Cattle Mayhem

good morning I'm Pete and this is my Angry wife welcome to just a few Acres Farm walking out today I noticed how far the Sun rises north of East and you know why today is the summer solstice it's the longest day of the year the start of summer all that good stuff you guys are ready for breakfast aren't you oh my God as you can see the broilers out here are still fenced and we just move the fence once a week or so long with the boxes because we're still worried about raccoons Hillary's caught five so far five and Counting yeah she's an expert raccoon catcher it's the year of the raccoon on just a few Acres I can't believe we got that many no we never had problems with any Predators out in the field here in the summertime except for a hawk once in a while which wasn't a big deal with the raccoon that got a box of chickens that put a blip in our production but we're back at full capacity bringing chicken to the farmers market this weekend and for those who are wondering when we catch a raccoon it gets relocated to the woods down back but only after it gets an injection from the 22 rifle how do you two some for bossy Pig well watch out Billy some for Billy hey bud hey JJ big guy there's breakfast for you bossy Pig how are you doing lady time for breakfast how's it going how are you doing are you pregnant I don't see any signs yet corn and peaceful bowls Titus in Oregon patiently waiting for your breakfast in less than a month we're going to be turning these two gents loose to do their most important job of the year till then they're just peaceful hanging out in the barn they're Buddies the air smells great this morning there's things in bloom that are just making the sweet smell I love it hey little monsters why don't you guys come and see me [Music] they are some nice looking pigs good morning cows how's everybody doing today Hillary and I got some work to do with you guys today but we're gonna have breakfast first so just relax for a while looking good Rusty I think two up here is going to be the next Patty she's the second most complainy cow we have and she's Patty's daughter this is Hillary and the kids geriatric hen crazy eyes how old is crazy eyes ah she's at least four at least she's got funny eyes she always has Hillary letter out as a trustee let her out of jail well the Flack was really picking on him so we went ahead and let her out in the yard and she kind of wanders around and does her thing and seems very happy yeah after raising chickens for so many years we've kind of figured out the chicken's favorite food chicken especially when they find a weak old one so she's on work release she's actually still laying eggs which is amazing we're fully stocked with pork and chicken now we got pork back from the butcher last week the only thing we don't have in stock is beef but that's not going to last very long we don't really have a shoot system or anything like that for Logan cattle but we do have a method that works pretty good for us come on in guys we just opened this gate here and the cattle all run into this little lot to see what's in here come on guys what do we got everybody's coming in yeah here comes Patty hey y'all gotta come in and check it out [Applause] come on cows you guys can stay out here we'll have you back to your mom's in no time then we take my gosh you guys now we take a look around [Applause] this guy yeah that sidekick you gotta watch out for that these are 2022 calves earlings they're not going 2109 too small 2106 possibility him yeah no tag yeah let's compare him to 2106. he's still laggy 2106 I got my eye on him where did he go this one I'd take this guy instead they stand reached side by side that makes it easy well I just want to Mark you good enough all summer long time for the July 4th weekend going on through steak season we take two beef to the butcher every month and these are the first two and we use the strategy of the cattle exploring a new space to get them into the heifer pen here or winter heifer pen and now we use the same strategy to bring them into the even smaller pen where we'll hold them until we load them onto the truck in a few days in here is secure or not I would have secured it now we come in here and wait for him to come explore and after we get the two in that we want we'll shut the gate and sort them come on guys they don't know about it fortunately steers are usually some of the more Curious to the bunch and they come in we got any there's the one and now we just need the brown one we're putting your eye on that he's right here [Music] well patience foreign let's go out come here and let him have the run here goes Coco all right guys let's see there's one of them there's the other one going in so let's see if we can coax this guy a little bit come on buddy yeah you're a steer so you're gonna be crazy that's the way they get in the second year they get crazy come on guys come in you go all right we got you both in here come on close the gate then we just work them around a little bit not too let the ones go it aren't marked you can go let's see you can go there you go who are you you can go go ahead there you go two at a time we're down to five here you go buddy not you come on buddy there you go we're down to three no you're staying [Music] that's the last one now outside these guys are all bellyaching all right we're done yes yes it's time you're free I got a special treat for you too head back out [Applause] there you go guys we always get the ones with the square gears here you gotta go out back it up come on there you go foreign oh they are so disgruntled why'd they make us do all this we didn't get anything to eat everybody's out yeah I know you got complaints with me that's it takes 10 or 15 minutes down the hole then we gotta go in here oh look at that beautiful Bush growing by the dorts it's in front of it wow okay well let's see let's go to the goodie drawer it's not in there what the heck it's not there all this commotion even got you guys a little upset didn't it Titus yeah you'll always come for a back rub though we'll go look up here I don't know where I left it oh Hilary and I were working on chicken boxes I hate looking for tools so I always put them away when I'm done with them but for some reason yeah I didn't that's not like it this is why I put them away because I hate wasting time looking for tools all right now that we're properly equipped we can get back to it here's the pen in the Big Barn there's a big barn full of hay tractors you know you've seen it [Music] as your typical caddy keeps watch over what we're doing from a high place [Music] with cattle out of sight out of mind applies to cover up this door y'all still hear him a little bit and they'll settle down but I'll keep these guys from getting too squirrely at the gate this is the first time we get to use the new Hydra in the upper Barn makes things a lot easier and carrying buckets of water to these guys they're understandably nervous that's one of the reasons we put them in here three or four days before it's time for them to go so they can settle down and get used to this that makes loading day less stressful for us and Them and while they're in here they get to eat hay left over from left winners half first but still good being that these are Dexter cattle they don't look as big as maybe some of the Angus or Hereford or the other breed you see getting sent to butcher these guys will dress I'm guessing at 350 or so for Lucky 400 that's about the range you get 300 to 400 for steers and coal cows will go about 500 pounds dressed where'd the cows go they have vacated the premises we shall see look at this I love it of course you know I went out and bought all that hay and what did it do shortly after that it started raining we've gotten between two and three inches since this field was cut uh whenever that was I was three weeks ago and it's coming back now the Alfalfa's going on a foot high the grass is eight inches high this is what it comes back like after you cut Fields it just comes back Lush and young and tender and the cows just gobble It Up Here Come Those male contents they really want me to put them over here they can see it and they say geez that looks better than what we're on but they're not going there you guys got way too many complaints she's got food hanging around him out of her mouth too they all do oh my gosh little ones let's go down here and see what we got I put them on this five acres before I went to Nebraska and that was six days ago and they've toasted this it's it's gone [Music] I'm definitely pulling them off of this I know you guys now let's go down the very bottom of our property and look at this field here's what we have in this field we have multiple things going on here the Orchard Grass has gone to seed and this is why you graze before it goes to seed because once it starts going to seed you can see the plants done its job and it's starting to die back it's starting to Yellow out and that applies to the leaves as well as the stalks but this does not mean that everything is lost although you can see a lot of that see that first growth yelling off here we've got new stuff coming up in here you can especially see it right here see this deep green and then you've got this stuff here which is stuff that's died back that went to seed and of course the Clover in Alfalfa not nearly what it was in the first field I showed you but it's still growing especially with this rain that we've gotten so what do you do in this case you want to keep the grass growing for the rest of Summer and you have this you have debris and you have reduced growth because the plants that have gone to seed are going to take a while to restart the first thing we do is we let the cattle into this field the one I just showed you guys ah all right that'll quiet them down that's some good stuff you guys found we're coming on the most difficult part of the summer for grass growth when the Orchard Grass has done its thing shooting up in the spring Timothy's starting to come on and clover and Alfalfa keep growing but overall volume goes down as the heat goes up and our rains normally do space out further going into July and August plus you get to this situation where you know the cattle aren't perfect they don't take everything down and the pasture starts to look ratty and you have plants that were allowed to get too tall and went to seed in overall production decreases hey little one this is the point in the year where we start cutting pastures either to make them into hay or clip them and leave them on the ground because you get that new flush grass growth when the plant is stimulated by The Cutting so the question is which is it do you bail it or do you clip it and leave it on the ground to further mulch the soil insulate it from the hot dry weather common and feed the soil with Critters coming up and incorporating that dead material into the soil it all depends on your judgment and degree some people can't bear to cut a field of grass like this and leave it you know they'll make hay out of it even if they were to get one bale off this five acres they'd say make hay out of it I'm not in that camp what's left in this field is stocky and then there's low undergrowth but not a lot of low undergrowth I choose to clip this field drop this stuff on the ground and then leave it to do what I said feed the soil because if I bailed this I'd probably get two Bales off it and there's a point at which you say I run into this people say well do you re-rake the field after you bail it to catch anything you missed and I say no it's not worth the fuel cost and the amount of time you spend doing it to get what little hay you might off of it this one's going on the ground and this is the time to do it right now because we're still in a wet pattern we haven't dried out for the summer and we have a chance of rain forecasted for tomorrow and Friday I take these fields out of rotation one at a time staggered so I'll clip this one first and if the weather cooperates in three weeks four weeks it'll be ready to graze again with nice nutritious tender young stuff and I'll go right through the field order making a judgment call on each field every two weeks or so whether to bail it if there's enough good stuff left it to bail it or just clip it and leave it on the ground that's the way summer grazing works until the grass comes back on strong in the fall in this field I was in at the very beginning looking at all the beautiful stuff we'll go back into the rotation now we'll run a temporary fence across where the chickens are in that end of the field and put them on this after they come off the field I just had of them on I had good food when I was in Nebraska but I sure did miss home-cooked meals so that's what I'm doing tonight we're gonna Grill it's not tonight yet I'm just getting ready I had some other things to tend to and I came back in here and they were all waiting for me hey guys these guys need some more mineral we do Coco don't you these days I'm keeping Redmond salt and kelp in the mineral feeder cows eat that stuff right up don't you guys little treats for you what is that it's plastic oh my gosh they're digging right in hey it's time to make dinner these are carry Burgers from the old cow that we called last winter delicious flavor half pound each time to flip I put McCormick Montreal steak seasoning on these that's my go-to burgers are done smell delicious that was a lot of work long day a lot of different things I hope it made for an interesting video I hope you have a great day and I'll see you next time

Channel: Just a Few Acres Farm

Views: 151,847

Keywords: farm, farming, hobby farm, hobby farm guys, hobby farming for profit, homestead, how farms work, just a few acres farm, life on a farm, day on the farm, slow farming, busy day, farm day, small farm, life on small farm, a few acres farm, few acres farm, just a few acres farm youtube, pigs, dexter cattle, cattle, chickens, pasture, how to maintain pasture, sorting cattle

Id: GUEIE2GRp4o

Length: 20min 42sec (1242 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 23 2023