There was a trap door with a ring on the second floor that we lifted to throw the bales down into the manger. It sure made feeding hay easy. I do remember one time going south with a bale, right onto the cement. It went so quick, there was no thinking about it, just gone. Glad I can’t remember the pain.
Most of the years in that barn, grain was fed from 100 pound bags. The bags were poured in to a barrel and scooped from there into a wheel barrow for feeding in front of the cows. Later my dad had a big steel grain bin put up in the barn for bulk feed to be blown in. There was a slide door to let the grain out and the wheel barrow filled with a whoosh. This was great unless the bin was empty and the door was left open by mistake. I remember how hard we worked to bag up a couple of ton of grain when it was all in front of the cows in the manger. If we forget once, somehow we are much more careful after that. It was a long process plus we were quite concerned that some of the cows got too much feed.
In bag feeding times, there were always so many rats and mice around the barn. We used to go out evenings and turn out the lights and wait a few minutes. We would turn the lights on and the barn was full of the varmints. We used to go after them with utensils to alleviate as many as we could. I would have a heart attack doing that now. My dad told of one night when he was milking of seeing a rat’s tail hanging down through a crack in the second floor. He got a knife and reached up and cut off the tail. He said that rat really squealed. It was a long time after that he had a rodent problem.
We used to stable heifers in part of the second floor. The original stanchions still stood in the part of the barn over the present, refurbished cow stable. Most of the original stanchions up stairs were gone as that part of the floor had fallen in. My dad made run-ins for the cattle under that area.
There was a time when my brother kept rabbits in that part of the stable. It was closed in for warmth. I can remember rabbits all over and they would go into piles of hay to have their babies. This was definitely a not profit organization. Seems to me as the rabbit herd grew, he would let them all out to run free. There were always rabbits all over the door yard. Some lived under the old garage, but most under the stable on second floor, and in the hay mows.
My dad would find liters of bunnies as he was taking hay out in the winter. He would bring them in the house and warm them in the gas oven by the pilot light. We tried to keep them alive by spoon feeing them. Some were pretty young and survived, some did not. We sure raised a lot of liters in the house.
My dad was so kind hearted. He would always put his heart and soul in to trying to keep a struggling animal alive. He would give that animal so much time and energy trying to get it to eat. I am similar to him, always worked along side of him, but as I get older, I am realizing that it is God’s will if an animal lives or dies and we sure aren’t going to save many of them. The weak are weeded out in nature and that I believe is the same for domestic animals. We interfere with the over all plan of things.
I think the most amazing thing my dad came close to accomplishing was saving a four to five month bovine fetus. This tiny specimen did not weigh five pounds. It did not have hair. The eyes were formed, but not open. I have never known one before or after to be born alive. My dad brought it to the house. He would feed from a spoon several times a day. It survived several days. It was one of the things that made an impression on me. It takes so long to get a seven month fetus to grow. We had a few of those through the years. My dad did a good job with keeping those alive, though, they never matured into an animal that looked normal or produced very much. I can’t imagine how long it would take to grow a small creature like this one was.
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