KEBABS

The Easter weekend at Kangaroobie is an annual event. Many folk come up here from Melbourne and help to herd all the cattle into the stock yards so that we can separate the cows from their calves and do what needs doing. The cattle need drenching and the calves need to be ear tagged and injected and the boys need their tackle removed. It is an experience to be amongst a herd of 1000kg animals, persuading them to go where we want them to. They are a funny creature the cow, imagine weighing more than ten times as much as something and being frightened of it? The noise of them all mooing is a strange and surreal sensation as we push them into the yards. Each calf is put through the “race”, the narrow fenced section that runs through the stock yard, it puts them into single file so we can deal with each one in turn. If it is a girl it gets tagged in the right ear as it is squeezed inside the crush, then a couple of injections and off she goes. The boys are a different matter. As well as all that, Matt gets his sharp knife and bending over behind the unfortunate creature slices and cuts and removes the reproductive bits. It is a pretty swift operation. But hey, they do not go to waste, oh no. As an entrée to the evenings cocktail party (an appropriate title) the bits were threaded onto skewers and spiced. Moroccan style kebabs were then barbequed and sampled by most. An unusual texture and psychologically challenging, but not too bad. The things you do on a farm……..