By the way, both Steve Hoffman and Steve the hoof trimmer think only great people are named Steve. For clarity reasons, from this point forward, I will call the hoof trimmer Mr. Snippy. Now Snippy has nothing to do with his attitude. He is quite an agreeable guy and is very gentle with my cows, although, he did make quite a few funny and smart comments toward me. So anyway, on days when Mr. Snippy is scheduled to come clip the hooves on our cows, Steve and I try to get started milking a bit early, so we are ready when he arrives. Monday we were really prepared and had Travis come in the morning to help with chores.

On these special days, we milk the cows, send them back to the barn and let them eat as Sooner or later, we are going to come into the barn and start a frenzy while we try to sort cows that need to be trimmed and cows that don't.

This particular day, 50 out of 90 cows were going to be getting their nails done. Travis, Steve and I trampled into the barn to prepare to sort 50 cows. This time I thought I was prepared. I had a list of cows that needed the trim, and it was in numerical order.

Let the chaos begin. When cows get nervous, they either run like maniacs or, if they can't figure out where to run to, huddle in one big massive group. It was my job to find the cows on the list and separate them from the group. Steve and Travis were supposed to keep the separated cows from the non-separated cows. In the meantime, Mr. Snippy had finished preparing all his equipment by sorting time, and he was wandering around in the barn watching the three of us. At some points, I was a bit disgusted. I would sort a cow out and a few minutes later she was running back with the huddled mass. I would look at Steve and he'd be standing there looking at his list of numbers.

I think at one point, I actually said something like, "You really stink at sorting!"

I am such a joy to work with, especially when sorting animals. I can't help but think of what my brother Kurt jokingly said to Joey at bowling, "Be the ball!"

I wanted to holler out at Steve, "Be the cow!"

Eventually, about a half hour later, we managed to sort off 53 cows or so. Steve wanted to return those extra three cows to the barn.

"Are you crazy? A few extra cows are not going to kill us."

Mr. Snippy started trimming the hooves one at a time. (I would explain how he does this, but I don't have enough space; that's another entire column.) I enjoy watching him trim hooves, and often spend a few minutes observing.

Mr. Snippy said we need to trim our hooves more often; I told him I would work on Steve to accomplish this. I mentioned it to Steve and he said he would ask Mr. Snippy for suggestions on how to make this event more pleasant for the cows and every human involved. Mr. Snippy is such an intelligent person. He looked at Steve and explained how we should lock the cows into the head locks and release only the ones that need to be trimmed.

If Homer Simpson had been here he would have slapped both Steve and I on the forehead and said, "Doh."

You see, any other time we have to sort cows, that is exactly what we do. Why we couldn't think of using it when we trim hooves is beyond me. Maybe next time we have to sort the cows for a trim, it will go much quicker.

This article was written by Kerry Hoffman of New Ulm, MN.  It ran in the April 28, 2007 edition of the Dairy Star paper.  Kerry and her husband, Steve, live south of New Ulm, MN and milk a well managed herd of holsteins.

For questions, or comments, e-mail Kerry at kahoffman@newulmtel.net.