Locomotive - The Idaho Rancher's Wife

Loving the Open Range

February 27, 2015 by Allison

I’m a Montana girl. The small ranching town I grew up in was just a little valley, cross crossed with streams and rivers. Something very VERY different from where we are ranching now. Everything was green. All the time. That may be exaggeration, but really I remember that there was so much green-ness. So many meadows, so many hay fields. There were little groves of trees everywhere. Really so much green! And then there were the skies. I love the fresh and blue open skies. The clear mornings that renew each morning with a new sunrise. The sunsets were made with cord that illustrated that God truly is an artist. And the clarity of the nighttime sky allowed you to see even the most distant stars. Whenever I go home I just drink it all in.

Here we have a few trees. Unless you count the sage brush, which some if them are big enough you could consider them to be trees. Actually, I love the safe brush. The smells that come from when you move cows through them or when it’s raining.

It’s this lifestyle that let’s me have those open skies, the green-ness, and the fresh air.

It’s amazing to me how we can be all a part of the same industry but do it so differently. We can raise cattle in this errid, dry dessert just as well as my family did in the fertile river plains. Just very differently. Very differently.

Sometimes the differences get me a little homesick for the way we did things. You may take the girl out of Montana, but you can never take Montana out of the girl. So the days when we go out on the wide open range it satisfies the little Montana girl inside of me. Like last week when we dropped the cows off to Locomotive. It was that time of year to haul the cows down south. The kids and I hopped on the semi with The Rancher for a day out. We were only there for the few minutes to unload but they were wonderful moments.

Although some of the open range is a little bland, the skies can be amazing. You can see for miles with the beautiful blue mountains in the back grounds and the dazzling blue colors. The open skies and fresh air take me back to my big sky country. I guess where ever you are, you find little bits of home.

Mother Nature’s Desert Treasures

February 24, 2015 by Allison

The desert of Locomotive is a place of itself. It doesn’t seem to follow any of Mother Nature’s rules. It has it’s own freak storms, crazy winds and weird weather.

Today is the day we get to haul some of the cows to Locomotive to spend the next few month and I’m reminded again of some of the strange and cool things Mother Nature has put out there

Like some of the intense rock work out there. There are places where the wind gets whipping so hard it has carved around and through the rocks. Of courses that been over hundreds and hundreds and HUNDREDS of years. There’s a small cliff (it can hardly be called a cliff… But for lack of abetter term… Meh…) that has a sorts if Who-Ville look to it. It has silly windows and what could look like odd doors. Splash a little paint on it and you would have jumped into Sr. Seuss’ world!

This year we have had an incredible amount of juniper berries. Like loads and buckets and smatterings of berries. Why? The old timers were telling us that it meant we would have a record snowfall and the trees were preparing for it. I don’t know if that was right, since we have had like no snow, but maybe it was all the moisture last fall. Either way it’s cool to see so many berries.

One of my favorite oddities to check our is the wildfire aftermath. 50 Years ago (I’m totally guessing here) there were some crazy fires burning through these ceder hills. The fire must have burned hot and fast because it looks like they started up on fire , burned out and just fell apart. I love the natural, abstract art Mother Nature made from it.

We may be running on the desert- the dry barren desert. But every once in a while we find our own little treasures, provided by Mother Nature herself. It’s the desert’s own kind of unique beauty.

Not Letting the Drought Win

February 5, 2015 by Allison

There are few things ranchers depend on for their industry- cows/calves to sell, buyers to buy, and feed to fatten them up. The first two are in pretty constant supply, feed on the other hand… Well that’s a little subjective…

There is always feed out there, but good quality feed at a good price can be hard to come by. Why? One word… DROUGHT.

The last few years we (and by “we” I collectively mean all or most ranchers) have been needing rain in a bad way. Without rain grass, grain, alfalfa, hay, whatever won’t grow. Pretty cut and dry (hehe, dry… that’s what we are right now!).

The other day we had our turn to check water in Locomotive on our BLM association ground and we took a turn through our private ground to check the feed. Our private land in Locomotive is where we take our cows to calve out every winter, the turnout day coming up in just a few weeks. But the sad truth is that its going to be a very different year for Locomotive.

Throughout the summer and fall we have been keeping an eye on our feed down south, hoping and praying the rain and sun to get to work to make grass that we need to winter the cows. As the time has gotten closer and closer to moving cows out there we have realized we don’t have NEAR enough feed to winter all the cows there and keep the ground healthy.

Last year it was rough. With years of drought, we finally grazed it down to its limit. And we hate getting to that point. We consider ourselves stewards of the land. We care for it, trying to keep it flourishing in something more than tumble weed. But without the rains and the tough soil we have struggled the last few years. You can see in the pictures that the normal greenish brown is yellowish brown or even more greyish brown.

So what’s a ranching family to do in a situation like this? We could just take the cows down and not care. But we care. We want this land to sustain itself and our cows. We need this land to sustain itself and our cows. So we are keeping most of the cows home this winter. We will take down the number of cows we think will make it on the range and keep the rest here. That means The (poor) Rancher will have LOTS of cows to feed at home… bummer. And we might have some tougher weather for our cows to calve in… And we might have a little more sickness go through the calves since they won’t be spread out across the range. But we are hoping that we can help the land to renew itself and be fruitful in the coming years. This year will mean we get to put in a little more work, but protecting our land, something we CAN’T do without, is worth any effort.

So with a little less cows, a little more rain, maybe a few grass seeds, and a lot of faith we are trying to care for the land and not let this drought win.

Just Follow Your Momma

May 7, 2014 by Allison

I haven’t seen my husband too much of late. Don’t worry, we are still SO much in love, its just the time of year for early mornings and late nights. We have made it to our spring turn out dates so over the last few weeks we have been gathering the cattle, sorting into the different groups and then hauling them to their new pasture. Of course that includes branding (and read tagging, vaccinating, marking) any calves that we missed or were born after we branded (ya, that happens…). And we gotta make sure that the new pasture is ready- water flowing and fences up. The combination of no water and terrible fences means cows out… not what we need.

So needless to say, I haven’t seen The Rancher too much. But every once in a while I have a day that I don’t have anything else going on (well, except house work… but that’s never stopped me from going out!) and they are doing something that we can help with so we tag along.

We were helping gather up the cows out on our private land and I just had to chuckle at some of the things that we deal with working these darn cows. Lets just start by saying that cows don’t think (mostly), they react, and calves don’t react, they freak out.

Most of these cows get that when we start pushing them towards the gate that it means new grass and boy do they step out. They just get a-walking, thinking only of filling their bellies. But then all of the sudden, they remember that they have a calf… somewhere. So they turn around and start bawling for baby, making other mommas do the same. Hey now! We are trying to go out the gate and every time you stir up the herd to find your baby that you forgot about because all you think about is food you cause problems! Too bad saying that wouldn’t actually get anything done- rational talk doesn’t work with cows that don’t really think.

With such a big herd we use our cow dogs to move them along. But sometimes that causes a little bit of an extra stir. See, in the winter we can get coyotes or even wolves that bother the herds, putting momma cow on super high alert. Anything that looks like a coyote is in trouble, including The Rancher’s dog. This is the same dog that is around every year, all year and they know who he is but they put up a stink if he gets too close.

The roughest part about moving the herd in the springtime is pushing the calves. With momma gonna, they are doing their darndest to find her and keep up with the herd. But with such little legs and no clue of where they are going, they tend to just lag. And if, for some reason, they get behind they freak out, running in the exact opposite direction as the herd. There is no coercing the darn things to go in the right direction until they just do it themselves (hmm, sounds like my kids!). They will run through fences, the brush, anything that gets in their path! Sometimes we just get ’em good and tired and then grab them.

It sounds pretty bad when I explain it all out like this, and it is if all of this is happening at once. But usually its not every cow that turns back and the dog has learned to shove with love and we do pretty good at keeping the calves from getting behind. But it would all be so much better if those darn babies would just follow momma (or momma not leave them behind…)! Regardless, we are getting the work done and loving it (well, most of it). And we will love it even more when it is done!

Many Irons in the Fire

April 29, 2014 by Allison

Having 760 cows means that we have to find places for all of them, which means that we have groups spread out on the range. Some of them are on our own private ground but a good majority of them run with other ranches on the Association rangeland. And that means that when we go branding we have EVERYONE’s cattle to brand!

The upside to this is that we have plenty of help to brand our calves, but that comes with the price of going out every weekend to brand (but that’s a price we are so happy to pay). It takes a LOT of time to get so many calves branded!

The group that we run with has 7 different brands in the fire! With so many different operations running together, we want to make sure that we get it right on branding day. The ropers are limited to the ranch owners or other cowboy they designate. The ropers have to be good at finding a mothered up pairs and recognizing which brand it will need. Talk about pressure!

Not only do we need to make sure we get the right brand on the right calf, but each operation has its own vaccines and marks to do. Each ranch sets up their branding station and is responsible for doing their own ground work. If you want a job done right, I guess you do it yourself, right? Actually there are a lot of the men that have run together for YEARs and YEARS that would do a fine job of doing work on each others cattle. But for the sake of not confusing the help, we don’t do too much crossover.

Since we are trying to get as many done as possible we don’t use the Nord forks. The time a roper would be tied up is time that he could be roping, which is precious. So they drag in their calf, the ground crew pounces and mugs the calf. They slide the rope off to send the roper back to rope and then they get to work.

When you write it out and explain it, it sounds crazy and a lot of work. But after doing it for so long, its amazing how you just know what to do!

Almost as Good as a Photo Shoot

April 28, 2014 by Allison

I love taking pictures on the ranch- that’s why I have this blog. And branding time is one of my FAVORITE times to take pictures. The gathering, roping, riding, and fun times together are just too awesome to not capture. In fact, last weekend I took like 1,400 pictures! Its almost like having my own cowboy photo shoot!

A lot of the pictures were duplicates (which have been deleted…) because I set my camera to burst mode to make sure that I don’t miss a thing. And some don’t turn out, so its not like I have 1,400 picture to share. But I do have a lot! You’ve been warned, there are a lot of photos here… (like more than a hundred…)

Click “Read More” for the rest of the pictures!

Days of Branding: Marking the calves

April 24, 2014 by Allison

Part of our branding routine includes, marking our calves. Running our cattle with so many others means we need easy ways to identify which is ours. We use tags, but sometimes tags fall out. And we use brands, but we can only see them when we are up close. So we have ‘nother other (in the words of The Rancher’s Sidekick) way to identify them.

The first is marking the ears. Calves naturally have a really full ear that can be easily seen. This makes for a great place to mark. Some notch out the ears, some do a split. We trim down the ear making for pointy, less full ears.

I have to tell you something… I’m not a fan of marking the ears. They look like a bat or something… But I do like how easy it is to pick up a pair of binoculars and spot those pointy little ears!

The second marking we make is a waddle. A neck waddle. I’m sure that we call it a waddle because is waddles to-and-fro… To make a waddle, we cut a flap of skin back off of the neck. When it heals what we have left is a wiggling bit of skin hanging from the neck. We only waddle the heifers since we will keep them as replacement heifers down the road while we sell the steers. No reason to waddle a calf that won’t need it!

Once again, NOT a fan of the extra wiggling, unattached waddle… but it makes it SUPER easy to identify our cattle!

Its important that these marks are done right. We don’t want too big of a slice taken from the ears or too big of a cut on the neck. We want as little stress on the calves as possible (because they have ALREADY had stress). So we let The Rancher and Rancher Sr. do it for the most part. Its a good job for them…

Days of Branding: Why we brand

April 24, 2014 by Allison

Branding can be a touchy subject when we talk with some people outside the ranching world. It can seem like a harsh or cruel thing to do. So why do we still brand?

The best answer is because it is required by law. A brand is a rancher’s signature, saying which ranch these cattle belong to. Its nice to know which ranch to call when the cows get out, but its more important to know when its time for those cattle to be harvested.

If a cow were to go in without a brand, there is no way to know who that cow belonged to, where it was, what other animals it was running with, and what region it was in. Its important to know this because we want to be VERY sure that there is nothing wrong with the meat. We don’t want to spread disease or sell contaminated beef. Ya, that’s a good reason to brand…

When cattle are sold, cross state lines, or head to be harvested they must be checked over by a brand inspector. This makes a record or a paper trail of where and when the cattle come and go.

But even if we didn’t HAVE to brand, we still would. I don’t know that there is any method out there that is as effective and efficient at marking our cattle as our own. Yes, it is stressful for the calves. It is probably painful and I really feel bad about that. But until someone finds a method of marking that can’t be altered, we gotta stick to branding. Did you know that cattle rustling is still prevalent today? (and in the state of Idaho it is still punishable by hanging!). Too many of the ways to mark cattle can be changed and someone else can claim them.

So we brand our calves. We do it so we can track our cattle so we can put out the best product possible!

Days of Branding: How we do it

April 22, 2014 by Allison

You really should come spend a day branding with us. You could almost pick any weekend and we would be going out. Most days we brand the association cattle. We have 7 ranches worth of cattle together on the range, which means a lot calves! But more about branding with the association another day.

The day that you want to brand with us is when we do our cattle on the Peterson Place. We have about 350 cows to sort through and brand. We start in the morning gathering the cattle from the north. This year we did it in the rain, and what started out as a refreshing little shower turned into a soaker (be glad I didn’t tell you to come until AFTER the rainy year).

We sort the cows out (but we leave a few… the babies are happier with a momma around) and then start to work. Actually this year, we had to wait a while before we could start- blame the rain!

But eventually we got to work. The ropers rope (obviously) and drag the calves to the “fire” where the ground crew is set up. The calves are caught and held with Nord Forks. Don’t know what they are? (neither did I until I started branding with The Rancher). The are a handy tool that is staked into the ground and has a fork like head catch. It slips on the calf’s neck and catches at the base of the head.

The forks make for an easy way to hold the calves while we mark, castrate, vaccinate, tag, and brand the calves. Its a lot to do, so we need some one to run the shots, guys to do the castrating, others to brand and the top dogs mark and tag. Once we hit our groove we just roll on through them. Before we know it, the calves are branded and the dinner bells is a-ringin’!

And then we start over.

We gather in the bunch from the south. Then sort (and no waiting!), rope, drag… you know how it goes!

Days of Branding

April 21, 2014 by Allison

Branding. So much branding. But that’s normal. Every year at this time we pull out the iron sharpen the knives, start the fire and get to work. The ranch trucks have an eternal burnt hair smell. Its stinky and dirty but we love it.

The boys especially love it because that means LOTS of roping. The long days are totally worth it when the work is more like play!

There is a lot going on when we are out there. And you are going to hear all about it! This week I’m going to show you the how’s, why’s, and what’s of branding on the Eliason ranch.