Back Roads

This afternoon Brenda and I decided to go and find the foothills that we can see from our dairies after going and finding a local fruit stand to buy apricots, cherries, plums, tomatoes, and peaches from. What we thought would be a quick drive ended up taking most of the afternoon, but that was okay. 

We set out by taking back roads, starting at our dairies, and heading west. 

They were getting closer and closer and then suddenly....

The road was blocked by a fence with lots of padlocks! They really didn't want us to get through. So we turned around, went across a big canal, and set off in search of another road. 

We found one that looked like it would go through so we took it!

We were kinda in the middle of nowhere when suddenly...

We found ourselves on the other side of the padlocked fence! We thought it was kind of ridiculous to have one road blocked off when you could get to it another way without trespassing or doing anything illegal. 

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Tonight I went out and took pictures of some of the cows and heifers on the dairy because it was too nice out to be inside washing my dishes. This first picture is of Olympia, one of the show cows. She is so friendly!

 These two are show heifers that I'm helping train to lead on a halter.

 This is Grace. She is one of the two Brown Swiss cows that we have on the dairy. She is very friendly and very big compared to the Jerseys that are everywhere else.

Barefoot Blue Jean Night

What a crazy week it has been! Just a quick recap: I spent a morning learning how to run the RFID scanners for vet checks, cleaned the separators (Tuesdays are my day), spread fly bait, cut foot wraps, and spent 3 days just working on misters and soakers.

With a few days this week being over 100 degrees F it was incredibly important to keep the cows cool and laying down as much as possible. There are times, however, when the cows will get up and stand around or eat. When they do this we have automatic water systems that spray a mist of water onto the cows. On Yosemite we have two kinds: misters and soakers.

The misters and soakers work really well when they are clean but out here we pump a lot of sand through with our water because sand is everywhere! There is no way around it and then the mister and soaker heads get plugged and don't spray water like they're supposed to. That's where I came in this week. I went through the pens that were having the most problems and cleaned the parts out. I got really really wet and the feed guys were all laughing at me when they drove by, but I was having a good time because I wasn't dying in the heat. Finally, after 3 days of pulling things apart and getting my mouth full of sand and who-knows-what-else, I had nearly all of the things working. Now the job is to stay on top of keeping them clean and not letting them be ignored for a couple of weeks like last time.

So that was my big job for the week. I've been meeting more people who work here on Yosemite and at Clauss Dairy as well this week. Yesterday I met one of the feeders. The first thing he said to me when he came over to talk to me was "So I heard that you're Portuguese?" I've got an idea of where that rumor started but I don't know for sure yet. I then had to clarify to him that I wasn't Portuguese, I was the intern at Yosemite and I am Dutch (mostly) and I'm from South Dakota, not Portugal. It made me laugh to think that people over at Clauss Dairy think I'm Portuguese. I don't really think that I look like it but whatever I guess.

Another highlight of my week happened today. My manager told me that one of the heifers that I had halter broken and taught to be led on a halter had impressed a lot of people at the recent National Heifer Sale in Wisconsin. It kinda made my day.

Tonight was another fun night with Brenda. We made plans throughout the week but we didn't make any decisions until tonight. We went out and ate at Hilmar Cheese Company (the BLTT on a Pretzel Roll is very good!) then we went and checked out the Hilmar Dairy Festival. After seeing that and watching a bit of the Little Milkmaid and Milkman Contest we headed to Turlock to see a movie. However, when we got to the movie theater the movie we wanted to see was sold out so we improvised and explored Turlock until we found a Coldstone. We stopped and had ice cream then headed back home to watch the fireworks display from the back of my work truck parked outside one of the barns. It was a beautiful, barefoot blue jean night outside and perfect weather to watch fireworks.

The past days have had routine mixed with some new stuff, so it's keeping me on my toes and I love it!

Not a lot of new stuff went on last week but I did get the chance to drive a really nice GMC Sierra pickup right after it had been completely detailed inside and out! There's a new on-staff vet that will be working at my dairy and the two dairies across the street, Clauss Dairy and Sunwest Dairy starting July 1. The truck will be her work vehicle and so it had to be taken up to Turlock to be cleaned. It looked really nice and some of the guys at the dairy were practically drooling. Okay, maybe not quite but they were still impressed when it got back from Turlock. There was so much oil on the inside that I couldn't out my arm on the console while I was driving it because it would have left a smear.

Thursday night Brenda and I went to the District 6 California Dairy Princess Contest. There was a dinner served followed by a fashion show, interviews of the contestants, the goodbye speech of the current princess, and the crowning of the new princess. They went all out for this with a cruise theme and everything. It was really interesting to see and kinda made me thinking about running back in SD. We'll see I guess. That's a ways away.

Friday night I needed to get groceries to Brenda and I ventured to FoodMax in Turlock. According to Urbano, one of the guys I work with, it is the place to go for good deals on food. It was quite the adventure. The carts for the store were HUGE and then we had to find what we were looking for. It was a good way to spend a night.

I hung out with my new friends here in Hilmar on Saturday night. A whole bunch of us got together and played Apples to Apples. It was a fun night and I'm really glad to have friends here.

On Sunday I went to Oakdale for church. It was nice to see everyone there again. They church is so welcoming! I went out for lunch after church with Gary and Amy Osmundson and their kids Deanna, Brock, and Beau. I have so much fun when I'm with them and I'm so thankful to have met them along with the other wonderful people at that church.

On Monday I went to work at 6 as usual but got to help with vet checks at 7:30. I felt like it was a typical Monday morning at work because vet checks are on Monday mornings back home. I was learning new stuff, however, because we use DairyComp 305 for all of our data entry here and so we use EID eartags and handheld computers and scanners instead of a stack of papers. Learning to use the handheld computer was really interesting and I like them a lot because of the amount of information that can be accessed on every cow.

Today I had an intern meeting at Hilmar Cheese Company's HR department. We got a tour of the cheese plant and saw how cheese is made. It was interesting but I had a hard time focusing because it was SO HOT inside the buildings and outside, too. It was 105 degrees today and hotter in some of the buildings we were in. Because its a food processing plant we were also required to wear smocks, hairnets, and hardhats. I was so sweaty by the end of the tour it was disgusting. After the tour we had lunch and learned about milk pricing, how to conduct interviews, and the course of action to take when disciplining employees. The meeting ended at 2:00pm and then we all headed back to work. Tuesdays have become my day to clean the separators, I'm convinced because today was the 3rd Tuesday that I've had to do it. I have to say, though, it get easier every time.

I also fixed a hose connection today. When I went to use the power washer on the separator I couldn't get any pressure out of it. When I started looking around I realized that there was a leaky connection from the machine to the hose and I figured that it was probably missing a gasket. The first day I worked here at Yosemite I replaced a gasket on the connection on the other side of the hose, so I knew what I had to do but I called Urbano just to make sure. When he looked at it he wasn't convinced that I was right so we went to look at the emergency replacement hose. Sure enough there was a gasket there where he thought there wasn't. We pulled the gasket out of the replacement hose and I put that gasket into the other hose and sure enough, it worked!! Urbano said it's a good thing that my fingers are so skinny because I was using my pinky and a 2 inch needle to get the gasket into the correct place in the hose connection. It was a good day!

So I guess I've been up to more than I realize, which I think happens when I stay so busy! I've only been homesick once, and that was during church on Sunday when we were celebrating how great dads are, and I'm 1400 miles away from mine. That was hard but at least I have a cell phone I can use to talk to him. My time out here has been great so far! 3 weeks down, 7 to go!

I Might Be A Girl, But I Can Still Do My Work

Have you ever had one of those moments that makes you thankful about how you were raised? The past two days were full of those moments for me. My parents provided for me and love me so much and they taught me to walk with faith in Jesus Christ. They also taught me that everyone needs to be able to pull their weight in a family. My siblings and I were, and still are, taught to do things to the best of our abilities for the glory of God. 

Even if I'm a girl. 

Don't get me wrong, I love working out here. The people are great and a lot of fun to work with. However, there are still men who don't like it when women work hard. The past two days I worked with a man who is like that. He is very nice but he doesn't like it when women lift things or do manual labor. It was a new experience for me. Back home I know what I can do and sometimes I have to ask for help. That's just the way it is. Here, for the most part, it has been the same way, but there are times when I'll be carrying a 50lb bag of grain and one of the guys will stop what he's doing to come and take it from me. Sometimes its nice but  its hard when I want to be doing it myself. I'm not sure if it's the culture that these guys come from or what, but it has been an eye-opening experience. It has taught me patience and made me thankful to be raised as I was. 

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On a different note, here's a picture of the interns that went to the bullfight on Monday night. And if you want to know what a suicide squad is, here's a link for a fight that was at the same place I went to:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xheTKg-ujzY 

I Went to a Portuguese Bullfight!

There are many new experiences that internships bring and in my case that has ranged from new experiences on the dairy to new cultural experiences. I work with many Mexican and Portuguese people and their culture is everywhere out here.
So a bunch of us got together and went down to Stevinson to the Portuguese bullfight. It was a lot of fun and something that I'm glad I got to go to. We got there around 8:00 and the place was packed! Half of our group, myself included, ended up watching the bullfight from the very top of the arena. It was intense! There was a live band playing music and the crowd really got into everything that was going on. The bullfighters wore colorful outfits and the horses had decorations in their manes. The bulls had padding on their shoulders which protected them from any real harm. There were three different 'events' that went on throughout the night. The bullfighters on horses, the bullfighters with the capes and the suicide squad.
Watching the bulls go after the fighters on horses and on the ground was good, but I think my favorite part was the suicide squad. The suicide squad is made up of 6 guys. They all line up single file across the center of the arena facing the bull. The first guy taunts the bull into charging him, then attempts to hang onto the head of the bull. If he is successful in doing that, the four of them run in and try to hold the bull still enough so that the last guy can grab hold of the tail of the bull. Once he has the tail, the other five let go at the same time and then the one holding onto the tail tries to hold the bull in place. Or at least that's how I understood it. I may be totally wrong but that's what it looked like. Either way, it was a good time! It was also a good time to get to know the other interns and some other people from Hilmar.
Even though it was a late Monday night it was totally worth it! I'm looking forward to more adventures with the friends I made last night!!

It's a Small World After All

This week was a lot of fun! It's been crazy trying to get everything ready for the upcoming fair in Merced next week on top of the everyday things that need to be done.

My day starts at 6 as usual and then the next hour and a half are spent feeding and tying up the show heifers and show cows. Then I check the fresh cows looking for any sick ones. The big thing that was added to my list was breaking the newest show heifers. It's been fun learning the correct way to lead a heifer and cow, as weird as that may sound. It's also been interesting to see the different personalities of each heifer. Some of them are sweethearts and have been relatively easy to train while others have been stubborn and near impossible to get along with. I'll be honest, there are some heifers I don't like because they like to push me around. Even still, it's a lot of fun. Did you know that if a show heifer doesn't want to get up and walk, biting their tail gets them up really quickly?!? I have yet to actually try it but I did witness it a few times yesterday.

I met someone yesterday who actually knew about Dordt! I was excited and it helped make my day! There were even a few people that go to Dordt that we both knew. I had gotten so used to the reaction of "Dordt? Where's that? It's how big? They have an ag. program? etc, etc." that when this person said "Oh, I know people who go there!," I was actually caught off guard.

I'm also learning that if I have a question, I should ask it, no matter how dumb I feel. I just need to keep reminding myself that it's better to be safe than sorry. It's keeping me humble for sure.

Something that has really surprised me out here has been working with the Jersey breed. I had never worked with them before and I had heard stories. Not good ones either... However, I learned that I need to make my own opinions. I love working with Jerseys most of the time! They are generally very quiet and easy to work with. It has been an eye-opening experience to say the least and I'm seeing advantages to both pure-bred and cross-bred herds.

I've been getting to know another one of the interns, Brenda, this week. She works at the dairy just across the street from me and lives just a 5-minute walk away from me. It's great to have another girl in the program because it gives me someone to relate to. She's great!

Last night I went over to the Russell's house for supper. The C.A. and Kirsten Russell are the owners of the dairy. They treated me like one of the family which was so nice! I helped set the table and visited for a  while. They are such a blessing to me! They have 2 sons, Colin and Lars, and a daughter, McCallister (Callie for short). I went to church with them this morning, too. It was a great message. The pastor focused on Psalm 3, written by David when he was fleeing from his son Absalom. The pastor pointed out that God's grace and hope are always offered to us, no matter what situation we may be in.

This is the first summer that I've been away from home for the whole summer and I'm missing events that I've never missed in the past. Today is my dad's birthday. Happy birthday, Dad!! I know you'll be reading this sometime : )

God is blessing me in many ways out here. I'm learning a lot and having fun doing it!

An Adventure I Won't Be Telling Mom About

Today was gorgeous! Sunshine and a slight breeze made it a perfect day to clean the manure separator with a power sprayer. Not a big deal, right? Well.... the manure separator is easily as tall as a 2-story building, maybe 3. Either way, it's tall and I had to climb the stairs to the top. The separator's stairs have plastic steps and a metal railing that goes up to my waist. I can see the whole farm from the top! Not gonna lie, it kinda freaks me out and I know I'm not the only one that gets nervous when I go up there. But we got it done without a problem.
The people here are great! They watch out for me and are so respectful. One of the guys saw me at the top of the separator with the power sprayer and told me later that there were enough guys around the dairy that if I didn't want to do it because I didn't feel safe, there was no reason I should have to. Well, we'll see how that goes. It was hard and I can't do it all by myself but another guy was teasing me that it would "make my muscle's bigger!"
The rest of the day was spent putting fly bait out, getting cows for the hoof trimmer, and going through a few pens looking for sick cows. I also had to have my work truck serviced and it was done in a couple of hours, so that was nice. We're getting ready for the county fair that's coming up in a few weeks! We've got a whole bunch of heifers and cows that have been trained for showing so I hope I get to see some of what goes on there since I've never been part of it before.
This past weekend I worked Saturday and went to church in Oakdale on Sunday. There are many wonderful people there that make me feel so welcome! There was a cook out after church and the food was excellent! I love spending time with them and I'm so thankful that God has blessed me with them.


Well, more stories to come later, I'm sure! And by the way, Mom did actually end up hearing about the separator :)

It's Gonna Be a Great Summer

Nearly a week of work done! I can't believe how fast its gone. People out here keep commenting on how odd the weather is right now. It's been "cool" and cloudy with some rain. To me, though, it feels like I never left South Dakota. The days feel like our nice summer days back home. I know that it won't last but I'm enjoying it while it's around.

This week has included many new experiences for me. I got here on Monday and after I moved in I worked for two hours. I got a tour and then got a crash course in how to use Dairy Comp, a dairy management computer program. After that my days have had routine but new things keep coming up! 

We begin the day with a short meeting at 6 a.m. My manager, Brett, goes over what's going on with me and three other workers, Urbano, Colin, and Alfredo. After that we split up and go to do our own chores. The first thing I do is feed the show heifers and show cows that are on the dairy. After that, Urbano and I usually check the fresh cows. These cows are the ones that have had their calves in the past couple of weeks and we need to watch them to make sure that they are staying healthy. The dairy has registered Jersey cows and Jerseys are especially susceptible to ketosis, or milk fever. This means that they start sending too much calcium to the production of milk and their other systems begin to suffer from lack of calcium. What usually happens is that you have a cow that can't stand up and if you don't treat it they may end up dying. Other things that may be wrong is that they are having stomach problems or may just be under the weather a little. Urbano has taught me what to look for to see a cow that isn't feeling well. He tells me several times every morning to look at the eyes, nose and ears, and to watch for cows that aren't eating the feed in front of them. Urbano has been working with these Jerseys for years and he really knows his stuff. He's also a great teacher and makes me try things after I see it done once or twice. This includes giving shots, pills, and IVs. 

When I got to work on Tuesday I was shown a cow that had ketosis. It had gone down on Friday and was still receiving IVs of calcium and sugar. Urbano showed me where everything was and then asked me if I wanted to try to IV the cow. Well, I tried, but even with the great teaching that I had gotten from Doc back home I was still unsuccessful so Urbano gave it. On Wednesday, however, he told me to go and do it while he went with Colin to get a skid loader. I went and found the stuff and got it on the first try! I was so excited because it's not as easy as people make it look but it worked!!! As soon as I finished giving the cow calcium Colin and Urbano returned with the skid loader. It as time for another new experience! We put the cow into a "jacuzzi." The jacuzzi was a metal box that we filled with water after getting the cow in it so that the cow's nerves and muscles could relax. She spent the entire afternoon floating in the water. Unfortunately it didn't do anything for her and today we had to put her down. 

Other things that I've been doing are taking cow's temperatures, sorting cow into different pens, moving cows around, walking show heifers, and LOTS of walking. I'm also working on my Spanish! When Urbano found out that I knew some Spanish he started saying everything to me in Spanish and then in English if I didn't understand. I think I'm doing pretty well. Either way I'm having fun and loving it out here! More stories to come!!