Trailing with Tap

Update

2008-09-26T19:31:00.003-06:00

Keeping a blog going is a bigger commitment than I expected. I am doing this so I have a record of my life, and what goes on with our ranch. This year has been unusual, but really, they all are. We had a heck of a storm on May 1st, which doesn't happen too often in this country. Fortunately. It rained an inch and a half or so, then we had about a foot and a half of snow on top of that. Then a few days later, we had another good rain, and it made approx. 5 inches of moisture in a weeks time. The south end of the ranch, down around the Crow Buttes, had more rain this year than this end of the ranch. It is not generally that way, but I am pretty sure that we have had well over 20 inches of rain down there for the year. The grass is fantastic yet, and the cattle are doing very well. Yesterday we sold the lighter end of last years calves, and even though the market was lower some, they weighed well and sold good. The steers weighed 930 plus average. We have sold 4 loads of steers, and will probably not sell anymore calves this year. The rest will be weaned and either kept for replacements, or sold for yearlings next year. I hope that we can keep our markets at this level at least, or hopefully better. The last few years have been good to us and other ranchers in the US. The last thing that is happening on the ranch is that we have a new employee who will be starting work in another week or so. I hope he works out, as he and his wife seem like nice people.

Last weeks photos

2008-09-18T21:30:00.001-06:00

Bull Day

2008-07-02T06:38:00.002-06:00

Today is the day that will influence what our next year's calf crop turns out to be. We hope that it will keep improving steadily. Damp and cool here today, but just right for gathering bulls and turning them out to various pastures.

Sorry

2008-02-18T12:30:00.001-07:00

I have too much going on lately to keep good updates on my blog, so it will be suspended until further notice..

Took a short trip today.

2008-02-07T19:41:00.000-07:00

I went over to my friend George's for a little bit today. He has driven horses a lot, and is helping me with things now and then. I have driven and owned other teams, but this is the first time I have broken a horse to drive myself. So today I went on a feed run with him to see how he does things. His horses are very mild, and hardly ever step out of a slow walk. They get down and pull instead of wanting to break into a trot like mine sometimes do. I know it all takes time, and I have made a lot of progress with my horses and myself. I am not always a patient guy, but you absolutely have to not be in a big hurry with pulling horses. I have heard that horses don't carry watches, or look at a calendar, and sometimes you have to tell yourself that when you are trying to hurry things along.

Here are 3 photos from George's country, and two of the Jumpoff on the way home.

BTW, sorry I have a lot of days that I haven't entered anything in this blog, but I sure can find other things to do at times, and it takes a lot of dicipline to do this on a day to day basis.

Today

2008-02-02T19:04:00.001-07:00

What a nice day we had today! Must have approached 40 above with light winds. When I went and did some feeding this morning, I saw another couple bucks that eluded the hunters. You might have to look close to see the buck in the first picture.

We are giving the cows some of the alfalfa that I have been hauling lately. We are feeding it in place of the cow cake we normally feed to them. (That is because of the price of cow cake.) It is nice hay, and they slick up the spot that they hay was on down to nothing. I threw a couple scenery pictures in just for the heck of it.

I am still around.

2008-01-29T18:35:00.000-07:00

I haven't been very active on my blog for a while. I seem to have other things taking up my time, and the camera has been idle for a while. I have a lot of things to talk about that I am interested in, and sometime I will take the time to get into some of them. lol. The Primary elections are at the top of the list, and I am watching the Florida primary results in the background at the moment. I can't get too fired up about any of the candidates, but there are sure several I do not like, and would never vote for. In both parties. I am a Conservative Republican, and always will be, so most of the candidates are less than desirable to me.

On another subject, we have been selling our calves over the Western Video Market for several years, and I sent some of our ranch photos in to their ranch page. I expected them to use a few, but they used all of them. Here is a link to their page.

http://www.wvmcattle.com/photos.htm

Brrrrr!

2008-01-22T06:54:00.000-07:00

It was seventeen below zero for a while before I went to bed last nite. This morning it is above zero a ways, but a good breeze is blowing. About all one can do on these days is remember the nice days, and hope the weather warms up soon. For the most part though, we have had a mild winter this year.

Here's hoping..............

Thursday Doings.

2008-01-17T16:06:00.000-07:00

Maybe I sound like a broken record, but I am still working with some horses, trying to get a suitable feed team. I worked one of my paint horses a bunch, trying to get him to mellow out enough to travel out on a lose line, but he just did not want to play the game. I have found a suitable substitution for him, but now the better paint horse is giving me a few problems. The paints were broke to pull a light wagon, or buggy, (at a trot) and they cannot seem to get that out of their minds. Kind of like trying to teach an old dog new tricks. I am gaining on the better paint and his new mate, but some days I wonder???? If someone asked me if they were working out good, I would be like the Norwegian who was asked if his car blinker was working. Yes, No, Yes, No, Yes, No. lol. I have enough Norvegian in me to get away with saying that.

Here is the makeshift team, and the flatbed I built this week for my running gear. I took another photo of it, and one of my new collars. They are real nice collars that came from Iowa. I am pretty sure they were made by the amish. I did not have enough collars for these smaller horses, so I bought 2 new ones.

Cattle and mirage photos.

2008-01-14T18:09:00.000-07:00

It had better days.

2008-01-10T10:04:00.001-07:00

Christmas gift.

2008-01-10T09:58:00.000-07:00

I wanted to show a photo of a gift that I made for a friend of mine. We ordered the sign out of a catalog, and I built the brand and mounted it on the pipe. It will be displayed in his yard, next to his turnoff.

Contented Cattle

2008-01-10T09:49:00.001-07:00

Here are a few photos of our late calving cows, on winter range. They will begin calving around the 25th of April, and so far all they owe us this fall is grass and some salt. I imagine sometime in Feb., we may start giving them a little cow cake to go with the grazing. If we don't get a bunch of snow, they should have nearly enough grass to get through the winter without supplementing them with hay. That is our goal anyway.

A Sunday Drive

2008-01-06T20:15:00.000-07:00

This afternoon a friend of mine and I went to North Dakota to see a cousin of mine who is in the hospital there. I picked him up and we headed across country on a bladed trail that may not have been a shortcut, but it was the scenic way to where we were headed. I snapped some pictures on the way, and they all happen to be taken from the grazing association that he is on. We did eventually hit a road that we made better time on, but this was the best part of the trip.

Colors

2008-01-05T18:27:00.000-07:00

We had the most beautiful colors just before sunrise this morning. I don't know if the pictures do it justice, but it is the closest I can get.

Hay handling and feeding.

2008-01-05T12:56:00.000-07:00

Last week I built a bobcat mounted bale spear that was part of an old frame we had around here. It is for handling the 3x3x8 foot square bales we bought. They are fed to our replacement heifer calves we have on pasture. It is great hay, and the calves love it. I am also trying to get a horse ready to drive, and he is the solid colored one you see in the one picture. They make quite the matched team, don't you think. lol.

It has really warmed up again in the last few days, and we lost the skiff of snow we had. The temps. have been over 50 F. the last three days.

A contrast.

2008-01-02T17:44:00.000-07:00

I believe it was in January of last year, we went from this........., to this.............

The first photo is of a prairie fire which was man made, and the last is burning slash piles in the hills west of us.

It sure can change in a hurry around here.

My "Stairway To Heaven" photo

2008-01-02T17:39:00.000-07:00

A professional photographer my not agree that this is a great photo, but here is my favorite picture that I have taken.

It was taken in one of our winter pastures last winter.

This and that.

2007-12-31T06:47:00.000-07:00

Lately it seems as though every time I look up I can see a job or project that I could be doing, and that is ok because it makes the slow winter days pass a little faster. I have spent quite a lot of time trying to get everything ironed out with the team, and other little projects. The horses behave themselves pretty well until I get too much weight on the wagon, then one of them would rather not pull his weight. If I go at a good clip, then he is fine, but when I try to hold them up to a slow walk, he thinks it is time to stop. It will get better with time, and the stone boat I borrowed seems to help them a lot. I ran over to a friends ranch the other day and he helped me with a few things, and the pictures of the wagons, etc. are from his ranch. The panoramic picture is from the drive into his outfit. The other photos are from a frosty morning we had here the other day. Sorry that they got out of order.

Four Photos From Christmas Day

2007-12-27T06:38:00.000-07:00

Christmas Day weather was very nice here. On my rounds, I snapped a few shots of the day.

The center two photos were taken of our neighbor as he was waiting for cows to come into cake. The weather has been good for the most part for cattle to do well this fall.

Learning Process or Trial By Fire

2007-12-27T06:28:00.000-07:00

The last week I have been adding to my resume' by learing to do a little trucking. I have no aspirations to be an over the road trucker, but I figured since it needed to be done I just as well learn to do it. I have been making trips to North Dakota after some very nice alfafla hay that was baled up into the medium sized square bales. It is great hay to haul as it doesn't stick out past the sides of the truck, and you can still see what is going on behind you.

Christmas Eve Day Rambles

2007-12-24T20:50:00.000-07:00

My sister was here today, so we took a short drive around the country in the pickup, then later took a spin with the horses. We had a nice Christmas Eve, and I hope everyone else did too.

All the photos were taken off our ranch, just west of here a few miles, except the first one. I put the hayrack on the running gear today, so I can feed some of the medium sized square bales we bought last week.

Todays addition.

2007-12-20T18:19:00.000-07:00

We have been trucking some cattle to the sale the last couple days, and I stopped along the road and took this picture yesterday of an old set of corrals, and Castle Rock butte.

A few from the past.

2007-12-19T20:10:00.000-07:00

I thought I would add a few pictures from the past year or two. The first and third are of our kids, and the middle one is from Bear Country in the Black Hills. We went thru there last Mothers Day, and that big old bear just stood up and started scratching his back as we drove by. We all got a big kick out of it.

Take a ride with me.

2007-12-17T09:29:00.000-07:00

Thought I would show some of you what it looks like to sit in the "drivers seat" while you are driving horses. It got so nice late yesterday that we took them out again. I think I will use them to feed calves one of these days.

The others photos are cows on fresh grass, and my daughters favorite cat doing what cats do best.

Here are a couple of "people pictures" for you.

2007-12-16T12:59:00.000-07:00

I thought I better add a couple photos of some of us who live here on the ranch. I am dragging one in at a branding here last year, and the other one is a photo I took of the kids riding with me last spring.

A nice winter's day.

2007-12-16T12:01:00.000-07:00

Today is quite the winter's day here. It is not the warmest day we have ever had here, but real nice nonetheless. We have virtually no snow, and it is around 40 degrees at noon. It is a bit breezy, but hey, it can be a lot worse. We are not unfamiliar with open winters here, but on other hand we can get some tough winters once in a while, with lots of snow and wind.

I went out this morning to open a gate and let one bunch of cows into another rougher pasture. It has good shelter, and also lots of grass this year. The pasture should run the cows a long time, unless we get too much snow, and it covers up the grass. When we start feeding cake to those cows, I usually end up sitting and waiting for them a while as they sure can get scattered out. We happen to have a couple highpoints on our ranch that give a great vantage point of the surrounding country. One of them is in this pasture. When I am waiting for the cows to gather up, I am always amazed at what a beautiful view I have from up there. To the south, I can see Terry Peak, located in the Black Hills, and it is close to 70 miles in the distance. Looking to the west, the Short Pine Hills and Lone Mountain loom up nearby, and I can see parts of the Long Pine Hills, and the Sheep Mountains in Montana. Also the Jumpoff (you can see it in my first picture), is full of badlands and mud buttes, and lay just to the NW of here. To the North, I can see the Cave Hills and the prairie below, and to the East the Slim Buttes run a long ways from N. to S. All of these hills have pines, hardwoods, and other various scenery. And to cap things off, most of the prairie below has scattered mud buttes, that poke up like many loose haystacks on the range.

Once in a while you have to count your blessings, and it is always easy to appreciate life when you are in a scenic location and have plenty of time to soak things up.

2007-12-16T11:55:00.000-07:00

Playing around this afternoon.

2007-12-13T18:27:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine came over today and we messed around a little with my horses. He is a very good teamster, and uses a team to feed with every winter. In fact the low cost ranching guru's would think he must be on the right track because he does not own a tractor. And we are not necessarily ranching "down south". He does have a skid steer that he loads large square bales up with. I have some photos on one of my earlier postings, that were taken on the ranch that he is on. It is good rough country. He is the one driving the team in the photos.

This is my paint team with the wagon and caker mounted. The horses did real well today, and it was an enjoyable afternoon.

Working calves.

2007-12-12T19:28:00.000-07:00

It is the time of the year when we bangs vaccinate the heifer calves. So today we had the vet come up and get the job done. We ran them through the chute, and things went pretty well. Some of the heifers weren't crazy about going into the squeeze chute. I was surprised about that as they have never been caught in one before. The other times we worked them, they got their shots and went right through, without being caught. The calves are getting about a pound and a half of cake, and 7 or so pounds of alfalfa hay. Then they need to graze for the balance of their ration. They seem to be doing pretty fair, and they are out where they get lots of exercise in a decent sized pasture. It sure has eliminated the sickness so far. That is always a plus.

I don't think they need to put of lots of weight over the winter, but they need to grow frame so they can catch up next summer. I think it has worked as they have weighed just as much by the next fall as they did when we used to winter them in the lot.

Welfare cases, and and old mower.

2007-12-12T19:16:00.000-07:00

When I was out checking water, the cows were thinking it was time for them to get a handout. But no such luck. They will have to wait a while for a bite of cake if the snow holds off. They are wintering very well so far on grass, salt, and fresh water. This bunch will be moved to fresh pasture soon, but they are doing great where they are at.

The old mower in the lower picture is a remnant from earlier owners of this ranch. It has always made me think I should do something with it, but so far all I have done is look. It probably will stay that way. I need to get the dates off the pictures, as they are wrong.

Archive Tuesday

2007-12-11T10:14:00.000-07:00

Thinking back to warmer days.

Nature's Portrait

2007-12-10T21:02:00.000-07:00

Just recently we got the kids gathered up for their yearly Christmas card photo. We drove a short way up the road to some neat mud butte formations, that were all "dressed up" in mother natures finest. We spent a short time afterwards hiking around, and enjoying the beauty of things.

Christmas Tree Huntin'

2007-12-10T09:40:00.000-07:00

The kids and I went looking for a tree last Sat. We went over to a neighbors on the Forest and found a nice one. We always used to cut pines, but the last three years we have found nice Juniper trees to cut down. It was a calm day, with just a tiny bit of snow in the air, but a nice day nonetheless. Of course, I took the camera along, and took a few photos of the country.

I think I have their attention.

2007-12-10T09:34:00.001-07:00

This fall weather is something!

2007-12-05T16:41:00.000-07:00

This area has seen some wild swings in the temps. lately. We had some snow last weekend, then it got down to just below zero on Sunday morning. By Tuesday morning at daybreak, it was well over 40 above, and had a daytime high of 58 degrees. That ate up the snow in a hurry. By early evening it was back down below 20 degrees, and we had light snow again last night. It has to be hard on livestock , but it does give us locals something to talk about! And the light snow cover makes for some nice photos.

Frisky Calves

2007-12-01T11:17:00.000-07:00

The calves had quite a bit of life in them this morning! I was trying to gather all of them up, so as to feed them together, and they came running in. They sure were "feeling their oats", so to speak. I liked how the sequence of pictures turned out.

*

Frosty Morn.

2007-11-30T09:42:00.000-07:00

It was a cool 4 below zero here this AM. At this moment it is actually a "steaming" 12 degrees, on the plus side. It doesn't feel too bad, with light winds.

The livestock don't seem to mind it at all, and they weren't even terribly excited to come in to feed. We are only feeding the bred heifers, heifer calves, the selling bunch of calves, and some short termers etc., that are for sale. We are actually supplementing them, as most still have to graze some too.

As we calve closer to green grass than some ranchers do, the requirements of our bred cows are not real high right now. If they have lots of grass, and good water they will do quite well when the weather is moderate.

Here are two pictures of the coming two year old heifers eating some haybet barley hay (that we purchased for them), and a couple panoramic pics.

Recent Photos

2007-11-29T19:06:00.001-07:00

I finally got a picture taken of our ranch sign, which is also our brand. The other two photos are of a butte, and some range around here.

More fall photos.

2007-11-26T19:13:00.000-07:00

Here are a few pictures I took today. The top photo is taken of our ranch HQ with the hills in the background.

The two cattle pics. are of our repl. heifer calves enjoying the the nice day we had here today, and coming into feed.

Then lastly, the corral pictures are part of the finished product of our late summers work. We took down an older large barn, and some older corrals to make room for this corral system.

A few thoughts on low cost ranching.

2007-11-24T21:05:00.000-07:00

First off, I thought I would throw in a picture I took of working on a set of corrals this fall. We had torn down the old set, and "modernized" them, trying to streamline things for a smooth shipping day, and for other cattle working projects.

On this ranch, we have never calved early because of shelter, feed, weather, etc., but over the last few years we have backed our calving up later, for several reasons.

Since the horrible spring blizzard we had on April 5th thru 7th in 1997, we have gradually moved the calving date back to around April 7-8th from March 20th or so. That was a brutal, cold blizzard that killed a lot of stock in this area.

A year and a half ago, we added some property to our ranch, and it spread us out enough during calving, so we started a second herd of even later calving cows, with a due date of April 20-25th. That is still not completely out of the woods as far as spring storms are concerned, but should eliminate some of the cruddy, cold days that are tough on baby calves. The cows in that herd calve unassisted with us looking at them every now and then as time permits, but they are on their own for the most part. They calved that way with very good success this last spring. I think later calving is what we are going to see in a lot of operations in the future.

I will have to add more about the costs/expenses, and other thoughts on this topic in other posts later on.

Ranch Signs and Travels

2007-11-24T20:48:00.000-07:00

I have always been somewhat interested in Ranch signs around the country. Last Saturday I was at a bull sale in Wyoming, and I took a bit of a side trip on the way home. Here are a few that are between Casper to just east of Midwest Wyo. I will have to get a picture of our ranch sign sometime. It is just a large version of our brand, and it has reflective tape on it that makes it very visible during the nighttime.

This is an big hill that caught my eye. It is just south of Midwest.
This last photo was taken up above Casper. You are looking NW.

2007-11-23T11:39:00.000-07:00

The wild Turkeys are still hanging around the yard this morning. As I came home from feeding the replacement heifers, they were cruising around the corrals. They moved away, but none acted too threathened with my presence.
Here is a part of the National Forest that lies off our property, just west of here. It is called Lone Mountain by the locals.
Just west of HQ, looking back to the SE. The N. Moreau River is just to the right of the Cottonwoods.
The calves coming in to their mornings feed of alfalfa. Pine hills in background.

2007-11-22T18:51:00.000-07:00

Just a few more from the same day. It was a fun day.

2007-11-22T18:42:00.000-07:00

The real date on this photo should say around Oct. 1st of this year. We were headed out to gather cattle on weaning day, at a friends ranch. I had to stop, look back, and take a photo.

Holiday and a first posting.

2007-11-22T16:53:00.000-07:00

Hi, I am a cattle rancher in Western SD. I had a few minutes today, so I thought this might be a good day to start my blog. It is a nice day here today. A bit cool, but clear and calm.

Had a nice holiday. I don't eat Turkey, so had grilled beef filet's instead. Mmmm! We don't see a lot of wild turkeys on our ranch, but just a few minutes ago nine of them wandered through while I was out prowling around. They must have been giving their thanks to me for not partaking in their "fowl" meat. They sure didn't seem to be too nervous around me anyhow!

Hope you all had a good Turkey Day.

Tap