My neighbor and brand inspector for the area, Alex Martin called and asked if I could help him gather some strays that showed up on another neighbor down the river, Mark Ward. Both are super nice guys that I really enjoyed being around.
I knew the place as I’ve helped get cattle there before. It’s on the river and pretty brushy and fun to figure out how to get cattle up and in the pens.
It went real good finding and gathering them on a beautiful fall day. I really enjoyed how they worked in the corral and how well Rocky did sorting on them.
lf you lost four red tagged steer calves without a brand near Ryegate, Montana I know where they are!
I’ve had the privilege of riding some real nice big, stout bay geldings in my life.
I bought a 2 year old gelding up in Alberta and he became one of my favorite horses I’ve owned. He was real handy to ride and I roped lots of cattle on him and used him to start lots of colts.
He was a real character. I would have some kid hold him for me and tell to watch that he didn’t lick them, and sure enough when they were not looking he would get em.
We called him Stewball. He was such a good horse.
My wife bought another big good looking stout gelding from our friend Clayton Hines, also from Alberta. I name the horse “Low Tone” which was the nickname of Clayton.
Another good one that you could do anything on. My wife Tammy, and daughter Mesa were kind of partners on him I think, and he ended up with a real good family friend in Kentucky, Mary Ann Ellison.
He ended up being called Montana, and really was a nice horse.
Another big stout bay geldings has come into my life. His name is Rocky, a horse Tribe Ranch purchase along with three others that we started a few years ago, from Riley Olson with Ride Prosperous Ministry.
They have a horse sale every year and it’s coming up soon. October 3rd and 4th this year. Check out their website to see the offering of foundation bred horses that are raised and handled right.
Here’s some video of Rocky and some ideas of what makes a big stout bay gelding good.
When I get to visit the Tribe Ranch I always get to feeling good about sharing how important understanding animal behavior is and the influence of that behavior through proper pressure and release of that pressure.
The whole crew has been very interested in going about it to improve the way they interact with all animals and humans while working with animals. There have been lots of moments when things were not perfect and the emotions sometimes get pretty elevated, both positive and negative. The important thing to understand is you need to learn from these situations in how to make them better and if they are negative, try to keep them from happening.
Being the lead in teaching or running a crew with livestock is tricky business. You have to push people, and while learning be willing to let people make mistakes, but still be productive and keep animals and humans safe and improving. I still overstep and sometimes let my emotions get the best of me but I am getting better at controlling my emotions.
I find working livestock with family and/or a crew it will cause you to do and say things you never say anywhere else. I find this a fascinating thing and have seen it all my life all over the world. If you want to be an effective leader, it is so important to communicate before and after and during working stock to keep this in check. If not it will make it very difficult to be effective and not create animosity with working stock and having a crew that works together, rather than fighting stock and fellow workmates.
The definition of Tribe is this:
a social division in a traditional society consisting of families or communities linked by social, economic, religious, or blood ties, with a common culture and dialect, typically having a recognized leader.
This ties in perfectly with working as a group working livestock. The Tribe mentality is a great mindset to make it work.
Some things to think about to improve stockmanship, and “humanship”
These are some clips of the Tribe working as a tribe!
Curt Pate Stockmanship 