The Cattle Are Lowing, The Baby Awakes

Cuckoo the randy calf

A year and a day ago Pilsdon’s brand-spanking-new cow-sheds were opened for business. Our two beef cattle and three calves were herded in from their temporary housing, tricked into running after a bucket of tasty soy nuts.  Over the previous few months the ramshackle “Loose Boxes”, the long row of cow-sheds and human-sheds, had been razed to the ground and completely rebuilt, outwardly retaining the same shape and look as before but inwardly offering a far superior set of rooms for us people as well as de-luxe winter accommodation for the cattle.

One year ago, the rebuilt cowsheds looking pristine

Day one inaugurated with a couple of cow pats

Yesterday, one year after completion, a representative from the building company EC Harris came to do a final sign-off to check that we were happy that it was all to spec and in good working order. The present incumbents are Rufus, Hazel and Jasmine (the huge beef cattle in one shed) and next door, Cuckoo, Julian and Oscar (the calves born this year). I’m not sure their opinions were sought but they do seem happy enough. Not many cow-sheds are mucked out twice a day like these ones are, and the cows get lots of natural light.

I find it tricky to distinguish Rufus, Hazel and Jasmine.

Across the yard the three dairy Jersey cows, the mothers of the calves, are quartered in an older but very serviceable cowshed. They are Angelica, by far the eldest being around ten years old; Snowdrop, perhaps three years old; and the youngest, Daffodil, who was born shortly after I first arrived at Pilsdon in early 2012 (she was mentioned in this post in May 2012). Daffodil is the naughtiest, possibly because she’s the youngest, and during the first five or ten minutes of being milked she will not stand still. Buckets of milk have gone flying as she’s lurched forward to search for more food along the trough (we feed them a couple of scoops of 'dairy nuts' each while we milk them), and recently she just crashed onto her knees for no apparent reason. She also delights in flicking her tail with deadly accuracy into the eye of whoever is unfortunate enough to be milking her - somehow she even gets it behind my glasses.

Snowdrop, left, and Angelica

Daffodil, facing the wall no doubt because of some naughty prank 

Snowdrop is not well. She’s off her food, she plods to the milking parlour as the others race ahead to get to their nuts, and her head hangs low as she’s being milked. The vet came in yesterday and did some tests for which we await the results. We are hoping it is nothing but the cow equivalent of the flu. It would be a disaster if she were to keel over and expire, particularly if it happened whilst being milked! 

The milking is done at 6am and 5pm every day, each time by two or three people, depending on the rota. This duty is not finished when the pails are full of frothy milk - all the cow-sheds then have to be mucked out, the wheelbarrows of dung and straw carted off to the huge pile at the bottom of the vegetable garden, and finally the calves fed a scoop each of cow nuts. This last task is anything but simple. Each calf has their own bucket to eat out of, but Cuckoo and Julian tend to finish first, being biggest, and then both push little Oscar out of the way to eat his nuts too - that is, unless we can stop them by clinging onto their necks. Julian particularly is not easy to hold onto.  

Mischievous Julian, left, and poor Oscar with his temporary muzzle and running sores on his leg (not visible)

Add to that the fact that Cuckoo and Julian are getting very playful with us as we try to muck out their quarters, jumping and bucking around, bumping us with their heads and almost kicking us with their flailing legs. Given half a chance Cuckoo tries to mount us, in fact she succeeded locking her front legs around Rupert this morning, pinning him to the wall. Somehow all of this just endears them to us all the more. Inevitably the breakfast conversation will include some story about the early morning milking. Life at Pilsdon would be much the poorer without the livestock to look after. And of course, ultimately, to eat.