no where. It's hard to find people willing to drive out there. Hopefully, I'll be the first to make it. These 2 animals would fill 2 of the 3 rolls I need, so if I get them, I'll only need one more thing to be set for the year.

These are the 2 cows that will be calving next. The paint is Amiri. She's a 5 year old jersey. Absolute unit. Incredibly overweight. She had a calf as a 2 year old, but missed the next 2 because we had 2 terrible bulls in a row. She only had this chance because she was so nice to work with the first time. Super nice about us handling her calf. Took fosters without a second thought. Held her condition perfectly and never gave us any trouble. She's now growing a nice big bag and we're praying she doesn't have any metabolic problems at calving due to her weight. Being fat sets them up for ketosis and milk fever, but this is what she looks like on only hay. There is no slimming Amiri down.

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The other cow in the picture is Amiri's daughter, Celina. Celina is by a registered shorthorn that came from the same ranch as Etherion. Her dad was the best bull we ever had, so after having some bad luck, we went back to where the good boy came from. We haven't gotten her registered yet, but if she gets confirmed bred to Etherion later this year, we'll be getting her papers. Celina is 3 and this will be her first baby. She's got a really good udder for a beef cow. The red angus bull took the color right off of everything else, but if she throws her white gene, the red angus can't overrule that and the calf will be roan. I'm really hoping for a roan heifer, but I'll take any heifer or a roan steer. Celina is a pretty calm natured cow, and if she's anything like her half sister and her mom, she'll be a fantastic mother. Amiri raised 3 calves up to 500+ pounds on her first lactation, so I'm hoping Celina will raise one big fat calf. These two cows look nothing alike from the back or side, but their faces are very similar. The pictures are a couple weeks old, so they have a lot more baggage now.

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Entei has been entered in the big show he was nominated for. Classes will be posted after the weigh in at the show. The ag teacher is going to come out some time this week and put the tag in that he needs for the show. I'm going to see if we can just cut off his old tag and put the new one through where his old one was. That would make him a much less cranky steer. He's been his usual sweet self lately and seems to finally be back to eating well. Once the weather is a bit better, I plan to bring out Etherion to be his eating buddy again. Etherion needs more feed that he can eat in his group so he can really develop right now. Entei eats a lot better when he has competition. It'll be a little bit of a challenge to give him his champion drive without Etherion taking any, but Entei is good about eating it the second I pour it on his grain. The poor boy has had a bad time with week because his water keeps freezing over and I have to keep breaking the ice with a sledgehammer, but on the plus side, the hammer doesn't scare him anymore. It's finally back above freezing now, so he's going to be much happier and he'll be a happy guy with his friend. A little jersey heifer in the stall next to him has been keeping him company, but there's no company quite like your bro.

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It looks like it'll be next week before I can see the mare with the road situation, but I did get a goat. I couldn't get the one I planned to get because the guy ended up being a jerk, but I found one I like better afterward. This thing is a paint dappled boer. He's a coming 2 year old, proven color producer, pretty good attitude, and he has 3 ennoblements on his papers. He's also from a much bigger breeder and I got him from his second owner. He came with papers and his DNA testing already done, which is way better than the other goat being sold on application with no testing. This billy goat weighs somewhere between 150 and 200 pounds. He's stinky and stained from marking himself, so as soon as it warms up a bit, he's getting a bath and a blow drying. Even though it was a disappointment when I couldn't get the other goat, this one is way closer to what I wanted, so despite the fact that I'm still 2.5 hours from home, I'm happy.

When we got home with the goat, who I'm calling Neon, we put him in the pen and went to check on the cows. We found Celina and Amiri at the fence by the road looking upset. After further inspection, there was a calf laying under a tree by the road, and it was Celina's baby. We got the heifer carried to the barn and put her and her mom in a stall. They're doing great. The calf is red with a white underline, and we think she may be roan. The grandma to the baby was trying to steal her, and yesterday afternoon, she had her baby. Amiri had a red heifer with a little bit of white by her udder. Entei got evicted from his stall so they could have it. We left them for a couple hours so the calf could get nursing, then went and milked out Amiri. We haven't milked her since 2018, but she was still perfect. Right now we just hand milk, and this cow stood with barely a shuffle to get comfortable. Now we have some good frozen colostrum in case we need it. We're getting her 2 extra calfs tomorrow, so she'll be milked a few more times before she gets her fosters. Amiri is extremely motherly and very safe to be around. She takes fosters no problem and really claims them as hers. We're really excited to see how these 2 heifers turn out. There's only one cow left to calve, a tall, long legged red poll heifer named Denarii. Denarii has stranger danger, but she's my baby and she loves me. She's just long everywhere. Long neck, long body, long tail, but short face. She should have hers in a week or so.

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Entei was happy to be free from the stall again. He doesn't like being cooped up. He's nice and bright and hungry, and we can't forget destructive. If a square bale is left unattended, he he shreds it. Big chonky boy has also found a halter he prefers. It's a really fat old rope with a leather nose band. It's easy on his face and moves very freely. He acts very nice with that halter, so it'll be the chosen one for most cases. He can't be tied up in it at his big show due to how old the halter is, but it can be what I lead him around with. He's been very interested in the new calves, but not enough to bother their mothers. He now has the middle of the barn again and looks pleased about being back in his old arrangement.

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Here in Neon. He weighs a good 175ish pounds. He's big and stout and doesn't turn 2 until July. He would rather not be touched, but he walks totally fine on a halter and isn't super hard to catch. My doe goats seem to like him. He's a really nice and quiet character, which is just what I wanted in a goat. He also has all the pretty points I could ask for.