It’s calving season for the more conventional cattle operations.
For about a month now I have seen calves starting to show up all over my mail route.
We have been blessed with a very mild winter but regardless of the weather these farms will have babies starting as early as mid-February.
March is the snowiest month for us historically so most of the time these babies are in for a real slog to get to fresh spring grass. People have gotten in the habit of having their calves earlier and earlier so that they are bigger when they sell them to market later in the year. Without any other choice for selling their livestock than the sale barn it probably makes sense for them.
Many of these calves are also born in sacrifice lots. This is a small area of the farm where you pen up your cows in the winter to prevent them from damaging your larger pastures. These areas quickly become completely filled with mud and manure.
So now you have babies being born in freezing temperatures surrounded by urine and manure. No wonder they need a million vaccines and antibiotics to survive.
When we first started getting mother cows and breeding we decided to go with Joel Salatins’ advice,
Calve when local herbivores do.
I can tell you for sure that the deer in our area aren’t dropping fawns into a foot of snow and manure in February. This is completely in line with one of our core principles at the farm, mimic nature as much as possible.
Part of the reason we are trying to go the direct-to-consumer route is so we have the freedom to do things better for the animals and our customers, not for the big meat producers.
Is there a difference between a cow who is born in a slurry pit and one who is born on clean spring grass (which they will often begin nibbling on within 24 hours of being born?)
Spoiler alert
…
There is.
It turns out that what’s good for the animals ends up being good for us to and you can taste the difference.
Happy to let mother nature decide,
John Michael