Welcome to the Ranch!

November on the ranch.

Autumn is a beautiful time of year.  Some leaves are changing color.  Some evergreens are bearing bright red berries.  The air is crisp and cool.  The wind reminds you to put on a sweater.  Autumn is a great season to enjoy the outdoors.  The months of September, October, and November mark a busy time of year as well as several holidays.

My father’s favorite holiday is Thanksgiving.  Families come together to celebrate the many blessings that God has bestowed on us.  It is a holiday without the pressures of Christmas.  You don’t have to worry about buying and giving gifts.  You only have to cook and eat delicious foods prepared with loving hands.

Thanksgiving is also time of reflection.  A chance to reflect on your year and remember how blessed you are.  In the spirit of this holiday, I want to share with you some of the things that we are thankful for at Cross Creek Cattle Company.

• We are thankful for our loving and close-knit family.
• We are blessed to have so many good friends.
• We love being able to enjoy healthy,  delicious meat on our dinner table whether from our grass fed herd or from the wild boars and deer that wander in the woods.
• We are thankful to have good horses on which to ride and survey the beautiful scenery around the ranch regardless of the season.
• We have been blessed with fat cows and green grass.
• We are very thankful that health has been restored to the ranch manager after his accident.
• We are lucky to have a substantial store of hay ready to supply our animals with needed food no matter how hard the winter gets.
• We are thankful to have made it through the drought and to have finally received the much-needed rainfall.
• We are grateful that we can live our lifestyle in the 21st century.
• Last but not least, we are grateful for our customers who help support our family-owned and operated ranch.

From everyone at Cross Creek Cattle Company, we wish everyone a very “Happy Thanksgiving!”  May God continue to bless each and every one of us.

In a typical year, we try to not put out bales of hay until after the Thanksgiving holiday.  This is a personal goal of Cross Creek Cattle Company.  With good rain throughout the summer months, our pastures can supply grasses for our cattle until then.  Unfortunately this year we had drought conditions.  For months we had no rainfall.

We prayed for fat cows and green grass, and we were blessed accordingly.  Some of our less fortunate neighbors were having to put out hay during the summer.  It was incredible.  Just yesterday, I was driving in the northern part of our county.  I was amazed at how bad all the pastures looked.  They had their herds on completely bare and brown pastures.  You have no choice as a rancher, but to give hay in this situation.

As the grass season comes to an end and autumn is in full swing, we stop rotating our pastures.  Instead, we open all the interior gates and allow the cattle to forge for themselves.  They can find the best grasses on their own.  They have that innate ability.

Now as winter time approaches, we are preparing to put out hay a few weeks early.  My dad is disappointed, but considering the year we have had I think we are doing well.  In fact we are doing better than most in our area.  The way I look at it, we made it to November.

Cross Creek Cattle Company is in the process of weaning 10 calves right now.  My mom surprised me by visiting the ranch.  Her house is very close to the barn where we separate the calves from the mama cows.  She got to enjoy the endless ballads that the calves sang to their mamas and the mamas sang to their calves.  Needless to say, she did not sleep very well the first night of weaning.

It has been a couple of days now and the serenade has stopped.  The mama cows have left their calves and rejoined the herd grazing in the bottom.  The calves are adjusting to their new no-dairy diet.

Weaning time is a stressful time for both the cow and her calf.  At Cross Creek Cattle Company we try to eliminate as much stress as possible.  A stout pipe fence with cattle panel welded to it separate the calves from the cows.  The cows can see, smell, and speak to one another.  The calves just cannot nurse.

The calves are enjoying eating grass, which they have done for months.  They just are not supplementing their diets with milk anymore.  To help maintain their body condition during this time of adjustment, we feed them a very small daily ration of alfalfa pellets.  Alfalfa is very high in protein grass.  We start the calves on a small ration and slowly build up their daily allowance of the dehydrated grass to prevent bloat.  Cows can bloat on alfalfa because it is so rich.

The calves also have their own mixture of kelp meal, stock salt, and diatomaceous earth.  We continue to allow them to freely partake of this mineral supplement and natural de-wormer.  It is self-limiting.  They can only take what their body needs.  Of course, we supply the calves with fresh clean water and hay.

Soon we will be able to return these calves back to the herd.  Their mothers will welcome them back as adolescents; however, they will not be allowed to nurse.  The cows’ milk supply will have dried up.  There will always be one calf in the bunch who tries to resume nursing, but it is quickly kicked away.  Calves will be calves.

Weaning time means that we decide how the calves are going to work for us.  We will determine if we have any show heifers.  We will sell some to other ranchers.  We have some that we will keep to build up our herd.  Of course, we also have our grass fed beef business.  If you are interested in ordering delicious and nutritious grass fed beef, contact me at lndehaven@aol.com or call (936)870-5792.

Our Snowman

Yes, I know that it is the beginning of September and that autumn has not come yet.  As ranchers, we cannot afford to wait until freezing temperatures arrive before getting ready for winter.   We are blessed to be living in Southeast Texas where the winters are relatively mild.  We do not have to contend with a lot of winter precipitation.  We hardly ever get sleet or freezing rain; it is even more rare to get snow.  Last year we actually received some snow and we were so excited.  We ran outside late at night just to play in it because we knew that it would all be gone in the morning.

Our winter generally consists of some freezing nights.  We seldom get a hard freeze.  The air is almost always humid, which makes the cold air seem much colder than it is.  The coldness is magnified by a stiff, north breeze.  Grass stops growing and goes dormant under nighttime temperatures below 70 degrees.  Our night temperatures should fall below that in the next month.  Therefore, we have to store up food for the cattle to eat to keep up their condition during the winter.

To help protect the cows from the north wind and cold, we make sure that they are on a pasture with a wind break.  The trees in the woods break the wind.  In addition, so does the dam of our lake.  The cows on instinct alone search out the warmest places to sleep.  Depending on the pasture, they naturally seek the woods or behind the dam.  We never leave them on a pasture without a wind break of some kind.

Since we raise grass fed beef, we do not supplement our cow’s diet with range cubes or grain.  Our cows keep their good body conditions on hay.  My husband puts out round bales of hay for our herd.  Cows know what they need.  Sometimes they devour the bale and other times they just nibble.  Good quality hay is a must for a rancher in any climate here in the United States.

The cows will continue to get their supplemental minerals throughout the winter.  Most cows are bred at this time and will be calving in the late winter and early spring.  Their nutrition is very important to us.  We feed them a mixture of kelp meal and salt.  We add diatomaceous earth for other health reasons.  You can read about those in the article “Diatomaceous Earth?“  This combination is loose in a mineral feeder and given to the cows as free choice.  It is self-limiting.  They will only eat as much as they need.

Water is essential in any season.  Occasionally on really cold nights, we have to break the ice off the surface of the watering troughs.  Our ponds and lake have never frozen over so we are not concerned about them.  The temperature only gets cold enough to freeze over above-ground water troughs every once in a while.

Rows of square bales we hauled out of the pasture.

So right now, we are ensuring that we have enough bales of hay to make it through the winter.  We have round and square bales this year.  Although, the square bales are mainly for the horses.  They need hay in the winter too.

Even though it is still summer, we are looking forward to the change in weather.  From the ridiculously hot temperatures to the much more pleasant days of autumn.  Beyond that, we know that it will get colder in winter.  We have to be prepared for the health and well-being of our livestock.  Cross Creek Cattle Company does not fear the winter because we are ready.

Traditionally, a rancher who wanted to wean some calves would separate them from the herd and pour feed to them.  The calves would fatten up on the grain until the rancher decided what to do with them.  He/She would decide which calves needed to return to the herd, which ones he/she was going to continue to fatten up to eat, and which ones he/she would sell.  With a grassfed herd, the traditional way to wean is out.  One cannot wean their calves on grain and sell them as grassfed.

Some of our weaned calves.

Therefore at Cross Creek Cattle Company, we wean differently.  We still separate the calves from their mothers.  In order to make the transition less stressful, they are separated by a stout metal fence.  The cow and calf can still see each other and call to one another.  The calves just cannot nurse.  Usually by the second day the cows decide to leave their calf and go grazing in a different pasture.  Sometimes a cow will decide sooner.  Either way the cow knows where her calf is and she knows that it is fine.

The calves have access to plenty of water, hay, and grass.  We carefully monitor the grass situation to ensure that the calves have what they need.  After a week or so, we begin feeding them alfalfa pellets, which is dehydrated alfalfa grass in pellet form.  Alfalfa is a high-quality grass.  It is high in protein.  Therefore, the calves do well on it.  Unfortunately, alfalfa does not grow well in this area, which is why we choose to feed it in pellet form.

However, cows can bloat on such rich grass if their bodies are not adjusted to it slowly.  We begin with 1/2 pound of alfalfa pellets per calf a day.  We slowly work them up to 2 pounds a day of alfalfa.  This helps to ensure that their body condition does not fall behind while they are going through the transition of weaning.

We have several pens in which to graze so that they always have a good supply of grass.  We even use electric fencing to help us separate large pastures into smaller grazing fields.  This ensures that all the grasses are getting eaten.  Sometimes cows will selectively eat a pasture.  Then a rancher has to come behind them and shred the grasses that are left.  This is a waste.  It is like a child who will not eat their vegetables and a parent who throws them away every evening.

Our calves look just as good as the traditionally weaned calves.  They have maintained great body condition without the use of grains and other feeds.  They have eaten grass in several forms: fresh in the pastures, dried in the form of hay, and dehydrated in pellets.  Grass and water is really all a cow needs.  It is healthier for them and for us, which is why we raise grassfed beef.