Quick Barbed Wire Unspooler

We were in the process of enclosing a small heifer lot adjacent to one of our feeding pens and when the time came to string wire we discovered that the fancy un-spooling device I had made years ago was 80 miles away. The four wheeler we were using has a steel tubing frame to hold a box to haul around irrigation stuff or whatever. I cut a length of 3/4-inch pipe, drilled two 5/16-inch holes 13 inches apart, clamped it down at the off end with two small lengths of 1-inch tubing and a piece of angle iron and two vice grip clamps. We used a short piece of tubing and a single clamp behind the pipe at the spool end. I cut two crude discs with an inch and an eighth hole in the middle and about 4 inches in diameter. A quarter inch bolt through the first hole, with a nut, then the disc, then the roll of wire then another disc, then another quarter inch bolt and nut and we were ready to string wire.



The fabrication took about ten minutes. We used it to unspool about two rolls of wire (1320' each) without any problems. It should have a brake of some sort rather than the heavy glove we used to keep the spool from turning too fast. If the basket rack hadn't been there, I think
we could have extended the pipe to clear the fender and attached it directly to the four wheeler rack.

The apparatus did its job. We didn't have to suspend the roll on a pipe and carry it. We didn't spend any money and only a little time. I'm thinking about a very simple brake system to attach to the spool and to the pipe. If you aren't going to build lots of fence it will probably work as well as anything you could buy. When I figure out the brake, I'll let you know.

Someone asked me about the mud flaps. They are each half of an old door mat tied with snap ties to a piece of 3/8" X 1 1/2" tubing and tied to the rack with smooth wire. Pretty high tech. This four wheeler sometimes pulls a trailer that will hold two, three-string bales. In the wet, the bales get wet and muddy from the tire spray. The flaps are another of our chugly inventions (cheap but ugly).

JCE

Recap of the Oregon Cattlemen's Annual Convention

The Oregon Cattlemen's Association http://orcattle.com held its annual convention at the Riverhouse in Bend on December 2-5.

On Thursday, Pfizer sponsored a Cattlemen's College that got off to an infomercial start with one of Pfizer's veterinarians explaining that nearly every animal health problem can be resolved by using Pfizer products and making certain that the protocol is followed through to the end. Dr. Gordon Brumbaugh, DVM, etc. explained that no pharmaceutical company can guarantee or even predict the amount of time necessary for a sick animal to recover. Furthermore, he claimed, no one advertises any time predictions for recovery. Those statements brought giggles from our section of the audience as someone recalled that about every livestock periodical contains advertising that absolutely does predict recovery time, including most or all of Pfizer's ads.

The infomercial portion finally ended and we were treated to some proprietary Pfizer stuff by Dr. Kent Anderson DVM, but without the blatant advertising included. Check out http://pfizeranimalgenetics.com to learn more about Pfizer's 50k panels and how to get your very own DNA tests done with more than the eight or ten markers that have been available up until now. Pfizer is marketing the 50k panels as a more accurate indicator than EPD's, especially early in an animal's productive life.

Finally, Dr. Darrh Bullock, Univ. of Kentucky, who has no obvious connection to Pfizer, made a case for EPD's and DNA information to be combined in some way to realize the benefits of both. He began by cautioning the audience that EPD's are based on progeny and DNA tests are based on the individual animal's genetics. The formula for determining EPD's is convoluted but as more progeny are added to the database, the accuracy of an animal's EPD's and his (or, rarely her) influence becomes much more accurate. DNA testing, on the other hand, gets you an immediate result for that animal (provided you know where and how to look at the markers) and may give a more accurate picture early in an animal's life. Additionally, up until now, almost all DNA testing has been limited to looking at single or very limited combinations of markers. With the cattle genome now documented and better computer analysis available, the ability to find and assess multiple markers will increase accuracy in predicting traits. The 50k Pfizer panel will almost certainly become 100k or many more within a fairly short time period.

Dr. Bullock seems to be an advocate of using the single number (such as $Beef in the Angus EPD) result of combining various EPD traits. He did caution the audience that it is important to know which traits are included in the composite number so you won't be selecting for something that you aren't interested in. The example he used was that if the EPD for milk were to be a large part of the composite score and your herd cannot support more milk or you don't want more milk, you wouldn't use that single number as a selector. He did think that some future combination of EPD and DNA information may result in a very valuable single number to use in bull selection.

On Friday, the convention turned to business with committee meetings, nominations for new officers, etc. The annual Oregon Beef Council luncheon was held and, once again, the audience was bored to death by a too long program during the event. The highlight of the day was the Wolf Committee, chaired by Rod Childers. Until recently the passion surrounding the wolf issue has caused the Cattlemen to tilt at windmills, fight with each other, threaten closing access to private land for hunters, and generally be shrill and counterproductive. Rod has managed to soften the rhetoric and begin to work on solutions. Dennis Sheehy has written a compensation program draft that uses a baseline of historical loss and provides insurance above that number, without directly tying wolves to the equation. Oregon State Univ., the Oregon Beef Council, several ranches, and several individuals have become involved in documenting wolf activity and cow activity by using GPS aided radio collars. The hope is to document interactions between the two, to learn if cattle are changing their use patterns, and whatever else may be gleaned from the data. The radio collars on the cows transmit location every five minutes. The wolf collars transmit every fifteen minutes. The resulting plots are, in the aggregate, a virtual solid color of cattle movement, which can be looked at one by one to make sense. The wolf plots still show distinct points but every fifteen minutes for 150 days results in many points. An attempt to compile a moving interaction documentary overwhelmed the computer before much was learned.

On Saturday, the day began with a talk by a man from Idaho who manages a ranch with serious wolf problems. He and his wife have spent many hours gathering data from wolf scats, kill sites, wounded calves and heifers, and have participated in the OSU study by having ten cows collared and one wolf collared. He claimed that he lost 60+ calves to wolves last year over his baseline losses, in an area used by about 250 cows and about 100 heifers and second calvers. He showed graphic pictures of animals that were apparently attacked but not killed by wolves. He talked about how his cows have become much more aggressive toward his dogs and to people since the wolf population has returned to his area. He claimed that cows that were workable in the corrals by people on horseback or on the ground are now liable to challenge anyone or anything entering their flight zone. He made some claims that he cannot substantiate but, overall, his talk was well done and his insights compelling.

Temple Grandin, the woman who is famous within the industry for her insights on cattle handling and facilities, and famous to public television viewers for her portrayal as an autistic woman who has become the preeminent authority in her field through a movie released in 2010, was the featured speaker of the convention. She had attended the wolf talk earlier and had taken several pages of notes. When her turn to speak came, she changed her prepared talk to include much interest in what the man from Idaho had said, especially about the changes in cattle behavior. (The Cattlemen's Assn. had sold tickets to the public to attend Grandin's talk and about 200 people, in addition to the convention attendees attended.) She has spent most of the last several years working on low-stress handling of livestock, mainly pigs and cattle. Her work is usually for packing houses but she also works in feedlots and on ranches and she has written handling protocols for McDonald's, Burger King, Wendys, Wal Mart, and others.

She talked at length about how the wolf may cause her to re-think her handling ideas on the ranch. She also talked about her belief that livestock have a place on the land and that the wolf also has a place. She did the livestock industry a service by speaking out without reservation about the humane treatment of cattle in the food chain. The took many questions and, as is apparently typical of autistic people, she showed little interest in softening her remarks to sooth people's feelings. She said "...lawyers should all be locked in the closet."

There was much more to see and do at the convention with a good trade show, lots of people to visit with who you only see once or twice a year, and other meetings in other rooms that will determine the direction and efforts of the Cattlemen for the next year.

JCE

First 2011 Calf

The first calf of the 2011 season was born at about 11:30 am on 12/9/2010. The bull calf's mother (846) is a six year old cow with a mixed calving history. She calved as a two year old but the calf died two days later, apparently the result of being stepped on. She did not calve in 2008 and was placed in the cull cow pen to be sold. When we shipped cull cows we had several more than made even loads and she was cut back. She had a very nice heifer calf in 2009. That calf was retained as a replacement heifer prospect (photo below) and will calve this spring. She missed again in the spring of 2010 and was bred on the hay grounds before we expected her to calve. (We have foregone preg-testing for the last ten years since about 98% of our cows usually calve, so we assumed she was going to calve in the spring of 2010.) We were guilty of not separating several timid bulls from that group of cows, thinking that the cows were all bred and wouldn't bull again until at least mid-April, after they had calved and were moved out of that field. Those bulls weren't doing well in with the other bulls and were put with that group of cows so they wouldn't get beaten up at the feed bunks every day. I'm curious about how she must have been bulling on the hay grounds and no one noticed. Anyway, we have a problem cow that should have been culled twice by now, who is in the prime of her life, in great condition, and who has a good calf.

She will go into a group of cows that will be preg-tested this fall. I think we will start testing again, but just those cows that, for whatever reason, are recognized as possibly open.

JCE

On the Road to Bend

We fed early and got on the road for Bend and the Oregon Cattlemen's (OCA) Annual Convention at the Riverhouse. It was raining steadily at home and on the road until it turned to snow at Prospect and packed snow and snowing hard at Union Creek. We were in four wheel drive from there to nearly LaPine on Hwy 97, about 80 miles, where the snow turned rainy and the roadway cleared.
From there into Bend the snow and rain alternated but the roadway remained clear. We arrived at 11:15, checked in, had some lunch, and then I went to the opening session of the OCA convention. Several good speakers talked about cattle genetics, how genome information is rapidly becoming available, how it is and will be used, and how the new information will integrate, or not, with existing selection aids.
Back at home, the drain tile under the Antelope corrals fell behind during the night. There was about six inches of standing water on the low sides of several pens this morning. Since this is pretty exciting stuff, I should have taken a photograph. If it is still there on Sunday I'll take a picture and put it here. The cattle seemed unaffected and were going about their business as usual. The only interaction they need to have with the water is walking through it to get from the field to the feed bunks. The feed bunks are about two feet higher than the water and more than 40' away at the closest.

Christmas Mimeo

CHRISTMAS MIMEO 2010

There has been a noticeable decline in the number of Mimeos we receive during the Christmas season. One of the reasons for this decline might be that our own Mimeo efforts have been, for the last several years, spotty. Another might be that pretty nearly anyone born after 1955 has no idea of what a mimeo is. I'm guessing, though, that the real reason for the decline is that your own efforts are stifled by the lack of a template or outline to help focus your thoughts and your year so the Mimeo you produce and distribute measures up to those you receive. In an attempt to alleviate this perceived problem I'm busy, on the day after Thanksgiving, drafting this interesting and informative document which can be used as a template for your own Mimeo.

Section I. - Bragging About Work

(This first section is not the most important part of the Mimeo so it should be first. In it, in fewer than 250 words, you will puff anything good and diminish everything else pertaining to your work.)

Two thousand ten (twenty-ten) has been great for us, jobwise. Sam/Dor revolutionized dental hygiene by developing a technique that allows patients to answer questions and to visit about family while having their teeth cleaned. She continues to LOVE her work and once again has pushed back retirement plans for at least another year. During the year her A&C business again acquired over 1.600 items and she came in under her $300.00 acquisition budget. Jon put up 17,502 perfect bales of hay, fed out 17,495 perfect bales and collected and recycled all 52,485 strings, even going so far as to reclaim one from half way down a hungry calf's throat. For the 14th consecutive year nothing broke, every calf was born on a sunny afternoon on dry ground, and even after Jon got knocked into the canal by a protective mom, she realized her mistake and charged right in and shoved him out the other side so he wouldn't drown.

Section II. - Bragging About Kids, Grandkids, Pets

(Some think this is the most important section of the Mimeo and place it right in the heart of the document. Here, puffing is a weak descriptor. Grossly exaggerating may be more accurate, so don't hold back.)

Our grandson, Jack, celebrated his second birthday by signing an eight figure contract to play for the 49ers and then nullified it when the Giants, immediately after sewing up the Series in five, offered him an eight and a half figure, guaranteed contract to play, beginning in the 2025 season. But he's still our little Jack and spends most of his day simply being better than your Grands. Sid and Elizabeth keep him well grounded by demanding that he regularly attend his Tidwell AP pre-pre-school classes and that he put his head under the water in his Super Dolphin swimming classes.

Section III. - Bragging about Travel and Entertainment

(It's hard to go where no one else has gone and once you've met Harry Connick, Jr. what's left to do in the entertainment world? But you should try to think of such a place and such a show so your Christmas Mimeo Recipients [CMR's] will know it's futile to try to one-up you.)

In February, after enduring months of reduced sunshine and feeding in the mud, Sam/Dor and I escaped to Atlantis for a warm and quiet week of relaxation. Getting there was half the fun. You can imagine the agents she went through when Sam/Dor called to book. "Oh, sure, we can get you on Delta to Atlanta through Salt Lake City." "Why would you want to go clear to Atlantic City when I can get you a $199.00 round trip to Vegas and a free night at the Bellagio?" She finally found The Little Mermaid's agent and he set it up right away.

Section IV. - Humble Bragging

(This is by far the hardest section to write, not because it's hard to be humble, it's not. What's hard is to out humble some of your CMR's who have made careers of being humble. Every year it seems someone has received a simply colossal kindness or given what is nearly impossible to imagine giving. Practice will help.)

Finally, 2010 has been a year for us to make others weep. We are SO thankful for our health, its fullness shown by Sam/Dor running 14 ultra marathons to raise money for those folks who don't have enough stuff to hold a garage sale. She received contributions equal to $8.9 million (retail), which allowed her recipients to pocket $74.30 each in garage sale equivalents. Jon continued his long history of giving back by offering a bouquet of fresh flowers to each cow as she calved. After all these years it's still a curiosity that some cows ignore the kindness and some eat it.

Section V. - Summing Up

(This should be a fairly succinct statement of how the experiences of your year made you a better person, certainly better than anyone on your Mimeo list, and probably in the 1st percentile Nationally.)

All considered, 2010 was one of our better years. We commiserate with you who have felt the pinch of the economic downturn. And though it has left us completely unaffected, nay, even left us better off, we understand and even feel your pain. We hope 2011 will be even better, at least for us.

So there you have it, five sections to a highly competitive Christmas Mimeo. I'm certain, though, that some of you are wondering if there's any place left for legitimate bragging. There surely is. Go ahead and report it. Just be aware that it may not measure up to the historically high achievement of Mimeo standards. Please also remember, Christmas Mimeos have become about the only recorded on paper history of middle class America. Will you be content that Ashley is remembered as being first in her 3rd grade class to complete the summer reading assignment? Or, should Ashley get the full benefit of history by being remembered as placing first in her AP Summer Enhancement Reading Comprehension course having read twice as many books as her closest competitor and that she smashed the old record by some 19 tomes, several in Latin, her third language?

We look forward to receiving many more Christmas Mimeos in 2011. We're already documenting Jack's entry into King's College, Oxford as the youngest PhD candidate ever, so young that he will be taking along his private assistant to read for him, since he's slightly behind in that skill.

Merry Christmas,

Jon and Sam/Dor

JCE

Welcome

          This Blog is in response to those six or eight of you who have expressed an interest in my daily projects and wanderings.  I think the name, "Quotidian" is appropriate since most of what I do is daily repetition of a few chores.  Mainly, I spend my days looking after cattle.  Their welfare is my highest priority.  Cows mostly want to have a place to keep dry, good grazing or good hay or feed, some shade in the heat of the day, a place out of the wind in winter, for their calves to be safe, and to be left alone.

          So, along with working to provide those things I have time to make improvements to our fences, water facilities, pastures, buildings, equipment, etc., to volunteer within the community, and to fool around.  Fooling around sometimes includes thinking about things so you may at times be confronted with some words describing whatever it is that interests me.

          I try to take photos of things as I make or do them but sometimes the project gets in the way of pictures and I forget to take the 30 seconds it would take to snap a photo.  I'll try to remember to take more of what EB calls "ditch pictures", a reference to the many photographs I took of a large restoration project I completed when she was young and not very interested in photos of restoration projects.  (She now pretends to be interested in ditch pictures, but it's probably just a courtesy to me.)

          I welcome your feedback as long as it is thoughtful and not mean or crude.

                                                                                                    JCE