Hello from Eastern Europe

Better pics of the newborn. Nothing too exceptional about him at the moment, but he should change quite a lot in a month time. 47kgs before feeding. Very strong and lively calf. Dam is 9 years old. Never assisted a calving, very nicely tempered, plenty of milk and good fertility, always tooks AI on the first try. Had her calf on the 30th of January last year, two years ago on the 8th of March. I missed her one heat last year as I didn't have my AI equipment at that moment. So it's actually the first calf from my AI work.

Had a heifer calf born a couple days ago by AI limousine bull Faisceau. Very easy calving, 282days gestation, 37kg birth weight.

Next calf is due on the 8th of February, another on the 11th and one more on the 27th.

Going slowly this year. I do know that I had some hard time with a couple AIs, but with practise it got easier. The best teachers were heifers. When I got a held of how it is done with them, cows became pretty easy.

We actually had a bad snow storm last night. Many people without electricity, roads full of snow.

A pic is from 6 days ago. One of the most beautiful winter views. Probably only the third time this winter.

Had another calf born yesterday. Charolais sired heifer from 3/4 lim cow. Born at 278th day. Quite small, lively girl. Considering her dam, she might make into the replacements group.

A lot has happened since the last post. A spring might be not that far away, but we still get temperatures below 0°C at the night.

Had two new heifers born until now. One blondex, another belgian bluex. Some more calves are due very soon. Going to get a couple from the last herd bull. He only bred 7 cows before his injury. Four are due this month.

Had some delay with bulls semen ordering as some bulls weren't available and had to choose some other bulls to replace those, so still waiting for the delivery. Have a couple cows for AI at the moment, so just going to use leftovers for them. Got 10 straws of Lodge Hamlet by accident. Hopefully, this time he'll click better with a different selection of cows. The first try was on first calvers. Despite very easy calvings his calves appeared to be shorter in height and I wasn't that impressed with them.

Have bought a new bull. Brought him home yesterday. Not overfed, seems very calm so far. Not showing much of stress after a good 3 hour journey and the whole environment change. He's 21 months old, 760kg. His job will be mostly as a clean up bull for cows. He should get at least 20 this year hopefully.

Anything can happen really. This night the temperature can be as low as -10°C. The weather forecast shows some colder weather and then some more warmth at the end of March. Hopefully the spring will come soon. It was very late for the past couple years.

Calving is moving forward bit by bit. Have some cows over 285 days already, so they should pop any time now.

Started AI for some individuals as well. Got my delivery of new bulls from company called - inoveo. Waiting for a couple more bulls from Ki-samen and czeck company- Naturalgenetics.

Got three blues- Langoureux de fooz, Mambo des peupliers and Newman du blanc dos. Trying out culard charolais- Nippon exc and Eperon. Plus two parthenaise bulls- Ilus and Lamparo. Going to get Wilodge Cerberus son from Ki-samen in two weeks. And added some Blonde to the mix- Gazou from inoveo and Tresor with Vacherin from Ki-samen.

A link to one of the parthenaise bulls.

http://www.evolution-int.com/en/bull/71/FR4438833353/alt

Thanks for the info. Going to keep that in mind. Character is one of the main criteria when selecting replacements for me, so hopefully there will be no issues.

In some places it is very muddy. The current problem is that we had no rain for some time and the weather is very dry. It's warm and sunny during the day time and some small temperatures below zero degrees at nigh. The ground is getting dry, but the grass can't grow with freezing temperatures, so it's not a good sign if it will get too dry for the first grass. The upper layer of soil has thawed out already, but the soil is still frozen deeper in the ground.