I know I've been talking about this allusive other cow for a while now & although we have owned her since November last year, it was only about a month ago that our newest farm addition 'Chocco' became a true member of the 'Sunnyside menagerie'!
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| Sorry about the terrible photos ~ my camera is really broken :( |
Chocco is a half Jersey & half Murray Grey cow. She has calved previously, although she is only a little older than our Bessy (one of those 'oops' pregnancies :). Chocco belonged to my good friend Corinne & when her hubby Damo told her she had to downsize her cattle herd we did some chatting & came up with a solution ~ I would buy Chocco & she could visit as often as she wanted (which is often we hope)!! Surprisingly Damo is the one who told my Dave " Whoever's wife has the most cows wins"!
(Nothing like a bit of good old male competition ;)
I think he's winning right now, although it won't be long & we'll be eating one of theirs (butchering time coming up in May) & then we shall see......
I'm sure you may be wondering why would I want another cow & I know it was a little bit of sweet talking that got Dave to agree to this purchase (after all a cow is quite an investment) :)
Because Chocco is half Murray Grey we are crossing her with a Murray Grey bull. This means that the calf she produces will be 3/4 Murray Grey & Murray Grey are much better eating than Jerseys :) With all the males here at Sunnyside, meat is very popular & so to have our own beef produced & grown here on the farm is a blessing for sure! We are also partial to good quality meat and this should be delicious!
So Choco's primary purpose here at Sunnyside is to produce our beef over the years and feed all these hungry people!
Being half Jersey I may even attempt to milk her ~ well that was the original plan, but she isn't letting me too close to her at the moment, so it would mean tying her & I'm not sure how all that would go (Miss Bessy can be milked in the field so it would seem so cruel tying a cow, OK I know I need to become a harder, harsher farm girl :). We shall see what happens regarding milking once she's dropped her calf.
In the meantime Chocco went directly from Corinne's beautiful farmstead "Clayton's Run" to the bull & we left her there over the Christmas & summer months. She has arrived at Sunnyside quite obviously in calf & we are praying for a successful calving ( she had no problems with her first). Unfortunately she is due in winter, so hopefully the calf will decide to come during the day as it was the freezing cold night that brought me inside during Bessy's disastrous calving last year. I will always wonder if I had not been so cold & had stayed would I have been able to save that little one?? ...
It's always exciting to have another animal on the farm & it's lovely seeing the 3 cows together ( although Miss Bessy is definitely still the boss!!). It's nice for Bessy to have a companion as Beefy is growing so quickly & we are looking foward to butchering time next year!!! Hopefully by that time Bessy will be ready to drop another calf & we can continue the cycle.
I'm not sure if we will have them each on a two~yearly cycle of calving (alternating years) or if both will calf each year. We may even try & cross Bessy with a Jersey Bull to get come kind of additional income from selling pure Jersey offspring. We have some decisions to make, but not just yet.
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| Her eyes don't normally glow ~eerie hey :) |
Chocco is a sweet, gentle cow & we look forward to having her around for many years ~ Lord willing!
So that's some of our news ~ I intend to do a catch up post soon as there is so many little things to record here, but at the moment my bed is calling...(please excuse any grammatical errors, I'm really tired tonight).
Blessings to you my friends
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