Progress Report on LuLu

In the middle of the long, hot summer last year, LuLu gave birth to her first calf, Nicky.  Calving in the worst possible time of year wasn't bad enough.  We happened to be in a drought.  We had no grass.  LuLu was in stress from labor and delivery and had no strength.  We babied her and her calf.  We ran water hoses to try to keep one small patch of pasture alive with bermuda grass.  We drenched her with molasses and gave her a calcium supplement.  

In all truth, we thought that we were going to lose her.  Slowly, she rebounded.  She and Nicky, although stressed, made it.  This year, the grass in the pasture is growing as we've had lots more rain than last year.  LuLu is a small cow and isn't a particularly large producer of milk like our other cows.  We get between a half gallon to a gallon each day.  She seems to have perfected the art of holding back her milk for her calf.  She is able, somehow, to not let her milk drop for us.  She's real tricky like that.

It's hot in the barn so we keep the fans running while she eats.  That helps in two ways:  It cools us and her down and it blows the mosquitoes away.

You can see we have some hay twine wrapped around her rear end that holds her tail out of the way.  LuLu will show her annoyance at us, if you don't wrap her tail, by swishing us in the face with her tail.  Although that's not such a bad thing, it is not an enjoyable experience if her tail is wet with dew or urine.

We hobble one of her back legs to a cleat on the 4x4.  That keeps her from kicking the bucket.  We've learned that lesson the hard way, having milked mostly a full bucket and then having her kick it over and spill the whole thing!  Hence the old saying, "You can't cry over spilled milk."  She isn't the type cow to kick you to hurt you, so that's a good thing.

We are talking about weaning Nicky within the next month.  That will take some of the stress off of LuLu for the peak summer months.  Plus, he's a big galoot and able to make it on grass as he approaches his one year birthday.  We'll be focusing on getting LuLu re-bred and Elsie bred to yield spring calves in 2025.