Tiffi learns all about cattle

_Elsa_

“Are those your cows?” asks Tiffi. 

Baby Huey tells her that him and his siblings own these cattle. We had a lot to learn before we were able to purchase them. We inquired with cattle farmers how to go about setting up the pasture and we also read as much as possible on Google too.

‘Unlike goats and sheep, cattle need high quality pasture. If you don’t have good grazing for your cows now, you’ll need to improve the quality of your pasture land. One way of doing this is to plant clover, alfalfa or other legumes in advance because they add nitrogen to the soil and improves the likelihood of good grass in the future.

Having ample good grazing space for your cattle can save you a lot of money. When you keep your cows in a situation that is as close to nature as possible, they can get most, or all of their nutrition from grazing during the spring and summer months and well into the fall. This saves money on feed, hay and veterinary bills.

Keep in mind that a single cow can eat as much is a ton of hay through the winter months, so if you don’t have enough land to produce the hay you need, you’ll need to find a convenient, reliable, affordable source of hay for your cattle. You should also set up secure, dry storage so that you can stock up on hay as soon as it’s cut. That’s when the prices are lowest.

Cattle are ruminants, so they have four stomachs. It’s important to feed them correctly to encourage the right balance of beneficial bacteria in the gut to facilitate their multi-step digestion processes.

When dealing with new cattle, it’s important to find out what they’ve been eating and lay in a supply of that feed at least for the first few weeks. Make any changes in feeding very gradually over the first 7 to 10 days. Changing feed abruptly can throw the helpful gut bacteria off balance and causes undesirable changes in the pH level of the cows digestive juices. You may be surprised at how much cattle can eat. Cattle being raised for meat production or milk production need to eat about 3% of their total body weight in feed daily.

Additionally, they should have forage or silage available constantly to keep the digestive system busy. This keeps it working correctly; additionally, cattle left without anything to nibble on will become anxious, and this is detrimental to their overall health and quality and amount of milk or meat they produce. (Info here)

“There are two of my siblings, Happy and Witchy, oh I mean bitchy. She acts more like a bitch than a witch,” Baby Huey says. 

Tiffi’s head is spinning. First she lands in another world. Then she meets up with a talking pumpkin. Now this talking pumpkin talks to her about cattle and farm life. Is she dreaming? It kind of sounds like a nightmare.  

Let’s continue here – Tiffi never knew how tedious working on a farm can be

Start at the beginning – Tiffi and the 7 pumpkins