47. Food and Geometry

Today I am going to write about my favourite thing, which is food.

I work in an industry that produces it and when I am not working (or sleeping) I mostly eat. One of the good things about the job I do is the physical work means that despite indulging in possibly my favourite hobby of eating and enjoying one or two casual beers, I am unlikely to get fat. I reckon I burn off plenty of energy milking and putting up reels.

These are the big three food types that are necessary to do my job.

1.Tonnes of carbohydrates (mostly pasta, potatoes and bread) – for energy and filling up the stomach, and as a carrier for meat. 

2. Fruit and Veg – for vitamins etc. Hard work is made a lot worse if you have man flu.

3. Protein – because I get loads of free meat, it tastes nice and every meal should have meat in it somewhere. Also for biceps.

A few days ago I had the rare opportunity of interaction with people who do not work with me. 

Two friends from university, Will and Matt, came to visit in their campervan. Having been across the ditch in Aussie for a while they thought a roadtrip around NZ would be a good thing to do before returning home to face the inevitable job search.

(Incidentally anyone looking for a herdsman/assistant herd manager in the UK I will also be looking for employment when I get back!)

Anyway back to my story, I thought the arrival of some friendly pommie faces was a good opportunity to put the metaphorical chef’s hat on and dazzle them (and Stephie) with my cooking skills.

After tying a rope around my waist and writing my will, I dived head first into the chest freezer and did a bit of exploring. Lurking between some dodgy looking orange ice cream and forgotten-about-fast-chilled-beer-ice I found a decent chunk of silverside.

It came from a beast (I think a fat empty heifer from last year) that had been gifted to all the share-milkers and workers. With the knowledge that it was a dairy animal, I thought a pot roast was in order.

Throwing in a few rashers of bacon, chunks of onion, carrot and celery, a load of red wine, and some stock, I put the meat in the oven and forgot about it for three hours.

When we were all hungry I sliced the roast up and piled a bit of mash and the veg onto plates. With some gravy (basically the juice from the meat and veg) it looked and tasted great and looked a lot better than this picture shows.

I didn’t have my camera on ‘culinary setting’ and was in a hurry because I was starving. The meat looks like it has been cooked rare inside out, the pink is actually the wine soaked in. I will put in less than 2/3 of a bottle next time.

My second best meal this week was lamb. Remember these guys?

Well some of them (more grown up than that picture obviously) is now in the freezer. My first taste of the woollies came in the form of lots of very small chops. All the small ones from the end of the rack had been put in one bag and I think I had them all. They tasted good and this picture shows how important that culinary setting on the camera is because the look good too.

At the moment I am cooking what was a gamble meal. I defrosted a suspect looking bag of unidentifiable meat. It turned out to be steaks of some sort with what I hope is a BBQ sauce marinade. I am going to assume that it was once cow, but to be honest it could be anything from possum to lost Chinese tourist.

As well as cheffing about in the kitchen this week, I have also been doing some large scale geometry. Sometimes I wish the paddocks on this farm were square, with an even cover of grass and sensible trough placement, but then I think that that would be boring.

I spend a lot of my time deciding where to put my reel, and change my mind about ten times whilst doing it. The aim at the moment is 2 hectares per feed, a nice round number. It doesn't help when the paddock is 9.6 hectares area and has 9 sides, a pond, a rough patch where gorse used to grow, a few steep banks and only one trough. But that is what you get for dairying on converted beef/sheep land.

Here is how that paddock 18 was grazed (red lines = reels, yellow mark = gate) you have no idea how much thinking went into that!

The 5^th break was half a feed with the other half in another paddock.

Here are some more awkward reels I have done recently:

That last one included the thin triangle of grass for 80 cows that were there to clean up the left-overs and leave a good residue.

It can be a bit tiresome sometimes but I am learning some good grazing management skills.

Righto, that’s all for today. I have three days off now, I plan on going on a drive somewhere interesting, not sure where yet though. I might video it anyway and produce another short film! 

For those of you wandering where the next logical film about milking is, it is in pre-production and is on its way. Release date still unknown.

46. Fetching The Cows

Here it is, to celebrate passing 25000 pageviews, I present my first film - 'Fetching The Cows.'

I recommend watching it on a computer rather than a phone.

I hope you enjoyed it!

Keep tuned for more.

45. A Message From Fred.

Hello blog readers.

This blog post is just to keep my loyal readers happy. I have not got much interesting content today and I don't have a collection of good photographs. This is mainly because I have been pretty busy, mostly showing Stephie (Daniel's replacement) the ropes.

Also I have got to a stage where there is much less new things going on!

However, Good News! I can announce that the next blog post will contain my directorial debut, a short film in which you can come along with me to work. This could well be the first of a number of episodes, depending on its popularity and feedback. Look out for it in the next few days.

In other news, the final pregnancy test results have come back and I am pleased to announce that only 5.8% of the herd is not in calf. Unfortunately 1280 is empty so she will be gone at the end of the season. She has had a good innings though, and in her lifetime will have produced plenty of pizza cheese for the Chinese.

5.8% is a very positive figure especially given the difficult weather conditions during calving.

The repercussions, especially in the body condition of the herd could be seen a good few months into spring. It is makes the job even more satisfying when a bit of hard work from us cow-men pays off resulting in a productive herd.

Speaking of cow-men (or women), my employers David and Jocelyn are currently looking for someone to replace me for next season. If you have some experience in working with livestock and like me, love an early morning..... get in touch and I will pass your details on. The job has an excellent roster 8-2-8-3, a competitive salary and includes on-site accommodation in the comfortable and sort of well equipped bungalow.

Right that is all for now, I hate to write a post without a photo, so here is one of a couple of cows enjoying some rock salt.

Follow me on Twitter for blog updates: @FLawder

44. Miscellaneous Snippets IV

It is pretty dry here in New Zealand at the moment. Official drought has been declared for most of the North Island and the lack of rain is making the news headlines every day.

Down in the South we are coping, it rained a little bit last night but before that it had been well over a month since the last precipitation. The irrigation is doing its job mostly, and the grass cover is pretty good at the moment (average is about 2350 kg DM/ha).

You can see the effects of irrigation very easily in this paddock. The brown strip is too steep to move the K-lines, and therefore doesn't receive any water.

In another paddock, here is the residue 4/5 days after grazing that has not yet had irrigation on it:

And here is the grass that has been watered since grazing, some good regrowth!

I think this highlights how vital irrigation is. 

Mowing the lawn has recently got much easier, a little bit because of the weather but mostly because of the arrival of this beast:

Due to the lack of grass in the North, farmers there are drying off, selling and culling cows much earlier or in greater quantity than usual. We have sent 14 to join the food chain,  most of them were chronic sub-clinical mastitis cows that also had other problems such as lame or low production. That has resulted in cell counts of 166 - 180 in the last week and at the moment there are only two cows whose milk is being dumped.

Next week we have the final pregnancy test for the remaining 12% not confirmed in calf. Any remaining after that will also be sent to produce dog food or McDonalds. We are all a bit worried for everyone's favourite cow 1280, or 'Ginger' as all ginger cows are called.

She is either 14 or 16 yers old, I can't remember, either way very old for a dairy cow. She is a pretty average producer with a cell count that is a bit high, but is definitely the friendliest cow in the herd. She loves a cuddle in the morning whilst she is waiting to be rowed up for milking.

The imminent pregnancy diagnosis will determine her fate, if she is empty we will miss her poking her head through the gap at the back of the shed to get a pat and a rub on the neck.

In other news, Daniel, my Irish work and bungalow mate is leaving today to milk on a flat farm in Canterbury. I think his main reason is the 20-odd Irish also from Cork who work up there. He has been replaced by Stephie who is from Germany and has been working on cattle stations in Australia. Apparently, with a choice of wall decoration, she would not put a German flag up but a Bavarian one. I had a look on Google to see what it looked like and it turns out it is a pretty awesome flag:

Daniel's departure will free up a load of freezer space, which is always good. On the subject of freezers, I learnt this week to never put the meat on top of the bread or you will end up with very small but dense sandwiches.

That is all for now. See you later.

(Twitter: @FLawder)