PART III

AUGUST 23

Tomorrow we’re pushing the herd into North High, 10,000 feet plus. This is where the cattle will get brisket, if they’re going to get it – altitude sickness, which will essentially kill them because it is so far back to lower elevation with no road access for loading them in a truck and getting them lower. We’ll see. The boys have been putting up electric drift fences to keep them from going over the ridges into the neighbor’s country to the north.

AUGUST 24

We pushed the herd into the draws leading up. Each draw has small springs feeding through them, each a diverse community of grasses and forbs with thick trees on the sides. The trees are different up here, not only in species, but also in the way they grow, bunched as if protecting themselves from the cold, high winds. 

AUGUST 25

The day was crystal clear, not a cloud in the sky. I could see all the country we have been traveling through back to the south. To the west I can see over the Big Horn Basin all the way to the Absarokas. The Basin is a huge stretch of very dry land in between mountains. To the east and south a bit, I could see the four forks of the Paint Rock. When I rode back to check on them this morning, the cattle were bedded down in small groups here and there, scattered from the bottom of the pasture to the top, chewing their cuds, seemingly in heaven. No brisket yet.

AUGUST 29

Moving the herd down into willow swamp, literally a marsh surrounded by fir, aspen and willow trees, a small clear creek moving slowly through the big bog. Meredith found a moose shed riding through it. It’s a moose kingdom; we see them every day. 

AUGUST 30

The herd has now become a mountain herd, completely adapted to this landscape. They climb steep slopes to get to the best feed. They realize we won’t let them lounge in the riparian areas where they water, so they walk down, drink their daily take, then back to the higher slopes and ridges. When we approach them to move them to another area, they all begin to move knowing what is happening. It’s such a privilege to work with them. Homegrown cattle make things so easy. They are so different from purchased cattle with bad habits.

SEPTEMBER 3

As I was riding East Cement pasture today, I kept feeling eyes watching me. Bobcat, lion, bear, mice, owls, hawks, countless birds, countless other animals. Me, the intruder in a world of silent creatures who live there, watching me pass through. Me, seeing none of them. Most days I am here, but I don’t always think about the effect of my presence upon them. The only time I do is when we are planning our grazing rotation and its interaction with the ecosystem and wildlife. Yet, there is an impact. Not only by my passing through, but with the herd that we are managing. I take for granted that I am placing myself and my interests in contrast to theirs. It is something that I think about often. What is the total weight that the natural world carries from us, the human overlords taking for granted the richness that surrounds us? At least I have the opportunity to do something positive about it. I am thankful for that.

SEPTEMBER 6

Moving the herd down into East Cement, the second-to-last pasture before October 1, the turnout date mandated by the Forest Service. It’s all down-hill now. We moved the horses and camp to the cabin, out of which we’ll operate until we move again, which will be our last time: out of the Paint Rock Basin where we’ve been all summer. Leaves are starting to barely turn, evenings are chilly. There’ll be icy frost on the grass soon. The horses are starting to grow their winter coat, just barely.

SEPTEMBER 15

Drifting the herd into Toe of Cement today. It’s a rich pasture along the creek, with perched meadows all over it with little groves of aspen, mostly open without trees. It’ll be nice to be able to see out, so much easier to gather. Tomorrow we back ride the pastures behind us. In a few days we’ll move the herd across the Paint Rock onto West Bench from where we’ll gather and move the herd down the canyon to HDQ right at the month of the canyon. That’ll be a long day, but a good one. I remember last year when our intern Dan teared up as he was riding behind the herd down the canyon trail, thinking of the summer behind him now, the challenges he’d faced, all the lessons, the endless camp fires and hard dirt he’d slept on. An experience that changed him, forced him to dig deep on occasions. He had never been on a ranch before, much less camped out in cow camp tending to the herd, many days alone. Not a lot different than Rob or Myles this summer. I’m looking forward to the walls in the canyon rising on each side of me thousands of feet, funneling us home.

SEPTEMBER 23

The herd is scattered in West Bench now, staged for the move down the canyon in a few days. Hard to believe we’re at the end of the season.

SEPTEMBER 25

We’ve been back riding, finding a few cattle here and there to catch up with the herd. We’ll be doing more back riding after getting home to find others – the trees hide cattle well. Myles and Rob are quiet in the evenings, it seems, compared to this summer’s lively chatter around the fire. I assume they’re thinking of the end of summer. These young guys have never been in a situation like this before, camping, herding cattle around. They’ve done such a great job, never complaining, always positive. 

SEPTEMBER 29

Moving the herd home tomorrow. Heavy clouds today, looks like rain tomorrow. We are all thinking about tomorrow being our last day in the mountains.

SEPTEMBER 30

What a day. Some days everything goes wrong, and today everything did. We rode out in the dark. And in the drizzling rain. As we approached the pasture in the early dawn, which was the side of the mountain, we saw that clouds covered the entire pasture down to the ground. We were all wet already. I thought as we rode toward it: we‘re going to ride right by the cows, I can barely even see the ears on my horse. When we reached the top of the pasture an hour later, the clouds lifted here and there, and we discovered that the entire herd had climbed to the very top and didn’t want to go back down the slippery slope to the trail at the bottom that leads down the valley to the canyon. We battled them all the way down to the gate and the next pasture we had to go through, which took several hours, instead of 30 minutes. We had to tie our horses to bushes and walk most of the time because it was so slippery. Up and down, up and down, back and forth, back and forth. By the time we finally got the herd to the bottom, we should have been at the canyon entrance, three miles further down. Even after we got there, it still was a hard, slippery push to keep the cattle moving. But once we arrived, they filed right down like a train on rails. Because of the lengthy and difficult push and the large size of the herd, a pile of calves ended up on the back end and as we approached the head of the canyon trail, about 12 of the little turds turned and got through us running all the way back to where they had last seen their mothers, way back. I rode over to Ava, Myles, Rob and Meredith and said to them, we have to ride back to get those calves. All of us were wet to the bone, fingers and feet cold, toes crabby in our sloshy boots. They all nodded without looking at me. With heads down, we trotted all the way back, but as soon as we started trying to get around them, they outran us, dodging here and there. They were much more agile than our tired horses. I saw we were not going to turn them and waved everyone off, saying, we’ll have to let their mothers come back after we reach HDQ, to retrieve their calves. In a few days we’d have to come back to get all of them. We all sat on our horses in the rain looking at each other and then quietly turned downhill and headed toward the remaining herd that we’d left behind.  When we arrived, only a few cows were there, most of them had already gone down the single file trail. Everyone looked relieved… light at the end of the tunnel! We pushed the last ones through the gate and followed behind them, all of us glad we were not having to work to move the cattle. The day had been one to remember for sure, but in our hearts we all knew there had been a great many more good days than bad.

OCTOBER 1

Today is Saturday. After yesterday, we were all looking forward to a free afternoon and the whole day Sunday off. We got an early start again, saddling up in the dark and riding back to where we’d left the herd, ready to bring the entire group to the corrals a mile away, where we would sort the cows and calves from the yearlings. We’d be done by noon, easy. 

But our luck was down. Again. About half the herd had climbed through a small crack in the fence and up a single file space between the cliff and a couple boulders and stood bawling on top of the cliff, unable to go anywhere. No wonder they sounded so close as we trotted toward them. Additionally, there were cattle spread out between them  and all the way up the creek a couple miles. When we saw how everything lay, we pretty much just looked at each other and half smiled. What else could we do? Accept it, I guess. So we did. Our half day just turned into a whole day. Or perhaps two. We divided up, two of us to bring the herd back down from the top of the cliff, and the other two to gather what was up the creek back down to the gate. Man. What an ordeal. There was nothing to do except do it. Several hours later, we had the herd back at the bottom at the gate where they were at the end of the day yesterday. Jonathan and I grabbed between 5 and 10 at a time and eased them down the slim trail. Meredith and Dylan rode a long way up the canyon, finding cattle grazing in the brush. When we opened the gate, they flooded through like a tidal wave. We just stood back and watched, all of us tired, each of us quietly wondering what was in store next, with the turn of luck the last two days. 

As it turned out, things couldn’t have gone smoother. By the end of summer, our team was a well-greased machine–we knew what each other was going to do before we did it. We sorted calves, cows, bulls and yearlings into two groups. In five days, semi-trucks will arrive to load the yearlings and take them to their new home in Texas. In three days, we will wean the calves and pregnancy test the cows. And the day after that, the unbred cows will be shipped to the auction, and the bred ones taken back out into the pastures on the face of the mountain into the BLM fall pasture until December, or when deep snow comes. 

And with this, the fall season begins, with our entire herd of cows on the ranch in-calf, babies that will hit the ground as newborns starting in March next year, just about the time a whole new crop of yearlings arrive from the other ranches, ready to begin the summer journey again. 

The circle keeps circling.

OCTOBER 2

The summer with all its ups and downs was so awesome. It’s always epic. I suppose because it was. But for now, the colors of fall fill the creek bed and mountain sides. The chilly mornings and warm days are thickening the fur on the horses and cattle and dogs. Winter time bald eagles that I see sitting in tree tops have arrived from other places. All this tells of the all-encompassing change that is underway here and in the rest of the world beyond what I can see. It makes me think now about cutting wood and the fires we will soon be building, the imminent winter storms bringing snow. But for now, we’ll enjoy fall, my favorite time of the year, and the peace that has come with knowing that our mama cows are safe at home.