The cowboy mind is a marvelous thing to watch work if you ever get the opportunity. Or so my wife tells me.
Around this poor outfit one year out of the last eight was a good year and that year was so good we had enough grass to run some steers along with the cows. This presented a problem the first time we tried to corral the mixed bunch of bovines. You see, on this el rancho there is only one level spot and that is where we built the corrals. Standing in the cattle’s glide path to the corrals is a normally dry creek bed, crossed by a land bridge. Our cows have been across the land bridge hundreds of times but mix in a few male minds, in the form of some steers, and the whole bunch was quitting on us. Every last one of those worthless critters balked at crossing the bridge.
At first we tried to coax them across but they squirted out the sides of our cowboy vise. Next, we tried herding the steers to the back of the bunch but the cows in front still refused to cross. Then we tried “the bigger hammer” theory, as in, “don’t force it just get a bigger hammer.” All seven of my neighbors took a rush at the herd and with sheer manpower tried to force the stubborn cattle across the creek. The cattle fought the creek bed like my horse was fighting his bit.
One of my neighbors who is studying to be a half-wit suggested, “why don’t we get some hay and try to bribe them across.”
I wondered aloud, “What cow in her right mind is going to chase after some moldy hay when she is standing in two foot of succulent green grass?”
A funny feeling was sneaking up my spine that we’d never get the cattle across. We decided to pow wow on the predicament for a spell and while we were standing around trying to scratch our ears with our elbows, my wife approached apprehensively. Realizing that we were engaged in man talk she interrupted meekly. “I have an idea.”
Of course, all the men broke out laughing. “How can a woman understand anything as macho as cattle fording a stream bed.” (As if this were the Red River) But we were so desperate for ideas we’d even listen to a woman.
“I know from personal experience,” said my wife, “that big yellow cow there is very protective of her calf. Remember that time Lee when you tried to corral that cow because she retained her placenta and you couldn’t get her corralled?”
I looked down to the ground sheepishly and the other men gazed upon me in pure disgust.
“Remember when I caught her calf, tied it up, put it in the back of the truck and the cow followed me right into the corral?” continued my wife. “If one of you manly cowboys could manage to get a rope around her calf, tie it up and put it in the back of my truck I’m sure the cow and the rest of the critters would follow that bellering calf across your little obstacle.”
“Ha, ha,” laughed the cowboys collectively. “There are steers in that bunch, they aren’t curious cows. Steers are like men, they have minds of their own.”
My wife knew better than to argue with a mule, a cook or a cowboy. So we tried a couple more times to force the cattle across, just long enough for my wife’s idea to now become our own. Of course, we had to tweak my wife’s idea a great deal So instead of catching the calf and putting it in the back of the truck one of us would just rope the calf and drag it across the bridge.
How original!
One of the weekend cowboys got a rope on the bellerin’ calf and drug it across the land bridge with its bug-eyed momma in close pursuit. Before we knew what was happening all the cattle, steers included, were running across the bridge to see what all the fuss was about.
As we surveyed all the cattle, now safely settled in the corral one of the cowboys remarked, “It’s a good thing we did it our way. It never would have worked her way.”
