Tuesday, December 2, 2008

11/29/08 Playing Cow

Les delivered a handmade wooden bridge to the house, a flat one, made from an old wooden pallet. We dumped it in the side yard, and repaired a plywood stall wall that Chewie pulled off.

Then we loaded Romeo, and hauled to his house. He grabbed Amigo, we loaded up in his trailer, and off we went to the arena. We were going to play with the steers, and nobody else got called that we'd be there. This would be what the day before was supposed to.

Amigo tracks cows like a madman! He stayed right on their hip, often bounding one way or the other before the cow would move. It was hysterical fun to ride. I spent most of the time in the saddle hanging onto the horn tightly, trying really hard to keep my reins loose and my rein-hand on his neck. He galloped down the arena a few times. Les insisted "the Old Man only gave you about 10%. If you had your spurs on, he would've cut off every single one and kept them from running back to the herd." It didn't matter, I had an absolute blast, and got my cow-horse therapy in the form of outright squealing giggling aboard the OldMan.

Les rode Romeo, and said while he didn't track great, he did "lock on" to one steer, and when the steer stopped wiggling around, so did he. Les never got upset with Romeo while teaching him, and when Romeo got it right, and tracked up, Les was praising the daylights out of him. "Good boy!", patting him on the neck. Romeo's eyes looked bright, ears pricked forward. He knew he'd done good.

More work will be needed in this area if I intend on ever helping move cows out in a pasture, or the like. But a fun day overall.

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