A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

Last Friday was a “Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood” for me and Puncher and Paint. (And T.H. too.)  We go out first thing to ‘work’ the steers we bought at the auction on Thursday.

 Puncher does the foot work. She brings them up from the back pens to the chute where T.H. is getting all the stuff ready.

‘Working’ the steers means giving them shots, putting ID tags in their ears.

Squirt their backs with a parasite remover goop  and brand them.

That’s our brand.  The ‘Rockin’R7’

And if they are not a steer …. ummmm…. we turn them into a steer.

My job is to hold the tail out of the way, otherwise it would be whacking T.H. in the face.

They’ll stay in the pens for a few days to heal up and then get turned out on grass or wheat.

After lunch we went down to another place where our neighbors were dropping off some cows and calves in the pens.  We run their cattle on our grass for the summer. They rent the grass from us and T.H. takes care of the cattle. Last year we had to send them home early because we ran out of grass and water because of the drought.

This year is looking promising already.  We’ve had a lot of rain. All we had to do here was walk them out of the pens and across the highway to the pasture. They’ve been here before and they know where to go.

It was about 2:00 and such a pretty day. T.H. said we were done with cattle work for the day and I wanted to ride some more so I took the dogs and Paint for a little jaunt around the ranch to enjoy the green grass. T.H. always has to give me a chore at the same time so I was supposed to be checking the fences, too.

I know he’s already checked them  and their might be a test when I get back  .  We ran into Bevo out there. He’s a 13 year old roping steer that has the run of the place.

I got back and gave Paint his first bath of the season. He loves them. They must feel good on his itchy back.

It was about 5 PM by now. I thought we were done for the day until I stepped in the house and the phone rang.  A neighbor from another place called and said ” Your cattle are down on my place, blah, blah, blah …..” He seemed pretty excited about it.  I told him I’d find T.H. and we would be right down to take care of them. I wonder if he was one of those men that talk to women differently that they talk to men.

I found T.H. and off we went with Puncher and a 4 Wheeler. It seems these big bruisers went on a little ‘walk about’. It rained quite a bit last night and the water gap (fence across the creek) was obviously out.   They just wanted to see what goes on down stream. Here was about 20 of them. 50 more were still in the trees. T.H. said to take these up the road and put them in through the gate.

He said the rest of the 50 head would probably come back the way they left. Through the water gap.

And he was right. As soon as they heard us, they came running back. They are just like big dogs.

They all filed right back over the fence.

Except for a few non-conformists.  I sent Puncher to get them but we accidentally chased them the wrong way for awhile. Ooops. It happens.

Then we pushed them back up to the north end of their pasture while T.H. was fixing the water gap.

They liked us. They kept coming back. And I kept pushing them back up stream.

This is the ‘Water Gap’.  It’s a flimsy fence built across a creek. When it rains as much as it did last night, the water rises and the debris can take the fence out. Puncher thinks he’s playing.

We take them up further to the north wheat field and then we ‘skee-daddle’ out of there before they follow us back again.

Then we drive across the highway to check on the cows and calves that we turned out earlier today.

And take a moment to enjoy this breathtaking sight.

Love,  Cowgirl Red    aka Terah