Allison - The Idaho Rancher's Wife

Headed to Fall Pasture

November 16, 2014 by Allison

Calling it fall pasture now sounds wrong that it is currently covered with a sheet of white snow, but since the calendar still calls this time of year fall we will go with it. Fall pasture. That’s where we headed a week ago. The Rancher asked me one of my favorite questions- do you wanna ride? Um… YES!

It really was a fabulous day and a fabulous day for a ride. Unfortunately… there was one part of that day that wasn’t so fabulous- I didn’t bring my camera! I was so busy getting kids together and getting out before the cowboys left me that it slipped my mind. But in some ways it made for a different kind of ride.

I always enjoy being out for a ride and I love capturing the scenes of the day. But as I’ve been riding and photographing at the same time, I realized that as much as I take in with my camera I don’t personally it take in. I look around seeing my next photo or noticing some exciting action and then I take the picture instead of internalizing what’s happening. And that is exactly what I did this ride.

We gathered in the forest cattle, the same bunch we had brought in twice already. This time it was to sort off all of our remaining cows to head over a couple of hills to the fall pasture. Luckily they pretty well sorted themselves… a few of them were a little hot and if too many were that feisty it might have made for a bad day… When they take on the horse in front of them rather than running through the gate, you can see that there was plenty of fun that day. Once we got all of our cows out The Rancher, Cowboy E and I started moving them down the road.

It was uneventful. The cows moved slow because they were busy eating all along the way. The air was chilly but the sun beating down was warm and comfortable. We commented about how good and fat the cows looked. And we called for the dog keep the cows moving (NEVER move cows without a good cow dog… he’s worth his weight in gold!). It was nice to have a moment to connect to what we were doing and take it all in. The creak in my saddle, the cow’s hooves on the gravel, and the dog running were the only things to really take my attention.

This little uneventful ride helped me realize how beautiful of a life we live, in its simplicity and in its intensity. We have times of the year that we fall into bed exhausted only to wake up early again the next morning. Then there are the days that The Rancher gets done early enough to saddle up the horse for the kids to ride. In all of it we get to live a life where we work as a family to raise beef to help feed the world. We work hard, play hard, and have beauties all around. On this ride to fall pasture I didn’t capture the day with my camera, but I certainly captured it with my heart. If only I could help you to see the imprint it has left on this rancher’s wife.

The End of a Satisfying Year

November 14, 2014 by Allison

The first week in November is always a big week for us. Over that week most, if not all, ranchers in the valley sell and ship their calves. We calved out these babies, grown them over the summer, and then put the weight on them since weaning. I’ve said it over and over-this is the day we work for. Sale day is the day that makes every other day possible. And when its over we can finally relax (its only for like a day until we start thinking about the next year!).

We have had amazing growth over the last two months and it really showed on sale day. They were chubby, so chubby that we weighed in heavy! Seriously, fantastic! When we contract our calves, we contract less than what we have (mostly to hedge our bets because occasionally we contract before the calves are even born!). When we weigh heavy and have more calves than in the contract, that means there are more we can keep and sell on the side. Its like having two paydays! We do keep back anywhere from 90-115 heifer calves to keep for replacement heifers the next year.

The morning of sale day we bring the calves, already sorted into steers and heifers. We weigh all the calves, getting an average weight. Based on that weight, our broker will pick out any calves that he won’t be taking and then we reweigh those (to make sure we have the MOST accurate weight down). After the work of sorting and moving and weighing and reweighing its time to load the trucks. Once those trucks are full, they drive off into the sunset and we all live happily after. Ok, not really… It was noon so more like driving into the sun…. And its not all sunshine and roses, but having another year behind us is as sweet and satisfying as any fairy tale ending!

Why Ranchers Don’t Need a Personal Trainer

November 12, 2014 by Allison

I just got done spending a few days helping The Rancher fence. Mostly by accident. Like, my kids took off trekking down the busy road to find their dad and I followed after in my sweats. And of course once I got there I got put to work. And boy was it work, actually more of a workout. I tease The Rancher from time to time that he had better get doing some exercises before he has to move his buckle down a notch. But in reality, his daily living is enough of a workout that he doesn’t need to exercise.

Well, I take that back. As an exervise science major I believe that everyone needs to exercise, everyday. But hanging out with a rancher provides enough core building, heart racing, strength training exercises that you won’t have to hit the gym at the end of the day.

For example, take the job of tamping- using a narrow, 15 pound bar to pound and pack the dirt around a fence post. And since nothing done on the ranch is slow, you do it fast, as fast as you can. You squeeze your core tight as it will go to stabilize your shoulders as they slowly begin to burn from lifting the bar over and over again.

Moving hand lines. In the days when I was a pipe mover I always considered it to be my morning exercise routine. Squatting with an extra 50+ pounds stretching out 15 feet off each side is a great for a little balance work, especially while the water is still running up and down the pipe.

Roping… oh boy roping… I’ve learned this last year what a great workout this is. Keeping your elbow, swinging at just the right rhythm and then still having the strength to throw is so much harder than what it looks. In fact, I have yet to even remotely come close to figuring this out… But I have gotten sore, super sore.

And then there are all of the sledge hammers. Big, little, tall, short- they all have one thing in common. They are all heavy. So heavy that you don’t slam them down as much as swing them up and then just let them fall on whatever it is you are hitting. While they are doing whatever damage you need, they are building some beautiful core, shoulder, and even back muscles.

I really could keep going on… ranching is a physical job. So much so that even with my intense morning workouts, I still get sore after a long day with The Rancher. If ever you were looking for a change in your exercise routine, come spend the day with a rancher!

Cutting Cowboys

November 11, 2014 by Allison

I married a cowboy, a roping cowboy. And I’m down with that. Actually, I love that. Its what I wanted. But its definitely the type of cowboys (they were more ranchers than cowboy if you get down to it) I grew up with. The rancher’s from my roots were more cattlemen than horsemen. My dad, however, did a lot of riding. He had this mare that was his partner in crime for years. She did her best work when she was cutting a cow. Once she knew what she was bringing in she was locked on. She had an incredible drive and hustle… so intense.

I fell in love with cutting watching and riding this mare. I learned a lot from her- mostly to hunker down in my saddle and lean back to free up her front to move fast and easy. But really, just to hold on…

The boys around here do a lot of roping, and although I love watching them roping and I am highly impressed by their skill, I get really excited to watch them cut. (I get even more excited when I get to do it!) After preg checking all of the cows, they have a pen full of buggers that are being sent home and need to be sorted according to each rancher. This is one of the highlights of the day for me. Those cows are tired and ornery and put up a good, GOOD fight. And that means that the horses put on a good show! I love to watch them put all their weight on their back legs and spin their front around to follow a cow and then launch forward in a totally new direction. Its so smooth and explosive all at the same time. Then there are the times that they have to take off to cut off some cow and have to make a quick, hard stop at an instant. Its pure athleticism. Can you see how I love it?!

Unfortunately, I was busy cleaning up during the majority of the sorting. These darn boys still need to learn how to work around my schedule… But I did catch the tail end of cutting cowboys.

The Sights of Preg Checking

November 4, 2014 by Allison

Crazy Days of Preg Checking

October 29, 2014 by Allison

Anyone can imagine that three days of preg checking 1514 cows would be kinda crazy. This year certainly didn’t disappoint, that’s for sure! But even as crazy as it gets, it is such a fun weekend. Getting this crew of Curlew cowboys together always means a good time. They can’t go more than just a few minutes without giving somebody a hard time about something- teasing them with the hot shot, giving some sage marital advice, or telling them to pick up the slack. They try to share WAY too much candy to my kids but only because they love them. My favorite cowboy always searches out The Ranch Princess to say hello and give her a kiss. They are a hard working bunch, never forgetting that they have a job to do but never letting the work stop them from keeping things fun.

We preg check these cows out to Black Pine- WAY out on the desert in the middle of nowhere on some corrals built there permanently for days like these. Keeping the cows in the corrals for the long three days means that they get hot and raunchy and make any tough cowboy ready to crawl up the fence. In fact we had a few intense moments that will go down in the books.

Let me set the stage…

Imagine, if you will, some old (but well built) corrals- big enough to hold 500 cows. There are two or three cowboys on horses pushing cows through to the back of the ally. There is a guy or two at the ally keeping the ally full of cows and running the back gate to keep from losing any. The ally is lined with a few guys on each side with hot shots ready to zap (responsibly, I promise) any cow into gear. (And when they’re not busy getting the cows, they pretend to shock each other… or steal their chair or something else to give some grief.)

Staying with me? Good- there’s more!

At the chute we have the vet up to his shoulder in cow- obviously… he’s like the man of the hour. There is also a man running the chute, one marking the cows with hair bleach according to their gestation, and one replacing any tags that have been lost over the last year. Next to the chute is a flatbed truck where we have ranchers taking numbers, doing shots, taking pictures (actually, that’s just me!) and my awesome kids. When the cows are done being tested, they are sorted one of three ways- to go home now, to go to Locomotive, or to come home in a week. What makes our sorting work despite the fact that there are no fences is the row of trucks and trailers that make a big ally to the field for the Locomotive cows.

Are you thoroughly confused?

That’s ok. Just understand lots of cowboys and lots of cows. Now let me take you to the afternoon of day two. Work is going along nicely, nothing out of the ordinary. That means we’ve had some great lunch, the chute has been cleaned out of a good sox inches of poop and at least one cow has attempted to jump over the fence. I make the kids play close to the truck in the event some crazy manages to get over- something that really hasn’t happened in a while. Until this day. I’m not sure if the girl was nervous about her time in the chute or just ready to be free (I’m going with the latter) but whatever her reason, she was ready to get out.

I was standing next to the flatbed, looking over the shoulder of my rancher’s wife double (we share the exact same name!) as she was teaching me about her record keeping program when all of the sudden we hear, “She’s coming over! She’s coming over!” And then “Get the kids!” I don’t even remember actually seeing the cow as she started teetering over ally just behind the chute, but I understood enough that we needed to move- FAST! I swung The Rancher’s Sidekick up on to the truck quickly, but just as fast I realized there wasn’t enough time to get The Ranch Princess and climb up behind everyone else. There wasn’t really even enough time to grab my girl and run. I scooped up my baby and pressed up to the truck, turning her out of the way as best I could. Just as we got there, one of those tough cowboys came to stand between us and that crazy, ornery cow. He figured better a guy with a hot shot than a cowgirl with a kid if there were to be any type of face off.

Are you on the edge of your seat? Not really, I’m sure, but for us in the moment it was slightly intense because we were standing exactly in front of that cow and could surely have taken the brunt of her nasty attitude. However… she went a different way. We must have made enough commotion or looked like such a crazy site that in her tantrum she wasn’t willing to put up with us. She just kicked up her heels and took off for the desert (a good place for her for the next five months).

Oh, the crazy days of preg checking. We love them and are happy to be done with them for the year. The cows are bred up, pregged up, and turned out for the winter. We’re all alive and well and have decided to put up a few more poles on the ally next year!

Wanted: Good Fall Pasture

October 25, 2014 by Allison

Have I mentioned how thankful we are for rain? We are so thankful for the rain! Its been incredible what the rain has done for us this fall. The most recent realization of its awesomeness is that with all of the growth that has come from the rain we have found ourselves in some what of a dilemma. OK, not a dilemma really, but more of an interesting situation that we haven’t seen…

Every fall when the calves are weaned and we are done with the summer pasture we look for fall pasture. The more fall pasture means that we can leave our cows out longer and not have to feed them at the home ranch. Really, that never happens but some years finding enough pasture has been a slight issue.

But not this year! We have had calls from so many farmers and ranchers saying that they have great regrowth after their last cutting and would have plenty of feed for our cattle to go through the fall on. In fact, there are some farmers with wheat fields with winter wheat in that may be growing too much (so much it might not make it through the winter!) and want us to knock it down a little. Can you say blessed?! Oh, how we love the rain!

So a week after weaning the calves off, we gathered off 150 cows of the forest group and hauled them out for some good fall pasture. And honestly, we hope not to make the return trip with them for a good long time!

The Chicken Fiasco

October 22, 2014 by Allison

I had to buy eggs today. It’s the first time in like five years because we always had our own chickens. Even when we were poor-starving-college-students we had a few hens that provided “golden” eggs. Moving to the ranch only meant more eggs for us because when you have 18 hens and three families the eggs get shared around fast.

But it seems that every fall we have some sort of chicken drama. It was this time a year ago that the calves found their way into the chicken coop and scattered those crazy chickens all over the ranch yard. We spent all day gathering up those darn critters to try and keep them from the drooling dog that stalked them from the shed to the shop to the tractor… This year, though, we couldn’t save them from such an end.

Yep, you heard right. The chickens are gone, dead, no longer laying eggs! Fortunately for the dog, he wasn’t the one to get them (I’m pretty sure he would be done for too!) and it wasn’t because the calves crashed down the door. The intruder was much more stealthy- coming in the night and nabbing a few at a time. After the first couple nights of losing a few hens we guessed there was a weasel or racoon that had tunneled into the coop and moved the hens.

But it didn’t stop that ninja critter.

We tried to get one step ahead of the hunter to save the few chickens we had left- the four remaining chickens. We put them in the horse trailer and left them there for days. The Ranch Boss set traps hoping to nab the intruder and let us feel safe to put the chickies back. But we never caught him. For weeks we didn’t catch him. By this point we figured he had gotten frustrated and moved on.

So we put the chickens back. They were happy and we were happy to have the few eggs they were laying. The kids and I were stalwart in doing the nightly egg gather and chicken lock up, always careful make sure there was no way a chicken could escape or a creeper to get in.

But one morning we heard the bad news- the last of the chickens had been attacked and killed. We felt defeated. We lost all 18 chickens. And all this boiled down to one conclusion- no more fresh eggs.

To appease your curiosity, we did find what got the chickens. There was a mink that had escaped the mink farm in town and trekked down to our chicken coop.

Now we know that we need to beef up our chicken coop to prevent any unwelcome visitors for getting their dinner. And until next spring when the next batch of chickens comes in we will buy eggs, coloring eggs as The Rancher’s Sidekick calls them (apparently white store eggs have only one purpose!).

A Deer Hunt up Quaken Asp

October 16, 2014 by Allison

Our quiet little valley has suddenly come alive this last week. Our quaint little roads have become a bustling highway for hunters. The deer hunting season is open and everyone has come to try and pull a big one out of our mountains. We see hunters of all kinds- on horse back, hauling ATVs, old ones. young ones, smart ones, and … ones that think that they are too cool for orange. If you don’t wear orange, you deserve to be shot. Ok, I didn’t say that, but really, why would you NOT be smart and wear something so the other hunter wouldn’t shoot at you?!

Opening morning The Rancher and I decided to join the hunting crowd and head up to our private property in the heart of those mountains. I guess we went up for two reasons- 1, to see if we couldn’t find something big and 2, to keep everyone else off of our property. And I guess a fun morning date is a good third reason for going!

We get a lot of mixed reactions when we post “No Hunting” on our private property. With so many hunters coming in (we can usually count about 15- 20 opening morning!) we try to give the deer a little bit of refuge on our property. Over the last ten years when the hunt opened up from a draw, the area has really picked through and it seems that only the young bucks are all that’s left. So we post our few acres and hope that people will respect our wishes and just move on. There is enough land and game around that it isn’t worth their fight. At least that is what I am going to believe that they are saying, as we haven’t had a problem yet.

On our hunt this year, we didn’t see much at all. Day one there was one little two point that popped up with a few doe… and that was it. We sat for a while and watched them before moving on… kinda fun. On day two we saw the same little buck, but this time in distress- he was being chased by a coyote! Poor bugger to have two different kind of hunters after him that day!

Even though we didn’t see much game, it has still been a fun deer hunt. I definitely deserve the award for the most “shots” taken, although mine are fired from my trusty Nikon instead of The Rancher’s rifle. The morning sunrises were beautliful, the fall leaves were colorful, and the company was great!

Can you find the little deer hiding in this photo?

Checking Out the Calf Crop

October 14, 2014 by Allison

Every time we look out towards the fields we see the beautiful green speckled with the black of the calves. Its a beautiful sight… Actually, the contrast of the beautiful green with the black really is pretty. But there is a different beauty. The beauty of a year’s hard work. The beauty of the rain that has blessed this valley with the feed we desperately need. The beauty of the healthy calves eating and energetically running through the field. Truly, a beautiful sight.

Throughout the week, we will take several trips through the calves- checking the feed, the mineral and salt, and the overall health. Its a little routine, but at the same time its a fun little drive we take as a family. We spend a good part of the time yelling at the dogs to not chase the calves (who invites the dogs anyway?). That usually follows with them trying to jump on the 4 wheeler, where there is NO room for any extras. Just picture the Beverly Hillbillies… Now that the calves are really beginning to settle in, they have become quite curious. They’ll follow us around or chase the dogs, but as soon as we make a sudden move they take off to the other end of the pasture, just to turn back around. Any typical curious child, right?

These calves have really taken to the mineral and salt that we have been putting out. We are doing everything we can to supplement their feed so that we can get them all the nutrients they need for healthy growing. That means that on a lot of our family drives through the calves we are also loaded down with bags and bags of mineral. How is the picture you are creating in your mind? No, no one has fallen off…yet… But do go so far as to imagine that dumping the mineral in the troughs is a highlight for the kids because it is SUPER fun to play in!

This is the time of year we take a little pride in the hard work we have put throughout the year to raise this calf crop. A little drive through the calves has such a sweet smell of satisfaction!