I grew up in the late 1960s and early 1970s on a Saskatchewan Charolais ranch where my father worked.
It wasn’t long before he was trained in the art of artificial insemination, which was a skill that hadn’t been in much demand on the grain farms where he had previously worked.
Some of my earliest memories of the house where we lived on the ranch were of the big metal can that sat in our porch. My brother and sister and I were under strict orders to stay clear of that intimidating stainless steel mystery.
Read Also
Agriculture needs to prepare for government spending cuts
As government makes necessary cuts to spending, what can be reduced or restructured in the budgets for agriculture?
The scary wisps of fog that would escape when Dad opened the can to retrieve a straw of semen were a stark reminder that something was going on in there that I didn’t want to mess with.
Dad’s visits to the corral — semen straw in hand — often turned into after-supper outings for the four of us. (One of the other regular ranch outings was sitting on the tractor while he ran the manure spreader over the pasture — but that’s a story for another time.)
Anyway, once the supper dishes were cleaned up, we would make the one-minute walk to the corral, where Dad would separate a lucky cow from the herd, secure her in the chute, put on a long, plastic glove, attach the semen straw to the stick and go to work.
It was a bit of a mystery to me as to what he was doing in there, and my father wasn’t inclined to get into the actual details with us, but it always seemed to go off without a hitch.
Then came the fun part. Dad would peel off the glove — inside out, course — and hand it to one of us boys to dispose of in the burning barrel.
The glove would eventually make its way to its final resting place, but not before we chased our sister around the yard with it first. I’m not sure why she kept coming along with us on these trips when she had to know how it was going to end — maybe watching Dad at work was compelling enough to justify the final horror.
I also clearly remember talking to friends at school one day about what our fathers did for work.
“My dad breeds cows,” I told them.
Somehow that got back to Mom, and I was soon sat down and told in no uncertain terms not to say that again.
