The cows seem to be loving being in the top 3-acre field and as a herd, are now really together and calm. The calves still lead their mums a merry dance at times and at least once a day we see one or more calves suddenly take off down the field with mums and the older steers quickly galloping off after them. The calves also play with each other a fair bit, chasing and shoving. It’s fabulous! And as the photos show, the calves are seriously cute. We have not yet seen Parsley or Sage come back into season yet. Parsley gave birth on 12th April and Sage on the 26th. In theory, several weeks/a couple of months after giving birth they should start cycling again with signs that include mounting, allowing themselves to be mounted, mooing, some restlessness and ultimately ‘standing heat’ where they stand ready to be mated. Their vulva also swells and can have mucous hanging from it.
We are looking carefully now as we want to be able to catch the first cycles for all three cows and so plan the time for getting them back into calf. The gestation period for a cow is approximately nine months and in an ideal world we would like all three cows to give birth in late April/May next year, so for Parsley a little later than this year. This means getting them pregnant from mid July onwards. We will be using Artificial Insemination (AI) and so need to order our semen straw and talk to the AI man in the next week or so.
The best times to observe the cows are morning and evening. It’s great that we have them in the top 3-acre at the moment because this makes them very visible to us. It has even been known for us to get out the binoculars and watch them from the study!!!