Time travel

I thought I had him. Jim, that is.
In his last blog Jim was rattling on about babies in their mothers’ wombs right now that would be born “next year.” Hmmm. In my little mind, I got out the calendar and started wondering about how long gestation is for a cow.  Longer than 12 months? That must be some superbaby cow, and some tired mother. I had called and called Jim to get clarification, but the cell must have been turned off, underwater, or worse.
Surely Jim was wrong. So I did what all writers do: I wrote “around” the unclear point in a way that would protect the innocent.

“Calving year, it’s the calving year!” Jim roared when I did get hold of him after publishing his blog. Got me.

Turns out that at every cattle ranch there is (or should be) an intricate plan for managing the herd according to what the herd needs, and when a rancher talks about “this year” or “next year” he or she is really talking about the reproductive year: the best time for calves to be born so they have the greatest chance to survive and to thrive.

are you my mother?

Keep in mind, too, that Jim’s operation is the antithesis of the factory farm where cows grow up confined and rely on corn and soy for feed. In Jim’s world, the herd is outside all the time, ranging freely, and the feed is pasture grass — with flakes of alfalfa hay to bridge the period when winter grass has frozen and lost nutritional value.
So it’s critical that when babies are born, they have every factor possible working for them and for their mothers. And to that end, timing is everything.

“Everyone believes that babies must be born in the spring. But since the baby doesn’t eat grass for the first month and a half of his life — he lacks the anaerobic bacteria to digest it — it’s better in this Mediterranean climate for the babies to be born in the fall,” Jim says.

Jim is now on a roll.  He’s in his element.  He’s educating someone from the City.

“We need to get babies on the ground before the bad weather gets here. That means our calving year is August 15 to August 14. ‘Next year’ is anytime after August 15,” he explains.
I see. Babies are conceived around November 15 (“this” year), and born nine months later between August 15 and October 1st (“next” year).

you're my mother!

“When they’re born in the fall, they go through winter on their mothers’ milk. When the grass is here in spring, they’re big enough to eat it  and also eat on their mother’s surplus production of milk from the new grass. You can just about stand there and watch them grow right in front of your eyes, they do so well,” he adds.
That’s why Jim is usually running around like a crazy man in the fall, just when you’d think things would be buttoning down for winter. Fall is full of babies. Winter is for mothering, and for walking cows from one end of the pasture to another to manage their use of forage. Spring is for new green grass and as for summer … Summer is fraught with irrigation, irrigation and more irrigation chores, 18-hour days, and miles and miles of racing across warm green hillsides on the tractor.
It’s not your normal calendar. It’s not your normal cattle ranch, if you go by the numbers of cows raised on CAFOs (Concentrated/Confined Animal Feeding Operations) vs. the number raised like this.
And above all, it’s not your normal rancher. It’s Jim Gates, the guy who’s already mentally in “next” year this year, and planning for next next year this year.  Make sense?
See you next time, this year, then next year later this year.

Oh, by the way, here’s a link on CAFO farming. Jim says it has so much interesting stuff in it “you can read ’till your eyeballs fall out.” Thanks, Jim.

Sound bite

What’s wrong with these pictures? OK, another city-ish question, but I still have to ask: with so much brilliant green grass covering the hills like velvet, why are these cows so interested in dry alfalfa flakes? Jim, a walking compendium of all things cow, is only too happy to oblige an answer.

caught me with my mouth full!

breakfast

To maintain herself at this time of  year, he explains, a cow needs three things: nourishment for herself, nourishment to produce the milk for her nursing baby, and nourishment to come into heat and conceive her next baby. Satisfying all three needs requires about 20 pounds of feed every day, but at this time of year that feed can’t be grass alone. Why? Because right now and for about the next two months or so, the new winter grass consists of nearly 98% water and not enough nutritional value.

“If the cows were left just with the natural forage, only very few would conceive. They wouldn’t have enough energy to produce milk for the babies at their sides. And older cows that are short of teeth would starve because there’s just not enough nutrition to keep them alive, ” Jim explains.

So how does Jim select the alfalfa he feeds? Turns out that, just like my screen, alfalfa hay is wysiwyg: what you see is what you get.

“I can tell just by looking at and feeling the hay, how much gross energy and gross protein it contains. From the color, the smell, and the feel I can tell how it was grown and how it was put up,” Jim says. And what’s he looking for? Small stems, good green color, an absence of mold, and lots of leaves. If the alfalfa is too “stemmy,” the cow can’t get the nutrition she needs. (To get a grip on this all-important stem-to-leaf ratio, check out this study by the USDA/University of Wisconsin: “Harvest-Fractionation of Alfalfa.” Or just call Jim.)

With about 180 animals in the herd at the Trabucco ranch (where we are right now), you can do the math to get an idea of this chore’s scope— 3600 pounds of hay have to be doled out each and every day at this location alone. But over the years, Jim’s developed an exquisitely efficient way of accomplishing the task: he throttles down to first gear, steps out of the pilot’s seat, and lets the tractor from hell wander the field as he tosses out the bright green flakes.

As the flakes land, the cattle, who’ve streamed over the hill to meet us,  mosey up to their feed in companionable groups. There’s no competition and no stress. Just the sound of munching.

And that reminds me, I’m hungry. I need breakfast, too, and my morning cappuccino. See you later.

Tractor from hell

For about a month now, everyone at Nevada County Free Range Beef has been after Jim to start blogging. There’d be talk of blogging, thought about blogging, careful consideration of blogging, then some other pressing matter would take center stage; like putting up a couple miles of new fencing, rescuing a newborn calf, or taping up some broken ribs (Jim’s).

“What is blogging, anyway, for cryin’ out loud!”  Jim would bark in his usual gravelly voice, on the rare occasions that we could capture him on the phone. And so we explained what it is, making up some of the details just to keep Jim’s interest.

And Jim was all for blogging. Just one problem. Or two, really. No, make that three.

1. Jim has a computer but has never actually plugged it in.
2. Jim has a cell phone but it often is either unintentionally thrown into irrigation ditches, stepped on by 400-lb. animals, or it has no bars.
3. The thought of Jim tapping away on any kind of keypad, full-scale or contextual, really gave us pause.

“You do it!” was the command.  Everyone else had a lot going on, so it fell to me, the city girl and a perfect foil for Jim Gates, the real deal, modern day cowboy.

“OK, Jim, but just don’t make me ride on that tractor again,” I implored. That would be the charmingly antique 1950 Ford tractor that Jim uses to do ranch chores and test the mettle of  white-knuckled visitors on tours of the terrain. Think Sean Connery or Tom Cruise on some spaghetti switchback road in Monaco or Italy, trying to force the villain over the edge and into oblivion. This is how Jim drives the tractor on a good day. The roll-out is slow, but note the monomaniacal grin on Jim’s face as he plots my fate.

the tractor from hell

“Whatever you say. We’ll always take the ‘gator,” Jim promised while muttering something.

Deal. But first time out for the blog, the comfy ‘gator was nowhere in sight. In its place: the tractor from hell. What makes this the tractor from hell, in addition to Jim’s driving, is the unfortunate fact that there’s no seat for a guest. To go on this journey, you have to perch over the axle while clinging to the back of the driver’s chair. When Jim picks up speed, you have to dodge globs of mud and other unidentifiable flying objects kicked up from beneath the tread.
But I had signed up for this blogging thing and there was a ranch to survey, there were stories to gather and cows to consider and I couldn’t be a wus and back down. Anyway, maybe the tractor from hell is a good enough metaphor for how it is at the whole Nevada County Free Range Beef operation: offbeat, charming, hard-working, and real. Or maybe those are good keywords for Jim himself.
I’ll be back tomorrow or the day after with more. And listen, don’t tell Jim about what’s in this blog. After all, I have to survive the next ranch visit.