A Repeated Pattern

Do you ever notice how many times in life you catch yourself in routines and patterns?  The alarm clock goes off and you hop out of bed, shower, shave, dress, and grab a cup of coffee on the way out of the door.  You turn on the radio and you can judge if you are running late or early because the news comes on at the top and bottom of the hour.  The farm report comes on at 5:45 am and if I haven't passed Welsh, Louisiana yet, I'm running late.

Life ticks off the clock minutes at a time, marching on, stopping for no one.  Spring arrives with brilliant green growth followed by what seems like endless heat of summer.  By the end of summer, the grass has gone to seed and the bright green grass of spring has been replaced by dull, drab green colors.  The tallow trees (chicken trees) and cypress trees begin to turn colors, signaling the coming of fall.  Each year these routines repeat themselves. 

This changing of seasons, if you have animals on pasture, tells you that there is work to do.  As the grass goes dormant and the north winds begin to blow, it is important that you have hay put up in the barn or a good source to purchase it from.  Also, it means it is time to remove the temporary electric fencing that separated the pasture into separate paddocks. 

During the spring and summer, the pasture was broken up into separate paddocks with temporary electric fencing powered by solar energy, and the cows were rotated through each paddock throughout the week.  With the grass no longer growing, it is pointless, so I begin rolling up the poly rope with embedded wires onto my reel. 

It is amazing that a tiny "string" containing energy harnessed from the sun, can control a 900 pound animal and keep them where you want them.  The cows are very afraid of getting popped by the electric fence.  They respect it.

The sound of me rolling up the fence on the reel always gets the attention of the animals as they equate it to the opportunity to move to a new paddock with fresh, tender grass - only, at this time of the year, there's not much fresh, tender grass.

I walked through the pasture, removing the 'jump-wires' from the perimeter hot wire, rolling up the electric fence onto the reels and pulling up the step in posts and that transforms a pasture that was broken up into 7 individual pastures for 1-3 day grazing, into one 3 acre paddock.  I put all the electric fence equipment up in the barn.  It will sit there for another five months until the familiar sights and sounds of spring beckons me to begin the routine all over again.

Thus says the LORD, Who gives the sun for light by day And the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, Who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar; The LORD of hosts is His name:  Jeremiah 31:35