Saturday, November 17, 2007

Aileas

The reason I put Mad Cow down in the back pasture with Aileas is because when I milked this morning I got less than a quart and a half of milk! I had no idea why she had dropped in production so suddenly, so I thought I would put her down with Aileas and maybe having a nursing calf would encourage her to produce more. After I came back in the house Mooky told me that he had seen Aileas stick her head through the fence and try to nurse. He said he didn't think to tell me about it because Lily stepped away immediately and swung her head at Aileas. Hearing that changed my mind about having Lily down there, so I brought her back up here around noon. Later in the day Erinn was feeding Aileas handfuls of oat grass out of the garden and she saw Aileas stick her head through the fence and nurse. Bummer. I don't know WHAT to do now!
Mooky's stomach is hurting really bad tonight. I gave him a haircut at 8pm and then he took a shower, so he's up much later than usual.
Kris called and said that he is enjoying visiting with Jordan (his nephew) out at the cabin. He'll be home in the morning! It's been a long 2 days without him home. The kids are disappointed that they won't get to see Jordan on this trip, but since neither one of them is interested in hunting they didn't go to the cabin. You'd be bored to tears if you weren't hunting.
Erinn helped me make soap today. We have a new mold with a doe and kid on it. The soap turned out REALLY nice looking!

3 comments:

Teresa said...

Well... Hmmmm...
This is a problem.
Can you maybe tape Lily's teats to stop Aileas from being able to nurse? Maybe if she figures out the source is not providing she will stop trying. Obstinate little calf.
The only other suggestions I can think of are 1) back to something like an adjustable Kant Suck device, 2) run an electric fence line at the level she is sticking her head thru so she can't reach Lily.

On a more positive note - Got pics of the new soap???? :)

FourMileFarm said...

Yeah, I was thinking I had some teat tape, but it disappeared so I will have to order some.
:***(
If we had an extra charger, the electric fence idea would probably work great, but we only have one and it is being used to keep the critters out of our tree planting area. So, unfortunately, there is nothing I can do in the immediate future. And her udder looks empty this morning. I think I'll cry. I hate it when we get this short on milk!

Teresa said...

Got any vet wrap? Maybe that would work until you can get some teat tape. If it would not risk irritating her udder, I'd say use some pepper juice on the teats to discourage her... tabasco or something. :)
Seems like, years ago, I saw farmers put burlap or some kind of cloth sling under dairy cows to keep their udders from being scratched up in brambles. Kind of like a reverse goat coat. Think Lily would tolerate that?