The Red Poll Girls (and one boy)

It's a comfy life for a Red Poll cow here, with summer days spent lounging in the shade:

Or gathering around the water tank for some bovine gossip:

Or munching tender grass:

Or tending to one's baby:

Or, as Jasmine is doing here, chewing her cud:

This is little Merlin, the only male in the herd. He's growing rapidly and is both friendly and smart. He's also fiercely bonded with his mother, Jasmine, and the only calf I've so far not been able to catch and tattoo:

There have been two round dirt depressions in a far corner of the pasture whose origin have been a mystery to me - until, that is, I saw Violet dusting herself in one of them. Besides rolling her head and neck in it, she pawed the dust up onto her belly, a form of fly control, I'm guessing:

Little Merlin again. His little boy parts are visible now. They were hard to see when he was born:

Jasmine and Merlin. Look how big he is already. He's going to be very difficult to tattoo and tag:

Merlin, lovingly nuzzling his mom, with Gladys tagging along for the company: