view sourceprint? 01 Ramblings from a Ranch Wife: Naming Cows

Random Thought:

"The darkest nights produce the brightest stars"
~


Monday, April 21, 2014

Naming Cows

Do you name your cows?  Apparently we do.  I guess you could say it's been a long winter feeding here because now the majority of our cow herd (and some of the corrientes too) all have names.  Of course it falls on mom to remember all of the names and who each name goes to.  When there were only 3 cows and calves, it wasn't this hard!

I do take full responsibility.  I encouraged the boys to name the twin heifers their grandpa gave them a couple of years ago.  QT named his "Rosie," and TR had "Juliet" and her calf "Gnomeo" (who is now our herd bull).  Our other bull is named "Tybalt" to go with the Gnomeo and Juliet theme.  Some names are pretty unimaginative.  We have a "Blackie" (she's black), "Red" (she's red), "Baldy" (who has a white face), and "Roanie" (you guessed it, she's roan).  Then there is a "Vindicator," our muley herford heifer and "Ely the Second" (Ely the first belongs to the ranch and resides at Red House).  Some names are really off the wall.  We have a black calf named "Sunshine," a red cow fondly known as "Mustard Sandwich," (because QT likes mustard on his sandwiches), and a black and white corriente known as "Snowflake."

I have vetoed a few names.  We just can't have a bull named "Sprinkles."  I wouldn't let them name the cow that got me down last winter "Fighter Attack" either.  We need some more color in our cow herd because the color black is about exhausted!

5 comments:

  1. I am responsible for naming some of the cows here. And the bulls. Even if its just their tag number.
    My favs are Nerdly, beanstalk, yard hog, moink, tater. And the bulls, patches, justabull, dark meat (angus), that's just a few of the 650 cows!

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  2. I leave most of the naming up to the kids but I will offer suggestions at times. I would guess that about 10% become name worthy here usually because of unique coloring or attitude. A few cows, Crybaby, Precious, Brownie (who is black) Awesome, and my personal touch just to make my daughter scream "Shitnose"

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  3. I used to name them on the ranch when I was your kid's ages. The people that owned the ranch my mom worked for raised me like their grandkid since theirs were older and lived across the US from them. Two of my favorite ones (because it made the ranch lady giggle every time her husband got it wrong) were Black Legs and Black Neck. They truly looked alike, I just could tell the difference and Gene always got it wrong, even when he tried.

    Now my kids have started naming our cows and their goats and chickens. Gene's favorite hen's names were named when he was four. "Yellow"...yes, she's a big yellow hen and his two red hens were named "Light" and "Dark". The goats are Dukes of Hazard themed. First twins were named Daisy and Dukes. Then Dukes became the resident billy, and in the goat world it's ok to breed back, so we bred him to his mother as we love both of their characteristics and fondly referred to him, the father and uncle, as "Duncle Dukes" with that batch of kids. We've since raised a Rosco and have four new kids to name this year.

    And, miss cinch tier, his pup's name is "Cinch". :)

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