Cattle handling systems

[M Blake]

The picture posted there by Rob shows a system that we have. Although it seems hefty it is so easy to move in the back of the trailer. We have two outside blocks of 12 acres and we simply set up the system in 10 15 minutes shake a bag of corn in the pen and away you go. Normally it is positioned in front of our main shed as a pen area between the shed and the field. The cattle come in to the area to drink and feed in winter and we simply close the gate whenever we need to move or handle them.
We have a middle section with a yoke gate in it which we use to sort them and a short run in section as you are thinking of having running to the crush. The crush is set up so that it returns to the outer yard.
These systems are so universal they may seem expensive but one sold in auction here locally for £900 for 10 sections, gate section and yoke gate section. It is well made and if looked after should not devalue dramatically but makes handling so easy.
On another note pleased to report two new arrivals over the last two evenings bull calf and heifer calf !

[Tim Watson]

Very interesting re-reading this.
Our small yard (we only have 10 Dexters at the moment but the yard could take about 30) is bordered with cut down telegraph poles and timber horizontals to shoulder height. We have a crush we bought second hand.

To use the crush we just partition off the yard with sheep hurdles, and walk them in to the smaller pen and then through the crush. The older ones know whats going on when we lay the sheep hurdles out and as soon as we walk to the opposite end of the yard to the crush they just walk into the temporary pen while we close the hurdles behind them. They have never jumped out - yet - and the vet seems happy enough with it.

For us, it allows us to make the pen as big or as small as we want depending if we are TB or worming all of them or just checking one animal over. As they go through we usually move the pen in so its smaller, helping to encourage them through the crush. Even if we are only doing one we often bring them all in and stick them through the crush so they get used to doing it, the calves see the older ones going through and they don't associate the crush, yard, pens etc with something unpleasant happening.

[Rob R]

On Tuesday we put the majority of the herd through the crush within the buildings for weaning. Having brought everything inside in the order the grass had run out and before the other building was emptied, we had all the cows & calves in the youngstock building, and steers & heifers in the cow pen. We had three bays in the cow shed and set up the crush against the feed barrier (handy that the handle is reversible on the yearling crush!) in one half of the centre bay put the youngstock through into the far bay, then moved the cows and calves into the holding pen (first & half-second bay), and then let the steers and heifers out of the front of the feed barriers to run them up the feed passage and round the corner into their rightful pen - it was a bit like moving the fox, chicken and grain!

Anyway, the baby (21 months) was in the pushchair while all this was going on, in the 'safe' pen by the crush, with cattle on boths sides of her. After we'd moved the cows, she appeared to have become upset by it all & was hanging out of the pushchair and appeared to be screaming, but we couldn't hear her above the noise the cows were making, so my wife rushed over to comfort her and it turned out she wasn't upset at all but was gesturing towards the crush and shouting at the cows "In, in, in"!

[Saffy]

Rob you are training that child well!!!

You will have her running around then soon, how do toddlers respond to away and come bye?

Stephanie

[Rob R]

It's funny you should mention sheepdogs - she's not that keen on cartoons, soon loses interest, but is captivated by One Man and His Dog!
Here she is assessing the land

And here sorting the cattle out

[Duncan MacIntyre]

One animal tale stands out for each of our two offspring.

When Catriona was well under school age we kept some blackfaced ewes in the shed in the winter, I could hardly get into the pen to feed them without getting bashed, smashed and almost knocked over. I came into the shed one day to see Catriona climbing out of the pen. "What on earth are you doing in there???" Answer "Well two were fighting and I was sorting them out"

At a later age Alasdair had one of his friends up, and they were, I thought, playing in a wee house I built for them over a steep bank next a field with a young bull who was not trustworthy and I had issued and edict that no one was to go into the field. We were harnessing a horse for a drive, and a wee voice is heard saying "Alasdair canny get up" and this gets repeated louder and louder till eventually I leave the horse and go to see - there the two boys are in the field with the bull, Alasdair upside down in a ditch with the bull standing over him. I pulled the wee friend out over the fence, in quickly and grabbed Alasdair out of the ditch. Apparently the bull had been cheeky to them at the fence and he went to sort him out with a bit of 2 x 2. Burnside Panjandrum went to the slaughterhouse the next day.

I wonder as I write this if it is a coincidence that Catriona is a vet and Alasdair is a computer engineer.

[Saffy]

OMG Rob pics like that are just priceless...I hope she remembers them being taken. One of my first memories is of my Dad taking me on a farm walk in my best dress when I was pre school and handing me a couple of silage samples from the clamps at this farm. This he said is what it should smell like and THIS is what it should not....always remembered!

Duncan your children sound like a brave pair..... now - how many children did you start off with?

Stephanie

[Duncan MacIntyre]

Only two on the herd register Stephanie. They both had close encounters with a wide variety of animals from an early age. I would post a pic but can't seem to get them on here.

Duncan

[Rob R]

She was so intent on levelling the mole hills that day that I actually left the fields and hid behind the hedge & I got bed before she did. I'm sure she'll be well used to animals but might get a bit of a shock when she does leave the farm and work with 'real' cattle. She'll probably grow up with no interest in it, though.

If the picture you're posting is already hosted online Duncan, just copy the url and paste it between the tags [img]here[/img]. I usually use facebook to host pics these days.

[Saffy]

This is the photograph that Duncan wanted to post, it shows his daughter Catriona with the hens.

[Saffy]

You never know Rob, my Dad didn't think for a minute that I would be interested, he had such a shock when I announced that I wanted to farm!!! Firstly he realised I was rather spoilt so that had to be cured and also he wasn't too sure about a girl farming. So he made a list of things I needed to be able to do....if I REALLY wanted to farm. There were some VERY nasty things on that list. I think he rather enjoyed watching me struggle my way through his horrible hit list and YES it did do me a great deal of good!!!

Stephanie

[Rob R]

My dad tried his best to put us both off farming, but we came through it more determined than ever, rightly or wrongly. He also said we'd never make any money with Dexters...

ETA - those chickens look massive next to Catriona!

[Rob R]

Anyhow, back to the handling system, I've found a
photo of the 'site' (not recent, it's currently covered in haylage bales).

[moomin]

I use alpaca hurdles, high enough to deter jumpers and light enough for me to lift! Look at McVeigh Parkers stock - they were doing a special offer on packs of ten.

A tip from my wise old friend the late Miss "Ben" Robinson of Statenboro fame who had a lot of gates tied with bale string and said :- "If a cow gets stuck jumping a gate I can always get my penknife out and cut the string "
Saved me many a broken leg over the years!!!
Di

[Rob R]

One of the problems with bale band, these days, is that all our bales are net wrapped and we only have a very limited supply from bought-in mini-hesstons. It was quite a shock when we first realised we were running short a couple of years ago! Even considered buying a roll just for gates...