The Grass Always looks Greener...

On the other side of the electric fence.

Saturday was a work day at the farm in Oberlin.  It is the time of year where the plentiful summer grass that keeps the cows fat and happy has been eaten down to ground level.  In anticipation of the onset of fall/winter and the lack of grass, we always plant rye grass in October.  Rye is a winter grass that grows lush and thick and beckons hungry bovines to partake.  Rye grass provides good nutrition to the cows and coupled with hay, bridges them over until Spring when the bermuda/bahia mix of grasses come out of its winter dormancy.

This year Dad added some wheat seed in with the rye grass for an extra buffet item for the old girls.  The trouble with rye grass is that it takes a little while for it to grow big enough to turn the cows onto it.  Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers used to sing a song entitled, "The Waiting is the Hardest Part."  The cows concur with Mr. Petty. They just don't have the patience or intestinal fortitude (literally) to wait for the rye grass to grow.

Rye/Wheat pasture is growing...

Once a cow gets it in her mind (or if a bull or steer: in his mind) to go somewhere, it takes a mighty strong fence or gate to hold the animal back.  As if to underscore that statement, the cows have been going on 'manoeuvres' at night and have managed to break through the fence and get into the freshly planted rye grass field and out onto the road and gotten themselves in all kinds of mischief.

The task at hand is to add a third wire to the electric fence.  If you look closely, you can see where the three wires are as evidenced by the yellow insulators that fasten them to the fence.  The black insulator, ratchet and wire running horizontally to the right is a cross fence that separates the pasture into two large paddocks. I'll show you a better picture down below.

I'm SHOCKED the cows would want to get in here.  Shocked, I tell ya!

We have a large reel that sits on a frame in the back of the Kubota Mule all terrain vehicle that we roll up or unroll wire with.  We decided, however, that it would be easier to make a trip to Tractor Supply in Oakdale and pick up a couple rolls of spooled wire, putting a shaft through the center hole and attaching to the tailgate of the Kubota.  Dad drove the Kubota and I walked along the perimeter of the 40 acre pasture attaching the wire to the insulators at each post.  The weather was nice and the job went quickly.  It is amazing what you can do with 40 acres and a mule!  What a good program!

Spool of electric fence wire

The idea of having two paddocks is a wise one.  You see cows are so happy to get on fresh grass that they don't know what to do with themselves.  So they walk and walk and eat and poop and walk some more.  If you don't manage their eating, they 'tromp down' and waste more grass than they eat.  Then like an over eater at an all-you-can-eat buffet, they will eat until they get themselves sick.  Not a pretty picture, I know.

The tracks mark the cross fence that separates the two internal paddocks.

So the plan is, you set up two paddocks within the pasture, allowing them access to one of them for a short period of time while the other paddock "rests."  Then, for the next period of time, you allow them to eat in the other paddock while the other pasture rests, refreshes, and re-grows.  In doing so, you lengthen the life of your pasture and regulate the cows' intake of the rich grass that can make them sick.

If you look real real close, you can see the family graveyard where the grass meets the trees in the distance on Durio Cemetery Road.  My great-great grandpa and grandma lie at rest there.  There is an American flag flying and there are some old (circa 1800's) Civil War era grave sites under a sprawling live oak tree.  I'll have to research sometime and find out some information about those old gravestones and the soldiers interred there.  The old Sonnier Family homeplace lies just east of the graveyard over the gully only about 300 feet from the cemetery.

There goes Dad on the mule

The grass has to grow a bit more before before the cows will be granted entry to the buffet, but they have hay to munch on until that time.

Hey kids, get off my lawn!

As the sun started going down, our work was done.  Dad reconnected the chargers to the fence and I tested each of the 3 wires at different points to ensure we were getting good voltage.  All was good so we called it a day.

An honest day's work

Patience is a virtue.  It really is.  I struggle with having patience and the cows do too!

Where the green grass grows...

In fact, Dad reported that a steer already jumped over the top wire of our newly constructed fence, breaking the wire!  Doggonit!  Time to put that bad boy in the freezer and enjoy some Grass Fed Beef.