High Desert Cowboy- How far is it up north?

High Desert Cowboy

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So my longhorn scar story.
A few years back I was working for an outfit that had one lone longhorn cow on the place, and at the time she had a calf. One day we hear a bunch of bellowing and come over to find that that longhorn cow had somehow managed to get out of the pasture. This was a frequent occurrence with this cow, in spite of that spread in her head she seemed to be able to Houdini her way out of anything. Polled cattle couldn’t follow her escape attempts, and this time neither could her calf. So I saddle up and ride over to push her back home. The shortest way to do this was by pushing her south away from the main road to the back corral gate, and then run her through some alleys back to the pasture. Easy....with any other cow. Any attempt to push her away from that fence line was futile, she wanted to stay with her calf (wanted it that bad she should’ve stayed in the fence) and she had plenty of area to get away from me and back to her calf. Alright, Plan B. I shake out a loop, a big loop. She knows what’s coming, and goes north to the main road, keeping that fence close to her right shoulder preventing an easy catch. She turns onto the main road and open up a little and I let fly my loop. Too small! Instead of getting both horns I get around the far side one but the loops in front of the other. It’ll hold, but you don’t get the best control. I dally on and start my way off the main road, and I’ve barely made it off before we’re suddenly straining like this cow had turned into a Mack truck. I glance back, and that clever wench has wrapped herself around the stop sign at the end of the dirt road. Stop indeed! After some cursing of cow and her ancestors back to the first horned creature that mooed I get her untangled and manage to drag her through the gate, alleys, and final gate to the pasture. Mama and baby are reunited, all is well with the world except one thing...she’s still wearing my rope. Now this is a fine King rope from Sheridan Wyoming, I’m not about to leaver her with it. I lean out and grab hold of the loop and start working it lose as she “relaxes” with her suckling calf. BAM! Stars, red, pain! That indecent creature had swung her head and stuck me with her namesakes right next to my eye. Fortunately the bone in my eye socket prevented further penetration, but if you’ve ever broken skin right there you know it splits like overripe fruit and bleeds like it’s pulling the blood from your entire body to that spot. Rope in hand I storm off, daring anyone to comment on my bloodied face as I unsaddled in the corrals. The next day my eye had swelled and blackened, and that sorry cow had escaped again. This time, I just cut the dang fence figuring it was less trouble to fix that then to fight that hussy one more time.
 

RollingAcres

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BAM! Stars, red, pain! That indecent creature had swung her head and stuck me with her namesakes right next to my eye. Fortunately the bone in my eye socket prevented further penetration, but if you’ve ever broken skin right there you know it splits like overripe fruit and bleeds like it’s pulling the blood from your entire body to that spot. Rope in hand I storm off, daring anyone to comment on my bloodied face as I unsaddled in the corrals.

Ouch! But glad it didn't penetrate further and cause damage to your eye.
 

greybeard

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Well, you can't blame an animal that is heavy into maternal tenancies for doing what hundreds and hundreds of years have taught her to naturally do. I sure wouldn't cull or butcher one for it.

Many cows are good about using their horns to push down or pull up wire and then just walking on thru it and one with long horns will just stick her head thru, then tilt it back and raise the wire up so she can get her back under it, with the top wire just sliding along her horn..

When I was a teenager, there were lots of LH influenced cattle running the open range here and one that belonged to a guy up the road was so bad about getting INTO people's yards and pastures, he ended up putting a vertical wooden yoke on her neck so she couldn't get thru any wire. It was strange watching her graze tho.she had to drop down on her front 'knees' and tilt her head over a good bit to get her mouth to the grass. Looked sort of like this, but his was made with two 2x4s.

C_3814-694.jpg

The story:
https://www.texaslonghorn.com/pr/2016/index.cfm?con=Almond-Eyes-20160824

There are different kinds for jumpers, some steel with barbs on the end that poke their knees, others that drag a pole under between their legs and stick out the front. The part in front would hit the underside of the wire when the cow walked up close to the fence and started to jump.
 
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