I’ve been telling you about loading and promoting loading bulls. Lucy Rechel is one of the real leaders and innovators of the beef industry.

She and her husband Dennis are amount some of my favorite people I have gotten to know in my work. They are having fun and enjoying life no matter if they are working, playing or killing something.(big time bow hunters)

I have gone to the bull test/feedlot several times (one time I got paid in sweet onions that they farmed). I really enjoy the noon meal, as they all eat together at the folks place.

Lucy took me up on my challenge of trailer loading training the bulls in the sale.
She and her crew worked with the bulls and got them to loading.

When I got there, we walked the bulls in a 100 foot round pen with an alley around it to stage the bulls. That was very interesting as you need to stay far enough away to not get in the shot. Then we would walk the bulls over and load them in the trailer.

One bull that was a little snuffy didn’t want to load, and I worked him pretty hard. It took about 45 minutes and he went from being scared to being on the fight to yielding to pressure and loading real nice, and not on the fight at all. I was on foot and I was pretty wore out, but it was real rewarding to make the change in the bull.

Lucy gets it. She is adamant her crew work cattle right, there is a sign at the load out to remind truckers to work the way she wants cattle to be handled, and she creates facilities that work but are not over the top expensive.

We worked hard for two days walking and loading bulls. I was wore out from all the foot work. We went back to the office when we were done and settled up (she tried to pay me in Draxxin) and I headed out and she was heading out to breed cows. A cowgirls work is never done.

I think this article and the videos of some of the bull work will tell you more than I can. The main point is when you train a bull to load in a trailer, you are teaching him to take pressure and how to respond to it. If you can’t see what advantages this creates there’s probably not much use in spending any more time on this scoop loop.

Write up for Western Livestock Journal

Trailer Trained –
Added Value from Snyder Bull Test

Bulls for the 21st Century, Snyder Livestock’s bull test and sale, is once again leading the industry in providing value to bull buyers in the form of trailer trained bulls.  Lucy Rechel and her crew have spent many hours teaching the bulls to load into a trailer.  The goal of the training is to sell ranchers bulls that will load into a trailer in the middle of a pasture or on the open range.  “Teaching the bulls that the trailer is a safe and comfortable place could be valuable to ranchers throughout the life of the bull,” says Rechel, bull test owner and manager.  As evidence of the training, the videos posted online show each bull stepping into the trailer.

Rechel was guided in the trailer training by Curt Pate, animal handling expert and educator with NCBA’s Stockmanship and Stewardship program.  Curt believes the value of the training is much broader than teaching the bulls to load into a trailer.  The bulls are taught to accept pressure and that will be evident whenever the bulls are being handled – into the chute for annual BSE or vaccinating, onto a scale, or just moving cattle from pasture to pasture.  Rechel is appreciative of the sponsorship of Zoetis for Curt Pate’s assistance in the trailer training project.

Trailer training provided unexpected benefits.  Rechel says, “what a great way to train my workers on how to handle cattle.  To load bulls individually into a trailer without the aid of alleys and gates requires a high level of handling skill.  My employees’ ability to read the cattle, anticipate their actions, and apply the right amount of pressure at the right time and from the right angle took a quantum leap through this project.”

Rechel adds one caveat: “These bulls can be untrained.  For cattlemen to enjoy the value of trailer training for the life of the bull, he must be handled correctly.  Some cattlemen evaluate their own handling ability on results – not process.  Getting a bull into a trailer or a chute with crowd pens and gates does not necessarily equate to cattle that are not stressed.  Forcing a bull with a rattle paddle, a loud yell, or a hotshot and slamming the gate before he can turn around is not stockmanship and is pretty likely to untrain the bull.  Many options are available for ranchers to become better cattle handlers and NCBA’s Stockmanship and Stewardship trainings offer prime opportunities.”

Rechel believes that correct cattle handling has very broad industry implications.  “When my employees learn to read cattle, and apply and relax pressure correctly the risk of someone being injured is greatly reduced.  Vaccines are more effective, animals are less likely to be injured, conception rates increase, bawling calves to learn drink and come to the feed bunk more quickly.  Cattle gain more weight with less input.  Consumers are historically focused on the quality and safety of the beef they purchase.  Today, they also want to understand how it is produced.  Good animal handling skills make it easy to be transparent about our ranching practices.”

The trailer trained bulls will be available at Bulls for the 21st Century annual sale on March 11, at the ranch in Yerington, Nevada. Bull sale catalogs are available on the website.

Check out the videos of Bulls on sale catalog and better yet, head to Yerington, Nevada and take in the sale.

I was visiting with my Mother on the telephone and she told me she saw me RFDTVsCattleman to Cattleman.  I looked it up and found some great clips from NCBA convention.  I am real proud of what we have done as a team, but a good team is a combination of individual talents working together to make a team.

The leader of our team is Chase DeCoite.  I have watched him improve his people skills over the last few years, and as you will see in this interview, he really shows his passion and intensity for Stockmanship and Stewardship, which is what our team is all about.

Next up, Todd McCartney and Dean Fish.  They are the backbone of our convention demos.  They are responsible for arena set up and design,  finding cattle and horses, deciding on schedule and topics to demonstrate, as well as production and MCing trade show demonstrations.

This year they took on another role at Cattlemans College, presenting on facility design and cattlehandling. We need to see them more as they have so much to offer.

Ron Gill, who I get to present with, was named the “BQA Presenter of the Year” here’s an example of his knowledge and skill as a presenter:

And here’s my little spot my Mother told me about.  I am real proud to be a part of this team, along with my wife Tammy adding to the team,and like I said, each member adds our part to make the team at Stockmanship and Stewardship.  Hope to get to visit with you at one of the events in 2018!

I have mentioned working for Sieben Ranch previously. It was a great place to work, and the foreman, Clark Atkinson was really a great stockman and boss.
It was a big ranch with lots of different country, lots of different employees, and John Baucus was a real good boss that left us alone to do our job.

John and Nina Baucus

We lived about 10 miles from headquarters, but I spent quite a bit of time there doing cattle and sometimes sheep work. They had a cook and cookhouse, and the bell rang at 6,noon, and 6. If we were working and got to a good place to stop for dinner, Clark would shut things down and we would head to the bunk house to wash up and wait for the bell. Sometimes it would be an 45 minutes to an hour early. Clark would use this time to discuss some plans he had, or just to share ideas to improve ranch operations. We never had formal meetings, but got lots done in these visit sessions.

There were stacks of Western Horseman magazines in the bunk house. Sometimes we would just pick out one and read (or look at the pictures).
I saw a article about two California fellows loading bulls in a trailer out in the pasture. I later met Joe Wolter and Brian Newbert and still admire the things they do.

Well, I couldn’t wait to get to loading bulls. We had bulls out on the “Sieben Flats” and they were good size open pastures with some timber and brush but not much, and you could get pretty much anywhere in the pasture with a trailer.

The first bull I tried to load, (I can’t remember if he had foot rot or pinkeye, or I just needed him somewhere else) I pulled the trailer up next to the fence, and opened the gate against it and loaded the bull. It took quite a while, and I figured out that I was trying to “make” the bull get in. Later I learned to go about it so the bull “decided” to go in.

The next time I went out, I parked right out in the middle. Then I drove the bull real careful, so as not to get him to trying to get away from me. Once I got him to the trailer, I would get him to the back entrance and if he looked in I would back my horse up a step or two. If he went by the door I would just put a little pressure on take him for a little trip around the pick up and when he got to the back gate and looked in, step back. It didn’t take long and he got in all on his own.

I had really been working on my horsemanship and was really aware of the release of pressure, so it was easy to figure out. I had gotten real good at getting horses to load, and I used the same mindset, I just didn’t have a halter and lead rope, but the principle was the same.

I got really good at loading bulls by myself out in the pasture. One time I loaded one older bull, shut the center gate, and went to loading a younger bull. Every time the young bull would step up to load, the older bull would blow snot and send him away. I worked at it for quite a while, got the old bull to quit running the young bull off, loaded the young bull, then put my horse in and headed to the headquarters. I remember how good I felt about what I had accomplished.  No one around to see, just me and the animals I was working with.

These things took quite a while at first, but I got better and better at it, and pretty soon I could load a bull real easy, because I learned by doing how to put the right pressure on, and how much to take off or let the bull take it off. It became a real time saver, rather than driving them all the way back to the main ranch corrals.

One time I was riding up “Little Sheep” checking on some young pairs we had up there. I was about a mile or so from the trailer and I came upon a young bull that had pinkeye in both eyes and couldn’t see a thing. He was real gant and I new he hadn’t drank for a while. There was no way to get the trailer up the draw to him. I rode up to him and made a little noise and he left and would walk right into a tree. I would start him walking and just before he ran into a tree I would say “hey”. If didn’t take that bull long to figure out that he needed to turn when I said “hey”. I got him down to the road and the creek. He got a drink, and believe it or not, I drove that blind bull the couple miles to the ranch, and it got to where I could keep him on the road just by noise.

We purchased 18 young bulls one year. We were riding some young horses, and in one of our bunkhouse meetings, and I suggested we put our trailers in the middle of the bull lot and get some good work for our colts and teach the bulls to load. It took a lot less time than I thought and you couldn’t keep those bulls out of the trailer. They new that was the best place to be when we were in the pen with them. I don’t think I ever got to load any of those bulls as I went out on my own not long after that, but I bet they were always good to load anywhere.

I can’t think of a better opportunity for me to learn than those days at Sieben. I would work by myself a lot and really learned how to be a better horseman, stockman and dog handler. I was as gung ho on learning as you could be and it was the perfect place to learn. Clark as the boss, and John Shelby (great California trained cowboy)and myself roped, doctored and moved cattle as a good team.

All those experiences really thought me to learn and think for myself. The horsemanship, as well as Clark’s strong influence from the sheep world ( he was the camp tender [sheep boss]for years before becoming foreman), and working solo lots of the time, really helped me to figure out many things with stockmanship. If I heard about something hard to do, I did it. It was a great time of learning in my life.

That’s also about the time I got real interested in a better type of saddle. I remember one saddle catalog that had a poem on the front of it, and a picture of some young cowboys. It’s the only “cowboy poetry” I ever learned and I still remember it.

“Dream back beyond the cramping lanes to glory’s that have been,
The camp smoke on the sunset plains, the riders loping in.
Loose reined and Rowelled heel to spare, the wind our only guide,
For youth was in the saddle there, with half the world to ride!”

Well, that was me. Learning and loving the work.

I know the value of being able to load bulls out in the middle of a pasture. Thanks to that article in the Western Horseman, it got me started doing something I might not have ever done. I gained so much confidence being successful at it. Bulls will teach you about proper pressure better than any other class of animal. I feel it probably helped me improve my stockmanship more than anything else. That was all started a long time ago!

For the last few years, I have been promoting the idea to bull producers that are selling bulls that they should get the bulls trailer broke and that would raise the value of the bull. Well finally someone took me up on it. I’ll share the story in the next loop I throw out there.