Bar 33 Ranch

05/14/2026

Letting the girls chow down the fall rye before they head to pasture next week!

04/17/2026

Devan and I got the SxS stuck and had to walk home. We grabbed the tractor to pull it out and I fully contemplated which one would be safer for him to drive back - walking back out again was never on the agenda.

This is why farm kids grow up quick and why they have the confidence to do hard things!

04/15/2026

She made it to 16, still in excellent shape with the most perfect bag for a cow this old; actually for a cow of any age really. However, she just calved yesterday. The very last cow to calve by a mile.

I just looked back through the calving records, she had a live calf that made it to market or the replacement pen every single year. That’s 15 calves in her lifetime, that’s the kind of longevity we strive for. Good genetics, good management!

Do we try for one more year??!

04/06/2026

Despite the entirely unpredictable weather, a couple tough loses and a few to many c-sections. We had another great calving season.

Once you’re on the other side of it, you truly wonder how you got through it. Calving in Jan/February is not for the faint of heart. It is continuous sleepless nights, it’s sore backs, it’s frozen hands & feet. It is putting every bit of grit and determination into every single day. It is knowing that if you don’t put the time and work in today, you’ll pay for it tomorrow. It’s getting a calf sucking at 2:00am even when you haven’t yet closed your eyes for the night. It’s night checks every 2 hours because newborns don’t survive in -40. It’s juggling school pick ups, extra curricular, still maintaining a home & making sure your kids know they’re still loved and important even though they do come second in this season. It’s not easy. And some days you’ll even question why you’re doing it.

But then you’ll hear the smacking of a calf that finally figured out how to suck, or a motherly beller of the heifer that took a few days to want her calf, it’s the warmer days when the baby’s are running with their tails straight in the air. It’s when your scour calf finally has a solid s**t, or your diptheria calf makes a full recovery. It’s now, in this very moment when you see that the hours, days, weeks & months of mental and physical exertion has paid off.

Most of all, it’s the pride in myself that each year I learn a little more & change a little bit. And that I know, without a shadow of a doubt, that my Dad is more proud with each passing day.

02/25/2026

It’s been a fast & furious calving season! A month in and we’re down to the last 20. Mother Nature has been all over the map this season from a week of -40, to a couple weeks of 0 degrees, then 2 feet of snow in 24 hrs and back to frigid temps! The end is in sight and I am counting down the days till we can see dirt.

02/06/2026

HALF WAY BABY!

With just over 70 calves in 2 weeks, we’ve hit the half way point. Weather still looks to be in our favour for the next couple weeks so let’s keep the hammer down!

02/04/2026

01/29/2026

With just over 30 calves on the ground, we’re about 1/5th of the way done after this first week. What a week it’s been! Today was the first day I’ve been able to catch my breath and appreciate these little babes running around. Weather has finally warmed up and I’m looking forward to this week much more than I did the last.

12/30/2025

Ranching is this…

Yesterday the cold snap finally surrendered after just about an entire month. The sun was shining, happiness was inevitable. I spent the day walking through the cows, giving scratches, pulling the kids on GT’s and prepping the barn for our upcoming calving season. Joy, light, gratitude. It filled my cup yesterday. That was yesterday.

Today, I went out and did chores like every other morning. Still warm out. Still gratitude. My last bale before parking the tractor was for my breds & 2nd calvers. As I crested the hill, my nightmare flashed before my eyes. A back leg straight in the air. It didn’t matter how fast I drove, how upset I was. She was dead. Hadn’t been for very long though, and the thought of ‘what if I would have fed them first’ plagues my mind. One of my favourite 3 yr olds that was heavy in calf.

An immense level of defeat will linger with me all day, without question. And what was excitement for the upcoming calving season yesterday, turned to dread today.

Tomorrow will be a new day.

12/16/2025

Growing up a Farm Kid.

The lessons weren’t often taught by sitting you down and looking you in the eye. They were taught in the silence, sitting on the armrest of the 4450. Sun beating through the window, watching the field become smaller one round at a time. They were taught while your hands were balled up in your mitts, hunkered down in the corner of the barn, silently watching for a new life to enter the world. They were taught hiding out of sight so the cows went where they needed to go without being spooked. The lessons were so clearly taught in his body language, in the anguish on his face, the heartache in his eyes. They were taught in that great big bear hug and ear to ear grin at the end of the day. They were taught at every 1:30, 3:30 and 6 o’clock alarm. They were taught with a frozen calf in the bathtub while you got ready for school. They were taught with blood soaked clothes. They were taught in every 5 gallon pail you filled in the tub. The lessons were taught in the missed holidays and sporting events. They were taught with a 4-h calf being pulled behind a tractor because giving in isn’t an option. They were taught in the urgency of getting pairs to pasture before a calf got hurt in the trailer. They were taught with a whiskey on a hard day and a cold beer on a good one.

The lessons were taught to every farm kid without a word being spoken. Hard work, love, empathy, resilience, determination, wit, heartache, grit, joy and pride. Most of all, you knew without a shadow of a doubt that there is so much more to life than yourself. Selflessness.

Being a farm kid is sacred. It’s not in what you learned, it’s in how.