Watch Your Animals Graze
I don’t mean watch them from your pick-up, or watch them from a distance. I mean watch them close. Close enough that you can see what actually goes into their stomachs. The best time to do that is early in the morning when they first arise to fill their bellies. Ideally, they should be grazing shoulder to shoulder in a line. That is the natural formation for a grazing herd. You will learn the most when they are into good fresh pasture. Grazing in those conditions seems to put them in a competitive mood. They each want to get their share. That is when you will most accurately learn what they eat and how. Bison and cattle in a natural setting will eat about 70% herbage (grasses and legumes), 20% forbs (basically flowering non-grasses) and 10% browse (brush and brushy plants). It is normally stated that bison eat more browse than cattle. I am not sure that is true. In my pastures the two herds appear to eat similarly but that is a different story. In any case it is clear that bison and beef can benefit from a wide variety of plants. Not just a variety of grasses. The animals will do best when they have lots of plant choices. They should also have the knowledge of how much of each plant species to eat and when to eat it. It is well known that plants which many consider weeds have high nutritive value. Common plants like dandelion, alyssum, curly dock, smart weed, white campion, sow thistle and Canada thistle are actually more nutritious than many grasses. These and numerous other non-grasses are high in digestibility. Many forbs contain high levels of vitamins and minerals. Grazing animals will readily eat these plants at an early stage of growth. As with most plants these are best served before they get too tough or spiny. Many common plants are listed as toxic or poisonous to livestock. Some of the more common members of that list are nightshade, cocklebur, milkweed, pigweed, Johnsongrass and wild cherry. I do not doubt that these plants are poisonous when eaten at the wrong stage of growth or in excessive quantities. Nevertheless, I have watched my bison and beef eat all of these in the normal course of grazing without observing any ill effects. When grazing in a row as described above a typical routine is for the animal to grab several mouths of grass then swing its head over to purposefully bite the top six inches off of a milkweed, take a few more mouths of grass and then two bites of alyssum, take a few more bites of grass and then grab another mouthful of milkweed. It appears that they like variety in their meals as much as we do. Other plants especially those identified as herbs are known to have medicinal properties. Wormwood, although not a native plant, was believed by the farmers in Germany to be a vermifuge, a dewormer. I don’t doubt that it is. It is proven to have antimicrobial properties. I occasionally see cows walk over to a wormwood plant and eat the tender, top half of the plant. I think they are on to something. There is a plant called cudweed, a pungent member of the everlasting family that in folklore is supposed to help animals get over an upset stomach. My animals seek out and eat cudweed from time to time. Both bison and cattle are good browsers of brush and woody plants. The situation there is much the same as with forbs. Many brushy plants are high in nutrients. Some are listed as poisonous but our herds seem to eat them all at different times of the year. Buckthorn, a recent invasive bush, is a growing nuisance in much of Minnesota. It is not a problem on our farm. In the early fall the larger animals walk the plants down and eat the leaves and berries with delight. Near the beginning of this essay I wrote that animals do well if they have choices and knowledge. I have explained some of the choices. The knowledge is herd knowledge. Knowledge of what to eat, when to eat it and how much to eat. For a herd to have this knowledge it must have senior individuals that have lived on the land. Older cows are best. The younger animals are great observers of their elders. If the old cows know, the herd knows. I should add a few words of caution. Some animals will overindulge. I have seen a heifer eat choke cherries until she died with a stomach plugged with seeds. That was not a toxicity issue but an actual mechanical plugging of the stomach chamber. I once had a steer that ate himself sick every time he could find pine needles. I have had a single animal in the herd get sick each time I rotated the herd through a particular pasture. I never did figure out what she was obsessing on. I just took her permanently out of the rotation. Some plants can cause quick neurological problems. Some cause fatal liver failure. There can be problems. The problems should be rare if both you and your animals have knowledge of what is growing in your pastures. There is a group at the Utah State University Extension Service that does great research into grazing issues such as these. If you wish, you can follow the link below to their website and sign up for the BEHAVE Research and Outreach Newsletter. http://extension.usu.edu/ Best Regards, Tom Barthel Secretary and Director at Large
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The first photo is of a young cow and her calf. The calf was born at the beginning of April. Two more heifers are due to calve soon. These animals, plus two yearlings and three more calves that were born here last summer comprise a “welcoming committee” for new arrivals.
Here is how that works. Each year, from April through July, I buy 100 beef animals. Most are calves, some are yearlings and some are cull cows. I then raise and or fatten them on grass for my customers. I select virtually all of those animals from a reputable sale barn. The sale barn is in a good location near the Minnesota-Wisconsin border. That is a good location, because good grass fed animals come from small farms in northwestern Wisconsin. Buying cattle through a sale barn seems to be the only way to get good animals at a reasonable price. That bothered me until I spoke with Joel Salatin about it. He does the same thing. Almost all of the cattle are sold as singles. That means they are the only one I am able to buy from their home herd on that day. The animals are under terrible stress during this process. Cattle are herd animals. Without a herd, they are terribly lost. It generally takes two days from the time the animals are selected at their home farm, until they reach the farm, pen or feedlot of their new owner. During that time, they are separated from their herd of origin, yelled at, poked, prodded, driven through pens and locked in a headstall, where they are subjected to vaccinations and other indignities, yelled at some more, loaded onto trucks or trailers, hauled long distances and unloaded with a group of strangers. Those strange animals are scared and angry. The bigger animals push them around, especially if the space is small. At their new home, the water tastes different and is provided in a different way. The food has no connection with what they have been eating. Everything is confusing, everything is frightening. I am not being overly dramatic. The process of separating and hauling cattle is so stressful that farmers gave the illness that normally comes from it a name. It is called Shipping Fever. All cattle that are separated and moved in this way are susceptible to Shipping Fever. Numerous medical treatments have been developed for it. Amazingly, little consideration has been given to prevention of the disease. Just medical treatments for the disease and its symptoms. In general, younger animals are more susceptible to Shipping Fever than older animals. Apparently, older animals can handle the trauma better. Contrary to its name, Shipping Fever seldom involves a fever but it is very serious. It frequently results in death from pneumonia-like symptoms. Seemingly healthy animals develop respiratory symptoms and die in a day or two. As a buyer, I am on the tail end of this process. (No pun intended.) There are limitations on what I can do for these cattle. I carefully select animals that give all the signs of being healthy and vigorous. I have every animal rechecked by a veterinarian. They get vaccinations and treatments that comply with the organic standards. If the vet suspects an animal is ill, that animal is treated with antibiotics as necessary. Fortunately, antibiotic treatment is necessary for about one animal each year. The greatest good I can do for the animals is to reduce their stress level as quickly as possible. That is where the Welcoming Committee comes in. The first thing the new animals need is a herd. The welcoming committee is a mixed group of calm cows, calves and yearlings for them to join. The animals that I keep overwinter are specially calmed and trained. They are accustomed to my presence and relaxed when I am around. The new animals although frequently spooky and untrusting, closely observe how the resident animals and I interact. The animals have lots of space, grass and easily accessed water. I provide hay in several feeders so the cattle do not have to compete. The results are dramatic. The second photo is of the herd and seven new animals just two hours after they arrived at our farm. They have already bonded and blended together. They are intermingled and resting with full bellies. Two of the new arrivals are lying flat in restful abandon. No doubt they are exhausted but clearly, they feel safe and relaxed. The members of the welcoming committee are trained to come when I call. They remain tranquil when I walk among them. They are also trained to follow me when I lead them. That is necessary because we rotate the herd through 70 pastures during the growing season. The new animals see this behavior. By the third day, the entire herd will come when I call. They are already trained to follow me to new pastures. It is quite unlikely that any of these new animals will succumb to Shipping Fever. They are at the start of a very good summer. Best regards. Tom Gail posted a video in late April on facebook, Snake River Farm Minnesota. It got 2400 viewers. Incredible.
There was one comment that made me think I should write at least a little about animal handling. You cannot see it but I am struggling with how to start this topic. I think I will just jump in. I have been handling animals all of my life. My earliest recollections are of doing farm chores. I have always enjoyed farming. I cannot say that I have never been rough with animals but I can say that I have treated animals with great care for decades. One of our goals is to humanely raise and harvest our animals. We work hard to give our animals the best reasonable life and a painless, stress free death. A good life in my opinion means that the animals have a healthy diet, shelter as needed, protection from predators, a low stress existence and a satisfying social life. Each species of animal has different needs in each of those categories. For example, our bison have no use for shelter nor do they need protection from predators. But bison social needs are high. It is well known that a lone bison will not prosper. Poultry need both shelter and protection from predators and their social structure is well defined. Think, “pecking order”. I intend to explain many of those differences and how we try to satisfy them. I will do so in a series of letters. For now, I will give you the abbreviated form. We do not yell at our animals. I can imagine the need to yell in a dangerous situation but I cannot recall such a situation in recent years. We handle and work with all of our animals calmly, gently, and courteously. Animals that are treated calmly are themselves calm. You will see that when you visit the farm. Providing a low stress life for the animals has many benefits. Calm animals are easier to handle, easier to care for. It is easier for me to work with calm animals. Calm animals are healthier and grow better. Whether I am working with horses, cattle, buffalo, hogs, sheep, or smaller animals, every interaction is a training experience. The animals either learn new behaviors, behaviors that I want from them, or they learn to be edgy and wary. I used the word courteous above. I know that seems like an odd choice in this context. I do not believe it is out of place. For example, when I am traveling through the animal’s pastures, whether on foot or on a tractor, I take care to give them time to move away. Or, I walk around the animals so they do not have to scatter before me. It might seem odd but they, especially the senior animals have their own sense of dignity. To make them scatter to let me through shames them within their family or social group. Humiliate a bison matriarch and she will never forgive you. Animals remember such things. We brought home 110 little pigs a couple weeks ago. Since then I have been in their pen several times a day to bring them feed to water them and to check on their health. I walk slowly and talk to them as I move around. They are very active, but they are not afraid. They have learned to be comfortable with my presence. In fact, one measure of success is when I reach the point where I need to tell individual animals that I am there because none sounded an alarm. I like it when they feel comfortable ignoring me. We brought the piglets home in a stock trailer. The first week I used that stock trailer as their temporary sleeping room. Casey posted a nice photo on our facebook page of the pigs sleeping in the trailer. One of the reasons I use the trailer for their first shelter is because I will use the same stock trailer to move them to pastures. In the fall, I will use that trailer again to transport them to Quality Meats. They have good memories of that trailer and they will readily walk into it whenever I need them to. No yelling, no shocking, no hitting required. I move the bison and beef herds by leading them. I have attended some excellent workshops on driving cattle and bison. I find however, that training them to follow me when I call works much better. Leading eliminates the crowding and stress that comes from driving. I can easily lead the cattle herd from the far end of the farm, through many turns, gates and even across the township road to get them to a specific pasture. A walk in the park. In case you are wondering, I lead the bison but then get out of their way when they stampede, as they always do. It is their nature. Hogs cannot be lead. They are not herd animals but rather family animals. I will explain that in a future letter. Pigs will only go where they want to go and they will not stick together. It is a subject for yet another letter but I also train the animals for the day when I will harvest them. The goal is an instant, pain free death with no anticipation of danger. If this letter raises questions for you, please ask. Best regards. Tom I have been handling animals all of my life.
My earliest recollections are of doing farm chores. Feeding calves. I have always enjoyed farming. One of our primary goals at our farm is to humanely raise and harvest our animals. We work hard to give our animals the best reasonable life and a painless, stress free death. A good life in my opinion means that the animals have a healthy diet, shelter as needed, protection from predators, a low stress existence and a satisfying social life. Each species of animal has different needs in each of those categories. For example, our bison have no use for shelter nor do they need protection from predators. But bison social needs are high. It is well known that a lone bison will not prosper. Poultry need both shelter and protection from predators and their social structure is well defined. Think, “pecking order”. I intend to explain many of those differences and how we try to satisfy them. I will do so in a series of letters. For now, I will give you the abbreviated form. We do not yell at our animals. I can imagine the need to yell in a dangerous situation but I cannot recall such a situation in recent years. We handle and work with all of our animals calmly, gently, and courteously. Animals that are treated calmly are themselves calm. You will see that when you visit the farm. Providing a low stress life for the animals has many benefits. Calm animals are easier to handle, easier to care for. It is easier for me to work with calm animals. Calm animals are healthier and grow better. Whether I am working with horses, cattle, buffalo, hogs, sheep, or smaller animals, every interaction is a training experience. The animals either learn new behaviors, behaviors that I want from them, or they learn to be edgy and wary. I used the word courteous above. I know that seems like an odd choice in this context. I do not believe it is out of place. For example, when I am traveling through the animal’s pastures, whether on foot or on a tractor, I take care to give them time to move away. Or, I walk around the animals so they do not have to scatter before me. It might seem odd but they, especially the senior animals have their own sense of dignity. To make them scatter to let me through shames them within their family or social group. Humiliate a bison matriarch and she will never forgive you. Animals remember such things. We brought home 110 little pigs a couple weeks ago. Since then, I have been in their pen several times a day to bring them feed to water them and to check on their health. I walk slowly and talk to them as I move around. They are very active, but they are not afraid. They have learned to be comfortable with my presence. In fact, one measure of success is when I reach the point where I need to tell individual animals that I am there because none sounded an alarm. I like it when they feel comfortable ignoring me. We brought the piglets home in a stock trailer. The first week I used that stock trailer as their temporary sleeping room. Casey posted a nice photo on our Facebook page of the pigs sleeping in the trailer. One of the reasons I use the trailer for their first shelter is because I will use the same stock trailer to move them to pastures. In the fall, I will use that trailer again to transport them to Quality Meats. They have good memories of that trailer and they will readily walk into it whenever I need them to. No yelling, no shocking, no hitting required. I move the bison and beef herds by leading them. I have attended some excellent workshops on driving cattle and bison. I find however, that training them to follow me when I call works much better. Leading eliminates the crowding and stress that comes from driving. I can easily lead the cattle herd from the far end of the farm, through many turns, gates and even across the township road to get them to a specific pasture. A walk in the park. In case you are wondering, I lead the bison but then get out of their way when they stampede, as they always do. It is their nature. Hogs cannot be lead. They are not herd animals but rather family animals. I will explain that in a future letter. Pigs will only go where they want to go and they will not stick together. It is a subject for yet another letter but I also train the animals for the day when I will harvest them. The goal is an instant, pain free death with no anticipation of danger. If this letter raises questions for you, please ask. Best regards. Tom This letter is about horses.
We keep about ten horses. All geldings. We have had mares and stallions but it is simpler and safer to have a herd of geldings only. Safety is an important issue. Many inexperienced people and many small children enjoy our horses each year. I train all the horses to ride and to drive. They are ridden year around. There is also a lot of wagon and bobsled work for them I use them as much as I can for pasture work. Harrowing the pastures in the early spring. Tilling, seeding and packing the pig pastures. Moving pastures in the summer. Logging when we can find the time. Most of our horses are Mustangs or of Mixed breeding. I prefer mustangs. Mustangs are significantly healthier and more durable than other horses. They have terrific heart and put great effort into any work. They are inclined to take care of their own needs. They are proud and their sense of dignity shows in everything they do. Perhaps most of all, I like the challenge of taming mustangs. A domestic horse wants to know if it can trust you. A mustang wants to know if you deserve its trust. Two of our horses are gaited horses. Gaited means bred for a smooth saddle ride. Two are horses of mixed breeding that just turned up here. Well, maybe there is more to it than that but they were not planned. We have never sold a horse. I have considered it but Gail will not part with a horse once she comes to know it. Why we keep only geldings. Mares are moody when they are in estrus. Worse yet, when there is a mare around, the geldings tend to be aroused. Stallions, like bulls can be dangerous. So can geldings who think they are stallions. The greatest danger is not that a horse will intentionally hurt a person but rather that someone will get hurt by being between the wrong two horses. The worst horse kick I ever received was intended for another horse. Gelded horses are not like steers. Cattle are typically castrated very young. Horses cannot be castrated until they are more than a year old. Because of that, geldings frequently retain some stallion-like behaviors throughout life. Training a horse is different from training any other large animal. The nature of a horse is different from the nature of a dog or a cow. The fundament difference exists between a dog and a horse because the dog is a predator and the horse is prey. Cattle are prey animals too but cattle have horns. The primary defense for a horse is to run. People like horses, so the intuitive response is to be kind to a horse. That is nice, but horse relationships are not based on kindness. Horse relationships are based on dominance. Not dominance based on fear and pain. Fear and pain produce spooky, dangerous horses. But, dominance based on leadership, consistency, trust, protection and calm. This letter is not about horse training. I know a few things about horse training but so do many others, including some of you. There are thousands of books on horse training but all horse taming and training is based on understanding the unique nature of horses. I will give an example or two.
A good trainer understands those keys. No doubt there have been countless humans with unique insight (whisperers) around at all times over the history of horse domestication.
Horses spook. It is the nature of a horse to run from any threat. A run-away or a bolting horse is very dangerous. The reason for this is based in horse nature, of course. In a flight situation, as prey, the slowest horse was the one that got eaten. Horses have developed the ability to take flight to a fine edge. They are so well adapted to flight that many “spooky” signals never reach their brain. Everyone who trains horses trains them to be as spook resistant as possible. Some horses are incredibly spook resistant. I trained my boyhood horse for hunting jack rabbits. I could shoot a 12 gauge shotgun over his head at a full run. ( I do not recommend this by the way.) Nevertheless, every horse will spook at something This letter is about cattle.
We sell grass-fed beef. Cattle are social, ruminating, prey animals. Taxonomically, cattle are in the same “Family,” (bovidae), as bison, sheep, goats and antelope. Obviously, cattle are more like bison, than they are like sheep. Cattle are in the same “Order,” (artiodactyla), as pigs and horses, because they walk on their toes. Ruminating means that they have complex stomachs which allow them to digest fibrous plant material. That is a great advantage; cattle can live on fibrous plants that would not sustain us. We keep only a few beef animals through the winter. All of our land is grazed. We must purchase winter hay. Hay for the bison, beef and horse herds is our single greatest expense. Because of that, we minimize the number of animals we keep through the winter. As I write this letter, it is March, and there are six beef animals on the farm. By early summer, we will have 100 animals grazing 300 acres of pasture. Each spring I personally select the calves and yearlings that we will raise for you. Those animals come from small farms in central Minnesota and western Wisconsin. I select animals that will grow well through the summer and become grass finished beef by fall. Finished means large enough, mature enough, and fat enough to be great grass-fed meat. Most of the beef animals are sold to you by the ¼ for cuts. I buy only heifers for that purpose. Heifers finish younger and smaller than steers. The fact that heifers finish younger is important. The Minnesota grazing season is bountiful but short. Our beef animals must be ready for harvest by December at the latest. Heifers finish smaller than steers and that is also important. Most of our customers want a smaller ¼ of beef. 300 acres of pasture, over 60 paddocks. Snake River Farm is the main farm. It has over 200 acres of pasture. Sandhill Farm has 70 acres of pasture. Five Straw Farm has more than 20 acres of grazing land. Each farm is fenced and watered for rotational grazing. There are more than 60 separate paddocks or pastures on the three farms. There will be a herd on each farm, from the start of the grazing season until late fall. Lead cows welcome the new heifers. The six beef animals that are here now are the welcoming animals for each farm. Having mature animals to greet the new arrivals is incredibly helpful. When the animals arrive, they are stressed. They have been corralled, loaded, and hauled from the farm of their birth. Sometimes they arrive with a herd mate or two, but often they are with complete strangers. It is important to calm the new animals as soon as possible. Young animals become ill quickly when under stress. This is where the welcoming animals come in. The senior animals that we overwinter are selected to be good leaders and matriarchs. They are calm. They know the pastures. They know us. One or more of the overwintered animals will be on each farm to welcome the new arrivals. That works miraculously well. Young animals look for leadership. The heifers find that most readily in a cow. Animals quickly learn from their leaders. The cow is calm and that relaxes the new arrivals. The cow sets the schedule. She leads the way to food and water. I select a leader who is a superior grazer. From her the heifers learn what to eat, when to eat it and how much to eat. Plants that are considered toxic are often medicinal in the correct dosage. The lead cow is trained to come when I call. When she comes, the herd will follow her. That means within a day of arrival I can move the herd to fresh pastures. Perhaps most important, the heifers see that the cow is not afraid of me. I can walk to the cow and touch her. That has a great effect on the new animals some of whom were mishandled in the past. Our cattle do not have horns. Both male and female cattle naturally have horns. That includes all varieties both dairy and beef. Horns can be problem, however. They are dangerous to farmers and to other cattle. Horns are managed in two basic ways. Some breeds have been selectively bred to be hornless. For example, Angus cattle, male and female, black or red are hornless. Farmers called such cattle naturally polled. Virtually all Holsteins, the black and white dairy cattle, have horns naturally. Nevertheless, very few adult Holsteins have horns. Their horns are removed when young. That is done by cutting, burning with a special hot iron or by caustic chemical. Frankly, there is no delicate way to dehorn. Most of the calves we raise are naturally polled. I do not buy horned animals. An animal with horns will quickly learn she has an advantage and abuse her herd mates. Besides, as Gail says, farming buffalo with horns is excitement enough. Proper grazing improves prairies, woodlands, wet meadows and stream banks. Grass farmers know that grazing is a powerful tool for improving prairies and pasturelands. In many areas people are learning that grazing is the critical element in both grassland and savannah management. Burning has a place, but burning should be used much less frequently than has been taught. Cattle and bison can do an excellent job of improving woodlands. For example, Buckthorn is an invasive bush in many forests. It grows here. It is an attractive plant that provides winter berries for birds. On our farms, the grazing animals keep Buckthorn in check. The cattle walk the plants down by wedging the thin trunk between their front legs. They eat the leaves and berries as they move ahead. Buckthorn is not a problem in our woodlands, nor are other brushy plants. Properly timed grazing is good for wet meadows and stream banks. It has been erroneously taught that cattle should be permanently fenced away from streams. In some situations that may be true but for most streams that is poor management. Prolonged “rest” is as great a problem as overgrazing. Ungrazed stream banks often go to brush and trees. Then total shading produces a soft unstable bank, subject to erosion. Managed grazing that mimics natural herd movements can maintain healthy stream banks. It would be an advantage to graze the bison and cattle herds together. I have tried that for four years and the results have been mixed. It would be good to pasture them together to form a larger herd of grazers. It may be counterintuitive but the ideal grazing situation is large numbers of animals that eat or trample everything in a few hours. Then move on to let the land rest for months. Some farmers, mob graze small paddocks with enormous numbers of animals. They get a wonderful plant and soil response. The opposite extreme, continuous grazing is quite destructive to plants and soils. Continuous grazing is common. Many people with small numbers of horses or cattle continuously graze. You can watch the pasture degrade, year after year. Unfortunately, one of the bison cows is not tolerant of the beef heifers. Last summer she injured three heifers in three days. I separated the herds. The heifers recovered although one limped for a month. Perhaps I can solve the problem by converting the ornery cow to hamburger. Space, social order and choices. Cattle, like most animals establish a hierarchy, or pecking order. To do that they need adequate space. Our herds have enough space to arrange themselves socially, at all times. A stable social order means low stress. Adequate space also means they never have to stand in mud or manure. They can always find comfortable places to rest. They have trees for shade on hot summer days. At times, the animals enjoy using those same trees as “rubs.” Our pastures have a great variety of grasses, forbs and shrubs. The animals are free to make grazing and browsing choices to maintain good health. Pasture harvesting eliminates stress. We pasture harvest both beef and bison. This eliminates the high stress activities of corralling, loading, unloading and then dying in a strange place. Through pasture harvest, the animals do not anticipate, nor are they aware of their death. No fear, no pain, no stress. Some of you have asked for more about harvesting. I will write a separate letter on that topic. Our cattle get daily care. The animals are observed every day. They have frequent human contact. We walk among them several times a week to see that they are well but also to teach them to be calm when we are with them. Spending time with the animals, observing them closely and seeing that there needs are met is fundamental to animal husbandry. It is central to being a farmer. Best regards. Tom p.s. I wrote a more general letter on cattle about a year ago. You may be interested in that letter also. How We Select our Beef Animals on March 29, 2013 This letter is about bison.
In the US, we use the names bison and buffalo for the same animal. The name “buffalo” technically belongs to Asian animals such as the Water Buffalo. Bison are wild animals but on farms like ours, they are also livestock. Bison have not had the long history of domestication that other livestock have. Because of that, the care and handling of bison is significantly different from other livestock. We keep a complete bison herd. That means a mature bull, a number of cows and their offspring. Our herd includes calves, yearlings and two year olds, both male and female Depending on the time of year, the herd numbers between 20 and 30 animals. The number is highest in summer after the calves are born. Lowest after the fall harvest. Bison are herd animals. They have a high social need. Bison alone or in small numbers will do poorly. Bison have a very strong herd sense and a strict hierarchy within that herd. These two factors tend to hold the herd tightly together but with space between individuals depending on status. It is extremely difficult to separate an animal from the herd. Bison becomes highly agitated if separated. Bison can become so excited when handled or when penned that occasionally a healthy animal will simply drop dead. This same factor causes buffalo stampedes. Stampedes can start easily and instantly anytime a bison herd begins to move. I see it often when moving the animals to fresh pasture. This is how a stampede occurs. I open a gate and call the animals. A few cows or the herd bull, (Bill) start moving toward the opening. Bison like to move. Those closest to the open gate may break into a lope. Other bison see the movement and fear being left behind. Those animals run toward the departing animals. Then, all the remaining bison notice the movement. In an instant, every animal is running toward those bison that headed to the open gate. The leading bison hear the herd approaching at a run. They increase their speed to a run, fearing they will be trampled from behind. Now the entire herd is running madly. Each bison getting as close as possible to the animals ahead of it. The bison in the middle and the rear of the herd are in full panic. They are running blindly with their heads down. They do not know where they are going. They just fear being left behind. The bison in front are running as fast as they can. The front bison cannot see what is directly behind because the herd is in their blind spot. They correctly fear being trampled. Those two fears, the fear of being left behind and the fear of being run down are the essential elements of a stampede. Once begun, a stampede continues until the lead bison turn in an arc. From the arcing position they can see behind and manage their fear. As the arc continues the main body of animals tends to fan out. The group loosens and slows. They fan out because they cannot actually see the lead animals and tend to keep moving straight ahead. The herd continues to loosen and slow until each animal feels that it can safely stop running. Of course, there is one other way to end a stampede. Native Americans used stampedes to kill bison by running them over a cliff. Indians would start a stampede and then have hunters located along the route to prevent the herd from turning away from a cliff. An effective method but one that annihilated the entire herd. Some years ago, I built our herd up to 70 bison. That was too many. A herd that big did not fit through my pasture gateways. When they stampeded, they broke down the gate posts. I got tired of rebuilding fences. Bigger herds require bigger farms. Thirty bison at once is enough. Bison have a unique shape. Bison have a massive head covered with long, thick hair. They use their heads to plow snow from winter grasses. This unusual adaptation allows them to survive winters in far northern plains. The large head also defines their body shape. The “hump” on the bison shoulders is made of long extensions of spinal bones and enormous straps of cartilage. The hump is necessary to move and control the bison’s extra large head. Adult bison bulls weigh over 2000 pounds. The very biggest reach 2500 pounds. Cows however, are much smaller, averaging 1000 pounds. This “dimorphism,” difference in size, is also unique to bison. Most other farm animals such as cattle, horses and pig, males and females are undistinguishable by size. Bison live to over 30 years of age. That is roughly twice as long as cattle Bison are serious about self defense. Bison use their heads and horns as weapons. Bulls tend to use their enormous heads as battering rams. Cows on the other hand tend to use their horns with a hooking motion. Most of the cows in our herd sharpen their horns. They bring the tips of the horns to a knife’s edge by rubbing on trees and rocks. Bison with young calves are particularly aroused by canines, including dogs. Bison are not afraid of horses. Some cows will aggressively defend against horses. We never put horses and bison in the same paddock. The risk of injury to the horse is too high. Bison have a strict herd hierarchy. They enforce their hierarchy instantly and violently. A lower status animal must keep its distance from a higher status animal. That distance is 5 to 20 feet depending on the situation. The only exception is during a stampede where the animals bunch tightly together. Cows in general have high status. Cows rank themselves from highest to lowest within their group. Calves have the same status as their mother but only when they are together. A cows’ yearling and two year old offspring are also protected but only when near their mother. Young animals not born in the herd have no status. They must keep their distance from virtually every herd member. This “outsider’ status in combination with their strong social need puts them under intense stress. A young bull can never gain status unless he defeats the herd bull in battle. That is not likely. I harvest young bulls before they get large enough to challenge Bill. Fighting bulls will destroy any fence in their path. A young female can gradually build status by producing calves. Young cows rise in stature over years of production. The next time you visit our bison herd observe this hierarchy in motion. Each time a high status animal takes a few steps, there is a ripple effect through the herd as every other animal moves to reset the spacing. In general, the herd will look calm as they shift positions but occasionally you will see a low status individual make a hasty move to escape the horns of a superior. Bison are dead serious about enforcing their rules. Some years ago at an auction, I purchased several cows from one farm and several large heifers from a different farm. The animals were about the same size. The sale barn workers made the mistake of putting one of the heifers in with the cows. The cows killed the heifer. The poor creature was not able to get as far from the cows as bison rules required. I seldom bring outside animals into our herd. It is too hard on them. Bison also have a fierce aversion to capture or enclosure. There is no low stress way to capture or haul bison. Most bison producers have corrals, sorting pens and squeeze chutes. Bison frequently injure themselves in these facilities. Nevertheless, such facilities are necessary to vaccinate, tag, weigh, sort and load bison. Other than pasture fences, we have no facilities for bison. It is good that others do or there would be no way to stock bison farms. Nor would there be a way to get bison from farms to grocery shelves. I pasture harvest our bison. That means I kill them in their pasture in a way that causes no stress. I am not critical of other bison farming methods. In fact, I am taking advantage of their efforts and expenditures. It is a luxury for me that I can farm without the need to sort or load our bison. I move the bison herd from pasture to pasture by leading them. I use the same methods as for cattle with one exception. I walk ahead of the cattle. I cannot do that with the bison. Once they see the open gate, they would run over me. Normally I lead the bison from a tractor seat. Sometimes I can do it from behind a gate. When harvesting cattle I walk among them, when harvesting bison I do so from a tractor. The herd bull and a couple of the cows have rammed the tractor in the past. The tractor weighs almost five tons and is made of hard stuff. They learn to vent their anger in other ways. I will explain the details of harvesting in a separate letter at the end of this sequence. Bison eat the same diet as cattle. Some textbooks teach that bison eat more browse (twigs, buds etc.) than cattle. I do not believe that is true. Animals eat what they have learned to eat. If a herd has a history of living in mixed terrain with many kinds of plants, they will over time learn the proper season and use for every plant. In a natural environment, a herd will develop the knowledge of when to eat every grass, forb, herb and brushy plant that is available. The herd will learn how to self medicate on the many herbs that grow in their range. A group at the University of Utah has done some terrific work on this topic. I never separate the members of our bison herd. That means the bull, who we call Bill is always with them. That further means that the time of calving is up to Bill and the cows. Last year most of the cows calved in April. Some years most calve in May; occasionally we will get a calf as late as October. I see no point in interfering in the sex lives of buffalo. The cows are protective of their calves, as you would expect. In the case of calving problems, there is probably nothing that can be done. I once tried to save a weak calf by taking it from its mother. My intention was to warm it, feed it and return it. The calf could not stand. I used a tractor to push the cow momentarily from the calf. I then jumped down and carried the calf onto the tractor. The cow climbed onto the tractor seat with me. I returned the doomed calf to its mother. Good cattle fencing will hold well managed bison. When bison are upset or crowded, they require extremely good fencing. If well cared for and calm, their fencing requirements are not much different from cattle. I know good bison farmers who have five strand barbwire fences and have never had their bison escape. Bison have a healthy respect for electric fence and we use it for all our pastures. Bison ranchers I learn from in Dakota use a single strand of electric fence to divide their bison pastures. I generally use two wires minimum. In my smaller Minnesota pasture, a small animal will sneak under or a large animal will jump over a single wire. Bison are great jumpers. It is crucial that the bison are well fed, watered, trained to their fences, socially stable and calm. The two wire fences I mentioned above are interior fences. Although our bison have never broken out, there is always more than one fence line between them and the road. There are major differences between having a herd of cattle get out versus a herd of bison. If your cattle get out the neighbors call and you just bring the cattle home. If your bison get out you might appear on the evening news. Best regards. Tom In this letter, I will write about Pigs.
We raise pastured pigs. Hogs can only be pastured during the growing season. We buy little pigs in the spring, raise them on pasture, and harvest them in late fall. Pigs are not well suited to cold weather. We keep no pigs in the winter. The piglets come to our farm at the beginning of May. At that time, they are just a few weeks old. They are females, (gilts) and castrated males (barrows). Male pigs, (boars) develop a strong and displeasing taste. When raised under the same conditions there is no significant difference in behavior, growth rate, weight or meat taste between gilts and barrows. Normally the piglets are born in a confinement system. That means they have lived only in heated buildings. When we bring them home, we carefully acclimate them to a more natural environment. They must adapt to fresh air, sunshine and cool spring temperatures. They must also adjust to our simpler basic feed. Most important, they must develop immune systems that function well without antibiotics or medication. To do that we put them into a large shed with deep straw bedding. The shed is open on the sunny side. For the first two weeks, the pigs are together in one large group of 100 or more. Even though there are many piglets in the shed, they have much more space and more freedom than in the confinement barn. They can immediately start natural hog behaviors like rooting in the dirt. They are able to run and play. If the May weather gets too cold we enclose the open sides of the shed with tarps. Normally the pigs toughen up within a few days. I begin training the pigs for pasture life immediately I walk in the pen several times each day to clean and fill their feed troughs. While in the pen, I check the piglets carefully to see that all are feeling well. Walking in the pen gets the pigs accustomed to having me among them. I pick animals that are not doing well and place them in a nursery. The nursery is simply a corner of the shed that is fenced off. The nursery has heat lamps for extra warmth. The nursery usually contains five to eight little pigs. Tending to the distressed piglets in a less competitive area improves their well being drastically. Normally, within a few days the nursery pigs can go back in with the larger group. Each day I add a couple pigs to the nursery and return a couple pigs to the main pen. During this time, I also train them to electric fencing. Moveable, one strand electric fences are crucial for managing hogs on pasture. To train them I string a small diameter wire across a corner of the pen. I place a section of white ribbon wire across a different corner. These electrified strands are not needed to hold the little pigs in this pen. The strands are for training purposes only. The piglets quickly learn to see and to avoid the electrified wires. When I move the pigs to their summer pastures, I will use single strand wire along the permanent exterior fences. This wire keeps them from digging under perimeter fences. I use the white ribbon wire for the moveable fences to manage grazing. This white ribbon is the same ribbon that is commonly used for horse fencing. I use the white tape for the moveable fence because the pigs can see it easily. Some hog farmers believe that pigs will not cross a line where there was an electric fence, even after the fence has been moved. That is not true. They will readily move past yesterday’s barrier if they are trained to regular fence movement. I feed the pigs a special blend of grains that I grind weekly on the farm. Their diet is high in oats. Each week I adjust the ratio of the grains to supply the correct protein and nutrient level for their age, weight and pasture conditions. I developed the high oat ration years ago so that the pigs would not grow too rapidly. Hog digestive systems are much like ours. I like oats in my diet. It is my belief that our pigs are healthier, play more and feel better on this diet. In 2013, I developed a corn free ration. In this diet, the pig feed is a blend of oats and wheat. The hogs did perfectly well on this new diet. By the way, I never feed the pigs meat. Some growers throw road kill or offal to their pigs. That is a cheap source of protein and the pigs love it. I think it is a bad practice, however. Road kill carcasses may carry trichinosis. Trichinosis is the worm disease that grandmother worried about. Worse yet, pigs quickly become ravenous about meat. It just seems like a bad idea to me. I start moving groups of around 30 to their separate pastures within two weeks after arrival. By then they have adapted to our simpler feeds, strengthened their immune systems and toughened up for the outside world. Each pasture has shade trees and an open sided shed that faces south. Each pasture also has its own water supply, grain feeder and electric fence charger. I have found that hogs are most relaxed in groups of ten to thirty. More than forty and the animals do not socialize as well. In large groups smaller pigs may be picked on or fall behind. In the wild, two to four sows form a group called a sounder. Including little pigs, those groups normally number between 15 and 25. That group size may define both their minimum need and their maximum capability for a stable social order. Pigs of the same age with adequate water, food and space do not form a strict hierarchy. Each pasture is completely separate from other pig pastures. That is an important factor in disease prevention. A low stress life and a robust immune system provide good defense from illness. I move interior fences so the animals have green plants to eat every day. The pigs will graze off the green material within a few hours. Then they pull up the roots and eat those. Last, they turn the soil repeatedly to find all manner of tasty morsels. Digging in the soil is natural behavior for hogs. It provides good exercise and it helps them build strong, lean muscle. The pigs revel in it. Some growers try to prevent their hogs from rooting, because rooting and eating the roots kills plants. Instead of trying to change pig behavior, I fence off and replant the pastures up to three times each year. I use a separate fence charger for each pasture. Pigs occasionally short an electric fencer by rolling a big lump of dirt or a tree limb onto it. When that happens, I do not want a short in one pen to affect the fence in another. Pigs respect electric fence but they are not particularly afraid of it. Some individuals will test it frequently to make certain it is working. Occasionally, I will have a pig that is so tempted by something on the other side that it will scoot past the wire, knowing it may get a shock. When that happens, I leave the pig out. By late afternoon it will be standing, facing the fence wishing it could get back to its home and its companions. Eventually the pig will gather the courage to run the wire again to get home. It is not likely to repeat that traumatic act on the following day. There is always a woven wire fence beyond the electric fence so that if pigs do get past the electric wire they are not really “out” just into tomorrow’s breakfast. Pigs cannot sweat. On days over 80 degrees each pen has a water sprinkler to keep the pigs cool. The pigs grow through the summer and by fall, they weigh hundreds of pounds. By harvest time, they will average over 400 pounds with some weighing more than 500 pounds. I continue to walk in their pens each day but I carry a little stick. I use the stick to tap them in the snout if they nibble at my pants. Walking through a pen of curious little piglets is one thing. Walking through a pasture of 400 pound animals is something different. My goal is to walk through the pasture, checking pigs, fixing fences or performing other tasks without being eaten. The pigs are gentle and good natured, but they are still pigs. Harvest starts in October and all the pigs are gone before the end of December. I transport the hogs in the stock trailer to Quality Meats, ten or twelve animals at a time. The afternoon before loading, I back the trailer to the shed where the pigs sleep. By this time in the fall, the pigs are all sleeping in a hog pile within their shed. I put a small light and some nice straw in the trailer. The trailer is often filled with volunteers when I come out before daylight. If not, I close the animals in their shed and crowd them as needed with moveable gates. The pigs know me. The animals are always calmest if I work alone. That is true for cattle and bison also. I pasture harvest those beef and bison. Hogs cannot be calmly pasture harvested. At least not after the first one. I loaded 100 pigs for harvest in 2013. I did not need to shout, shock or hit a pig even once to get them loaded. I take the loaded trailer to Foley where Josh and I unload the pigs into the waiting area at the butcher shop. I can give more details on the actual harvest if you wish. Last fall Gail and granddaughter Ella (six) came along to Foley on one trip. They watched Josh handle and kill a pig. They were satisfied that it was done well. This is a good system This is a good arrangement overall for the pigs. The pigs live to enjoy the Minnesota growing season from end to end. As with all our animals, we work hard to give them a good life and a stress free death. Please ask if you have questions. Best regards. Tom In this letter, I will write about animal senses and animal memory.
Animal senses are roughly like our senses but with many significant differences. The same is true of animal intelligence. This article is about those aspects of animal senses and intelligence that are relevant on this farm. It is limited to the six livestock species of bison, cattle, horses, hogs, sheep and goats. All of the above are prey animals. Hogs are prey but they are predators in some situations. We cannot communicate directly with animals. That limits our ability to know precisely how animals experience the world. Nevertheless, we can learn a lot about animals by observation and testing. Unfortunately, the only way we comprehend senses and intellect is by comparison to our own. That certainly has limitations and it can be misleading. Some of the best practical insight we have into animal minds comes from Temple Grandin. Grandin is a Professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University. She is autistic. Her verbal skills developed late in childhood. Her mind works mainly in pictures. Her memories are like videos. She claims that animals, lacking vocabularies think in basically the same way as she. There is strong evidence that she is correct. Doctor Grandin, who is now in her late sixties, has brought about terrific and widespread changes in the field of animal welfare. She has focused her efforts on animal handling in slaughter facilities. Virtually all modern slaughter facilities incorporate her designs. Those designs greatly reduce animal stress. You can learn all you wish about Grandin and her insights by simple Googling her name. Gail says I should mention a 2010 biographical movie about Temple Grandin. It is quite good. Consider renting it from your local library. It is educational for both adults and children. Animal vision. The eyes of prey animals are on the sides of their heads. That gives them the ability to see a predator approaching from almost any direction. Predators, like humans, have eyes placed on the front of their heads. Frontal eye placement is necessary for binocular vision and for precise depth perception. Prey animals give up depth perception for the ability to detect predators quickly. In general, animals do not detect as many colors as humans. Their vision is optimized to detect motion. Motion is best detected in black and white. That does not mean animals have poorer vision than we do. Vision in prey animals is optimized to fit their needs. Prey animals do have some capability for binocular vision. It is narrow however, and they can focus only directly in front. These animals, most notably horses, must lift their heads high to focus on something distant. They drop their heads low to focus close. Most authors claim that bovines and horses have better night vision than we do. I am not convinced that is true. My human ability to navigate through wooded or uneven terrain seems superior to the animals that I am moving. Animal hearing is generally superior to ours. Most species can hear a broader range of sound than humans can. In addition, these animals all have large exterior ears. Most of them can direct their exterior ears independently. That gives them enhanced ability to locate the origin of a sound. Prey animals can listen to two separate sounds at once. Horses frequently point one ear forward and one ear backward. Animal olfactory sense. The ability of animals to detect scents is vastly better than ours. Our sense of smell is very weak. So weak that it is hard to imagine what a strong olfactory sense can do. For example, the olfactory sense of a pig must be incredibly useful as it digs through the soil. Much more useful than the close-in binocular vision which the pig lacks. Animals have a chemical sensing organ that is unique to ungulates and a few other creatures. Ungulates walk on their toes (hooves). That chemical sensing organ is the vomernasal organ. It is located inside the mouth of the animal near the roof of the palate. Google the word to see images and learn more. This sense detects pheromones and hormones and is used to communicate between herd members. I see it daily in our herds. It is most notable in horses, bovines and cats. If you have a cat, you are probably familiar with it. Most often, a male uses this organ by sniffing the urine or feces of a female. Females use it, but less frequently. Originally, researchers fixated on the ability to detect pheromones and identified this sense as mostly sexual. i.e. A bull could tell when a cow was pregnant or approaching estrus. Researchers just seem to think that way. There is evidence that the organ has much broader applications for general health and nutrition. In a wild and free state herd leaders could use that knowledge to move the herd as needed to maintain herd health. A herd would naturally know where to locate minerals, herbs and nutrients within its range. Animals can detect the byproducts of fear from other animals. For example if an animal is mishandled and terrified in a handling facility, the area must be cleansed before other animals are brought through. Otherwise, they will react fearfully in the same setting even though the mishandled animal is gone. This effect endures for days. Animal sense of taste is superior to ours. In general, these species have several times as many taste buds as humans. Taste buds respond directly to the brain to encourage grazing animals to ingest more or less of a plant while they are eating it. That is useful to balance nutrients and to avoid toxins. Animals have a good sense of touch. I doubt that it compares to the sensitivity that humans have in fingers and hands. I have seen little research on the topic. Animals have excellent memory. Animal memory is probably as clear, accurate and long lasting as our own. It is crucial for animals to know every detail of their home territory. For roaming herds like bison or horses, that territory can be enormous. They have both individual and “herd” memories. By working together, a herd can piece together information distributed in parts among many individuals. Prey animals have sharp pictorial memories. An animal will notice one small thing out of place in a pasture or alley. The animal may then refuse to move forward until that item is investigated and cleared as a threat. One new feature can cause a horse to shy on a path that it has traveled safely many times before. Animals never forget an emotional experience. If a horse is frightened and reacts in fear it will never forget the cause of that fright. Working the animal past similar situations in the future will be difficult. The animal may shy violently no matter how many times that action is calmly repeated. There is strong evidence that animals recall scents with great precision. The memory includes the exact setting of the first time they detected that scent. Animals sense body language and emotions in others. That includes members of their herd and humans. Prey animals have greater sensitivity to body language than we have. They will often take a position that to us appears non attentive, such as grazing, while they carefully observe. Animals that are newly introduced to a herd will often graze at a distance from the herd. They appear nonchalant but in fact are intently watching. I am afraid I could expand on this topic indefinitely. I would especially like to write on the instantaneous way that prey animals can respond to sensory input. Tell me know if you are interested in more about animal intellect and communications. I will try to write the next segment within a week. Your feedback is welcome and helpful. Best regards. Tom Link to our Facebook page. Snake River Farm Minnesota on Facebook In this letter, I will write about calming and moving animals.
By “moving” animals, I mean moving herds from pasture to pasture or into trailers for transport. Some years ago, I attended a three day course in South Dakota on this subject. The teachers were the daughter and son-in-law of Bud Williams. Bud, now diseased, was a leading expert on moving animals using low stress methods. Bud moved animals primarily by driving herds while on foot. You can learn more about his methods, books and teachings by simply doing an internet search of his name. I enjoyed the workshop. I learned some things. I gained some useful insight. Nevertheless, the course was only marginally useful to me for two reasons. First, I found that I already knew the methods Bud was teaching. Every farm boy who brings the cows home for milking or brings the heifers home from the neighbor’s cornfield learns the basics of these techniques naturally. All the animals I am focusing on with these letters, bison, horses, cattle, hogs, sheep and goats, are prey animals. Prey animals have what is called a flight zone. The flight zone defines how close a predator can get to the animals or the herd before they move away. To untrained animals, we are predators. The flight zone varies with different species and with different individuals. It is also highly variable in different situations and at different times. In the simplest sense, understanding the anxiety that we cause in animals by our role as predators is the key to driving animals. Anxiety comes before fear. A skilled animal handler uses natural anxiety to move animals while keeping them relatively calm. Calm in this situation usually means movement at a walking pace. If the handler causes too much anxiety, the animals become fearful. Short term anxiety is relatively low stress and does no harm to the animals. Fear causes animals to panic. Fear and panic lead to violent efforts at escape. That can result in injuries and future handling difficulties. If the herd is repeatedly moved in a calm way, driving becomes a learned response and anxiety is eliminated. The second reason the course was not particularly useful to me is that I very seldom drive animals. It is my belief that farmers are obligated to give animals as good a life as we reasonably can. That means, among other things, that I should minimize stress in their lives. Whenever possible, I lead animals or I set things up so they can move themselves. The first requirement is to reduce the animal’s natural fear of me as a predator. The technique for doing so is not novel or special. I visit the animals in their pastures or pens daily. Checking the animals to see that their needs are met and that they are healthy is just good farming. It is animal husbandry. By the way, I like the ancient word “husbandry.” It ranks right in there with land “stewardship”. Husbandry and stewardship as the two prime obligations of farmers. Land stewardship is in revival in recent years. Unfortunately, animal husbandry as a phrase and as a practice has fallen into disuse. Animal husbandry does not exist in a CAFO. Key precepts for low stress animal handling.
My goal is to reach the point where I can walk through the animal herd and have them essentially ignore me. That requires two things. One that they lose their fear of me and two that they expect nothing from me unless I call them. The second point is important. If you provide food or something positive every time you visit the animals, they will crowd around you. Horses will get pushy, cattle will get bossy, bison will get dangerously close and hogs will eat your pants off. I train animals to come, but only when I call. I train them to ignore me if I do not call. If I am close, I call in a quiet voice. If I am far across the pasture, I call in a load voice. Calling does not qualify as yelling. Calling is a vocalization known to them in a positive way. By the way, because bison are wild, I get close to them but either keep a fence between us or ride among them on a tractor. Otherwise, calming is similar. I get them used to having me hang around with them but not on foot. It would not be a fair fight if one of them decided to test where I fit in the herd hierarchy. Domestication and taming do not change animal nature. This statement is true for all species that I am familiar with including dogs. The sweetest, friendliest, tiniest dog has both the desire and the knowhow to grab a chicken by the neck and kill it instantly. I have seen it many times. Humans select animals for specific traits such as size or docility, but their underlying nature appears unchanged. Here is one example of a docile Jersey steer behaving as a prey animal. Some years ago, two of my brothers were with me to butcher a Jersey steer. Jerseys are known for docile behavior. The fact that this was a steer made the animal even calmer. In preparation, I had closed three steers in a small corral that was a part of their pasture. The animals had lived in the same pasture since they were calves. None of them had ever challenged a fence or broken out of their pasture. I fed them occasionally in this corral. They had not been handled otherwise. My brothers and I were casually talking as we approached. One of us was carrying a gun. I do not believe these animals had ever seen a gun before, so that fact is probably of no relevance. As we walked toward the corral, we were discussing which animal to kill. In hindsight, that was perfectly typical predator behavior. The animal that we decided on went from calm, to alert to frenzied in seconds. Before the gun was pointed or any overt action was taken, that steer broke through the corral fence. It ran across the lawn dragging part of the corral and broke through another fence back into its pasture. The whole event took a few seconds. I am now more attentive to the nature of my animals. I will give more details on moving the different species of animals in alter letters. Each species is unique. For example, moving bison is different from moving horses. Although the general concepts and taming methods apply to pigs as well as the other species, pigs are difficult to herd. In most situations, I set things up so pigs can move themselves. More in a later letter. I will try to write the next segment within a week. Your feedback is welcome and helpful. Best regards. Tom |
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