It's a Business?

We’ve all heard it, “ranching is a way of life.” It’s usually said (and I always bristle) in comparison to it being a business. Of course it’s a business! I’ve got the spreadsheets, the gross margin analysis, and the line of credit to prove it.

But you could have fooled me the past week. We walked the herd home over four days. It blew, it snowed sideways, they jammed up at times, then trailed pretty. We massaged them through canyons and around traffic, through grain fields, and by yards and flower beds. It’s what we do here in eastern Idaho - those of us that summer in the high country and winter in the valley. Up in the spring and back down in the fall.

When I was a kid we called it, “the cattle drive,” the best three days of the year (not counting Christmas). The family I married into calls it, “going up the Trail.” Or down as it were. Around every bend, at every creek and old homesite is a story.  At Spring Creek the brakes went out on the old black Chevy with Mom at the wheel. Two hereford bulls were fighting at Womach Hill and pushed one over the bluff. Vicki got dumped in the rocks at Miner Creek, and Wally slid his trailer off the road up Rawlins Creek.  We seem to live through it; even the bull got up and walked away.

We got the herd home on Thursday. It might be cause for celebration, but it's snowing hard outside and there’s weaning left to do, and vaccinating the cows, then walking them to cornstalks, and …..

They know the routine

Jesse said it, "Livin' the Dream!"

gathering three that got separated from Mom

Little Omnivores

The 6^th and 7^th grade kids at Sage International charter school had lots of questions for us.  “Do you have mule deer or white tail deer?”  “Who will take care of the cows if you die?” “Does it hurt the calves to put a tag in their ear?” “Do you slaughter the cows on the ranch or take them somewhere else to be slaughtered?”  And this one from a petite dark-haired girl, “Isn’t the filet from the back of the cow?” 

We showed them slides of a “year in the life” of a cow on Pratt ranch. From calving, then walking to mountain range, winter feeding, and finally a photo from Portland Oregon, where we helped the staff at Burgerville serve burgers from our co-op, Country Natural Beef.  We talked freely about the cold hard facts of beef production – taking grass that humans can’t harvest and turning it into nutritious delicious beef. And how, along the way, nature recycles plant life by manure on the ground. The children’s ability to grasp the entirety, right down to the human element (what if you die?) took me by surprise.

I applaud the administrator and teachers of the school for exploring this very practical topic - for we all eat. They used a student edition of The Omnivore’s Dilemna, Michael Pollan’s critical look at our food system, as a preliminary to our presentation. They visited farms in the Boise area. And even though the book is one-sided, the kids didn’t seem to be. They are naturally open-minded and inquisitive. Maybe it’s us adults that insist on taking sides and thereby lose our ability to learn from each other. 

Here's a few of the slides we showed the kids:

mother and son
"They look alike!" they said

tools of the trade used throughout time to tend livestock
horses, herding dogs, and kids

Diversity is good, on the range and in the classroom

Just good honest "real" food
Country Natural Beef in Bend, Oregon

November Serenade

I have often loved November.  It's a muted month, kind of like me.  I like wearing neutral colors and blending into the background - tastefully I hope. November is resolute. It's a no-frills, take me for what I am month.

November is also the month we get the cattle ready for winter. We just finished four straight days of working the herd. Day 1 thru 3 was collecting and moving the herd to a new pasture at a lower elevation.  Day 4 was separating the cows from the calves and vaccinating the calves.  Then we put them back with their mothers for a couple of weeks before weaning.

My job on day 4 was loading the calves, five at a time, in the chute to receive their shots.  It's an enjoyable task, but a young man who we've watched grow up the last ten years needed a job, so after awhile I gave him mine.  I gladly got my camera and hiked up the mountain. As high as I went, I could still hear the cows and calves calling to each other from across the corrals.

I hiked up past the old homesteader’s cabin. It is always picturesque, but even more so today, nestled quietly in a grove of bare quaking aspens that mimic the gray of its weathered logs.

As I went further I happened across a surveyor’s marker dated 1910. “Penalty $250 for removal” was plainly stamped on the cap. Who were the men that tromped over these hills a hundred years ago?

Ever the grass enthusiast, I made mental notes about the quantity and quality of forage; ever the naturalist, I greeted the bare chokecherries, the fragrant sage, and the spent blue flax with its wheatberry tops. Finally I laid down near a thicket, put my hat over my eyes, and sunk into the earth.

This land has a history. A history of man, yes, of the surveyors, the homesteaders, the trappers and cowboys. Of grandpa Eldro who purchased the property, of my friend Brenda, who prior to that with her folks took their turn at irrigating and loving this bit of range.  Man’s most recent history includes me and my kids picking wildflowers and herding cows here.

But the real history of this land is of the plants and animals that evolved here.  In a graceful dance, their symbiotic relationships compel me - sagebrush and grouse, willows and beaver, elk and bunch grass.  I respect them and understand my temporary place here.

Enjoying my respite from cattle work, I got a wild hair and tried a self-portrait like my teenage daughter does with her friends, hold the camera out at arms length and click the shutter. 

 

When I walked back down to the corrals, there was only one more draft of calves to process. We got done before dark, which was better than the day before. In 10 days we’ll return to walk the herd home and leave the field to the mule deer, the bitterbrush  . .  the snowfall.

Cowboys on Film

One of our marketing cooperative’s biggest customers, Whole Foods, wanted to show their customers that there are, in fact, real ranching families behind the Country Natural Beef label, not some corporate behemoth. We were asked to host a film crew for a day to video us working cattle and talking about our ranching philosophy. I very hesitatingly said “yes” to the proposal.  What would we have to offer them?  Surely there were more scenic sites within our cooperative, with people more eloquent than us to feature on a video!  But as I am learning to do these past few years, I took a big gulp and said okay.

Kate works for Whole Foods in the Durham, North Carolina area.  She is originally from Mississippi.  They flew her clear to Idaho to video our ranch. The film crew came out of Jackson Hole, Wyoming. 

Mark had to throw the saddle on my horse “Mater” twice to get the shot right.  When “Sly” stopped leading nicely to eat on a willow tree, that shot had to be retaken.  We stopped and started, waiting for the crew to re-group, time and again.  I was quickly learning to appreciate all the angles and vantages that are filmed and spliced together to make a movie.  

We moved the bulls from one pasture to the next, and as they went through the gate, they bucked and played, fought and ran.  As we loped around them, I knew this wasn’t the picture of low-stress cattle herding I had hoped to show on the video.  Finally the cattle relaxed and went about grazing.  As the crew interviewed Mark with the bulls in the background, I kept the animals within the view of the camera, tucking in this side then that.

We visited grandma Bonnie at ranch headquarters.  They interviewed her and even stopped for coffee time around her kitchen table, a ritual here on the Pratt ranch.  We shared barbequed beef sandwiches for lunch and worked ‘til nearly dark.  Kate got to ride Mater, and everyone seemed pleased with the way the footage came together. 

Jesse, the audio portion of the crew, really got interested as he heard us explain the art of conservation ranching.  He admitted to never eating meat, but our story of sustainability melded perfectly with his personal philosophy.  He was totally surprised to find we had so much in common.  He said he was going back home and tell folks to eat our meat!

The next morning Mark said we needed to move some cow/calf pairs to a new field.  “What,” I replied, “with no film crew?”         

The FFA Way

The streets of downtown Indianapolis were clogged with over 50,000 FFA members this past week, and our family was among them.  It’s quite an experience to witness a sea of their trademark blue jackets everywhere you go, in the mall, in every restaurant, around every corner.  And on every kid's back was the name of their state and hometown chapter proudly displayed in big gold letters.  They massed at every crosswalk, then took their turn as the light changed. 

The girls’ uniform consists of a black skirt with black nylons, the same blue jacket the boys wear, a white collared shirt and a feminine royal blue tie.  Our Anna said she felt more respected when she was in her “official dress.”  We went into Nordstroms to get an extra pair of black nylons.  The sales lady had a stash behind the counter for just such emergencies.  What a contrast from the droopy jeans look that most  teenagers wear.

Our son ran for national office, a grueling effort with months of preparation.  When his name wasn’t called, I didn’t feel as disappointed as I expected.  Oh, so that’s how it turned out, was about all I felt.  After the officers were announced and the convention came to a close, he said his goodbyes and came to us from across the emptying stadium, gave us another good long hug, and that was that.  He says he’ll run again next year.  For the past 5 years he’s given his best to the FFA and I expect he’ll give it a couple more.  The organization has helped create the man he is, given him courage, opportunity, the gift of service.

 

The state and national officers are the stars of the FFA.  I asked Seth once why that was.  I was thinking that they needed to feature the common member more.  What he said rang true.  “You have to remember who they’re inspiring, Mom - a bunch of highschool kids who need heroes.  The officers wear the same jacket they do - they see themselves up there on stage too.”  And he’s right.  The officers are farm kids just like Seth.  They share his heart for the job.  I wish them a great year ahead. 

Fall Pasture

It’s always a joy to put cows on fresh pasture, but there’s something almost mystical about fall feed. The days can be hot, but the evenings are crisp and cold.  There's a clarity to the air. We regroup not only the herd, but our lives; take a look back and a look ahead.

Summer is taking her last draw, the cured range grasses are yellow and lush - the water, crystal clear.  It's a bittersweet shift, for winter is staging her descent in the background and we may return sooner than expected if the snows come early.       

We moved cattle to their fall pastures on the last two weekends.  First the cows and calves on an uncomfortably hot day, over the mountain to Meadow Creek country.  We do our best to practice low-stress cattle handling, but we found ourselves reverting to old methods as we pushed them begrudgingly up the steep incline.  They seemed more interested in going back or staying put than any forward movement. At days’ end, we were totally spent, as were our helpmates, the dogs and horses.  Who’s stressed now?     

Then the heifers went to their new digs up along Ross Fork, high above the city of Pocatello.  We processed them first, preg checking and vaccinating.  Then we saddled up to make the so-called “short” drive to the fall pasture.  What we thought would take an hour stretched to three, the heifers tired and hot.  We traveled up, and up some more, and finally dumped them in a thicket at sunset.  As we headed home in the dark, we crested a hill to see the sparkling lights of the city laid out in the distance.  And above that, a bank of clouds and the slim crescent of a new moon.  For a moment the silhouettes of cowboys jogged against the sky.   

This life we have chosen, or rather that chose us, is at once sublime and wearisome.  Just when I think I’ll retire and let Mark hire his help, I get a reawakening . . . while watching cows wrap their tongues around native bunch grasses, or riding home towards a panorama of city lights.

Guess my love/hate relationship with this ranch is on the upside tonight.

Endings

Mom’s funeral was one week ago today.  One week, and so much changes and so much stays the same.  She had been fading for a month and a half – decided she was done eating.  And she drank only when we asked her to.  And so we watched her light fade, hard as it was.  She remained calm and seemingly content, a remarkable woman with no regrets.  She said to me just three short days before she died, “I’m okay.” 

And so we stood on the precipice between this world and the “other”; we felt the power that only those that accompany death receive.  I wish I could hold on to that unnamed enlightenment, but it grows weaker by the day.  Still, I fancy that I am changed.  That I have left behind fickle tendencies, matured somehow – more aware of what actually matters in this life. 

I can’t explain it entirely, but when the mystery was in my hand, when my Mom was taking her last breaths, in and out, I felt that all was as it should be.  The glorious unknown was playing its hand - and I was witness.

My daughter emailed me from New York City.  She said simply, “there is beauty in endings.”  And so it is true . . . but why?  Perhaps it is only in the ending that we truly embrace and appreciate what we had – and what we still have.  It is in the margin between life and death when that life becomes most precious, most remarkable. 

I told her that last morning, “You can go, Mom.  We’ll take care of Dad and we’ll be okay.  Everything will be all right.”  Whether she heard me or not, she was gone soon thereafter.  My sister was sitting with her, and I was walking out in the pasture with Dad when she died.  We had walked past the trees Mom planted and stopped briefly to gaze out towards her beloved mountains.  And when we returned to the house she was gone – like the words said about artist Charles M. Russell’s cowboys, “gone far and grazin’.” 

        Mom sharing her love of flowers with

                          my darlings