OFI 706: The Amazing Range Cow And The Amazing Rancher

I Say It All The Time

When I do commercials for our great sponsor, Powder River Livestock Handling Equipment, I always talk about them developing equipment for cattle that are raised on the range out here in the West.  And, I always really mean it.  If you have never had the pleasure of working with these cows, you don’t know just how scary a cow can be when she is all instinct and not tamed to people at all.

Since I am always around our calm cattle these days, I sometimes wonder if I am exaggerating when I talk about these cows for Powder River.  But this past weekend, I spent sometime around the hearty range cow, and I know that I am not.

Three Days In Paradise

For those of you who have been fortunate enough to spend some time in the high deserts of Idaho, Nevada, Oregon and Utah, do you consider this to be a paradise?  I certainly do, and I was able to spend Friday, Saturday and Sunday of last week living out there with my family.

My daughter, Hattie, had drawn a good deer tag in the high desert of Idaho along the Nevada border to the south of Twin Falls.  We headed down there on Friday, set up camp and started looking for her first buck.  It’s pretty amazing at this stage of life how much time we really do not have.  As a parent I don’t think you realize just how much of your time is spoken for until you have something to do with your kid.  But then it hits you.

For those of you saying, three days?  I agree, not enough time for a good deer hunt, but hear me out.  Autumm and I are not those parents that put our daughter into every activity possible.  But, Hattie is active and interested in a lot of things, and we don’t say “no” to her doing things that will help her in the long run, as long as we can afford it.  So, she is in softball, 4H, student government, cross country, orchestra, track, an annual rangeland competition and oh yeah, she wants to hunt.

When Hattie drew this tag, we had to find a window of time to take her hunting.  There was one weekend in October in which she did not have softball scheduled.  However, she had an orchestra concert on the Thursday night before that weekend.  So, we ended up leaving on Friday and coming home on Sunday.  This is really not enough time to put in a good hunt for a great mule deer.  So, we lowered our standards a bit and headed out.

We had a couple of opportunities for Hattie to fill her tag.  And, we made a good effort on both of those.  But, we came up empty handed.  I will admit here, that on the first opportunity it was 90/10.  90% of the reason we blew it was a poor plan on my part, and 10% of the reason we blew it was the wind shifting on us at the last minute.  Either way, we had a great time.

The Amazing Range Cow

On a hunt like this, in country like this, you spend a lot of time in the pickup, driving to high points and then looking through binoculars and spotting scopes.  This hunt was no exception.  In this area, spending a lot of time in the pickup means driving through a lot of cow country, and seeing a lot of range cows.  For a person like me, that is just a bonus.  Actually, it is a bonus for our entire family as we all enjoy cattle and know enough about them that we are interested.  So, they do not appear to be just part of the scenery.

There were definitely plenty of cattle up there that would be hard to get penned, hard to get loaded and hard to get into a squeeze chute.  But, the amazing cowboys who work for these land and livestock outfits get it done every year.  Every time I saw a cow turn and start trotting straight away from our pickup with her ears laid back, I knew just how much of a challenge handling a herd like this could be.

And every piece of fence I saw that was guitar string tight, every perfectly wired gate and every trough that was fed by buried pipe made me think not just of the work these ranchers put in, but also the vision to be able to run cattle in this country.

What Makes Them Amazing

You might be wondering why I refer to these cows as amazing.  Let me first start by saying that the cows and bulls that are up there on these ranges are not there by mistake.  This is really where the rubber has to meet the road for cattle.  These cows have to be able to survive in these conditions.  That means walking long distances on rocky terrain for water and feed.  It means grazing on steep slopes.  It means bearing tough weather conditions and keeping enough body condition that they can raise a calf and get settled by the bull.  It means be wary (or wild) enough to sense predators, protect their calves and fight if need be.

The cows that are up on these slopes and mountain tops have to be able to do the same thing that my cows do on green pasture, supplemental feed and sleeping on straw bedding in winter.  There are a lot of cattle, both cows and bulls, that go through livestock shows and win blue ribbons that could not survive in these conditions.

These ranchers who are buying, breeding and culling these cattle are amazing too.  They have an eye for cattle that I wish I had.  It does them no good to put a cow on the range that will not survive.  It does them no good to put a cow out there that will survive but can’t carry or raise a calf under those conditions.  And, it does them no good to buy the best, blue ribbon bull if it is going to die trying to keep up with the cow herd, day after day, as they go to and from water and feed.  The selection process for these herds is amazing.

Then, if you consider the record keeping it really blows your mind.  The smaller ranchers out here are running herd sizes in the hundreds.  Most of them are running herd sizes in the thousands, and they know better than me what type of calf each cow is raising.  Since they don’t get to see their cattle every day the way I do, they have to do a great job of collecting data and record keeping to know who is performing and who is not.

The Conditions

Let me describe the conditions we had up there.  When we got to our camp on Friday and started setting up I had to peel off layers because I was sweating.  Once we had the tent set up and the pickup unloaded, we headed out hunting.  The thermometer said that it was 74 degrees.

The next day we got up just before 6am and headed out to a canyon I wanted to try, and the temperature was about 34 degrees with a slight breeze.  By 8am the wind was blowing so hard it was difficult to open the door of the pickup and keep it attached to the truck for fear of it blowing right off.  And, the temperature continued to steadily drop.  Soon, the temperature had dropped to about 29 degrees and the wind was blowing like you couldn’t believe.

We did capture an amazing sunrise that morning in this photograph.  It was truly one of the most beautiful sunrises I have ever seen, and even though this picture is amazing it still doesn’t do it justice.

We kept driving around the area that day, looking for deer and really just exploring.  Ultimately, we couldn’t turn down the challenge and drove all the way to the top of China Peak.  I will admit that there were no cattle up on the very top, but there were cattle right below us enduring the same temperatures and wind as you can see in this video.

The conditions up this high are rough.  So rough, that the small bunch grasses you see in the video are all that grows on top.  And, they grow between stripes of rock that are laid out in line with the prevailing winds.  But, you can see that there is a fence up here and that cattle do get up this high.  How would you like driving those fence posts by the way?

We ended that evening at a lower elevation and found a group of deer with a buck in it.  I came up with a plan to put a stalk on them and to get Hattie a really good shot at her first buck.  In hind sight I know I could have done this better.  I actually think I overthought this because I wanted her to get her deer so badly.

By the time it grew dark we had walked about a mile after the deer that we ended up spooking when the wind changed on us.  We never got that shot.  The temperature started to drop into the teens, and the wind never slowed up.  After shooting light we were able to head back to our tent at an even lower elevation, fire up the heater and get into warm sleeping bags.  But those cows up by China Peak, stayed up there all night.

On Sunday morning we woke up to 18 degrees and snowfall.  At least the wind had quit, but we spent all morning hunting in falling snow.  It was beautiful and peaceful, and we saw a lot of deer.  But something about the change in conditions had really got them moving, and we did not see another buck.

As we drove home on Sunday afternoon I thought about the cattle.  74 degrees and beautiful one day.  29 degrees and 50 mph winds the next.  No wind and snowfall the next day.  The cows that survive and produce in these conditions are really amazing animals.

So the next time you are driving across the range and see the cattle out there, take some time to think about this amazing animal and the amazing job the ranchers do in selection and breeding to make this all work.

A Quick Word About Some Great Gear

Before I wrap this up, I have to talk about my gear for a moment.  Some of you may remember my interview with James Budd of Alpacas Of Montana in episode #363 of the podcast.  James’ makes winter clothing and other products from Alpaca fiber in Bozeman, Montana and sells it all over the world.

When I interviewed James for episode #363, he sent me one of his “Extreme Warmth WindStopper Hats” to try out.  I used it all weekend, and I want to tell you about the results.

Let me first start by saying that James was a great guest for the show, but he and his company are not sponsors.  So, he does not pay me to advertise, and if you click on the link to the hat and purchase it, I do not get any sort of commission.

This hat worked just as advertised, and I wanted to tell you about it.  I got to use it in those incredible winds that we faced on Saturday and in the 20 degree snow we walked in all morning on Sunday.  Now, in that wind on Saturday, especially after the sun went down, I got cold.  In conditions like that you are just trying to not be miserable, I don’t think there is anything such as being warm in that wind.  I felt a bit of a chill on my bald head, but the hat really did cut the wind as advertised.  I could not have been more pleased with the slight chill I had on my head considering the wind.

On Sunday is when I was really amazed by the hat.  I was wearing it again while we walked in the snow all morning in 20 degree temperatures.  I was leading the way, putting a stalk on a group of deer that turned out to not have a buck with them.  So, Autumm and Hattie were behind me the entire time.

Autumm later told me that my head was completely covered with snow, and she wished she had one of the alpaca hats as well.  I thought this was a great testament to this hat.  It insulated so well, that the snow did not melt on my head.  I never felt even a drop of moisture come through.  And, I never had any idea I had snow accumulating on my head.  That is how well it performed.

Autumm was too cold to take a picture of me, and we were trying to be too quiet for her to stop me and discuss it with me.  But we tried to re-enact it later.  It really did not work out as good as the first time.  But the photos of our attempts are below.

When we got back to the pickup that morning I had ice frozen in my beard and mustache, and I still had no idea that my head was covered in snow.  I actually did not realize it until I pulled the hat off when I got into the pickup, and by the time I did that it was too late for the photo because the snow was still dry and it all shook right off.

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