Blustery snowy day, more blustery than snowy

[Soapweed]

The cows are coming

Trick or treat

How now Frau cow?

Moo to you, too

The cows are caked

Cluster of cows

Cold and blustery

Gray day

Uncooperative kid

Cooperative kid

Pretty good feed outfit

Plenty of power to run the windmill

 

[Manitoba_Rancher]

Looks kinda nasty there too. Real hard on the old gals when its blustery and snowy. It was cold and windy here today also. Guess its that time of year :roll:

 

[Anonymous]

Soapweed, how do you like your Hyda-feeder or whatever they call your caker? I see that it is the one that matches your Hydra Bed. How do you monitor how many pounds you are feeding /head with it, or do you measure when you load it? It is hydraulic driven too isn't it?

We have the smaller model Hydra Bed, with a white caker with the electric motor. Can't think of what it's called at the moment. I thought I would measure what it holds for sure some time, then see how many seconds it took to empty it so I could tell how many pounds it feeds a second, or minute or whatever. Do you have any good ideas? We load from an overhead bin mostly.

 

[Soapweed]

I like the Hydra-Bed caker, model 1800# (but it actually holds only 1500# of cake). It has a digital read-out mounted above the steering wheel, and it can be calibrated however you want it. We have ours set so that for every number on the read-out, 2 pounds of cake has been fed. In other words, if there are 150 cows in a bunch, we pull in and feed out to where the read-out says "150". That means that 300 pounds of cake, or 2 pounds per head, has been fed.

It is auger-style and hydraulic driven, and seems consistent no matter how much cake is in the hopper. An older one that I had several years ago, fed more out if the hopper was full than if it was half-full. The new one works much better.

 

[the_jersey_lilly_2000]

Bet them cows give "ice cream" instead of milk!!!!!

 

[PPRM]

Cows Circled up reminded me of wagons in old west movies, LOL...

When I was a kid, I lived right accross from Walter Brennan's son, Mike. I was pretty good friends with Mike's son,

PPRM

 

[Faster horses]

We have a friend that is a good hand with cows and horses. He was at a dude ranch in Arizona when they filmed either "The Way West" or "How the West Was Won". Never could keep those movies straight.


Anyway, this friend was an extra in the movie and Walter Brennan was one of the stars. Our friend told us what a hand that old Walter was with a horse. He was very impressed and related lots of stories.

Just heard Walter on XM radio today singing 'Old Rivers.'

I always liked every show Walter Brennen played in. And of course, I am old enough to remember "The Real McCoys."

 

[nd]

new poster here- discovered the site about 3 weeks ago though.

I've enjoyed the site and really have appreciated your photos, Soapweed.

Soapweed-- I've been thinking about buying a bale bed. They really look handy!! The only concern I have is-- Do I want to mount it on a newer pick-up or older? Do hungry cows come running up to the pick-up and dent up the sides and grille?? I didn't see any damage to your dodge.

Thanks.

 

[Rowdy Ranch]

nd-we have a feed outfit similar to Soapweeds-a 2001 or 02(I don't remember) Dodge. Well so far no dents from hungry cows,but we figure that that is what is for.Anyway-the reason we went this way is that we wanted something reliable to feed with. Neighbors have a Ford similar to ours(year wise and set up) same reason. The only dent in MY feed pickup is the one my husband put in it when the stock trailer was hook on and he drove over the end of the gate stick and it flipped up and put a dent in the door. Guess what son caught **** for that because he did not open the gate wide enough,BUT other son drove same size trailer and pickup thru the gate right before and did not have a problem! Good Luck
And WELCOME!

 

[coulee_reese]

Is that a Hydrabed arm bed Soapweed? The caker sounds nice what do they cost?
reese

 

[Soapweed]

Since cattle can be a little rough on feed pickups, when we bought this Hydra-Bed three years ago, we went with a "middle-aged" pickup. It was a 1998 one ton Dodge, and had 80,000 miles on the speedometer when we bought it. So far, we've been lucky and it still looks fairly nice.

It seems like the caker part of the unit was priced at around $1200 when we bought it, but that is a guess. The only complaint with the caker is that the lid hinges on the front so it takes quite a bit of clearance between the ground and your overhead cake bin to have enough room to allow the door to swing up to open. We have one cake bin that we have to use a different pickup/caker to feed out of. With two people, and a funnel board held in place, I can load the Hydra-Bed caker if absolutely necessary.

Probably the caker lid could be modified so it would open sideways. This would allow it to be filled with lower clearance overhead bins. But all things considered, I really like the Hydra-Bed outfit.

 

[the_jersey_lilly_2000]

This may sound like a stupid question, but when ya'll refer to cake, is that the same thang that we call range cubes?

 

[Soapweed]

This may sound like a stupid question, but when ya'll refer to cake, is that the same thang that we call range cubes?

Yup. :wink:

 

[sw]

When Hanta Yo used to write a diary for the NCBA website, she got the same question about cake from a guy out of Dallas, except he asked if it was German Chocolate or what :???:

 

[the_jersey_lilly_2000]

HeHe, ok so ya'll call it "cake" n yer cows think they's gettin somethin extra special.....
"Range cube" sounds about as appealing as them tasteless crispy rice things people eat when they are tryin to loose weight.
Maybe I should tell my "girls" it's cake. hehe

 

[hometowngurl]

Nice pics as always, but someday that kid of yorn will git a good picture of you, and that will be cool. (oops , sorry R-calf) nice I mean. :lol: :lol: also the ring of cows brings back memories or yesteryear, it is also a good way to check the "hineys" of the cows too. just in case one slipped on the ice and lost her calf you can tell better.