Do You Think We Have a Baby?

How can any cow be on the verge of delivery for so long? Yesterday her teats swelled to a new smooth girth, her mucus flowed again, and when I checked her at 11pm, she was lying down, panting and straining (or so I thought). I've had four children, and I thought I recognized contractions when I see them.

But maybe she has a bad case of Braxton Hicks, because checks at 3am, 5am, and 7am showed nothing much out of the ordinary. Sure, sometimes she's off by herself, and I caught Beatrice, an equal opportunity nurser, guzzling away the colostrum from Bethany, who proceeded to lick her and, amazingly, moo to her.

Since, up until today, we've only ever heard Bianca "speak," to hear Bethany's voice for the first time was pleasant.

Then yearling Babe joined in, and we had a lovely chorus of moos.

But no baby.

When Butch stopped by to visit, I asked him about first stage labor. "Can it really go on for days and days? I mean, a woman who has early labor for days eventually has a C-section."

"Oh, no," he said. "You don't really intervene until the cow appears to be in distress."

And since Bethany continues to placidly chew her cud when she's not licking Beatrice, standing off by herself, or mooing, I can hardly say she looks like she's in distress at all.

It's me that's in distress, mostly for her sake. Poor mama! Deliver that baby already!

We had Giovanni out this evening to palpate our Fern, to see if the last AI took, or if we have to buy a bull. He confirmed that Butch was correct, and that Bethany just must not be ready. (He did eventually confess that, like with women, cows can have issues, but I think he was trying to make me believe that all would be well. And it very well probably will be.)

After almost three inches of rain earlier this week, the forecast this morning said another three inches in the next two days. Sure enough, by about 9:30am, drops fell, and by evening, the paddock was a morass of mud and dung.

Into this muck Giovanni came. The moment of truth: time for a bull?

Thanks be to God, NO! The AI took, and Fern is expecting around next June 7. Joy, joy, joy!

Giovanni said that the uterus of a cow has two horns. One horn has a bulge a little smaller than a walnut: the baby.

In other good news, Phil managed to fix the truck during yesterday's break in the rain. He is much relieved.

I went to my garden and noticed that several square feet of newly planted beds had been scratched away by the chickens. I had taken down the chicken netting when my family came to visit, because it didn't look very good, but I would rather have good vegetables than an aesthetically pleasing landscape, so I put the netting back.

Phil and I have been brainstorming an underground house, and it is very exciting. I think, in some ways, a year of living in 224 square feet has shifted my perspective dramatically. Had I tried to move into 1200 square feet from our Boulder home with 2700, I think it would have been a hard adjustment. But now, 1200 sounds luxurious, but cozy. Doable.