2012 Spring Cattle Drive

My goal this year was to ride Dexter at this year's cattle drive. However, when we got the call that we were moving cows this weekend, I just didn't feel he or I were quite ready for that kind of pressure. In the end, I took good old reliable Jack and had a wonderful ride. Jack only gets to work cows once or twice a year and in earlier years he was always just OK. However, I'd say the past 3 years, he has been awesome so it only took me 14 years to get him really great! Early on, the herd split into two groups with the faster cows/calves up front and the slower cows/calves lagging behind. At one point, we were riding along the trail, visiting with Lyle who was driving the mule team and wagon. Suddenly, Lyle noticed the herd had found a break in a fence and they were all heading into a neighbour's field. We only had three riders, Nikki, Gord, and myself and one quad driven by Everett aka "Eye Candy". Everett blocked the break in the fence to prevent more cows from coming into the field, while Krissy, who was riding in the wagon, found a gate we could open to get the cows back up to the trail. It was hard work for Nikki, Gord, and I to get the cows back on the trail but we managed to save face and get the job done before the trailing herd caught up. I am really glad I had Jack under me because I think it would have been a lot to ask of Dexter at this stage of his training. As it turned out, we got the entire herd safely back to the summer grazing ranch and in a couple of weeks we'll be heading back up to Water Valley for the branding. It is much easier on all the animals if the weather is a little on the cooler side. Other than the occasional sprinkle of rain, we had pretty reasonable weather for the 14 mile cattle drive. The creek was pretty high and other than the back of the wagon getting a good cleaning, none of the calves floated downstream and we riders, managed to keep our feet dry. Another great horse day! Tovie and Jack and Gord and Magic