Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Bundle of Joy?

Well, it's official. Calving season has started at Scratch-Nut Creek Ranch! Of course, it will be a slow start because most of the herd is bred to start calving in April. but we do have a few that were bred early.

First, thanks to everyone who played along yesterday. The popular vote went to Spooky; probably because she is not as grumpy-looking as the White Bitch.


Here, now, is a photo of the proud papa (surrounded by a couple members of his harem):














And now, the newest member of the herd:










As you can see, the White Bitch was first. The Bag Lady apologizes for the quality of the photo - she had to take it from quite a distance away using her telephoto feature on her little camera. The White Bitch is called that for a reason, and the Bag Lady didn't want to get too close! If disturbed, WB would have either charged the Bag Lady, with the possibility of grievous injury on the Bag Lady's part, or would have taken her calf and retreated into the bush, resulting in the possible death of the calf. So this is the best photo to be obtained for now.


So, now that the calf has arrived, she (yes, the Bag Lady is pretty sure it's a girl) needs a name. Does anyone want to participate in a naming contest? The Bag Lady hates comment moderation, but can't think of a way you can leave your suggestion for a name without using it. If you want to participate in a naming contest, use the email address in the sidebar to send the Bag Lady your suggestion. Please do so before Thursday at midnight, and the Bag Lady will put them all in another post on Friday to allow everyone to vote on them over the weekend.

PS if you want to enter a name in the contest, but don't want the Bag Lady to know what your email address is (although she doesn't udderstand why you wouldn't!), leave it in the comment section of another post - pick one at random - Blogger will notify her of any comments anywhere...

17 comments:

Leah J. Utas said...

Congratulations to WB. Spooky was very deceptive.

Hilary said...

That's cute!

Hmm I guessed wrong by suggesting they might both have their calves at the same time but I'm going to send you some names anyway. ;)

Dawn said...

Wrong again! But I've been wrong so many times in life that I am quite at home with the feeling!

White Bitch does sound the sort of cow to be a little cautious of at a time like this. Glad you didn't get too close. Calf looks gorgeous (you know I'm a calf fan) and I will be entering the competition.

the Bag Lady said...

dfLeah - the Bag Lady has found most cows to be deceptive at one time or another!

Hilary - looking forward to your entries! Know you'll have some good ones!

Dawn - the photos that the Bag Lady posted weren't really very good for determining which cow would be first. Should have posted a picture of their respective posteriors - would have given someone with your experience a leg up on everyone else!
The Bag Lady has been wrong more times than she can count, too, as far as predicting which cow will be first...
Looking forward to your entry!

Anonymous said...

Awwwww! Has Spooky had hers yet? How big is your herd?

Missicat

the Bag Lady said...

Hi, missicat! No, Spooky is still hanging on. She could have her calf today, tomorrow, or two weeks from now! The Bag Lady was sure a little while ago that she would be first... Sometimes, it's really hard to tell.
We had over 50 cows at this time last year, then decided we would sell the herd, and just keep the heifers (young females who haven't had calves yet) from the previous year. However, when the trucks came to take the cows to market, there wasn't enough room on the trucks for all of them, so we kept 6 old girls (of course, if we had known they wouldn't all fit, we would have perhaps chosen different cows to keep...). So we have 6 old cows (that, by the way, we got 8 calves out of last year - 2 sets of twins) plus 12 (or is it 13?) heifers. We have 2 bulls (seems excessive for such a small herd, but we haven't gotten around to selling the old bull yet), as well as the 8 calves from last year and 4 steers (neutered males) from the previous year that we plan to slaughter. Did you add those all up? The Bag Lady must have made a mistake somewhere. There are 33 animals on the ranch. Well, 34 now, if we count the newest calf.
The Bag Lady is a good rancher, eh? Doesn't even know how many critters she has!! Or is really, really bad at math.
Damn. Now she has to go count them.

Scrumpy said...

Congratulations!

the Bag Lady said...

Thanks, SB!

Anonymous said...

Woops! Didn't mean to stir things up! Can you get close enough to them to paint a big number on their sides? :-)

Missicat

the Bag Lady said...

Missicat - if I use a really lo-o-ong paint brush...

Reb said...

Glad to see you are keeping your distance, would hate to have you chased by an angry momma.
Cute baby, I'll email a name.

Anonymous said...

too funny.

my toddler tornado is on my lap screaming MOOOOO. MOOO MAMA MOOOO!!!

M.

the Bag Lady said...

mizfit - so shall we enter that in the naming competition? :)
{toddler tornado's entry is MooMama?}

Crabby McSlacker said...

Ah, come on, you don't want to get charged by a cow and endanger her newborn calf just to get us a biggger picture?

Congrats on the birth of the bouncing baby bovine!

Will try to think of cow names but I'm crap at naming things. Plus if Hilary's in the contest what chance would I have of winning? But will put on my thinking cap, if I can remember where I put it.

the Bag Lady said...

Crabby - have you been reading the Bag Lady's mind?! She took a video of the calf bouncing around yesterday and was going to post it under that very name (bouncing baby bovine)!! Of course, Blogger is giving her a hard time, so it isn't loaded yet, but she'll keep trying.

Emily said...

Well damn, I guess I'd make a pretty crappy rancher. You sure you want me to come lend a hand? I might end up inspecting the wrong end of the cow or something.

I'm no good at naming things, but I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone else comes up with!

the Bag Lady said...

Emily - it's pretty easy to figure out which end you need to be looking at.
The Bag Lady has a funny story about cows giving birth - she'll have to try to remember to post that one day...