Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Another calf plus some visitors

We invited some visitors for dinner last night -- none other than Andy Sewell and his wife and son. Andy Sewell is the artist who painted the rooster picture King of the Mountain.


He very much wanted to see our quartet of little heifers, so they came over for dinner.


Meanwhile we had a nice surprise for them: our cow Raven had her calf down in the field yesterday. I noticed her just after noon, way off by herself. This is normal behavior when a cow is about to give birth, so I went to investigate.


Raven had already dropped her calf.



In fact, the baby was almost dry.


She had just passed the afterbirth as I arrived and was in the process of eating it. This is very typical behavior for ruminants -- it lessens the scent of birth from potential predators.


Since all was well, we left Raven alone with her new baby. We'd learn the gender later.

A few hours later, the Sewell family arrived, and Andy promptly start photographing the livestock. He said he often films scenes, then chooses the best freeze frame to paint.

We walked out to see Raven and the new baby.


Boy? Girl? Couldn't tell yet.


It wasn't until the calf stood up that I saw the little scrotum. Aha! It's a boy!


My what a sweetie. How does Chester sound for a name?


Andy took all kinds of pictures, shading his eyes against the bright evening sun.


Chester is so photogenic!


He took photos of the other critters as well.



Leto meets some Very Big Horses.


We had a delightful visit with the Sewells and hope to have them over again. And I got my own copy of King of the Mountain!

6 comments:

  1. That's what, four calves now? Congrats! I love Mr. Sewell's painting and how nice of him to give you a copy.

    One of my chickens often stands on one foot, and I have tried to figure out if there's a physical problem. Looking at your rooster now I think she just stands on one foot.

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    1. Birds just like to stand on one foot. Several reasons are proposed: http://petcareeducation.com/bird/bird-standing-on-one-foot/ but I think they just like it.

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    2. Larry, thank you! I very recently became a chicken owner having moved from the city to a rural area, and have so much to learn. I appreciate the link.

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    3. You're welcome. Just got my own rural area. Learning lots from Patrice's blog entries. Should be ready to start by this time next year.

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  2. Five calves! Four girls and now a boy...

    Please tell Mr. Sewell for me how much I enjoy his painting of your rooster. I admired it so much on your website that I had to show it to my husband. Three days later I walked into my closet and there it was on my jewelry box shelf...the ORIGINAL painting....I love it! I'm in the process of choosing a frame for it and it will have a place where it will be seen every day. We moved to a more rural area just 8 months ago so we don't have our chickens yet, but it is definitely a goal.

    Thank you so much for sharing your life and animals with us on this blog.

    -Pamela

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  3. Nice herd, Patrice!!

    Monsoon Matriarch (not signing into google today)

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