Farming Isn't (Always) Fun

J-Loppy in the back and a new bull calf in the front---one is dying and the other is thriving 

     

    I was finishing up sowing wheat in the field when dad called me about a new heifer.  I had worked for many years to get this heifer on the ground.  She was bred with old "throwback" genetics.
 I came across this bull many times.  I first saw him on my cows pedigrees and then again in our semen tank.  I eventually looked him up, boy was he ugly and word on the street was his daughters had attitudes. This didn't stop me from falling in love with PVF Black Joker.  Fast-forward many years to a couple days ago, dad had called me about a heifer calf.  She was black, spunky, and a looker!  I was excited.  Two days went by and she came up to the barn while I was feeding.  She was hunched over, like she was cold but that didn't register to me.  She got worse as the day went by so we fed her some extra energy (colostrum.)  The next morning I was leaving the barn but I thought twice about it because her mom wouldn't stop bawling and good thing I had. J-Loppy, we had already named her, was laying in the back of the pen we put her and her mother in.  I immediately called Dad and he called the vet.  This calf was only a week old but she was so much more than a calf.  We got the vet and she did all she could do.  She had merely walked away and J-Loppy twitched, jerked, and spasmed out.  I had never seen anything like this and I still won't admit to myself I saw her die.  We couldn't accept it and even left the heat lamps her for 12 or so hours.  Farming isn't fun and this was just another insistence when it wasn't