Tuesday 9th June 2009 – “Oh Give Me a Home, …”

[ … Where the Buffalo used to roam]

We were just going up the road to see some kin ropin' and brandin'. We stopped for gas, and put a hundred gallons in the tank. Should I be writing to my next-of-kin ("I didn't mean what I said in the will, it was all a joke")?

We drove about 25 miles up US2, then turned off onto a gravel road. Because there are so many gravel roads (Valley County alone has 1500 miles of them, which they maintain by running a grader along them from time to time), windscreens are always cracked. I'm told the real rule about replacement is if two cracks meet.

We are going to run about twenty-five to thirty miles along this road before we get where we're going. But this is still very much Montana 'local'.

We spot a herd of sheep with its attendant dog. The dog is there to kill coyotes. It is left with a large quantity of dog food in a wind-steerable container. The steering keeps it dry, so it lasts. Contact is discouraged: this is not a pet.

There are derelict 'homesteads' dotted here and there. Homesteaders, in the late nineteenth century were allotted 160 acres (a quarter-mile square). It was not nearly enough.

The branding process involves separating out the calves, roping, branding and inoculating them; oh, and castrating the boys. There is a long preamble, while the calves are separated from their mothers.

Then some yearling heifers are separated out (I didn't quite follow why they were in in the first place). Finally, stray cows (other brands, which is why all this is going on) are separated out and reunited with their calves. This last bit is quite touching, and surprisingly easy to do. They also separate out the 'dry' cows, those with no calf ( apparently they are quite easy to spot). Failing to produce a calf is a sacking offence: "a trip to town" is how they put it.

Having separated out the calves, everybody stops for food, including me. There is a chuck wagon, which is a converted school bus.
After eating, the branding begins in earnest. It is almost totally traditional, with roping, wrestling to the ground and using hot irons. This is not for entertaining tourists (me!), but the most efficient way of doing it. I simply couldn't conceive of any kind of machinery which might do this without wreaking the most awful havoc. The only thing missing from the cowboy pictures of childhood is the guns, and this being Montana, they're in the truck, loaded.
The only concession to modern ways (apart from the inoculations, of course) is that they use a blowtorch instead of a fire to heat the irons. When they first told me this, I misunderstood: "We use a blowtorch nowadays". "Don't the animal-cruelty people object?"
The first half was not too strenuous, but the afternoon of branding, etc., was really hard work. This is their second day: they have another twenty-eight to go.

Despite all the hard work, everyone was unfailingly polite and friendly, and went out of their way to make sure I was enjoying the experience. It must be the vast, open spaces which make people here so well-mannered.

I have decided this is the life for me.

So I've got a horse …

A bit of useful experience


(next time I threaten to have someone's
balls off, they should be aware I know how to do it) …









And I've found a little place to stay
…
though it may need a bit of work.