On Monday morning Toni hauled Charlie, Annie and Abs in to Sheena to get their blood pulled to see if they could go off of progesterone. Annie and Abs can. When Toni tried to get fuel on her way out of Toni she discovered she had not gotten her pacific pride card back from Kade, luckily she found $75 in her purse to get some fuel. In the afternoon her friend Tracie came out to look at horses. She bought Robin and Fancy Gun. So they headed to the West side of WA. I went to Lewiston for a work trip/tour on Monday afternoon. Dad, Kaine and Kade were harvesting wheat. Anna and Jaxsen were working on steers and heifers. Wasps were everywhere. When Toni and Jaxsen were doing chores, Toni uncovered a wasps nest on the top of the hay stack and got stung multiple times trying to get off the stack and get away. Wasps during the heat really suck.
Tuesday I traveled to the Dworshak dam and National Fish Hatchery in Orofino. Toni sold Cappy’s filly Lassie, we were on the fence on keeping her. She is a fancy palomino roan. Dad and the big boys are still harvesting wheat. Anna and Jaxsen are still halter breaking calves and working on steers. Everyone is hot and just trying to stay healthy. Toni went to stay with Grandma Tuesday night after chores.
On Wednesday we took a boat ride to the Lower Granite Dam and went through the locks. We then toured the dam and saw all the fish passage. I got home Wednesday night. I got home in time for chores. Still wasps all over. Gates we go through everyday have wasps nests suddenly appear. The wasps even made a nest in our horse halters hanging on the side of our tack shed. We are like gunslingers, packing our wasp spray for the quick draw.
Thursday I was on a Family Farm Tour of the Quincy and East Irrigation Districts. We got the progesterone results back from the blood pull Monday. 2 of the mares also need SMZ tabs so we headed out in the pasture to catch them on Thursday. This was pretty short sighted as one is bad to catch. After spending 20 minutes stalking her around the pasture we got them both in, gave Charlie her shot, and fed them both their SMZ tabs in grain. You would think that would make day 2 easier as they would want to come in to get grain Spoiler alert- no.
Friday we took Sam from Family Farm on a Tour of the South District. After I got home Jaxsen and I went out and got some pics of some of the colts. No one wanted to help Ben fix a gear box on the circle Friday night, even though he snapped everyone. We spent another 30 minutes chasing Annie around the pasture. After that, both Annie and Charlie went to a pen in the corral. All the young horses came in with Charlie so Toni got out an aerosol fly spray can and started spraying down foals and older, any horse that would stand still for it. The foals were more excepting than the mares. Even though the can made a hissing sound like a snake, the foals didn’t seem to care.
On Saturday we went to the Junior Livestock Show of Tri-Cities. We all had a great time. Anna came with mom, dad and Skip, since she is too old to show there. They only let people that can show at the Benton Franklin Fair show there. It is a nice show, we always show after pigs. The kids all did great. They brought home 4 buckles and 2 cups, lots of banners. All three boys got awards, and our extended family also had a great show. We had some friends come in to watch the kids and saw our show family. It was a good, but hot day. It was actually one of the cooler days for that show that we have had. The men did chores for us so we did not have to do them when we got home. We did get Burger Ranch on the way home. Once home, we had to get Annie and Charlie fed and the dogs walked. It was a long but fruitful day.
On Sunday the kids washed their animals and worked on them. Anna worked on the calves she is halter breaking. We worked on the horses, put out big bales, check the calves, etc. Made sure everything was doing ok.
We are officially done with the 2025 jackpot season. Now we need to gear up for the fair season. Fun times ahead. Benton Franklin Steers below.
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