We’ve had epic amounts of heavy, wet snow, and a big melt’s coming.   No snow blower for the tractor, and the other person that plows is out of town for 8 weeks.  Today the sun is shining and the snow is crusty and deep.  All the neighbors are plowed out; yep, I’ve been kicking it old school plowing miles of road with the loader, fun. We’ve had over 90 inches of snow this month with more than 15 inches of water, and 85 of those inches fell over the past 2 weeks.  I’m thinking we must have broken some records.  Highs have been above freezing most days, so much has melted, but we’ve still got several feet of heavy, compacted snow on the ground.  I’ve headed out to town a couple times this past week to deliver eggs, get feed, and to get some winter tires with extremely aggressive tread for my truck.  I’ve got everything well plowed, so I took the new tires out in the deep snow for a test, they feel good, no slipping even pushing snow against the front grill.

Just had to take a break from this email to see what was causing the dogs to go crazy.  Someone was snowshoeing in the back gate dragging a sled, he wanted to pick up a cut and wrapped lamb for a neighbor, and buy 20 pounds of ground beef.  I need to remember to send a bill.

Last Thursday or Friday, can’t recall which day, we had a break in the storm in the late afternoon.  Skies cleared, the sun came out, the wind died down, and I thought I finally had an opportunity to plow fresh snow, instead of packed, frozen snow that had time to consolidate overnight.  About two feet had fallen since I plowed the day before, and, even though it was wet, this fresh snow was pushing easily in front of the tractor.  At about 4:30, after my first pass down the road, I was heading back out when Susan told me there was a cow missing, so much for getting the road finished.  I headed out into the pasture, breaking through waist deep snow to get to the cow’s path.  I went through one paddock, and then a second paddock, across a small stream into a third paddock, and there was the heifer, under a tree with her newborn calf.  This heifer’s name is Dummy Cow, used to be Dummy Calf, and I may have mentioned her before.  She had to be taught to suck, and after a week of training she had to be taught to get up and nurse.  She had dummy calf syndrome, you can look it up in your Merck vet manual.  Very frustrating to have to go out and pick up a calf several times a day, and put it on her mother, otherwise she’d just lie there and die.  It was fortunate the mother stuck around so long, and put up with being milked, etc.  Anyway, I was concerned about this cow’s ability to be a proper mother, based on her history.  Another storm was on the way, and I needed to get the calf and cow into the barn, I figured I would put her inside with Electra and her calf, so she’d have a role model.  I picked up the cold, wet calf, and started down the cow path with her.  About every hundred feet I’d stop, and get the cow to follow me, she kept going back to where she’d calved, this is typical and why I really don’t like to move them so soon, but it would be dark in no time, and then it would be real cold, real fast.  Without too much trouble I got Electra, Volt, Dummy, and her calf inside, fed, and watered.  The calf was strong, and about seventy pounds.  With a little light left, I got back on the plowing, and plowed until after dark.  It was a good day, everything went as well as could be expected.  That night we got more snow, and lots of it.

Dummy and her calf are still inside with Electra and Volt, until things thaw a bit.  Dummy’s still unnamed calf is doing great, and it turns out that Dummy is a very attentive mother; Susan says she deserves a new name.

Update:  The calf’s name is Sunshine.