Well, I think you can say winter is here. It was snowing right along when Mary and Jim came home last night. This morning, there was the better part of eight inches on the ground.

You might have read recently that some scientist has determined that cattle like to face north. When I went to check them this morning, they were,in fact, all facing north except for those eating. There is always an exception to every rule.

It takes longer to do chores when it gets cold. But everything started and worked.

Our summer neighbors stopped by unexpectedly and we enjoyed morning tea with them. He is a retired farmer and his wife a retired school teacher. They are looking forward to going to Florida for the winter. They are not looking forward to it being cold in Florida as it apparently was today.

The vet is coming back tomorrow to read Rochester's TB test. I have two cows that I'd like to preg check. They were not interested in coming down to the main barn. I'll have to try again in the morning. Our bull was very interested in one of them so I think it is safe to say she is open at the moment

After lunch, the sun came out and I was able to clean up a bunch of manure and hay from a feeding area. I like to keep these areas clean since I don't like it to look like I have short legged cattle.

We had an excellent dinner tonight of our own grass fed beef. It's nice knowing where your meal comes from. We also had a nice bottle of wine that our friends brought from Minnesota when they brought our most recent group of Lowlines. Living in the Finger Lakes wine region, it's a little different to be drinking wine from Minnesota. We don't usually think of it as a wine state. It was excellent and we thank them for it. We do have a friend down the road whose daughter is married to a wine maker from Minnesota. There might be something to this Minnesota wine.

The forecast for later in the week is lots more lake effect snow. I think I'll take the loader bucket off the 6415 and put on the plow tomorrow. Winter can get old real fast. We are just under a mile from the main road and there are five other families on our road. Between my tractor and an neighbor's old town plow truck, we are able to keep the road open all winter.