We raise and milk holstein cows, and typically breed the holstein heifers with a jersey or a jersey/holstein bull.
A jersey/holstein heifer calf.
Jessica feeding a newborn calf. The baby calves are weaned from their mothers after a few days and then are fed from a bottle.
Emily.
The heifers and dry cows spend 365 days a year outside. They are on irrigated pastures in the summer and are fed hay or a hay/corn silage mix in the winter.
The milk cows are kept in a covered shed.
Walt and Greg working the squeeze chute. We do all the branding, de-horning and vaccinating* ourselves. (Our cattle are vaccinated against, among other things, brucellosis, which a veterinarian is required to administer.) We do not give our cattle any growth hormones, nor are the milk cows given rBGH.
Moving cattle to another pasture.
Carhartt. Greg, Emily and Walt Schock.
Kris, Walt, Emily and Greg. March 2008.
