Told DH when he arrived home after midnight. He was speechless that I'd done that. Why would you do that, the potential liability ? Because they were so happy to be out, even Dolly was jumping and kicking up her legs and I didn't know they'd leave the farm.
Set the alarm for daybreak this morning and went out on the buggy again with the feed bucket and bell. Nothing. DH then found a trail going up past the back neighbours corn field and we followed if to Bennett road behind us, about 1/2 a mile away. Rob was driving past, and stopped for me and said that the dairy on the corner with Jackson road had a small herd of cows pitch up at their place after going past his place at around 1:30 am and rousing his dog.
The Doezmas had them, all 12. They had a vet pregnancy checking some of their cows, so they did Star and Dolly for us as well. Yep, Dolly lost her last calf about 2 months before it was due as she is now 50 days preggers. Star is 6 months, due end January 2014. Didn't get Pearl, Daisy May, or the Scottish Highlands, Pigtails, Scotch or Little Red checked. Would have liked to but DH wasn't interested. As the vet was already out, he said only $ 10 for our 2 and then Ken wouldn't take my money for it. They have a much larger livestock trailer, so loaded all the Jerseys + Pigtails into their trailer. The 3 horned Scottish Highlands were separated and loaded into our trailer, only Little Red and Gabriel fitted, had to go back for Scotch. They followed us home, we off-loaded both in the pasture, and Star, with a couple of followers, beetled directly to the gate I'd opened last night wanting to go galavanting again. Must say, I like looking out at the pasture and seeing all our cows.
So now everytime DH looks at me, he asks me to please not open the gate for the cows again. Of course I won't. Tramping through the fields for 4 hours trying to find them, and realising they could be hit by cars, or taken by other people gave me a bit of a scare. Well, they'll just have to eat hay. Sorry beasties.
So only had about 5 hours sleep last night, so think I'll turn in early tonight. Need to milk Bambi early as I'm going to twice a day milking with her as I'm stuck with her for at least another 3 months. Oh well. Wonder what happened to Dollys early calf ? The other farmers said that coyotes probably. I looked but never found a carcass, but then I never saw that she was bloody either, only that her size had decreased dramatically. So, Brownie is not going to be papa to any more of our calves. Wonder who the papa is. Hopefully not Gabriel :)
Realised this afternoon that my jeans had split and my ass was sticking out. Think it happened down in the millking parlour, which was after we had found the cows, so I don't think I flashed to anyone else.
This afternoon I didn't see Anni anywhere. Took me a few hours to think about checking the truck. Yep, there she was sitting on the passenger seat. I didn't see her jump back in there when I was parking the trailer.