As I watch Daisy, Rosie, and Luna eating grass in the front yard on a gorgeous, albeit hot, afternoon, I realized that I hadn't given an update lately on what's going on with each of our four Jersey cows. First, Daisy, the herd matriarch is getting up there in age for a milk cow. She's eleven years old and for some reason hasn't been going in heat. We want her to calve again and did some research on the Internet. We gave her a vitamin A injection and brought her and Clarabelle down the road 5 miles to a friend's house who has a registered Jersey bull.
Two days later, the friend called and said that he observed his bull breeding Daisy and that we could go pick her up. For some reason Clarabelle did not cycle and was not bred. We left her for another 21 days for her to cycle again and we received word today that the friend's bull bred Clarabelle. So if all goes well, we'll have two Jersey calves in late March or early April 2019! Hopefully, Benjamin's truck will be out of the shop tomorrow afternoon and we'll go pick Clarabelle up and bring her home. In a month or so, we'll have them palpated to ensure they are pregnant.
Now Rosie and Luna are still in milk. We're milking Rosie mornings and evenings and Luna once a day in the evening. We'll begin marking the date they go in heat so that we can bring them down to the friend's bull to be bred too. Daisy didn't calve this year. Rosie and Clarabelle both had little bulls, Junior and Astro. They are growing and we'll likely put them in the freezer when they are big enough. Luna had a stillborn bull calf and we almost lost her in the process, but she's recovered nicely.
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