Well, I have wondered if Girl was going to be a easy keeper of a family milk cow or not, and of course I still don’t have a real answer on that till she freshen’s and starts milking.

Having said that, she has always been a touch more of a fussy eater then Marty was,  I thought it was because I had her alone as a calf, because she came with just a touch of sours when I got her and because my big barn has been used with critters for many, many years, I raised her for the first months in the little red shed with a small outdoor paddock with lots of thick bedding in the shed, and she thrived, but she was fairly slow to take to her match baby grain and or hay.. in fact to tell the truth I had been known to sit there and place really good bits in her mouth and then once she was a bit older we started taking her to the pasture and again would show her the good bits and at times need to put things in her mouth to try, now in some ways that’s a good thing, she will try new things fairly willingly when it comes to garden stuff and I can play around in her mouth.

But when Marty came he was older, stronger (by two weeks and well started) he was moved into a pen just across from girl(sharing a hay feeder between them) and he got to share his pen with a very very old sheep, she was already two years past her old age prime at that point and I had pulled her so she could not get bred and then with a hard winter coming on, she was kept in the barn for the shelter, twice a day warm feedings  etc, so I figured part of the reason that he was such! a good eater of both his grain mix and his hay was because unlike her, he had both a bunk mate and a second cow to show him, everytime they got up to eat, so did he, even if it was to just nibble and stand with them..

But fast forward a full year and Marty still eats like a tank and Girl is now over half way though her first pregancy and she is a good eater, but this past week has been eye opening in the fact that she can be fussy, I tried to move her to a different soaked/sprouted grain milking combo and she basicly said.. NO and it threw her off her regular feeding to the point that she has a “off” couple of days, thankfully I caught it very quickly, I know my cow, she was still going really well on her hay but didn’t want the new grains, and was not drinking her correct amount of water, and it showed.. now why she decided to slow the water down, I honestly don’t know but I brided her with molasses water, warm water and she would sip and dip but not really drink.. it was enough to drive this farmgal crazy..

She would come when called but turn her nose up my offering, even walked away from fresh apples and carrots, this is a cow that will beg for apples..

So finally I thought lets see if I have any bit of her old grain mix left, and she attacked it, and I also put out a big tub of a vit/mineral/fat/molassies sweet lick, (which the horse spent the first two days licking at, clearly it had something she felt she was lacking) and while everyone from the smallest lamb to the horse are all using it, the cows both have been taking their turns on it.. its tricky to find something that is safe for all three different breeds in the pasture at this time.

After she started the lick and hovered up her old regular feed, she settled down and drank eight gallons of water and at the next feeding, repeat..  She won, I went back and bought her another bag of her regular ration, and she is back to eating and drinking like normal, even danced when she saw her morning treat of a fresh carrot..

It intersting to me how some of the critters can seem to adjust their tummies so much easier then others, Was her “off” because she didn’t want to try something new, or was it because after trying it for the first day or two, it didn’t sit well with her, I have no way of knowing that answer and I am not keen on putting it to the test to see.

In the case of Girl, I know what works at this time that’s were we are staying for the moment, I am just happy to have my bright, active, happy cow back who calls to me when she see’s me and comes a trotting.