Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Ten-four rubber duckie

Anyone ever watch The Convoy, or Smokey and The Bandit when they were kids? We did.  And I have no real idea of what ten four rubber duckie means, but it sounds cool over the two way radio!

Anyhow, the gist of all that is that the other day we had our own little convoy happening. With an over abundance of cattle populating our leased portion of Charley Creek (the inlaws property) and more knocking on the door, thanks to the "numbers building" phase of livestock production we are currently in, we had to find some more space.  An agistment paddock on The Downs was found, not far away. Decisions were made, paddocks mustered, and a line of four decks of pregnant cows was drafted off and loaded onto the truck.

My job on this day was Counter-on-erer (making sure I had the right number of cows per pen on the truck) and transporter of the mobile loading ramp to the paddock.

Cows loaded, we headed off, me being the sandwhich between two trucks. One to slow me down (apparently) and one to pick up any pieces. Ye of little faith, the men in these parts.

IMG_4776  The local contractor taking the lead...

IMG_4772husband in the rear...and me towing the un-aerodynamic mobile loading ramp (those bits you can see behind me) in the ute. I will admit to being accused of low level flying the past, but this trip saw me poking along at a sedate 76km per hour (any faster and things rattled alarmingly!)

IMG_4784 Lucky for the kids, the route took us past Granma's house, so they were dropped off before we arrived at our destination (look at that grass!)

IMG_4785Loading ramp unhooked and set into place, ready for the pregnant cows (also known as PTIC, which means Preg Tested In Calf) to daintily step off and survey their new pastures.

IMG_4793 which they did, with a minimum of fuss.

IMG_4800particularly this lovely girl, who was hardly flustered at all by the whole process. Always quite fond of Brafords with their white faces and clean red coats, I think I will be keeping a close eye on this cow and her progeny.

IMG_4802I'm a wee bit suspicious she may have been a poddy, as she looked at my like if I had had a bucket of feed she would have come right on over!

IMG_4836The unloading process continued uneventfully, and the mob was held by The Husband on the four wheeler, waiting for them all to be offloaded before he walked them the short distance to the water trough nearby.

IMG_4834    

IMG_4823 after which they put their heads down and hoed into this beautiful body of feed - Mitchell grass (and some Flinders) which is very nutritious. They'll do well here!

And thankfully, my normal driving habits were able to be resumed, leaving the loading ramp behind and collecting the children (reluctantly) from Granma's house on the way home.

I didn't get much laundry done that day.

Ten four, rubber ducky, over and out.

5 comments:

  1. Some people get all the good jobs. I've been digging up irrigation pipe trying to find the leak. Finally found it. Four ten rubber ducky.

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  2. The cows do look content, and already in very good order. I like your sleek-coated baldy too.

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  3. The feed looks amazing - hope the rain is timely for you. We've had an amazingly wet winter...

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  4. I'm with you...no idea what ten four big buddy means... and who the hell is Roger!!! (ha ha... a little bit of humour for you). Off to bed in a minute...just had to pay some urgent bills online. I love seeing these photos because here in the big smoke...(aka Brisbane) we don't get to do that stuff...so I feel like I'm coming along with you on all your outings because of your photos...keep them up. Kathy

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  5. oh yeah, while I've got you...are you taking your Instagram pics directly through Instagram (like me)...however I have been reading articles on people saying it's quicker and easier to take them in the normal camera mode (ie you can snap away one after the next quickly) and then go to Instagram and bring it in and process it as normal. I get the whole thing of could miss valuable shots because 1 instagram pic getting processed and typing a caption..could take at least a minute depending. Whereas you could click 5 or more pics on the normal camera and then Instagram the best one....I may have already mentioned this to you I can't recall who I was taking about it with. Check out "simpleasthat" blog by Rebecca Cooper....Kathy

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