A few sighs of relief were heard around the farm upon passing our latest tuberculosis test with flying colours.

While I always tell myself to not run a hand over the injection sites, it’s a fruitless lecture to myself as without fail I’ll be squinting at them on day two and under the guise of scratching their necks I’ll be feeling for any suspicious bumps. Not many farmers can read braille but we all know good or bad under our fingers when it comes to the language of TB.

The plan was also to clip cattle as they were being ran through the crush but for once everything ran too smoothly and only the younger calves got clipped, though two of them are so fluffy it was akin to shearing sheep and despite removing a lot of hair off both, there didn’t look to be much difference in the before and after.

A few days after this we finally got the cows scanned, and as we don’t use a bull we only picked out the few which we were more interested in due to using sexed semen and a couple which hadn’t gone in-calf to check if they had any visible internal issues.

Sexed semen

Happily we are three for three with the sexed semen which is a relief as the plan was breeding for replacements down the line so now all we have to do is get them out safe and sound next year.

Of course, all this to-ing and fro-ing of going up and down the crush all year has predictably left some of the cows rather hesitant to walk up it and our last cow to AI this year was having none of it.

Neither carrot nor stick would work and in the end we had to give in and inseminate her behind a gate in the pen while she was obliviously eating her way through a scoop of nuts in a bucket.

Though she has repeated a few times, we’re hesitant to write her off just yet as she’s a well-bred pedigree Limousin and along with inheriting the gentle nature of her dam her first calf has caught some approving glances from visitors into the shed.

Modern technology

Roughly 10 years ago we had a basic calving camera system in place but wear and tear eventually got the better of it and it became one of those items that never got put on the ‘necessary’ list of updates around the farm.

So not before time we finally got around to installing a few new cameras around the shed, with thanks to my technology wizard brother.

I’m already dreaming of the ease we’ll have checking cows from the leaba at all hours of the morning on a frosty night instead of the chilly walk up and down to the shed which I’d become acquainted with doing while somehow remaining half asleep.

Hardly a week goes by without hearing about machinery, tools or stock going missing from farms and it’s impossible to keep an eye on everything 24/7 so it’s certainly worth the peace of mind regarding that issue as well.

However, the one thing that’s never stolen from a farm is work and there’s always something appearing that wasn’t marked in on the weekly calendar.

After a few heavy days of rain a small lake appeared in one of the fields, the natural version of a big neon sign telling us there was a blocked drain to clear but that can wait until the water resides enough for wellies instead of a wetsuit.