Our 4th of July Celebration

The day started early...up at 4 AM. Horses had to be fed, lunches made, breakfast eaten, extra coffee made, and then an hour and a half drive to Roaring Springs Ranch in the Catlow Valley for the High Desert Cutters 4th cutting of the season.

My Man and I volunteered to be the "directors" for the three cuttings we have at Roaring Spring Ranch this year. We make sure the arena is watered, worked, the cattle are there, and keep the judge happy with food and drink.

We were the first ones there and the arena was sort of done, but there wasn't a cow in sight! Laura our president arrived along with Wendy the vice president and we all wondered if there would be a cutting!

But, the ranch manager, Stacy, and his crew came along and things got rolling...

Jose brings the water truck.

BTW, Jose is a fantastic vaquero style horseman.

I love to watch him work his horses.

Another crewman finishes working the arena.

One side of the arena is just wire fence

so we place a couple of rigs along the side to

keep the cows from trying to jump the fence.

Our's is the one on the right.

Then we see the herd of cows coming from the south.

My Man and Whiskey along with Bruce

are there to help get them into the pens.

Riders are getting their horses warmed up.

Our secretary, Andi, is busy signing up the riders.

Stacy and his hand are sorting out the bulls and

cows that are too big.

The first set of cows are brought into the arena.

Yep, there's Cindy Sue!! She stays on the bed

of the truck when we get started.

Our pregnant president Laura is busy making

sure everything is ready and in order.

My Man along with other riders watching and

cheering on other riders.

Everyone is friendly and supportive of each other.

The judge, Debbie Otley, is contemplating someone's score.

I rode in two classes; the 150 and the 125. My actual class is the 125, but we can show up another class if we want to enter more than once. The numbers of the classes don't mean monies won or anything like that. They just identify the ability level of the horse. Horses are classified at the beginning of the year to determine which class they should be in.

This is a clip of Colt and me on my second cow in the 150. We scored a 68. In the 125 class, we scored a 67.

I was very happy with both of our runs.

As you can see from the video, we have

a lot of improvement to make. But, this club

is designed to get us out there and cutting...no

matter what level you are at.

Fun...is the name of the game.

Ah, yes, lunch.

Lunch for the boys too.

You can't ask for better scenery than

the Catlow Valley.

All too soon, the day has finished. We send the cows back

down the road to find their way to their pasture.

And, just in time...see the rain sprinkles on

Colt's neck?

A perfect 4th of July in Harney County.

Wordless Wednesday

Whew! First Cutting is Done!!

Yep, I'm blogging again...it's either all or none folks. I've come to the realization that it's just going to be this way in the summers 'round here! So, bear with me ;~)

But, what a great feeling it is to have 1st cutting done...1 down...only 2 more to go!

This is how we do our haying. We do all the irrigation, but we hire a contract farmer to cut, rake, and bale for us. There is no way that we could afford to buy the equipment for only 45 acres of hay. We pay the contractor by the ton. It works out pretty well, and the job seems to get done.

With all the spring rain, cutting got set back almost two weeks. So while we were up having fun on our wild horse adventure, the contractor came and cut the alfalfa. When we got back, we had this beautiful sight:

Lovely rows of thick, raked alfalfa...just waiting to be baled.

Then the stress begins. The weather forecast is for hot, with chances of thunderstorms all week. The contractor was still on another field while ours sat...for what seemed like forever. We got lucky and a huge thunderstorm missed us by 1/4 of a mile!! We didn't get a drop of rain, and it actually left puddles. So, there was a lot of water in that one.

Finally, we wake at 1:30 AM to the sound of a tractor and baler on Friday morning. He got our big field baled, but as the sun came up, the moisture set in and it was too damp to finish the small field.

You can see the light green from where the alfalfa
had been sitting for a few days.
It'll darken up in no time.

Then we weren't so lucky with the next thunderstorm. We got a pretty good soaking on Friday afternoon. So, needless to say, baling and stacking were out of the question til it dried out.

Saturday was my cutting show down at Roaring Springs (Yes! Another post in the waiting!). It was a really hot day, so when we got back around 3:30 in the afternoon the bales had dried off and were ready to stack. The contractor had dropped off his old semi-truck for us to use, and I got my first lesson from My Man (ex-truck driver) on driving a semi.

Yep, Cindy Sue got to ride shotgun! You should
see her bounce in the air-ride seat!

We got the big field stacked...we were out there until 9:30 PM...but we got it done! Then Sunday morning, the contractor came and finished baling the small field and said it could be stacked that afternoon after it sat for a few hours.

The bales are stacked in twos and set in
position where the truck drives down
the center of two rows.

My Man is getting pretty good with loading and stacking.

We stack the two fields in separate rows to keep
the field count straight.

The big field had 129 bales.
(up from last year by 17 bales)
The small field had 100 bales.
(up by 9 bales)

My buddy Ed at Thoughts from the Road
should be proud of me!! I can drive and take
photos at the same time!!
But only in a hay field heehee!!

Sunday afternoon it was really hot. Cowboy kept laying under the trailer bed in the shade and wouldn't get out from underneath...he was going to be one smooshed pup...but we found the solution...

One happy cattle dog!

And now we get to change wheel lines twice a day again.
But, we have some pretty happy alfalfa
plants getting a good drink of water!