Dealing with the weather

Watching the cattle during the heat wave in February made me feel happy not to be a cow. They have a built in summer and winter wardrobe,  as memories of scarce winter feed fade they shed their heavy winter coats along with their scrawny shapes. They are down to their summer short back and sides but they now weigh in at a hefty 600 to 650 kilos. There are shoulders and hips in there somewhere but they are well padded by burgeoning rumps, sirloins, briskets, chuck and rib eye steaks. Lugging that sort of weight around creates its own portable heat wave.

By mid morning the cattle head for the shade of the trees by the dam and there they relax till late afternoon. Occasionally one will channel it's distant relation, the hippopotamus and wade shank deep into the dam. Cattle don't have a vast range of facial expressions, but the blissed out face of a Hereford standing in a dam on a 37 degree day is a joy to behold.

Come winter, our cattle cope well with the cold weather by growing in a woolly coat on top of their already thick natural leather jackets. If only the grass in winter would grow in the same way. Where we are, winter means scavenging over thin pickings supplemented with hay. If you want to train a herd of cattle to sit, roll over and beg, bring them bales of hay in winter.

4 degrees outside and not much better on the inside,
the calf is wearing an old jacket  

All of this brings me to the Asian water buffalo  Bubalus bubalis. 


While extreme weather plagued our east coast, we were in the hills of northern Vietnam, trekking through the winter rice paddies.

The Asian version of a tractor, plow, cart, family transporter and producer of baby buffalos - the water buffalo,  spends most of its life in cool squishy mud, the water buffalo has no need for a winter coat because winter in Asia is usually a non event. This year the temperature in the hills around Sapa in Vietnam was close to freezing for days on end.
Water buffalos died in their thousands- over 20,000 to be exact.  

That's 20,000 pieces of multipurpose farm machinery gone.

The ups and downs of Spring

All was going well down on the farm, as Spring emerged so did our new calves.  Looking back there were signs of trouble we didn't pick up on for one of the cows. She gave birth easily enough- but not without consequences because out came the calf and her uterus as well.  There she was slowly wandering along dragging her uterus behind her. One look at the dirt, stones and sticks she was picking up would be enough to make you think she didn't have a chance.

The great thing about the bush we keep discovering is that when you make a phone call things happen rapidly. Down here  'your phone call is important to us'.  The local vet was there in 20 minutes with a drop sheet,  a bucket of water and antibiotics. A good wash and a fair amount of shoving and the cow and her uterus were back together. After an hour or two she perked up and at the end of the day she ambled back to the herd, calf in tow.

All seemed well for the next month, then the same cow went missing. We found her caught up in some fallen branches- 3 steps backwards and she would have been free. Instead she had tried to push forward, had exhausted herself and was down. Again the phone calls went out and this time within 10 minutes the neighbours started arriving, some we knew and some were called up on the bush telegraph- strangers with a bale of hay, years of experience and  and the time to offer what ever help was needed.

She hung on for another day,  but she could not get up and so we lost a cow and gained an orphan calf. Life was not looking all that promising for the calf, but when a hungry calf needs a drink it finds a way.

The little orphan quickly worked out that cows can't count and they can't see behind them either, so as soon as one of the other calves sidled up to its mum, the orphan dived in between the cows back legs and slurped up as much  free milk as it could get away with. This tactic kept it alive but was not without it's dangers. Cows don't announce when they plan to empty their bladder or their bowels and when they do, it comes with an almighty rush. If you happen to have your eyes down concentrating on a surreptitious suckle from the rear end of a cow then you often end up with a pile of shit on your head. Our poor little orphan often looked a sad and sorry sight wandering around  motherless, with its coat matted and dripping.

He's still there, smaller than the rest and always one or two steps off to the side of the herd but he's going to make it all by himself in the world.