This week as I’m working on my cover story for our upcoming cow-calf issue, I’m trying to determine exactly what day my husband is on of calving season limbo. He’s still nice, so we must not be too far into it yet.
Although at the time I started writing this post, there’s no calves on the ground, he’s still been diligently checking on a set of heifers about 30 miles from our house every day, a couple times a day. What makes it even more challenging is we’ve had some very cold temperatures, and of course, wind. Calving in an Arctic blast is not for the weak of heart.
Two in the heifer group are our boys’ former show heifers. One is not your typical show heifer as she’s a horned Hereford. Peaches or El Peacho as Chance calls her, was a good one for him to start with. She was gentle and kind during the halter breaking process and she’s still pretty tame.
The other is Shaun’s heifer from last year, Darcy. She was an odd one and took forever to halter break. She’d plant her feet and not move an inch. When the other calves were walking with ease and setting up handily, she was standing there sulking and no amount of tail twisting and prodding could change her mind. At one point during the early summer, she went to live with the same group of heifers she is now with to get bred. She was a little better when she came back, but it was still disappointing she didn’t make a show heifer.
Shaun Scott shows his heifer Darcy at the 2024 Ford County Fair in Dodge City, Kansas. (Photo courtesy of Legacy Livestock Imaging.)
Both boys had some tough decisions to make when it was time to decide if they wanted to keep their heifers or sell them after the county fair. Shaun all along wanted to start his herd. Although Darcy wasn’t his first heifer. The first two ended up in the food chain. Barb, his first, went to freezer camp with no protests from anyone. She was flighty and Shaun was terrified of her.
Scarlet was his second heifer, and although she was much less temperamental, she still didn’t make it into the herd. We probably should have kept her and started his herd with her, but it just didn’t work out that way.
After both heifers graduated from the show pen, the boys sat down and decided they needed to form a company, Scott Bros. Cattle and started planning. They even pushed their desks together and made a sign for the door proclaiming they were open for business. Along with their dad they had a business meeting and that was quite the conversation to eavesdrop on.
My husband was pretty staunch in stifling their excitement as he brought them back to reality. The bull services weren’t free. The stalks and pasture those two heifers will live on aren’t free either. Neither is Dad’s labor. He provided more input on the brand registration process and what brand designs would work and what wouldn’t.
I hope the boys’ heifers can bring a nice calf into the world and raise them right. They’re both old enough to understand it’s not a guaranteed deal and things happen to calves and heifers in the process. But here’s to possibly raising the next generation of show animals and some warmer temperatures.
Kylene Scott can be reached at 620-227-1804 or kscott@hpj.com.
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