Its been a long time since I posted, but not because nothing has been going on. Quite the opposite in fact – haven’t had the time to sit down and write blog posts!

But this week has been a special one, as on Saturday morning I spotted a calf on the security camera! They weren’t due to Jan-Feb I was told, but I had noticed one cow bagging out (the udder filling) two weeks prior. Were were about to head off to an early family Christmas function (Dads side of the family), so spent the day with family and then headed out to the farm – didn’t arrive till dark.

Sunday morning I was finally able to investigate, and found another surprise:

That ain’t one calf, but two. Yep, twins! Pretty rare with cattle as I understand it. Here they are in more detail. I know some of the cows were serviced by a Brahman bull, a white one it seems.

This one is taken from a distance and heavily zoomed in (digitally on phone camera). I think the pixilation gives it an artistic effect – like a painting???

Not everything went perfectly, partially my own fault. Late Sunday morning I opened up the gate to another paddock, so the herd would have fresh grass for the week. The new mother had left her calves hidden. Nicole and I went and found them to have a closer look (that’s actually the top photo), but after I got very close they jumped up in unison and bolted down the valley. Didn’t see exactly where they went, but did see one of them later when heading back on the quad. Late in the arvo we observed the mother go back and collect one of the calves, and head off up the hill to the new paddock, seemingly oblivious to the other one being left behind. Appeared that one calf was enough to keep it happy, even though it had cleaned up and looked after both till now (or perhaps it just didn’t know where the other was).

The herd was now 300-400m away in lush fresh grass – no chance they were going to return to the eaten out valley. We spent a couple of hours searching for the other calf till it was literally too dark, but couldn’t find it. Talked with neighbour John who said he’d have a look in the morning and move the cattle back, and I also organised for Daniel to go up first thing in the morning. Lucky he is on holidays now! We didn’t get home Sunday till after 10:30pm.

I was concerned the calf had gone bush (off our property), but they found the calf Monday morning in our valley. Here is the poor little thing, no doubt pretty hungry.

Daniel and Lacey (who went up with Daniel) rounded the cattle up back into that valley paddock Monday morning. Fortunately the hungry calf, having spent Sun evening through to Monday morning by itself, was strong enough to get up on its own – calf and Mum found each other. It took a big long drink Daniel tells me!

Daniel and Lacey did some fencing and spent the day checking up on them, before heading home. I was very pleased to capture the following security camera vids late in the evening – the two calves playing around together. Seems all is now well with the twins. What a way to start our first experience with calves – twins with drama!