feed truck full of straw bales. The dogs would sniff out the calves their mothers had hid-
den in the brush, some already blown under drifts, and we would dig them out, put them
on a nice dry straw bed out of the wind. I don’t know how the dogs knew what were look-
ing for, but they did and found plenty of calves that would have died without help. We
were out all night long, but it sure beat a full night’s sleep only to have a bunch of dead
calves in the morning.
When we trail up to mountain pastures in the summer, the first leg of the trail is an east-
ern slope of rock and buckbrush, which is about 5 times larger than a sagebrush and has 2
inch thorns. It is 6 miles straight up hill, no water, and those days it always seems to be 90
degrees by 7am. The bulls get sore-footed and crabby, calves lose their mothers easily
winding through the tall brush, and you really have to watch for rattlesnakes getting some
early morning sun on a warm rock. We have also had several neighbors ask if we could
lend a hand bringing their stock up the slope, and could we please bring all our
dogs! About halfway, we all stop, giving everything a chance to rest, calves find their
mothers and the dogs get a big drink from the 5 gallon cooler of water I haul up just for
them. I get a lot of wet-nosed thank yous for that! About two hours later the tail end of
the herd pops over the top of the rocky slope and descends into the paradise of the moun-
tain meadows and we stop for the night there. The cattle devour mouthfuls of tall, lush,
green grass, the horses roll happily when we unsaddle them for the night, and the dogs
wade and swim in the cool flowing creek with the kids. Its heaven for man and beast after
a long dusty day.
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