Sunday, March 14, 2004

The End of an Era

What a weekend of traveling. Kim and I went up to Rockwell City to watch our 5 year old nephew, Tyler, wrestle. That was pretty fun to watch them all. Oh how the agony of defeat hurts. :) Tyler got second overall so he did really well. We then travelled to Humboldt to visit Kim's Grandparents for a bit. Then drove back to Gilmore City to see Kim's Brother's family. Then drove back to Humboldt to eat at the Fireside bar/grill for some good eats. Then we departed for Nevada to visit some friends there and finally back to Ames. So, we accomplished the Central Iowa Tour.

My Dad got home yesterday from the hospital with no back pain other than the incisions from the surgery so that turned out good. I got quite a shock when I talked to him today as he sold half of his dairy herd and will be selling the rest tomorrow. It's quit hard to believe that it's happening as this is something that he's been doing for at least 30 years. He started out with just a handful of milking cows and through the years built a heard of around 40 milking at one time. He's had hired help to help him milk following my brother and my moving off the farm, but as of late can't find only one (who can't do it all alone) that is reliable enough to make it in the mornings or nights to milk them. He still has beef cattle that he can work with and the land to farm (pending his healing), but life won't be the same for him or my family.

2 comments:

Elmo said...

I've been there. My dad sold our dairy herd about 15 years ago also because of health reasons. He'd milked cows for 60 years prior to that.

npl said...

I've never had cows, or known anybody who has...but I can imagine that would not be good...