Another cold Monday

This morning Garry told me he thought there would be a cow calving today, so I went outside to take some photos at 4 o'clock. Here is the cow- but she hasn't had her calf yet. Maybe tomorrow. She looks pretty nice, beautiful udder.

No sign of that warm weather yet- in fact the wind has been blowing since Sunday evening making it even colder outside and in the barn. Even feels cool in the house as I sit here writing at 8 pm, listening to the wind howl past the windows. The guys continue to fight with frozen waterlines and waterbowls in the barn, even watering some animals with the hose and bucket method like before we had waterbowls. Thursday the warmer weather is due to arrive then everything should start to thaw out, hopefully before the weekend.





There's a lot of milk sitting in the milkhouse- none of the "big" milk buyers have been here since yesterday. Oleg is supposed to come tonight, but he picks up milk in an old Lada so he can only take 300 liters at a time.

I took a picture of the top cow- the one that had 32 liters when the ladies measured milk last week. She is a big wide cow, and has lost weight already because she gives lots of milk. Garry says he's going to try to buy the bigger Holstein-looking cows in the village, because they are turning out to be the best milkers.


Of course the one he brought home today isn't all that big- he thinks she is 3rd calf, and due in 3 weeks. One of the younger heifers joined the two tied below, so she could have the stall at the end of the barn. A lady in the village came by last week wanting to sell a cow- she even spoke a few words of English, apparently she attended university in Zaporosia when she was younger. She is married to the butcher.


Garry has decided to start feeding grain again- Maxim picked up some at the mill yesterday- I think they got soybean meal this time, instead of sunflower. The cows' milk production didn't go down when they cut out the extra grain- in addition to the brewers' grains, but it stopped going up like it had since Garry came back from Canada. Maxim is feeding the extra grain- the higher producing cows get some- in the photo from this afternoon.



On Sunday Garry found out why people don't like to feed brewers' grains to cows here- they think it couses liver damage. We are wondering if they think it has alcohol in it- since drinking alcohol can cause liver damage in people.