Farm Fresh Blog

We have several contenders for Mother Of The Year on the farm. Let's start with the "Also Ran" category.

Crimson: Mother to adorable Bailey and brother that at the moment I'm calling Coffee (or Raisin, depends upon my mood)

This photo was taken last week. The babies are two weeks old and pictures like that are few and far between now. Crimson is a crack-head mother at best. She fully buys into the dairy farm idea of pulling babies from mothers and bottle feeding them. I don't have time or energy for that so I expect Crimson to hold up her end as a mother to her adorable brats. But since Crimson spends all night locked up with the little beasts, as soon as she is released to graze with the flock in the yard, she flings off all maternal trappings and refuses to acknowledge that she has babies. Seriously... 

They tag along with the flock, bouncing around their new world, full of merriment and fun, until the flock leaves them. Then they panic and scream their fool heads off, calling every predator in the county. And then this is what you usually see -

Briar sighs and walks over to see what they're screaming mimmies about. They get distracted and shut up. Most of the time I walk out there too just to make sure that nothing really bad is happening. I must have gone out there 20 times today. I check them regularly. Briar checks them regularly. Their mother? Not so much. In fact, she never looks up.

"Babies? What babies? Who has babies?"

Definitely Crimson is not in the running for the Mother Of The Year Award. No, this year's recipient of the coveted award goes to Snickers the Hell-Bitch Cow . . .

. . . for her stunning portrayal of Enraged Water Buffalo Mother when approached by two Border Collies. In case you missed this Short Film, Snickers and five calves were among other cows who made a jail break while I had the gate opened to drive the tractor in the pasture. I was forced to use dogs to get the cattle back inside the pasture. Snickers mutated from her normal Hell Bitch Self into a bellowing, raging water buffalo who rammed fences while roaring at the top of her lungs. It was quite impressive to all.  Snickers fiercely protected not only her own baby, but the other four calves in the Day Care Center. And for this act of bitchiness bravery, I nominate Snickers for Mother Of The Year!

If you have never seen the fierocity of a mother water buffalo, watch The Battle Of Kruger on You Tube. It's painful to watch at first, but keep watching. Not only does it gets better, but you will get a better appreciation for the protective instincts of a water buffalo. This is one of the best wildlife videos I've ever seen!

http://youtu.be/LU8DDYz68kM