Working Calves
Thursday, December 10th, 2009
Lane is cauterizing the horn while Clayton hold its head and Jake stands ready with medicine.
It was a beautiful Scottish day at Cross Creek Cattle Company. The overcast sky and the cool day was highlighted with constant drizzle that dampened your hair, clothing, etc. This of course made everything feel even colder.
My immediate family stood in the barn with my father discussing the day’s plans. Sorting, de-horning, branding, vaccinating, and castrating were the items on the agenda. We divided up the jobs and got to work.
We are all experienced cowboys having worked cattle for most of our lives. Even my eight-year old son is competent in many areas of cattle work. My dad is the most experienced of us all. He worked side-by-side with his grandfather since he could walk. Isn’t funny how cyclical life can be? Here my dad was working alongside his grandchildren.
This particular kind of cattle work is not for the faint at heart. You are going to see blood. You are going to smell the scent of burning flesh. It is one of the most unpleasant parts of living on a working ranch.
Daddy is branding. Clay is holding the vaccines waiting for his turn to work.
It is easier than in the past. We have squeeze chutes that hold the calf still while you work on them. You do not have to rope, tackle, and throw the calf. We have electric branding irons and a cauterizing instrument. We do not have to keep a fire going with metal brands sitting in the fire until they have red-hot tips.
We do give two vaccinations. Each calf receives an 8-Way Blackleg and IBR4 vaccine. The first prevents a fatal disease called Blackleg. The most susceptible calves are ones thriving with great weight gain by eating nutritious grass. A certain spore in the ground causes this disease and it is completely preventable with the vaccine. The latter prevents the Infectious Bovine Rhinotracheitis (IBR) disease. It is a transmittable disease via contact. We have never had any of our cattle with this illness, but there are other herds nearby. Occasionally we find a stray cow in our herd from a neighbor’s pasture. Both vaccines are ones that we deem necessary to prevent for the health of our herd.
We brand the cows we intend to keep. Believe it or not, but there are still cattle rustlers. People steal cattle and usually take them directly to the sale. A brand is one sure way to prove that a cow belongs to you. You have to register your brand with the state. Our brand is a C with a squiggly line beneath it. The C stands for the alliteration in the name of our ranch. The line symbolizes the creeks that cross the ranch.
We de-horn for safety purposes. Our cattle are docile and easy-going. Regardless of the naturally good disposition, it is always safer to work around cows without sharp-tipped horns. There are several ways to remove horns. If you act when the calf is very young, you can scoop out the horns. You can pay for a veterinarian to perform cosmetic surgery in a sense to remove the horns. You can also remove the tips. The horns will not continue to grow so the cow will have blunt nubs. We chose the do the latter this time. It is important to cauterize the bleeding because a cow can lose a lot of blood if you do not act.
It was a successful day. We worked together as a team. Nobody got hurt. The cattle are doing fine. Cross Creek Cattle Company is literally a family-owned and operated ranch. We are teaching the next generation so that high quality cattle and grass fed beef can continue for generations to come.
