Log 9: Dry cow season, and International Ploughing contest!

Now that the preg testing is done we’re moving into the dry season when the thousands of milking cows in this region ALL get dried off and moved to winter grazing until they calve in the spring. Spring being August and September. Besides a few farms that winter milk because the milk price is at a premium because of less cows producing, most everyone has 2 months off. Off meaning that seem to go on vacation, travel, or fix fencing and the sheds while the cows are gone. The winter grazing, at least in Canterbury is crop of the brassica variety that is grown in the summer months. Brassicas that are grown are kale, rape, fodder beat (sugar beet), and sometimes oats. The cows graze this in ‘breaks’ so only a section of the paddock is fed at one time then the cows are moved onto a new section when this is all eaten, and the stalks are ‘pugged’ into the ground. An important note is that the cows are first filled up on straw or silage prior to being let onto a new break because one of the huge draw backs with brassicas is that when cows gorge themselves too soon before the rumen bugs have a change to adjust the bloat and die or get nitrate poisoning. So on occasion the vets get called to go help stab holes in cows rumens to relieve bloat and then come back the next day to stitch them back up. Or we go out and find several dead in a paddock and even more that are sick from nitrate toxicity so we run around injecting methylene blue dye into their veins. Some hazards to pasturing, it is not all green happy cows with perfect grass.

Now during this time is also when the vets go out and do their dry cow consults and re-do the prescriptions for the next season. When I arrived they gave me 15 farms to be in charge of and many of them I had yet to meet. So I headed out to consult on drugs I had never used, give managers tips and reviews of their mastitis procedures that I quickly found out are extremely different than the US systems, and tell them how to transition their cows through to calving over winter in a system I knew very little about. Excuse my language but, ‘bring on the bullshitting!’ No, I was very honest with the farmers and I actually learned a great deal in just talking with them and having them talk me through what they’ve done in the past. What worked, what didn’t, how the season was different how it changed, what to expect for next season. It’s the same all over the world. Cows still get the same diseases the management is just different. So I just extrapolated from my disease knowledge and they taught me the management stuff. When my suggestions didn’t fit their management scheme, first they'd laugh at me, then we'd talk about it and come up with something that would work. It was actually a really good learning process.

In other news, I was talked into training for a half marathon race! Now, last year during my aspiration to become an athlete for the first time in my life, I managed to pull off two triathlons, a duathlon, and a 5K run. The longest I had to run was 7miles and that was about my limit, as running was by far my least favorite. But I thought, what the heck I’ll give a half marathon a try. It will keep me fit and there are lots of long flat roads to run on around here. There was a race in Christchurch in 7 weeks and so I started in the middle of the beginner

training schedule. Now, last year I might have managed this after my triathlon, but after 4 months of no training, starting in the middle turned out to be a poor choice. I went from running once a week to running 6 days a week and promptly pulled a muscle in the top of my leg on run number 7. Determined to get through the pain and keep going, I tried a 60min run that pretty much left me crippled for two days. Right. The race was pretty much off, as I needed about 2 weeks rest and I couldn’t start again fresh with 4 weeks till race time. The one great thing was that I ran just around sunset and these are AMAZING in New Zealand with the mountains as a backdrop.

Luckily about this time I also attempted to go to the Irish session in Christchurch again and this time brought my fiddle. I played the few tunes they did, and sang the ballads and plugged my ears when the trumpet player, first I’d ever heard at an Irish sessions, stood up on the table and blasted as loud as he could. To my great relief, at one of the breaks a gentleman came up and told me about a more ‘traditional’ session at a different bar on Monday nights. Score! I’ll give that a go next week. He also told me about their annual Irish festival that takes place in Nelson up north and happens to be the same weekend as the half-marathon. I jumped at the chance to play tunes with real people again as well as drop out of the my ridiculous attempt at being a serious runner. I signed up online the next day and spent the next week on my couch learning tunes in preparation and giving my leg a well deserved rest.

I also found a $1 movie rental place and stocked up on films to watch. I rented all the Lord of the Rings movies since I’d only seen them once and thought I’d try and see if any of the scenes looked familiar. None in particular as a lot of them were just sections of the mountains computer graphed into backgrounds. Still amazing films and good to see again, I think I’d like to live in Hobbiton someday.

Another weekend event was the World Ploughing Competition held in Methven, which happens to be the next town north of Ashburton. Not able to let a farming contest pass by without visiting I went up to take a look. I found New Zealand’s version of a tractor show!! As I first walked in, I passed a car cut and stretched with a pen in the middle with 4 ewes inside. No joke it was called Cabs 4 Ewe. HAHA! I love the humor here. I walked past tents of mechants with gum boots, woolen socks, jeans and waterproofs, water troughs, pencils, drenching guns, etc. Moved onto an isle of international food caravans and coffee’s to go. Oh no, not just any coffee in a styrofoam cups…these were mobile cappuccino vans. At the end of that isle

gripping my flat white coffee, I found rows and rows of antique tractors!! Darcy, Craig, and Paul would have been drooling I’m sure! I didn’t know what most of them were but I started taking pictures of all kinds of oldish tractors to show the folks back home. My absolute favorite was a John Deere B because we had one growing up and I used to drive it with my Grandpa. I was too small to work the pedals, so he did that and I did the steering. It was a good ol’ put put put tractor with a huge huge steering wheel. Well, maybe it was normal size but I remember it being about the size of ME.

Onto the ploughing section, I never knew there was so much skill or competition in making rows of dirt! Apparently it’s very serious business and judges with clip boards were analyzing each countries rows looking for uniformity, evenness, straightness, and loads of other things

that I probably couldn’t see. Each country’s appointed ploughman had a designated section of land to work up and a small sign with their name and previous awards. Each ploughman also displayed some version of their colors or flag for their country. At the end of the rows, beyond the barriers, walked farmers and ploughman from all over the world assessing the rows themselves and looking very serious, nodding or shaking their heads, and grumbling something about how that ploughman should be placed. I couldn’t help but smile as I walked by. I found a demonstration of horse ploughing in one corner, a few teams of Clydesdales and Percherons but mostly Shires. No Belgians here, those are my personal favorite.

Then I heard it. And saw it to for that matter. Tractor pulls across the road! I quickly walked over and had to see for myself how the Kiwi’s did at pulling tractors. Well, it is not just a distance run. These were superstock machines and they had a stone boat on the back. Two raced at the same time, they went down the track, around a barrel and back again. Didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me but there was a lot of whooping and hollering by the audience so one of them must have done well. With lungs full of dust, enough coffee to make anyone jittery, and still gimping around with a pulled muscle I headed back to Ashburton with a nice fill of country livin.

Log 8: Adventures!

Just to remind you that I really am working during my adventures here, I’ll take you back to Vetlife and the cows. On arrival at Vetlife my first day, I was told that I might get one c-section a year because farmers just don’t do them here. Accepting this as the rule I was floored when I was asked to do an elective c-section on an embryo transfer animal. I was yet again amazing when during a calving they let me do a cesarean on a heifer that had a scarred vagina, making a vaginal birth impossible, calf was dead but the heifer did fabulous! The alternative was shooting her so I might have talked the guy into it. I was also trying to keep it cheap as that was the main concern if she did survive. A record time of 50min from arrival to having the cow stitched up, I was pretty happy, as was the farmer.

Well, not 2 weeks later, once again I came to a calving with a live calf that was overcooked and just too big to fit. A quick conversation later and that one came out the side as well. Cow and calf happy as clams, and both doing amazingly well. Hopefully this trend doesn’t continue or they are going to start yelling at me for whacking holes in cows all over the county! Autumn calving is almost done at least so I’ll get a break before spring hits. This as prompted the boss to ask me to do a surgery lecture for the Kiwi vets though. So later this winter, when things are quiet I’m giving a presentation on LDA’s and other gut surgeries, as well as c-sections. Tricks of the trade, and tips for the inexperienced ones, as they don’t get many surgeries period.

In other news, I have purchased a ukulele! Hankering for an instrument that you can strum and potentially accompany someone, with a shortage of mandolins in this country, I opted for the ukulele. In hindsight, I should have just bought a small guitar but no, something called me to the ukulele. It said my name! Literally! Model No. K-AT. So now I have a ukulele and now I need to learn how to play the dang thing. My instrument collecting habit is getting a bit ridiculous. Just prior to leaving the US, I was given a gift certificate for playing a gig for a friend, and what did I buy? Some new fiddle strings and some rhythm bones! Those clickity-clackity pieces of wood or bone that people play sometimes very well, but most of the time badly and out of rhythm. I had to have a go at them. After a few months of working at it, I think I’m doomed to be a poor player of the bones.

My next weekend away was to Arthur’s Pass, or at least the sights around the pass. Arthur’s pass is one of two major passes that cross the southern alps of the south island and a major tourist route as there are many small and large treks all around the area and to my great surprise a hostel in a town half the size of Elsie, MI (~400). The drive up was amazing views of the mountains, crossing of the Rakaia gorge, and more twisty turning roads and one lane bridges. I stopped at Castel Hill which is an area of very interesting geology. Huge boulders and rocks are scattered over the hills, and climbers come here very often to go bouldering. I came across quite a few that day, and along with ropes, pullies, and climbing shoes, they also bring along huge mats. I assume to jump down onto after successfully scaling the boulder, or to fall onto when there is an unsuccessful attempt. After wandering around the area for a bit I climbed up a small boulder, worth of a non-boulderer and had some lunch. I continued on my drive and stopped at the village of Arthur’s Pass. There’s a train station for a tourist train that comes up and back from Christchurch through the mountains, a shop/café, a bar/café, a hostel and over various vacation rental houses.

Arthur’s Pass is also the home of one of the most awkward birds, called kea’s, that’s still surviving in New Zealand. Unlike its very flightless fat cousin, the kakapo parrot, kea’s do fly but they terribly curious and like to mess with stuff. People’s lunches, cars, tents, passerby’s, anything that’s different they will investigate/mutilate. One story from an outdoor shop salesman, was that they left their tent pitched while they went for a walk up a mountain. On their way back a flock of kea descended on their tent and ripped it to shreds! So note to self, don’t leave anything out in the open of bright color if there are kea’s nearby. As I only had the day to explore, I had a coffee and some soup at the bar/café, read my book for a bit on a roadside where you can hear a waterfall, then headed back to Ashburton. I’ll come back for proper adventuring another time.