When I was a little girl, I begged my parents to get goats. I made a PowerPoint and explained why it would be the best choice for us. I did not convince them, though many years later we would get them, and it would be the start to our ranch. The ranch would grow, and soon adapt into a farm as well, something my dad had always dreamed of. Working on a farm and ranch is not as simple as many people believe. There are a million different jobs, and different things that must be done. I have seen myself working as a veterinarian, a maid, an uber driver and a hunter. The work that comes from all these jobs sum up the wonderful, crazy, and hard job of working.
When I was a kid begging to get goats, I never would have thought I would be giving shots, helping give birth, or castrating a boy. The day I realized having goats was not for the faint of heart was when I had to help a goat give birth, all by myself. I was home alone, and I knew the goats were getting close to kidding. I assumed that it would be okay and that I would not need to worry. When I went down to check on the goat, her name is Skittles, I noticed she was acting strange, getting up and down over and over, and she kept bleating quiet loudly. I went back up to the house and called my mom. I explained what was happening and was told she was kidding. I freaked out I had no idea how to help or what to do, but I knew I could not leave her alone.
I stood there with a towel as the first baby came out, I wiped my nose so it could breathe and brought the baby up to its mother's face. She cleans it off and I wait to see if another kid was to be born. To my surprise another two pop out with me repeating the same process as before. The birth is mostly over now, so I moved the goat into a more shaded area. This is important as it was incredibly hot that day. I leave her alone as I do not want to stress her out and come back in around 15 minutes. When I returned a fourth baby is now on the ground that looks nothing like its siblings. At first, I assumed it was the afterbirth, but as I got closer it was a tiny baby. I rush to grab a towel to wipe its face and calm down a little.
After this moment of dealing with bloody and sticky goat births my viewpoint on animals shifts. I realize the “miracle of birth” is a little bit less of a miracle and a lot more of a hot mess. It is good that I am not a veterinarian, and I do not have to deal with this daily, but I am not a stranger to cleaning up messes.
The messes that occur in our shop are quite different to the ones the goats leave. This is where the role of maid comes in. Every week there is a new vehicle in our Quonset. The vehicle may be a car, a tractor, or a combine. There are so many unusual parts to these vehicles all of which need to be cleaned when taken apart. This past summer for example my dad and I pulled apart the entire engine of a tractor. We had to clean the cylinders, the gaskets, and the bearings. As a farm hand it has always been my job. Hours and hours were spent every day of the summer getting everything cleaned up and put back together. I probably made a good 1000 dollars on this job alone. When something needs cleaning the easiest thing to do is grab engine starting fluid and the best towels in the world, blue ones. Then you spray and spray until all the grease, dirt, and debris is washed away. This may take a few minutes or a few hours. Then after all that the real clean up begins. Sweeping up the dirt and throwing away all the towels. Everything must be spotless. When everything gets put back together a new job begins.
The next job is an Uber driver. Which is the easiest job on the farm, but the one that takes the longest? When moving from field to field you must have somebody leading you. This means having a vehicle in front of the combine or tractor to make sure that other people on the road are safe. I have always been the best driver of the children in my family and lead better than anyone, says my father. This is why when we must move, I am the one who hops in the pickup and keeps everyone safe. This is a boring job, but also important as it keeps the other drivers from hitting the farm machinery. The closest call I had was when I was sitting on top of a hill, where no one was coming from the other direction. My dad was behind me in a combine, and I was looking back at him. All of a sudden, I heard a cars horn and saw a semi-truck right in front of me. I quickly pulled the car into reverse and got out of the way just in time. I also give my family rides quite frequently to and from the fields as well as parts stores, and different states to pick something up. One of the strangest jobs that I have ever done was being a hunter. You may be thinking of hunting deer, birds, or something else that is commonly hunted within our area. However, I have found myself hunting down two dogs that came onto our property.
This all started when I came home from school one day and found two dogs walking around our property. One was a Great Pyrenees and the other a husky. They were friendly and allowed me to pet them, so I brushed them being there off. I then made my way down to our goat pens like I did every day after school, but something was off. The male goats all seemed frightened, and I noticed one laying on the ground. As I got closer, I noticed the goat was dead, but not from any injuries. Tears streamed down my face as I investigated further. I walked around the pen and noticed dog and goat prints circling it repeatedly. I knew immediately what had happened.
I yelled for my dad, and he investigated what had happened with me. His expression was pure anger as this was a well-liked goat on our property. We ran inside and grabbed a 22-caliber rifle. We got into a vehicle and chased after the now running dogs. They went into a field, and we got out with the weapon. My dad lined up the gun and aimed it first at the husky. The dog went down and the other just kept running. At this point we drive a ways down the road in the hopes of intercepting him on the other side of the field.
When we get there, we set up and wait. This is when we hear a vehicle come behind us and a woman get out. She pulls up a picture of two dogs and asks us if we can see them. My dad does,” Yeah we are hunting them right now.” If you could see the look on this woman's face as she realized that. We then see down the road the dog comes running over. The woman begs us not to shoot him and we agree sparingly. We inform her about the other dog, and it seems as if she does not care. She asks us to dispose of the body, not caring if it gets buried or not. This is when the reality of what we did hits me. Yes, the dog killed our goat, but it seems like this was the dogs escape from a home where he was not wanted.
I am a farmer and a rancher I have worked for several years now and have experienced some crazy things. My jobs are peculiar, and the ones described do not even explain everything. I have seen myself working as a veterinarian, a maid, an Uber driver and a hunter. These things all describe the first job I ever had, getting to work with my family and accomplishing something great.
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