Fun on the Farm

WARNING: Don't read this if you can't deal with the realities of farm life. It has a pretty good ending though.


"Are you having a great day?" asked the very perky girl behind the coffee bar in the grocery store.

"Actually, no," I told her as I waited for the overpriced coffee slushee that was my self-bestowed award for making it thus far. "But it's improving." (The picture above of Justin's dog Ali Ali is meant to be a representation of my mood in the face of all that perkiness.)

So what was my problem? I'm posting this because some people see my life as a sort of pastoral idyll -- picking flowers and tomatoes, rocking on the porch, etc. And those good parts are what I generally talk about. But then there are days like today.

My younger son called early this morning to tell me there was a very young calf whose mother didn't seem to have any milk and whose rear end (Okay, Ann C., you'd better stop reading right now) was covered with maggots and some of the hair had been eaten off. My husband, who normally would deal with this, is out of town so I put aside my plans for writing and hoeing and headed down the hill to where the calf was.

I'll spare you all the details, which were pretty disgusting, but after hosing the baby off while Justin held her and making sure there were no wounds, I headed off for the farm supply store in search of some sort of fly repellent/ointment. And a bulb syringe. (Don't ask.)

No luck at the nearby store (twenty minutes away) so I went on to one farther (twenty more minutes) away. Here, no one in the store seemed to know much about cattle. I then went to a vet who shook his head and said just to use fly spray -- whatever it took to kill the maggots.

Back home once more to find the baby looking as if she felt better. She had nursed and Mama Cow's bag was full. So that had been a false alarm. Then, with the help of younger son and girlfriend, there was more hosing, flushing of rear orifices with cider vinegar and water, topical application of peroxide, finishing up with a Pepto Bismal pink ointment said to be antibiotic and fly repellent. Mama Cow anxious and having to be warded off; dogs fascinated, calf indignant, Vicki with tiny maggots crawling up her forearms.

The calf looks pretty awful but I know she feels better. Here's a picture of her mama licking her nose after the ordeal. The pink is the ointment.

And here, in the foreground is the calf we were bottle-feeding -- now weaned and eating grass and calf feed.

Not the day I'd planned -- but the day I got. Could have been worse.