June 27-July 3, 2004: Summer Ranch Week

Monday, June 28, 2004

Picked up the crew yesterday, our veterans this week are our favorites… The Cupcakes.Just a couple this time, Averille the original cupcake and her daughter Carrie. Averille has been here seven times and Carrie has been here four times. Another veteran is Jack from St Louis his second time here, he brought along his brother Dan and sister Peggy this time. First timers are Holly and Nancy from Ohio. Steve and D.A. from Ca. And Harley from Houston.

Today was a usual slow start Monday but we got it going in the afternoon. All the cattle I had pushed out of the south trap were back in there so we gathered them all up and brought them to the H.Q. Our plan was to brand them but the afternoon clouds finally gave it up and it started raining!

There was nothing to do but settle the cattle with hay on the water lot and wait till morning to brand. Ya just can’t brand a wet calf.

When I had gotten home yesterday Lyndsey told me one of the foals had a problem. A huge abscess on his withers, when I looked, it was the size of a football. We tried to get them in the corral but Saint was acting like one of our old bulls and wouldn’t let the mares come in the corral. We tried for an hour but had no luck. We will try again in the morning and see if they are hungry and his belly over rules his brain.

Hi 65 lo 42

Tuesday, June 29, 2004

It was a slow rain most all of the night, over half an inch! Just the kinda rain to soak in and green up the warm season grass that has just been waiting for a little moisture.

Lyndsey and I tried to get Saint and the mares in again this morning but he just won’t let them near the corral. That little foal really needs some attention and it kills me we can’t give it.

We were branding after breakfast and had a long morning of it. The clouds built up early and rained lightly all morning. We kept expecting to get rained out but by 1pm we had done 27 calves. As normal it started off a bit slow and shaky but as usual everyone learned the ropes and soon we had a good system going. The corral was muddy but that just made it more fun. Just as we got done with the last calf the bottom dropped out of the sky and it really came down. A bit over an hour later we had another half inch. After the long soaker we had last night this one was what we needed next. A good hard gully washer that ran water and filled up a couple tanks. Damn we are having a great year so far!

Most all the crew was dying to get riding so they saddled up in the pouring rain and headed out with John to check Bearwallow pasture for strays. They rode about three hours and found no cattle but saw some great country.

While they were out riding Lyndsey saw the sick foal lying out in the pasture asleep. She snuck up to it and quick and smooth stuck her knife in the abscess. Boy did she hit the right spot. Gross puss flew about five feet, at least a quart of it. It sprayed all over her! She then came and got me and I looked it over, what a mess. She went and haltered Saint, led him in the corral, the mares followed and we penned him as we sorted off the sick foal and its mom and put them in the small hospital pen. Averille and Carrie came to help us as we got the colt in a panel squeeze and started flushing the abscess. The colt loved it…it hurt so good. His mom has never been touched by a human and considering that, he was awesome. He stood about 15 minutes as we worked on him, flushing, cleaning, giving injections, he never offered a fight. We sure raise some good kids!

Hi was about 70 afternoon hi was 55 lo was 43

Wednesday, June 30, 2004

A finer summer day could not have been found. It was clear all morning then some late day clouds drifted by. The temperature was about 75, the air was moist, a light breeze, it just was perfect.

We were out in good time this morning, our first job of the day was to gather the cattle we had worked on Monday out of the south trap and put them into Negrito pasture. We spread out over the trap and in a couple hours had all the cattle gathered and out to new grass.

We then spilt into three groups. Lyndsey took Jack, Holly and Peggy riding to Little Fence Spring then doing a loop around Negrito Mtn. John took along Dan and Nancy doing a shorter loop around the mountain. Along the way they found a prolapsed cow and turned around taking it to the south trap. After getting her penned they went out and continued their loop. After several hours of riding they came up with a couple pairs they put in the south trap. They were never more than three miles from the H.Q. but put down a lot of miles in that area.

Lyndsey's group saw nothing till close to Burnt Cabin where they came across a bear sleeping along the trail. He got up and lumbered on off. Then they found three pair and a couple heifers, which they pushed through to Burnt Cabin tank and waited for me there.

I had along with me Averille, Carrie, D.A., Steve and Harley. We rode straight over Negrito Mtn. And down the other side and continued south. That’s where I got sucked into the Negrito Triangle. We followed an easy draw and before you knew it we were headed down a bit technical slope to the bottom of a canyon I didn’t recognize. Once in the bottom it was hell getting out the other side. I hate backtracking so instead of going back the rough way we came we headed up the other side. On foot. It was a hell of a climb. I had to stop every ten feet to catch my breath, everyone was sucking wind. We finally got to the top, it had been about a 200-yard climb and when I rimmed out the words that came to mind were “Oh shit”. We had just climbed our way into the Triangle. I knew where I was but wished I wasn’t there. It had been Quaking Aspen canyon we had crossed and were now in the pine maze south of it. We had no choice but to ride the canyon rim through the thick timber and dead fall till we could ride back north and cross the canyon again. It was about two miles before we hit the trail and then shuffled our way north to Burnt Cabin where Lyndsey's crew was waiting.

It was fairly late and had been a long day already so most of the crew went back towards the H.Q. with Lyndsey and the cattle. The calves all needed to be branded so the mission was to get them in the south trap so we can brand later in the week.

I went across into Bearwallow pasture with Averille, Peggy and Jack. We had found a gate open in the fence with a good trail of traffic through it. We rode about an hour seeing fresh sign along the way when we finally came to a little tank of water about a third of the way up the mountain. At first we just spotted three head but over the rise we found nine more and a couple calves. Back towards Negrito Pasture we headed down the Green Gate road. The cattle traveled pretty well and in about 45 minutes we had then through the gate back into Negrito and pushed them down the creek till we found a little bit of water. It was too far and too late to move them all the way to Dog Spring so we left them there for the night and headed home.

Everyone felt like they had ridden a couple miles by the time we all were home.

Thursday, July 1, 2004

John and Lyndsey took most of the crew out into 7HL and Pitchfork hunting up some strays out there. They had a pretty good long day of it coming home with a couple handfuls of cattle, which they put into Negrito, and South Trap, depending on weather they needed branding. I took Harley, Jack, Averille and Carrie out into Bearwallow looking for strays, we rode and rode and rode along the side of the mountain seeing no cattle that belonged to me, a few of the neighbors were out there but we just let them be. I wasn’t wasting my time and horses moving them out. Finally late in the day we found a half dozen head that we moved to the head of Rocker Canyon where we lost them as they took off into the black timber and were gone. There was no way or reason to try and get them out and turned around. Everyone had a good day and sure knew we had covered some serious miles.

Hi 80 sunfactor 90 till late day clouds gave us some relief.

Friday, July 2, 2004

Everyone but Averille went out into the open Country of 7HL gathering up a bunch of cattle that had slipped into there somehow. They got about 40 head and spent the day getting them to the T gates where they then sorted out the branded pairs from the unbranded.

Averille rode with me back into Bearwallow. We really were just doing a quick run through and then were picking up the truck and trailer we had left out there yesterday. Along the way we came across the cattle we had lost yesterday and pretty easy we got them moved to the gate and back out into Negrito where they belonged. It was a good way to end the week, a productive day and got home by 4pm. The weather was just fine. Dang good crew, who just plain wore me out all week, we covered a lot of ground and got some good work done.

Thanks to all!