Hopefully by the time you’re reading this we’ll have been able to commence a mass exodus from the slatted shed.

It’s been a number of years since we were unsuccessful in getting some stock out in the first weeks of April and you can’t blame the cows for looking grumpy these days, with a bit of warmth creeping into the air again.

With the swallows finally here and settled into the old sheds around the farm, they too deserve a bit of peace and quiet without having cows roaring every time the door is opened – so anything that isn’t calving in the next couple of weeks is being let loose, as last winter was long enough on both man and beast.

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Not to mention the hassle of calves being everywhere at the moment, though we have a slight reprieve now with the next calves due in later May. For the last few years we’ve been inundated with heifer calves, but we’ve managed a complete 180 this year with a shed full of bull calves.

Only for the sexed semen used we’d be scratching our heads and hoping for some replacement heifers to appear and thankfully bar a couple of hiccups at the beginning of calving, we’ve not had to lay a hand on calves to start them sucking once we manage to get them out of the cow, so we can’t complain too much.

While he might have preferred a feed of Guinness to get him moving again, beggars can’t be choosers when there’s no drinks menu to browse and a couple of drenches later he was back to himself

They never thrive as well indoors either, though luckily we’ve avoided any outbreaks of scour occurring, which is a small blessing. Quite the opposite in fact, as we had one older calf in need of a liquid paraffin dose.

Strangely, his diet never changed, but he stopped eating and was walking around with a hump on his back and kicking at his belly.

While he might have preferred a feed of Guinness to get him moving again, beggars can’t be choosers when there’s no drinks menu to browse and a couple of drenches later he was back to himself.

Once we get him outdoors later this week he shouldn’t need any more intervention, with fresh grazing to keep him right.

While grass growth hasn’t been hectic, there’s still plenty of picking around in the more sheltered areas, although our fertiliser is still sitting in the yard waiting on our quad to return from its annual service.

The shocks were badly in need of replacement, so once back there should be a nice change from being bumped around when travelling across the fields.

It’ll be all systems go once that returns, as there’s a plethora of rushes returning. Before all the stock goes out we also need to look at our fencing and section off a couple of areas we’d normally use for pasture as meadow instead.

It’s not ideal and in a perfect world we’d continue with our usual fields, but with no slurry out and meadows almost too high for spreading, we’re debating the risk of a couple of silage cuts this year in some fields and running the cows on meadows – which are on the wetter side of normal.