03/18/2026
It's calving season on the ranch! Aside from the toolbox with our tagging tools that I shared last week, these items are my current must-haves!
EVERY vehicle that checks pastures has a pair of binoculars (that even includes the family suburban, because we know what we're like!)
For ~ $20 a pair, a decent birdwatching set of binocs can be found on Amazon. Perfect for checking a cow in the distance, especially if she's calving and we don't want to break concentration. Now- are these fancy enough that we can get a tag number far off? 🙂↔️ Nope. But, we can get distinguishing features, landmark location, and possibly a tag color. Realistically, anytime we use these we will be approaching that cow within an hour if the situation calls for it, so we can get a number then. Because our girls are sorted into pastures with similar calving and heat timelines, it's pretty straightforward what we expect to find, based on what pasture we're in.
Second, and this is my NEW favorite- the clicker counter. Nothing revolutionary, but man it's helpful. I got a SIX pack of these in bright colors- 1 for each piece of equipment, and 1 spare because I have a 6 year old. We call it the sacrificial clicker- it's the only one he's allowed to touch.
These are great for evening count! Because Tyrel Fleming is an absolute boss when it comes to nutrition and feeding, he adjusts our ration based on where we are in the gestation period, available feed stuffs, and how many cows are in each group. That means, beyond just knowing how many cows we own, we need an accurate count of what each pasture holds.
And let's be fair- I'm using this thing to count down how many cows are left to calve. It's the neon green light at the end of the tunnel! For under $150 we outfitted each vehicle on the ranch with these, and it has made such a difference. Small investments are worthwhile.
