July 25th, 2020, Volume 15, Issue 29
Haying season has finally begun here at McGinnis Meadows! This week Randy, Willy, Anna, Scott and Kevin have begun haying our meadows. In order for us to really crank out these bales the weather needs to be consistently warm and dry and it seems mother nature has finally delivered the weather we need with temps getting even as high as 96 degrees! Everyday at lunch we’ve all been watching out the lodge window as the hay crew works their magic. It’s fun to watch all the tractors, trucks and balers cruising around in the meadow. It’s been neat to see how it all works, and Randy runs a pretty smooth hay operation. I personally like to watch the baler pump out our 600+ pound bales. They all look so perfect sitting out there in the meadow. Once the bales are ready to be picked up Anna, Scott and Kevin have been driving in trucks and trailers and picking them all up and stacking them away like big Lego blocks for later use.
Hay!
While the hay crew has been busy in the meadow Emily, Maddie, Brenda and myself have been up on the mountain moving steers from the State section to the McKillop piece. Something I always forget is how beautiful the country is here at the ranch. Both the State piece and the McKillop are beautiful, but I have to say I think the views riding out to McKillop are pretty hard to compete with. While the views can be quite distracting, riding out is the perfect opportunity to apply everything we have learned in the arena in a real world setting. As we walked out of the arena to go look for cattle the first thing Maddie asked us was “What do we memorize?” and we all cheered, “RATE!” and off we went with slobber straps a swingin’.
While the steers we gathered were a pretty wiley bunch we managed to wrangle them up together and moved them to the lower water tank on the McKillop piece. It’s always important to remember that when moving steers to a new grazing area that we must first show them a water source before dropping them off. The girls were telling me that when it’s hot like it has been this week the steers tend to stay up high where it’s cooler and where there are fewer buggies. This is why we have been hitting the trail in the early mornings to catch them before they head up to the top. There’s always so much to learn when we ride out and move cattle. Everything from what kind of trees we’re riding through, to what to clues to look for when looking for cattle and knowing where they like to hang out. It really does teach you to keep an eye out for even the smallest details. It’s just part of cowboyin, or in Maddie, Emily and I’s case cowgirlin’.
That’s all for this week,
Alyssa
The herd
Emily Jingling
Chalkeye and Maddie moving steers to McKillop