Friday morning was cold again, but the guys had drained the water line the night before, so it was easy to get the cows water in the morning, all they had to do was turn it back on. The wind was not blowing as much, so the water was still working in the afternoon, cutting the workload, since they didn't have to thaw the waterbowls out again. In this photo, the main water line around the barn is the large metal pipe- the same pipe the black cow's chain is attached to, and the same garden hose type hose brings the water down to the bowl between cows (two cows share a waterbowl.) Both these things can get frozen water in them, or the valve on the waterbowl that the cows push to get the bowl to fill so they can drink will sometimes freeze, or worse stick open so water spills on the floor.
Saturday morning, someone rapped on our door just before six am and said there was a cow calving, so Garry hurried out to see. It was a backwards calf (calves normally appear front feet first) generally you want to get these out quickly, because they can breathe in liquid as they are born, causing problems. However Garry was excited, the feet were small, and he got this lovely live heifer calf out. I took this photo around 11 am when we were leaving for Dnepro, along with the one of her mother, who had just cleaned (the afterbirth came out.)
Yes, it was another black and white cow that gave birth to a red and white calf. Later in the afternoon a red and white cow had a nearly identical red heifer calf, increasing Garry's recent ratio to 10 bulls to 5 heifer calves- sounds much better than 10:3! It is supposed to get somewhere close to almost 50% girls. Garry is now sure the second Canadian bull that he bought semen from must be red and white, not just a recessive carrier of the red gene.
Garry turned the water on Saturday morning while the guys were still feeding the cows, and it was so cold in the barn that some of the water bowls were frozen before the cows got around to taking a drink. It seems like the cold weather will be with us for at least another week, so they will continue to turn the water off at night, like they did last year in February when they had the same problem. And thaw them back out in the afternoon if they freeze up. Garry was fixing a leaky one while I was taking photos.
Saturday morning there was no water running to the house, so Garry trying thawing various points in the delivery system, but finally discovered the problem shortly before we left for the city. The summer kitchen's bathroom walls were covered in frost inside, and the water was froze there. He put a little plug-in electric heater in the room, and the water was back on in our house before we got back. This year there is no excess heat producing gas furnace sitting in the nearby entranceway, since we put the new energy saving one in last fall.
Sunday evening we finally realized feeling cold in our house wasn't all the fault of the cold weather- somehow that furnace had been turned down, so that the temperature of the water in the rads was almost half! We had bought an electric heater for our bedroom, but it is much warmer in here now (Monday morning- its 17 C outside). Garry has run out of 1000 piece puzzles to do, he'll have to find a new indoor hobby, the last one was a real challenge, since I didn't bring the box with the picture, only the bag of pieces in my suitcase.
Saturday morning young Andrei (the neighbor boy) was busy (and rather cold) selling brewers grain to people in the village. Garry said people were lined up to buy when they started the regular Saturday morning hours. It was easier with the stuff already in the pit, most people shovel bags full to take home.
I am not sure what he and Maxim's brother Andrei where doing with the straw bales when we left for Dnepro. Young Andrei is the one in Seth's old camouflage coat- it was too small for Seth so it didn't make it into the suitcase to go home.
If you are wondering what happened to last summers' kittens, they are huge and happy living in the barn, as you can see, one of the toms is playing with the new puppy.
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