Like the rest of the country we’ve been basking in sunshine for the past fortnight, but it’s even getting to the stage where our usually damp land could do with a sup of rain. While we still have grass ahead of our cattle, a day of soft rain would be very welcome indeed to push growth on again, as it’s stalled in the last few days. A couple of the wetter meadows have bulked up nicely, but still not enough to allow them to be mowed just yet, and most have an excellent amount of clover through them, thanks to the dry weather.

We’ve not cut turf in a couple of years, taking part of the hardship out of summer work but just in case we missed out on blisters and sore backs, we decided to cut one small meadow to be made into haystacks, though with it being light there wasn’t too much work involved to save it. Hopefully we’ll get a run of good weather next month too in order to get some hay bales made, if only just to give the cows a bit of variety during winter.

Calving

Calving is still dragging on here with one overdue and another due in a couple of weeks, not the best time of year to have them calving but at least we can keep them on bare ground near the shed. Hopefully we won’t have a second Caesarean as the Blue heifer is next on the list, but we won’t be taking any chances with her and if we’re suspicious of feet size, the vet will be called for. She is scanned to have a heifer but as it will be the first calf off the bull we have no idea of his calving difficulty though with his breeding he should be easily calved.

Breeding

With an eye on the current cattle trade we’ve been thinking about what bulls to use for next year’s crop of weanlings, and while we normally stick with a couple of the same bulls I’d been thinking about using Claddagh McCabe on a couple as he’s producing some lovely stock. I was originally going to use him on a pedigree cow, but luckily I checked his breeding as it turned out she is a half sister to him, being out of Wilodge Cerberus.

Experience has also taught me to stay under 8% calving difficulty on cows until they’re on their third calf so we might just stick with the same bull on her again.

The hot days are making it tricky to find cows in heat, so usually they’re looked at before 8am in the hopes of catching them mounting when it’s cooler.

It’s always my favourite time of day, wandering down the hill to where the cows are usually snoozing away with not a worry in their heads and calves flat out dreaming in the early morning sun with a backdrop of birdsong all around. It was only recently that I learned we’re extremely lucky to have so many cuckoos around us as three can often be heard calling at once and so they’re termed the glebe, Con’s and lake cuckoo for their respective haunts.

We have a large number of meadow pipits, which the cuckoo favours as a nesting site so this is a likely reason, but regardless they’re a lovely bird to have around even if their nesting habits are rather dubious.