Cowboy Story as Told by Sandy Bush No shit, this really happened! Charlie and I had taken a week of vacation to visit Doug Kafka at his ranch in Glenrock, Wyoming, one more time before he made the move to his new place in Wheatland. He had sold the ranch to a wonderful couple with three little kids that wanted to raise their family as ranch babies. Good friends of ours and also Doug’s, Bill and Donna Larsen, had pastured their cattle on the ranch and they needed to gather and move them back to winter pasture. We had scheduled the last trip to Doug’s ranch so we could help them. Charlie and I had never trailed cattle before. We had been on several horse gathers at Harry Vold’s in Fowler, Colorado, but never had the opportunity to work with cattle. We left San Antonio in early October to make the drive to the ranch and traveled about 160 miles when we got a call from Doug saying that they had 30 inches of snow and he was snowed out. Charlie turned the truck around and we went home, disappointed but hoping that in another week the weather would clear. Doug told us that he was in Cheyenne when the snow hit the ranch and was stuck there overnight. Those of you who have never been to Wyoming, let me explain the gates. When the weather gets really bad they close the road with gates similar to railroad crossings. The next day he made it as far as Wheatland, 70 miles, and could not get any farther due to the gates. There is a $200 fine if you go around these gates. On the third day when he finally got to the ranch, the county snowplow had left him a nice little 5 foot snow bank at the driveway and he still had to find a place to stay, no rooms in Casper, Douglas, Glenrock. Finally found a place in Glendo. He asked if there was a room in Glendo and they said “we have rooms right here”. The room was in what they are calling a “Pod”, it is a unit with 6 rooms and there were two of them. Doug said it was the nicest room he had been in. Charlie and I, in San Antonio, kept checking the weather conditions on the Weather Bug app on our phones, and calling Doug every couple of days. Bill Larsen and Doug finally agreed that Saturday, October 12, the job could get done. We still had most of the truck packed with our suitcases and piles of stuff. Coats, vest, rubber boots, blankets, clothes, the 4 wheeler, saddle and tack, coffee for Doug…well let’s just say, half of our house. Charlie finished up a few things for work and we hit the road Wednesday evening. He drove most of the night and I took over in Amarillo, TX. The trip to Wyoming is 1147 miles, Charlie trusted me to drive 230 miles of that. The weather was beautiful all across Texas, Oklahoma and Colorado until we hit the state line of Wyoming. It started snowing, big quarter size flakes. Charlie was ready to buy us a set of chains for the pickup until he called Doug. Ribeye Steak dinner, complete with Raspberry Duff and ice cream was waiting for us at the ranch. Happy to be there on Friday, when Bill called and decided to come that morning and gather the cattle, move them to the pens across the creek and ship on Saturday. Doug and Charlie saddled up and I grabbed the 4 wheeler. Sorry, but I am not the greatest on horseback, Slim our best man calls me round butt. The 4 wheeler was a better choice because I wanted to take pictures of the event. On the 4 wheeler it was easy to get where I needed to be and still help herd the cattle in the general direction. Dewey Peak elevation is 6650 feet and it is covered with big rocks and trees with plenty of places for the cattle to find protection from the elements. It had snowed the night before and the ground was covered with 4-5 inches of the white stuff. Tami Larsen, Bill rode in from the pens down by the road. They all rode up Dewey Peak to push the cattle down toward Little Box Elder creek, located on the East side of Dewey. A large fairly deep draw circles around the bottom of the mountain. Bill rode up and down around the side of the mountain gathering cattle. Charlie and Doug searched the top and down the other side. From my position on the 4 wheeler I could spot some of the cattle that Bill couldn’t see. Bill’s cattle were being pushed down into the bottom of the draw around toward Little Box Elder. There was one black mama cow that was missing her baby and took off back up the mountain to find it. Bill chased it up the hill and had a hard time turning her back into the herd down the hill. That mama was a little mad about leaving her calf. Then they trailed them along the back fence across the ranch toward Doug’s driveway to the road. We had one big ole brown bull who lead the way. When we got near the road, the herd led by ole brownie, went through a narrow draw, across the road and over to the creek. Ole brownie checked out the creek and decided…no, I think the bridge looks better. Doug asked me to slow up the traffic on the road ahead of them, which was great, right where I wanted to be to get pictures of them coming across the bridge. The cowboys and cowgirl Tami, drove them into the pens, worked them to pair up the mama cows and the calves. Lots of pictures later we were finished. Bill figured that a few were still missing, but we had the majority of them. I took a lot of pictures of the cattle drive and have shared them with Doug on his Facebook page. He was nice enough to let me go through his pictures on the computer and post photos of what it looks like in the winter when the snow is so high you can’t see the 8 foot fence 20 feet from the kitchen window. There was one picture that Malik Haggie took of Doug when he walked out of the ranch, 3 1/2 feet of hard packed crusted snow with 22 inches of soft powder snow on top of that. He said each step was work, he would not have been able to make it back to the house if Malik had not been there waiting for him. It is a mile down to the county road, he was totally exhausted. I thought it was important to show the pictures of the conditions that made leaving the ranch a good thing for him. In the winter there were several times when the electricity would go out. Doug would keep the bathtubs full of water to use for cooking, coffee and toilets. There would be no television, computer, no heat and no water, and more important, no cell service. Charlie and I had given him an Aladdin kerosene mantle lamp on one of our trips to Cheyenne. With an Aladdin lamp you get 60 watts of bright white light, and 2500 btu’s of heat, he used the lamp a bunch of times and was glad to have it. The propane stove was his other heating source during this time. It must have been very lonely when you consider that there were times he was stuck out here from 20 to 30 days, with 100 mile an hour winds and 30 degrees below zero. Burrrrr! The difference in elevation from Glenrock to his ranch is 1500 feet. When it was 35 below with 45 mph wind the chill factor felt like minus 100 degrees. Saturday, Doug and Charlie saddled back up and went to gather the missing cattle. Doug, Charlie and I had driven the pickup back around toward Little Box Elder the night before and found two sets of mama’s and their calves. I went down some of the smaller draws out in the pasture to look for other cattle. Then I headed over toward Little Box Elder to wait for Charlie and Doug to come across the mountain. Charlie and I were communicating with our ham radios, when we could. I was talking to him and heard Doug call Charlie’s name. When I looked back toward the ranch I saw a cowboy on the hill behind me. Thinking that it was Doug, I took off in that direction to see if I could get in the way. Turned out to be Bill Larsen and a pair of his dogs, he had ridden over and seen the four cattle that we had found the night before. Bill left with them to take them over to the pens. I went back to let Charlie and Doug know about Bill and the cows, but could not hear Charlie on the radio and could not find either of them. After driving around awhile I headed toward the ranch to get fueled up. I could see, Doug and Charlie coming in with the little calf that the mama cow was looking for. He was an ornery little Son of a Gun! Doug had him on a rope and he had his own ideas about where he wanted to be. It took everybody to get him pushed, pulled and cussed into the trailer. If he only knew that mama was waiting, maybe his attitude would have been a little better. Later that day Kay and Art Parker came by to pick up their horses. They will be good neighbors in Wheatland for Doug. Really nice people, we enjoyed meeting them. Kay has the prettiest sparkly eyes. Sunday morning we woke up to snowfall. It had snowed a couple of inches overnight and continued most of the day. Work continued on the move. Doug and his helpers loaded the shed onto a flatbed trailer and the old pickup that was in the barn onto another flatbed. Jumped into the trucks and drove to Wheatland. First look at Doug’s new place. The house and out buildings are all very nice. Bill, the previous owner let us look through the house. They have the movers coming November 5 and hope to be out by the following day. Doug also bought a little one bedroom house in town and took us on a tour of that. It needs some paint and a fence, but it will be a nice rental property. We were climbing the hill up from Glenrock and noticed a jeep stopped on the side of the road. Doug stopped to see if they needed anything and found that it was Laci and Levi with their kids and a brother. What a cute family, I took a picture of them and posted it on Facebook. I had already posted several pictures onto Doug’s Facebook. He sure likes his internet, and all his Facebook fans love to read his posts. Monday morning the sun is shining, snow is melting and it is a gorgeous day. We are waiting for the help to show up so more loading can be done. Looks like another load to Wheatland, the wagon with the antlers, the tractor and the stuff out of the little house. By the end of the day most of the snow was melted, just a few patches on the hills that the sun didn’t get. Tuesday is leaving day for Charlie and I, we really don’t want to go, but it is a long drive home. We have enjoyed visiting with Doug here at the ranch. Very glad to have seen it in the Spring when the blue lupine were blossoming and all the wild flowers. The smell of the flowers, pine and sage is something that I will never forget. Riding the 4 wheelers all over the ranch, visiting the caves, finding beautiful rocks, it has all been great. The only thing I regret is not seeing a bear or a mountain lion or the elk that cross the ranch in large herds. I wanted to hear the elk bugling on the mountains like I have once near Cloudcroft, New Mexico when my Auntie Beth and I were out spotlighting one night. God Bless Jackie for her gift, God Bless Doug for his friendship, God Bless Laci and Levi’s family and God Bless America, keep it safe from Obama!
Posted on: Tue, 22 Oct 2013 11:15:46 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015