Our run of heifer calves finally ended last week, with the arrival of a bull who wanted to make his entrance a memorable one. We had only scanned a few cows last autumn and she wasn’t one of them, so I was beginning to suspect twins, as she was carrying fairly heavy. We watch these late-calving cows closely, as they’re more prone to larger calves and despite being indoors on a mainly hay diet, she had to undergo our first caesarean in a few years.

Sometimes when a person does something they’re used to, it becomes an easy task to them and they can’t quite acknowledge the fact that it’s difficult for others. Dad is outstanding at picking up small changes in a cow’s day-to-day behaviour and only for this, there could have been quite a different result.

I am too impatient a person to stand watching a cow for 20 minutes and this is often my downfall when watching cows close to calving, as if I see them lying down and chewing the cud, I reckon they’re quite content and no further action is required.

My father learned from the very same mistake years ago and is far more thorough in his inspections, and only for this he might not have picked up on the fact she was stampier than usual and in fact was sick to calve with no obvious signs, with the calf being simply too big to be ‘put up’. One sunroof exit later, a very large bull was delivered, and for a bull I’ve used many, many times over the years, this was actually the first time we had to aid a cow with delivery.

That being said, he’s roughly two thirds my weight, which is not a small amount.

Side-door exits do seem to be flavour of the month, however, as many people I’ve spoken with recently have had to section cows in the last few weeks.

Breeding has also started, so with one eye on the cows yet to calve the other is being thrown to the future ones. While we have to keep a number of cows which are four or five stars, we’re looking okay for the moment, with replacements to cover for them at our deadlines, in case of any unexpected incidents – and with two further heifers off scanned cows, we will definitely have quite a choice to pick from.

All of the calved cows have now been let off for the summer, with only a few yet to calve staying close to the shed in case of difficulties.

With ground conditions pretty good for Leitrim land at the minute, and with the forecast remaining dry for the foreseeable, it was decided to spread a watery mix of slurry on pasture recently grazed. Barring terrible weather conditions, the rest will be held now for second-cut meadows, as grass growth has shot up in the last week, meaning we were unable to spread any on our meadows, as they’ve gone from looking quite bare, to filling out immensely.

That being said the cows outdoors were not happy with their own grass and one night broke into neighbouring land, not once but twice. Thankfully, they were easy enough to remove, but I made the rookie mistake of fencing the following day in only a shirt – and whitethorn hedges and short sleeves do not mix, as I shortly found out.