Grizzly Man

I watched a very interesting documentary last night on a man named Timothy Treadwell, who was a grizzly bear enthusiast, and lived among them every summer for 13 years in Katmai National Park, Alaska. The documentary addressed the controversy surrounding this man's activities and his death at the hands of the bears he loved in 2003.

Treadwell was an athiestic, self-proclaimed "eco-warrior" whose mission was, in his mind, to protect the grizzlies in Katmai from poachers. He was about as "crazy environmentalist" as they get and practically loathed human civilization for threatening the grizzly's existence. His approach to studying the bears was the most controversial part of his story. Treadwell literally lived right next to the bears and considered them his friends. He would swim with them, play with their cubs, and get amazingly close to the adults, sometimes even touching them.

Watching footage from his extensive video recordings, it became very clear to me that the connection Treadwell perceived between himself and the bears was complete fantasy. He loved these bears with a passion, giving them all names, and their lack of aggression towards him was perceived to be friendship and acceptance. He went so far as to take on mannerisms of bears and expressed many times to wanting to be a bear and live among them. He did inject some reality into his fantasy. He was very aware how dangerous these grizzly bears were, and knew there was a chance one could turn on him one day. Despite this danger, he refused to carry bear mace or put up electric fences around his camp, which the Park Service suggested for his protection. He tried to be careful around them, but his fascination caused him to get much to comfortable with them.

The remains of him and his girlfriend were found by the bush plane pilot hired to pick him up in the fall of 2003. They were clearly attacked and eaten by bears, and not much was left to recover. The reason I found this story so interesting is because this seems to be a recurring theme throughout history. Man thinks he can tame or befriend wild animals, and eventually is killed by the animals he loved. What Treadwell perceived as friendship was nothing more than bored indifference on the part of the bears. He was not considered a threat, and was literally ignored by them. Only their curiosity would cause them to investigate him at times. His death occured because of natural bear tendencies. The year he and his girlfriend were killed, he stayed later in the season than he normally did. When the salmon were plentiful, the bears had plenty of food and had no reason to take notice of him. But late in the season, when the salmon are scarce and bears are trying to store fat before winter hibernation, he suddenly changed into a potential food source to them. I think these "save the world" liberal environmentalists sometimes live in a fantasy world where nature loves them because they are the heroes of the environment. The stark reality is that these animals are wild, and have two driving forces that never change: their need for survival and the urge to procreate. Beyond this, emotional attachment is an illusion.

Many environmentalists respect Native Americans because they lived "in harmony" with nature, but an Native American interviewed in the documentary said it best. He said there has always been an unspoken boundary between bears and humans. It's a level of respect. The indians leave the bears alone, and vis-a-versa. To cross that boundary into their world is disrespectful and foolish. The numbers tell it all. Treadwell and his girlfriend were the first humans to be killed by a bear in Katmai National Park. He didn't respect the bears enough to leave them alone and he died because of it.

Cow Happenings

Lately a few things have been happening with the cows that bears mentioning, and since this is a homestead blog, here goes!

DW came up with a great idea to feed our cows. We bought 5 big round bales and have been hauling in arm fulls of hay from the overhang connected to our barn, into the barn and dumping it in the hay feeder. This has caused more than a little to be wasted as it falls to the ground while we're walking, not to mention our clothes get covered in hay. The whole point of feeding the cows this way was to keep them from wasting the hay, so that problem wasn't solved. I thought about buying a round bale feeder (at least $100), but I'd have to find a way to haul the round bales into their pen so they can eat it. Then DW had a "apostrophe" (you have to have seen the movie Hook to understand). The pasture fence borders one end of the overhang where we store our hay. Why not replace the fence in that section with an old gate we have laying in the junk pile, cut holes in it for them to stick their heads through, and let them just eat right off of the round bales? Ingenius! Not only is the hay protected from the rain, but it doesn't require us to move the bales to the pen. When they finish a bale we just slide a new one in place, like a coke machine.

Secondly, we tried drawing blood on Chloe again to send in for a preg test. We must have stuck that poor cow 10 times and couldn't get enough to send in. We'll try again this weekend and if it doesn't work, I'll have to have the vet palpate her.

Thirdly, Pumpkin and I seem to be doing this weird dance every morning now. For some reason, about halfway through milking, she gets it in her head that she doesn't want to be in the stanchion any more. She starts trying to pull her head out and poops, pees and dances all over the place. I don't get it. She has plenty of grain left, and it's not like I'm taking forever. I just have to stand back and let her calm down. The rest of the milking consists of me trying to milk the rest of the way and stopping to let her dance some more. So far she has not kicked, which I'm extermely thankful for. She has stepped in the bucket once, but that wasn't her fault. I don't know what gets into her, but it makes milking twice as long as it has to be. The other thing I can't figure out is why she doesn't do it with Regina. Not even once. Go figure. From experience I know it could be much worse, which helps me keep perspective. Oh well. I'll just smile each morning now as I know I'm going out to the barn to dance with my cow.

Book Review - Lincoln

My latest finished book is Lincoln, by David Herbert Donald. This is a LONG book. It's supposed to be the authoritative biography on Abraham Lincoln, and I don't think this book could have been much more thorough, hence its length.

For the most part I enjoyed this book. I read through his childhood, but found myself skipping a lot of the pages dealing with his adult law practice and all the cases he argued. I was most interested in his presidency. Once I got there I also skipped a lot of the pages about the politics of the mid-19th century. His relationship with his cabinet, what the other parties were saying about him, how he dealt with Congress.....all things I found myself just thumbing through. You'd think I'd be more interested in those things, being a political science major and all, but I found them dry. What I gravitated towards and was most interested in was the war, and how he dealt with it. I'm an unabashed war history buff, but history in general interests me. I was also very interested in his personal relationships with his wife and children.

Here are the most interesting things I learned:

- He was a very "hands off" kind of leader, almost to the point of letting people walk over him. He would give very earnest suggestions to his generals, but go to great pains to let them know he wasn't telling them how to do their jobs. He picked a very politically diverse cabinet, a few members of which were anything but loyal to his policies. He didn't press his generals when they refused to divulge their military plans, even when things were going badly for the Union. He set aside 2-4 hours of his day, everyday, to entertaining visitors who wanted anything from the honor of shaking his hand to an appointment to some office or position. Much of this was a complete waste of his time but he did it anyway.

- He was a very involved father, but only later in life after he stopped traveling the court circuit. He would often babysit for his wife, a very unusual practice for his day, and one which led him to be labled "hen pecked" by many.

- He had surprisingly little security to protect him. This was common for presidents back then. He would sometimes have nothing more than one bodyguard, and sometimes not even that, accompanying him as he walked through Washington, traveled, or took carriage rides. It would have been extremely easy to assassinate him, as John Wilkes Booth discovered.

- He initially favored deporting black slaves to some country in the Carribean due to a widely held view that blacks and whites could never live peacefully in the same country if they were freed. He dropped this idea later after it became clear that the black community was not going to buy it.

- While a Christian, he did not associate himself with any particular church, and disliked organized religion. At the beginning of his life he was more of a deist, but came to have more faith in the God of the Bible after his son Willie died.

More than anything, this book helped to make Abraham more human to me. I always held him on such a pedestal, and in essence saw him as infallible. While I still admire the man greatly, this book helped demonstrate his weaknesses, fears, and shortcomings (i.e. - his human qualities) of which I knew little.

My next book is The First American, which is a biography on Benjamin Franklin my mother gave me. I'm only 20 pages into it, but it promises to be a good one.

Heat

As I pulled up to the gate yesterday coming home from work, I saw our cows out in the pasture acting a little weird. We know Pumpkin is due to come into heat soon as her cycle should be starting again after her calving. The thing to watch for is "standing heat", in that the cow in heat has to stand still and let the other cow mount her. Well, sure enough I saw it.

We marked our calandar and called our AI guy. He said he likes to come out within 12 hours of standing heat. He checked his schedule and determined he was too busy to make it over here today. He offered to give her a hormone shot which would throw her back into heat a week and a half earlier than normal. We opted to just wait until her next heat which should be within 18-21 days. The only problem with that is that he might be busy again when we call him. In that case we'll do the hormone shot so he can actually add us to his schedule.

We'll probably have her bred to a low birth weight Angus bull, like we did Chloe, since we'll be raising the calf for meat.

More Fun

I never thought I'd be able to say I had ever castrated an animal before, but this weekend I did it for the first time. Our bull calf Meatloaf needed the procedure done, so rather than pay a vet, I figured I'd give it a shot. We're learning to do a few of the easier vet practices here, like palpating, giving injections, drawing blood, and castrating. Since it costs $25 just to have the vet drive out here, we're saving a little on cattle costs. The procedure went very well. I opted for the bloodless band castration method. It's simple and less gorey. We locked mom out of the barn and tied Meatloaf to the calf pen. He struggled very little, and didn't even protest when I put the band on. I made extra sure I had both of "the boys" in there before I put it on, as I didn't want to have to call a vet out to fix my screw up later. I'm confident they're both in there. From what we've read, it takes 10 to 20 days to work, and it's a little easier on the calf because they don't lose any blood and are less prone to infection.

I can mark that off my list of farm experiences had. How many people can say they've ever castrated a bull? Sounds like a good ice breaker to me.

Another Homestead Experiment

Here at our homestead, we do things a little differently with our milk cows than a dairy would do. In fact, I do believe my wife's paternal grandfather (a dairy farmer) would think we were nuts. The biggest reason for the difference is that we do not raise these cows for profit. We don't wish to lose money on them, but we also are not looking to minimize costs and maximize income as much as a dairyman would. These are "family milk cows", meaning they exist to provide our only our family (and maybe a few friends who need it) with milk. That being said, some of the things we do are meant for our convenience, and can have an adverse effect on how much milk we get.

For instance, we leave the calf with the cow all day. This does a few for things us. We eliminate the added chore of feeding the calf by bottle, or the added cost of keeping a nurse cow around. Secondly, calves who stay with their mothers are healthier (this is debatable but there is evidence for it) because they get all the attention they need. Calves who are isolated and receive no attention do get sick more often. That's proven. Thirdly, it allows us to leave on trips, because the calf will continue to drink from mom's udder and keep it from getting engorged. This also prevents mastitis, which can be a serious problem in dairy cows. We don't get as much milk because half is being given to the calf, but to us its worth it.

In preparation for our Christmas trip to Georgetown, we experimented last night and left Meatloaf (the calf) with Pumpkin. We skipped our morning milking and will see how full she is tonight. We're not too worried as Pumpkin is not a huge producer and the calf seems to be keeping her from getting too engorged.

The Amazing Cow Heater

When I woke up this morning it was COLD! Not -40 below zero like some of my coworkers are used to up in Maine or Alaska. I'm talking Texas cold, which is pretty much anything below freezing. The homestead is so pretty when it snows or there's frost covering everything. I shivered for an extra 30 seconds opening the gate this morning just to admire how peaceful and beautiful our homestead looked. The crisp morning was so quiet and everything was covered in a thin white frost. Smoke slowly rose from the chimney as DW stoked a fire for the kids to sit by while she got breakfast started. (We do have electric heat, but with the firplace blower on and an good fire going, the heater doesn't kick on all day).

Cold on the homestead obviously has its drawbacks, like going out to milk at 5:30 a.m. when it's below freezing. I find though that once I get close to the cow and start handmilking, it's really not that bad. The three-sided milk barn we have cuts the wind out, and cows put off quite a bit of heat. Of course, it's not roaring heat like a fireplace would generate, but it's a gentle warmth that makes you want to snuggle closer. It makes winter milking more bearable. I found out today that cows also make good nose heaters in a pinch. My face is right there next to her flank, so why not use it to warm my nose up? Her udder keeps my hands warm, except maybe the last finger or two, and milking time usually rolls by pretty pleasantly.

It's not easy to force yourself to get up in the morning knowing you have to go out into the cold, but our barn's cow heater makes it better. I actually read about some European country where people used to build their houses over their barns so that in the winter the heat from the cows would rise up and heat their rooms. I'm sure the smell of "all things cow" would waft up there too, but they were used to it. Maybe if the power goes out in the winter we can bring the cows into the living room and snuggle up to them. I'll make sure to pass that one by the wife first.