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Checking out the new arrivals
The meat steers are always intrigued by the arrival of the first lambs...here they are all lined up to view the first sheep families turned out of their jugs.
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alfalfa bloom
We raise a fair bit of alfalfa, and other legumes and legume/grass mixtures, to feed our animals over the winter months. Alfalfa is really high in protein and helps to keep our animals growing thru the winter months. Plus legumes like alfalfa help fix nitrogen from the air into a form that plants can use thru a symbiotic relationship with bacteria that grow on their roots.
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marsh hawk
We enjoy the various animals that share our farm. Marsh hawks, and other hawks, frequent our farm and keep the rodent populations in check.
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checking water n fence
This photo was also taken by the journalist that visited our farm in 2010.
John and the kids are checking the water level and float valve in this water trough, while Lori Anne is moving the temporarty electric fence to give the meat steers additional pasture.
We use a lot of these recycled mine equipment tires for our water troughs.
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cow w trumpeter swans
Quite a few trumpeter swans visit our farm in the fall and winter months. They stick around as long as we have open water on Soda Creek.
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cows during winter
Our mother cows stay at our Meadow Farm, the land that has been in the family since 1882, year round. John either skiis or snowmachines over to them every day or two to give them fresh feed. Some of the hay is fed on the ground, as in this photo, other bales are fed in metal feeders that keep the cows from standing on the hay.
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Daniel Fredrick & Dorothea Lau
Daniel Fredrick and Dorothea were the first generation of Lau's to settle in Soda Springs. They were mormon converts who came from Germany and Switzerland respectively. Dorothea Zollinger came with her entire family, but Daniel Fredrick came alone. We are thankful for their hard work and perserverance as being one of the first 4 families to settle in Soda Springs counld not have been easy.
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DF Lau
DF Lau and his wife were the among the first people to settle in Soda Springs. He served as bishop for his church, and as postmaster, as well as being a farmer.
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Daniel Joseph Lau
Daniel Joseph, was part of the 2nd generation of Lau's, raised in Soda Springs. He served as a State Legislator for several terms, as well as raising crops and livestock.
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Ewe and twins in jug
Most of our ewes lamb outdoors and then shortly afterward are brought into our lambing barn. The ewe and her lambs are placed into small pens, called jugs, for around 24 hours. Seperating the new family from the other sheep helps to ensure that the ewe bonds to each of her lambs, that they are nursing adequately, and that all members of the new family are healthy.
If there is an issue with a ewe or lamb, the family may stay in the barn for several days before being turned out into a larger outdoor pen.
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Ewes and lambs
Ewes and cows know their babies by smell and sound. A ewe will smell each lamb that is nursing her to confirm that it is hers. Only rarely will they allow a lamb that isn't theirs to nurse.
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Ewes grazing
We keep all the sheep at our farm in town until they have all lambed (about 42 days) and the youngest lambs are a couple of weeks old. We then move the whole flock to our other property, The Meadow. In the past we have had severe problems with coyotes at the Meadow, so we use a livestock guardian dog to keep the coyotes at bay.
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Flying Swans
We have the unique situation of playing host to several swans each fall and winter.
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Gathering new lambs
Shortly after lambs are born we take them and their dam, mother, into our barn. One reason we do this is that ewes that are close to lambing will try to "granny" the newborn lambs. They clean and even nurse the other ewes lambs, but then wll often lose interest in the "stolen" lambs after they have their own, or if that doesn't happen they are trying to feed 3 lambs while the ewe that had her lambs stolen may only have one lamb.
In this photo you can see that several ewes are very interested in these 3 lambs-often 2 or 3 ewes will lamb near each other and the lambs can get mixed around. Sorting out which lambs belong to which ewe can be a challenge!
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Pretty as a picture
Although the Meadow is only 10 min from town it feels like it could be miles. It a beautiful place to spend our days!
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Ewes out grazing
The ewes and their lambs are always excited when they first get turned out on lush green grass. After a winter of hay they really relish the soft green foliage.
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Heber and Rhea Lau
Heber Lau is John's Grandfather, and is among the 3rd generation of Lau's in Soda Springs. Heber consolidated much of the land we currently farm, so we are very thankful to Grandpa Heber.
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Heber & Rhea Lau and Family
Heber & Rhea were blessed with 3 boys, Heber Grant, David and Tom. Grant is John's Dad. He is a treasure trove of stories of life during and after the Great Depression and knows much of the family's history.
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Round Bale
We put up much of our hay in these round bales.
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KIds feeding bummer lambs
The first chores kids on a sheep farm can really manage is feeding the bummer or orphan/bottle lambs.
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Snowball
Snowball, our livestock guardian dog, is a great Pyranees and okbash cross. He lives year round with the sheep to keep town dogs, coyotes etc from predating on our sheep. He is very patient with the lambs, even letting them crawling on him. He is also well liked and trusted by the cattle. The steers can often be found licking the frost off his coat.
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Lori Anne with lamb
This photo was taken several years ago at our friend farm. Lori Anne is holding a lamb so that it can be vaccinated. We vaccinate our lambs, with vaccines recommended by our veterinarian, each spring. We feel that vaccinating our lambs against commonly occuring, and life threatening, diseases helps them to stay healthy, which allows us to greatly minimize our use of antibiotics.
If we have an animal that is ill enough to require antibiotics we track those animals and sell them with disclosure, or sell them into the commodity system.
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Meadow View
About 2/3rds of our "Meadow" farm is indeed meadow land. The Five Mile Meadow and China Hat are local landmarks.
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meat steers
Our steers spend most of the summer grazing behind a single strand of electric fence. If we keep them with sufficient feed they will usually respect a single strand as well as they do multiple strands of barbed wire.
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Early Moon Rise
A pretty and early moon rise.
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Freshly born lamb
This little fellow is just a few minutes old. He was born on a warm spring day so I didn't immediately take them into the barn. His mother has spent sometime cleaning off the amniotic fluids but I don't think it had stood and had a drink yet (his ears would be perkier if it had).
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Nursing cow
Our calves stay with their mothers for about 7 months.
Sometimes you will see one or two cows with multiple calves around them, while all the other calves are in the distance grazing. I don't know if the cows are officially babysitting but it sure can look that way!
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Newborn lamb
Happy & healthy lambs usually have "helicopter ears". My term for ears that stick straight out from the head. Droopy ears can mean something is wrong in the lambs situation.
This fellow is really cute, but his ears are less perky than his sibling. It may be that he simply hasn't had his first feed (nursing) yet.
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Cutie
A little cutie - probably less than a week old.
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red angus cow
John started with a herd of black angus and hereford crosses (black baldies). Over the years he has consistenly bred to Red Angus bulls, and the cows are gradually taking on the solid red apparance of the Red Angus breed. I found this statement online:
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ruff leg hawk
We enjoy having a variety of birds living on our farm. This hawk is roosting on one our gate arches, made from old irrigation main line. Among other things these fellow keep the vole and mice populations under control.
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Sarah May Rose Lau
Sarah was Daniel Joseph Lau's wife (2nd generation). The toughness and tenacity of these folks is remarkable and evident in the tales about the family.
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Pond and quanset
This photo is taken on our neighbors land, from the west side of our pond toward our quonset hut.
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Soda Creek
Our "Meadow Farm's" western boundary is along Soda Creek. It is frequented by several species of waterfowl. We have fenced off most of the creek bank, and the animals access the water via a "water gap" which allows them to reach the water to drink, in just one location. This protects the majority of the creek bank, while still allowing our animals to reach the water so they can drink.
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Steer
One of our meat steers.
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Sunset at town farm
Pretty sunset at the farm where we live at the edge of Soda Springs
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Steers waiting for hay
Our meat steers are fed fresh hay every couple of days, as their previous bales are consumed.
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meat steers
This great photo was taken by a photographer and journalist who visited us to write an article for the Farm Bureau magazine. The meat steers are given access to fresh areas of pasture every 1-3 days during the summer months.