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"Black Walnut" picking


This is a device that some use to aid in picking Ozarks Black Gold. These can be purchased from Darrell Kochis at 417-746-4825. I do not know the price or what the shipping would be.
Cheerily
IJK

Comments (0) Permalink November 11, 2007


Harris Hillcrest Farms Slideshow and More

    I went and helped Ronald today. We dug up a water line that had a busted valve and put in a new valve. and then he asked me to help him pick some black walnuts. He has a sore shoulder and couldn't reach up to dump the buckets of walnuts into the containers on the back of his truck. I took the above photos while we were coming back across the pond bank.
 


    This little fella was under the tree that  we were going to pick up the black walnuts.  Woodchucks (Groundhogs) are normally very afraid but this young one let me get within ten feet of him.  I had never been so close to one before.  We were starting to think that maybe he had rabies or something but we figured out he was just a young moron. The black walnuts are the green orbs you see laying in the grass.  What you see is the green outside husk which is very soft (unless one falls on your head) but the inside holds a very hard wooden nut and the edible fruit is inside that.
 Cheerily
 IJK

Comments (0) Permalink October 30, 2007


Work Day at Hillcrest Farms

October 5th I went to help Ronald Harris at Hillcrest Farms. He had an ambitious day planned for us. Glen, his son Chris, Ronald and I needed to gather 60 Reg Black Angus cows and separate them from their 39 calves so we could vaccinate, de-worm, and tattoo the calves. We used three trucks to slowly move the herd from the bottom up to a 10 acre field then we urged them from there to a five acre paddock and then on into the lot where the handling facilities are located.  We released the cows after we got the separation process completed and when we were done with the calves we released them back to their mothers.  Everything went pretty smooth with no cows or calves trying to fight us or get away.  We were stated by 8:15 a.m. and finished up just a little after noon. Ronald's wife, Bonnie had a huge meal fixed for us when we were finished and we chowed down as we were hot, hungry, tired and thirsty.

Comments (0) Permalink October 6, 2007


Testing Bulls

I work for a very dear friend and his wife on a part time basis.  He had reason to test some Registered Black Angus bulls the other day to make sure they could be considered breeders as he had one sold and needed to put some bulls in with his cows.  He had reason to suspect that one of the old bulls was not up to the job and after testing the vet confirmed that he was indeed, infertile. The pictures below may be considered too graphic for some eyes by some parents so take a look before you let your children look.  Then if you think they are inappropriate do not let them look, but remember they are not meant to be nasty just honest photos of what goes on in animal agriculture.

The veterinarian is trimming the excess hair so as not to contaminate the collection of semen.
Here the veterinarian is measuring the size of the scrotum as part of the test.

On the very bottom (because I cannot figure out how to put it here) is a short video of the veterinarian collecting the semen from the bull.


This is the veterinarian looking through his microscope at the semen and determining if there are enough live sperm for the bull to be considered a "breeder".


This is a photo of the bulls going back out to pasture after we were through.  Only the old suspect bull was found to be considered a non-breeder.  Be sure to watch the video below.
Cheerily
IJK



Comments (0) Permalink July 7, 2007


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