Here in the ION country we have a different set of seasons. We have WINTER of course but then comes CALVING followed by BRANDING and then HAYING followed by SHIPPING and we are back to WINTER. I almost forgot hunting but that is a sub-season during shipping. If you think our world mostly revolves around cattle you would be correct. Before the ranchers can turn the cattle onto the range they need to be worked. This consists of branding them with the owners brand, castrating the bull calves, earmarking them with the owners mark and giving them a couple of vaccinations. There are special chutes which have been designed to make this a mechanical chore but you won’t find one amongst the ranchers around here. We are not old fashioned, we just know the value of a good horse. We have a use for the horse every day and that finger mashing contraption just sits most of the year and rusts. No, here we still work calves with good horses and ropes. I almost forgot to mention skill.

When it’s time to brand, the rancher sets a date and calls the neighbors and a bunch of friends. We all try to get to as many brandings as we can because it’s a chance to visit and have some fun together. Out here people are scattered out and don’t get together enough to get sick of each others company. It’s also a a chance to show off a new horse and maybe get some bragging rights on how good he is.

On the morning of the branding, every one shows up at the appointed time and gathers the moma cows and calves onto the rodear ground. This is usually just a fence corner with some extra fencing and all the pick-ups and stock trailers lined up to make a barrier. The riders hold the herd until they are settled down and the irons are hot. We mostly heat branding irons with a propane torch in a branding oven made of steel on legs. We like to say that a brand is a cow’s return address. Strange as it may seem to folks in the east, cattle rustling is still a very real problem..
When the irons are cherry red, the boss waves his finger in a circle and the riders ease into the herd. A buckaroo ropes a calf around the neck and takes a dally on his saddle horn with the rope. We do not use rubber on our horns because it is too hard on horses and cattle. As the header walks his horse to the fire another rider eases in behind the calf and ropes him by the heels. When the calf is positioned in the right spot by the ground crew, the heeler takes up the slack, dallys and lays the calf down in just the right spot. The ground crew removes the head loop and puts it on the calf’s front feet. The riders hold the calf with their horses while the ground crew works on him. Well, that’s the way it’s supposed to work. Many times the reality is a lot more fun to watch.

On Thursday we branded at the Fretwell’s. It was a really nice day and there were lots of good hands. There was a cooler full of beer and some of the boys really had fun before it was over. After about an hour of things going well, I heard a commotion and looked up to see a young fellow coming across the rodear trying to put a bronc ride on a sorrel horse. I think he got his rope under the horse’s tail with predictable results. He landed in a heap. Everybody had a good laugh and he got back on and went back to roping. A little later it all happened again but this time the kid got him rode. I offered to sell him a saddle that he could ride him in but he didn’t take me up on it.

The day wound down about 4 in the afternoon and every one agreed it was a lot of fun. There had been lots of good roping on lots of good horses. There were plenty of war stories told during the breaks and chow. We all headed back to what we usually do and wait for the next call.

“And it’s all about horses and cattle and men, the country, the work and the pride. And places where cowboys who still lean to lonesome, can pick up their saddles and ride.”

“For Those Who Lean to Lonesome” Don Hedgepeth

Any way, if you haven’t noticed, I haven’t been posting much. The reason is that, I have work in the saddle shop and am not building anything in the wood shop. I guess time will tell where the next dollar will come from. We are still eating way too much and working full time so all is well. I’m glad to be back.

On Saturday, long before the sun came up, Carleen and I hit the road for Winnemucca, Nevada. We stopped at Arock on the way to pick up a granddaughter and a spare, kid that is. After about 3 hours of fighting a snow storm we dropped down into Winnemucca. The reason for the trip was the annual ranch rodeo.

For a lot of years the people” in the know” have declared the American Cowboy deceased. Well, I’d say they did pretty good for a bunch of ghosts. It’s hard to find real cowboys if you drive on the Interstates or hang around the cities. Most of these ol’ boys came from places with names like Jordan Valley, Round Mountain, Denio, Arock, Rock Creek, Tuscorora or Plush. They came out of the sagebrush to have a get-to-gather, try to win a little money and take home some pride for the outfit. Ranch rodeos are based on what cowboys(buckaroos) do on the range every day. Professional rodeo has become a real sport but it is not applicable to the work on ranches. So, every event at a ranch rodeo reflects real life work on horseback. The ranch style team roping uses muley cattle(no horns) and the ropers must rope on leather wrapped saddle horns the same as we do on the ranch. No rubber wrapped horns allowed. This is the way we doctor sick cattle and brand calves in the spring. There is also stock saddle bronc riding. The cowboy has to ride his working saddle. the horses are tough but just like in the sage brush, all that counts is being there when the ride is over. Not a lot of rules and extra points if you can fan him with your hat and turn your head and talk to the judges. Also have team branding where 4 cowboys have to put a paint brand on 4 head of yearllings. They have to head and heel them then switch the head rope to the front feet before the paint brand can be applied. The winning team did in under 5 minutes and that includes switching ropers in the middle. The yearlings had a lot of fun chasing the cowboys as well.The girls did steer stopping where they head a steer and then stop for the time. The little kids had dummy roping and stick horse barrel racing. The calf roping was different from rodeo tie down roping in that the roper had to dally and then take the tail of his rope with him just like we do outside then tie the calf down.

The entries were made of ranch teams, 4 men and one lady. Some of those girls are as good as the men. While there was a winner in each event, the main goal was to win the team award. Now, that’s bragging rights! As you can imagine we had lots of friends there and we did a lot of visiting. The girls took off and did what kids do; they trooped around with the other kids their age and had their own community. Funny part was that they were hanging out with the same kids they go to school with. We don’t spend too much time worrying about our kids here. They’re pretty safe except for rope burns and gravel rashs.

By Sunday night everybody had disappeared into the sage again. Somebody had bragging rights and everybody felt like going back to work. Ian Tyson once described our part of the world as a black hole on the map. We headed home as well, feeling like we had some fun and spent some time with family. We’ll see them all again the 3rd weekend in May here in Jordan Valley for the Big Loop. Hope you can make it.

Our daughter and son-in-law live in Arock. Bob manages the Jordan Valley Irrigation District and our two grand-daughters attend Arock School. Attendance is hovering around 22 this year. Needless to say, everyone goes to all school events from ball games to Christmas programs. For many years school house dances were an event never to be missed. But then came satelite TV and computers. Last night Carleen and I went to a real school house dance again.

Arock, is nothing more than the school, the district shops, a post office that is about 12 feet square and 8 or 9 houses. Everyone in the area ranches for a living. Two young mothers, Robin Eiguren and Diane Fillmore decided it was time to have a genuine dance again. They went out on a limb and hired a really good band from about 300 miles away and cleaned out the old school house which is now like a community hall. they put the word out about a month in advance and made sure everyone knew about the event. The men brought in all their junk wood and old trees for a bonfire. Word went out and all the ladies made pies and deserts. There was a big barbeque wagon with chorizos and beef if you wanted more to eat.

They lit off the bonfire at 7 and everyone started to show up. We all kicked in $10 a head to cover expenses. There was a big table of desserts and the band was getting set up. Kids of all ages were swarming as only kids can. All the teenagers gathered up on the east side of the fire and sat on a wagon discussing how none of the boys knew how to dance while hoping the girls would drag them in to the music. These are kids that work as hard as their parents when they are not in school. The men stood around drinking beer and talking about cows, horses, ropings, horses, rodeo and the rain we were recently blessed with. There must have been over a 100 showed up. The Horse Thief Moon was shinning huge in the sky.

After a while the kids wound down, the fire died out some and most headed in to dance. Turned out those hairy legged boys could dance after all. As the little ones crashed they were laid out in one corner with blankets and tended by grandmas. The girls had brought in bales of meadow hay for everone to sit on. A couple bales were arranged to keep the babies from rolling out of the nest. The moms and pops got to dancing and laughing and having a good time. Every once in a while a moma would come over to check on her babies and be shued away by the grandmas.

The school kids were involved and the 8th graders had arranged to auction off pies to pay for their 8th grade sneak. Next year they will be going to the big school and in the spring they do a sneak day for some fun on graduating from the 8th grade. I was asked to auction off the pies and we raised over $200 for the kids fun day.

Miss Vicky, one of the local school marms, showed up in a dress. Now not many women wear dresses very often. She was having a great time dancing with her husband and teaching the kids some new tricks. I almost forgot for a moment that she grew up on one of the local ranches and ropes and rides as good as anyone else here. The young guys were trying to forget the last time she beat them at a roping. We had every kind of dancing going on that you could imagine and the visiting was non-stop. Many of the famiies showed up with 4 generations in tow. Grandpas teaching grand-daughters to dance and daddies swinging their little girls around and having fun. The Mackenzie boys drove 68 miles from Rock Creek to vist and have a good time.
Everyone knew everyone and we were a real community, sorta like here on LumberJocks.

” And we’ll gallop from afar, guided by the stars to dance the polka, ‘neath the Horse Thief Moon. By tomorrow night, she’ll be shining big and bright, gold and shiney like a Spanish Doubloon, Horse Thief Moon.”
“Horse Thief Moon” by Ian Tyson.

I wish we could all meet at the school house for a dance. It would sure be a fun time.

The Ezee-Feed arrived and I was busy with the pergola that goes along with this contract. I had it so long that Lee was worried that I didn’t like it. We visit back and forth a lot and I consider Lee a special friend. I had to get going on the cabinets so I got it up and ready to go last night. Lee was super helpful with the questions I called him about and always available. I walked out the door this morning determined that I would cut all my case parts with out any help. There are 12 cabinets in this set. 4 of them are corner cabinets and the rest are regular cabinets, all lowers. The case sides, bottom and tops are 3/4 inch birch and oak plywood and the backs are 1/2 inch birch. The base is 4 inch , 3/4 inch birch as well.I honestly couldn’t believe how easy it was to use the Ezee-feed. I had all the case parts cut by 3:00 in the afternoon. That included all the shelves and base parts. No messed up sheets and I wasn’t worn to a frazzle. Between 3 and 5:30 I got all the rabbits done on the back of the side panels and the shelf holes in three and sanded all the parts for those as well. I figure I came close to paying for the Ezee-Feed on this one job. Carleen is happy she didn’t have to help, etc. etc. I don’t know why. I think I’m a delight to work with.

If you get a chance to try one of these, do it. They are made to cut sheet goods so if you never use plywood it probably won’t be cost effective. But if you build cabinets and can’t afford a CNC, this will certainly help get the job done easier.

A neighbor called up and asked my help getting his cows to fall pasture. Kirk owns a small ranch outside of town. His wife works as a teacher and administrater for our school system. She does a great job and we really appreciate her efforts. Of course, I told Kirk I’d be there. This was a trail drive to Parsnip Peak, about 10 miles from the house, all the way on Kirk’s ranch. We saddled up at about 7:30. We live on the far western side of the Mountain Time Zone so please forgive the late start. We needed to be able to see. Bob Wrotten and Pat showed up to help us sort. Bob is one of our local deputy sherrifs and a local rancher as well. He also rides a saddle he won at the Jordan Valley Big Loop in 1983. He had 100 head of cows going with us and Kirk had about 200. It was a partly cloudy day, cool so the cows would travel along easy. It had rained on Monday so there was no dust for the first time since May. It never really warmed up but the sun did come out. Bob and Pat got us started on the trail and then after about 2 miles left us to our own devices. When you are out on the range in our country there is real silence. Pretty soon Kirk and I had the cows strung out over about 3/4 of mile and traveling a long about right. It felt good to be sitting on my top horse out in the real world. The only sounds were horseshoes on rocks and the rattling dewclaws of the cows. Kirk and I would line the cows out then get together at the back of the herd and visit for a while until we needed to do some more work. This was the first time I’d gotten to ride since the first of July. My leg is still not good but is some what better.

Back at the ranch, while Bob Wrotten and I were rideing across a meadow we got in to a conversation that is the reason I blogged this. He is now in law enforcement and I live in my shop yet to both of us our identity is here; sitting on a horse working cattle. Kirk drove log truck for 20 years so that now he can raise cattle. It seems that no matter what we do our self-perception is tied to horses, cattle and the range that is our home. You might perceive me as a craftsman but in my own mind I will always be a man on horseback tending and working cattle. Our converstion turned to the young people of today. Kirk has three sons; one grown, one in college and one in high school. None of these young men suffers from an identy crisis, they know where they are going. All have had the benefit of growing up working with their father and seeing what they have accomplished at the end of the day.

Kirk and I got the cows on water and rode back to the truck visiting along as men will do. Bob had brought my truck and trailer out part way so we wouldn’t have to ride all the way back. The trail was about 10 miles but when you are trailing cows you ride about twice that distance pointing them the right way. We got to the truck a little past 4:00. By the time we got the horses taken care of and something to eat it was 6:00. I still had to make a 60 mile round trip to take my horse back to pasture. It was a great day sitting on a good horse in my reality. Now I must go to the shop and work. Perhaps a little calmer for the time I spent yesterday.

Well, yesterday was the day. I was building the face frame for a corner kitchen cabinet. You know , the one with the lazy susan and the angle across the front. The cut list called for stiles that were 30 inchs long and 2 1/4 wide ripped at a 45 degree angle. I always build with a 1/4 inch over on face frame. I built the face frame and held it up to the cabinet. Even allowing for the plywood which was not a full 3/4 inch, I had way too much over hang. When I measured the stiles, they came out at 2 1/2 inch!! OOPS! No biggy, measure 2 1/4 and mark a 45. set the saw up and re-rip them. No dice! Not enough room on the left side of the blade. I clamped a piece of 1/2 inch plywood on the rip fence and attempted to go under the blade a little at a time, no good either. I also tried to use the 45 bit in the router table, nope. I built another face frame and that one can join the other boo-boo’s in the shop which include half of a full carved saddle seat that grew another size while I stamped it, a drawer going the wrong way and assorted other fun things to look at. I tend to nail these mis-comboobleations on the wall as a warning to any more of them that come around. sort of like hanging dead coyotes on the fence as a warning. It doesn’t work with the coyotes either.

Tom