It was actually a surprisingly "normal" week here at Yosemite Jersey Dairy. I went about my usual activities and such. However, two major things were added to my list of things I get to do/can do.
The first is halter breaking cows. Yes, full grown, 1100 lb. cows. The first step is to tame them down and get them used to being touched and petted as well as being tied for a few hours every day. That was last week. This week I got to start teaching them to go on a walk without trying to run away. The trick is that you have to show them who is the boss and I'm getting to be pretty good at that. If someone wanted to make me crabby and have a "don't mess with me" attitude, then having me work with show cows all day is the way to do it : )
Anyway, so yesterday I finally took two of the cows out of the pen for a walk. This is the first time that I've walked a new cow outside of a pen and the first time the new cow has been walked outside a pen, so it could have had a very bad ending (such as one actually getting away from me and running on the road, which didn't happen). Thankfully the first cow was really, really good! She'll be ready for the fair if they decide that she is one that actually gets to go. (Out of the 9 that I'm working with, only 4 or so will go.)
The next cow I walked was definitely more high-strung than the first. She was kinda wild but I was able to calm her down every time she tried to get away from me. It was (and still is) a learning process. We had been walking for about 10 minutes when suddenly our breeding vehicle came around a corner and totally spooked the cow. We had been in the process of turning around so somehow she got my foot pinned upside-down under both of her front feet. Because of the awkward angle my foot was at, I ended up leaning up against her to stay upright. Then she decided to stop moving around and stand completely still. With my foot under her. Now, the breeder had seen this all happen but he had no idea what to do. He backed the vehicle up to see if I needed help (which I did... having a cow on top of your foot is not what I would call a pleasant experience) but he doesn't speak very much English so he just kinda stared at me. Well, when he had backed the vehicle up close to me and the cow, the cow backed off and got off of me. Then the breeder took off and I gritted my teeth and walked the cow back to the pen, tied her to the hitching post, and went to find some Ibuprofen. Nothing was broken, thankfully, but I don't even have a really good bruise to show off! Part of me hopes that cow doesn't go to the fair but another part of me says she will because she's one of the better behaved cows in the pen. We will see, I guess.
The other major thing that I'm going to start doing is pushing up feed. It might not sound like much but I'm excited to be able to do it. Today I had "tractor lessons." I now know how to drive a simple tractor. I'm still a little rough when I shift to a new speed but at least I can do it now. I was supposed to practice for a half an hour this afternoon but I was enjoying myself so much that I just kept driving it around. Before I knew it I had been on the thing for 1.5 hours! I thoroughly enjoyed myself and seeing the smiles on the other workers faces was fun, too.
On a side note, the guys at work have started referring to me as "la niña" which I though meant girl. But I was mistaken. One of the workers informed me that they mean is as "baby" or the "little girl". I'll admit, when I was first here I didn't like it at all, but now that they know that I can pull my own weight and that I will pull my own weight, it's not so bad. At least I know that they're talking about me when I hear that. I catch more of what they say that what they think, though, which kinda makes me laugh. They're a lot of fun to work with.
No comments:
Post a Comment