Lots of contemplation in the last few weeks.

Watched PBR finals and they showed Ty Murray on some bulls. Great rides, but the bulls we watch today are so much ranker than then is what I was thinking.

I then had breakfast with Temple, before we did the event for Cherokee Ranch and she had made the realization from a lab with cattle that the systems she designed 30 years ago was for a different temperament of cattle than we have today.

(We used a Sort of Bud Box system, and Temple never said one negative thing about it. I’ve heard lots of folks criticize her and the tubs she promotes in a very negative way. She won’t stoop to that negative type of presenting. She presents the facts as she sees them. I admire her for her honesty. If you don’t like what she presents, give her the facts, prove them to be correct and she will promote it. She is always trying to learn better ways.)

I hear the same with horses. They say the old time horses were much tougher to “break” than the ones we are starting today.

These are real important things to think about. We can change because of the changes we make. See things for what they are, not for what they have been.

Watching the young bull riders and how they have stepped up to ride these great, seemingly impossible to ride bulls is amazing to me. I really like watching the animal athletes and the human athletes.

I finished a book titled “ The Hacking of the American Mind” by Robert Lustig.

It is very science based and talks about contentment in life. It’s main idea is that often pleasure creates long term negatives in quality of life. Many times these pleasures become habits that really create problems. Sugar is a big part of the book. The pleasure you get from sugar leads to health problems, the same as smoking or drugs. The more pleasure you get, the more you want, and the worse the outcome.

I think we all have addictions. I think I have an animal addiction. I have really enjoyed working with animals all my life. I think this is a good habit and addiction. When you have a positive interaction with an animal is sends the same pleasure signals to the brain and body as a drug. The pleasure you get, or the addictive behavior actually creates more pleasure and a positive outcome through a more profitable animal or a relationship with the animal that creates higher quality of life. This causes you to want to get even better and that is a very positive addiction.

The same happens with being nice or creating positive relationships to help people. Creating art, building saddles, braiding rawhide and any kind of creating something are great addictions.

It is so easy in this modern age to get addictions that create small pleasure but big problems. THE SIMPLE THINGS IN LIFE ARE THE GOOD THINGS! This is so important to understand. The more money, time and technology you have access to the more chance you have of going toward small pleasure and big problems.

I have spent a lot of time with Hispanic people and the Mexican culture the last couple of weeks. When I am with Mexicanos I get embarrassed by our American culture. We have so much, have to work so little, and really have it easy compared to most of the rest of the world, yet we are unhappy and complain about everything.

The Mexican people appreciate what they have, take care of their family and possessions, work hard jobs that might not be the best pay, but don’t complain and are always happy.  They are content.

Bill Dale, my friend and leader of Team California Beef Council and I went to Brawley, California for a NCBA Stockmanship and Stewardship event and worked with around 150 feedlot workers, that were mostly of Mexican decent. They were very friendly and seemed interested in what we were offering them.
We also learned great safety advice from Gordon Moore of Texas Cattle Feeders.

We went to supper that night and got to visit with Jesse Larios, who helped organize the event, and is a fellow Greeley Hat Works enthusiast. It made me appreciate the culture even more to get to hear his story and some of the history of the feedlots in the area.

Next I went to spend some time in Yuma with my Folks who winter there. It was great seeing all my Moms friends and how much fun they have living like young old people.

Then I went and played horseshoes with my Dad. Real fun and he is real good.
I recommend everyone at about fifty go spend a week in a retirement community. It will help prepare you for the future.

I have had a tooth that has been bothering me for about a year. My Dad said he had gone to a real good dentist in Mexico. I got the number and called and made an appointment for 8 AM the next morning. I then went back to my Moms place and she needed some new glasses but couldn’t go the next day. I called and the receptionist said to come today. We jumped in the car and headed to Mexico. We got there a little after noon, and I figured they would figure out what was wrong and then have me come back to fix it. After three hours I walked out with a sore mouth and all the work they could do done. I got in the chair, he looked at my mouth, figure out the problem, told me what he could do and how much it would cost for the work. I said let’s do it and he did it.

No nonsense. Just get it done effectively and efficiently for about 1/4 the cost of what I would have paid in Montana. I answered about seven questions before they went to work, when done the assistant took me to the pharmacy, got some antibiotics, paid the bill and was on my way.

Simple effective healthcare.

I went out to “The Ranch” as my Compo(a little Spanish lingo) Armondo calls it.
The Mendoza family are so welcoming to us.

They practice roping and horsemanship in the Mexican tradition and are creating some great young “Charros”. They are building a Lienzo (Mexican rodeo arena) at the place and are calling it the “Antonio Lepe Mendoza” arena to honor their father.

They are hard working people that put all they have into family and culture and I am so fortunate to be able to have them let me learn from them on how to be humble and proud in the Charro tradition.

So back to the book. Pleasure that creates contentment or a lifestyle that creates contentment. This is what creates the good life.

This is so important for us to create for ourselves, those that we are involved with, and the animals in our care.  Learn to create it.

I am going to Castle Rock, Colorado to do a cattlehandling presentation for Cherokee Ranch and Castle Foundation at the Douglas County Fairgrounds on Saturday with Temple Grandin. I have heard Temple use the term “when bad becomes normal” many times.

In continuing my thinking on the stress put on calves this time of year, I think this saying fits. It has become normal thinking that this is normal.

The way we approach the predator/pray relationship with animals makes all the difference. In my opinion it is much better to approach it from a “pressure” relationship.

The human has the ability to create a positive pressure or a negative pressure. We can walk into a pen with a bucket of pellets and shake it and all the cattle come to you, or you can walk into a pen and shake a rattle paddle or flag and fix fence for the next three days.

I know the human can create the proper situation to get animals to change behavior.

When I used to do colt starting clinics, several times I had a couple stud colts with a bunch of mares together in the arena and with the use of a flag and a riding horse that would put you in the right spot I could use the right pressure to get them to not want to breed or fight while I was in control. If I used to much pressure it would create problems for the person trying to ride them, not enough pressure would create problems for the people on the other horses. I might have to use a bunch of pressure at first, and that was why it was so important to be on a horse handy enough to get to where I needed the pressure. Releasing the pressure at the right time and in the right amount was real crucial, and if done properly it would take less each time and pretty quick all it took is being there.

We got some kittens awhile back. We have lots of dogs around here that are very aggressive towards small animals that run. All these dogs listen to me and understand that I am in control because of the pressure I use with them. We set it up with the right situation and the cats and all the dogs get along.

Because of creating proper pressure and control, these example show how the human can change real strong behavior and instinct in animals that are in a predator prey/prey relationship or the same species that left alone would be very dangerous in a group from fighting and breeding.

When the change is made life is much more enjoyable, safer and productive for the animal and the human. Quality of life improves.

This is a real challenging balance to achieve. First off, if it doesn’t work you could end up with dead cats and horses bred or hurt. Some aren’t willing to take the chance, so they either won’t try or put way to much pressure on and create a fear of the human rather then a change of mind. Then when the human is forgotten or not present the behavior intensified to get it done before the human shows up again.

Second, this requires controlling of emotions and developing a feel for pressure.
It is much easier to just put lots of pressure on and use facilities or a tool to make it happen. By using excessive pressure you get the job done, but create fear or mistrust in the animal for the future. This is the place that some horse people use the term “feel, timing, and balance”.

Third, people that use high pressure to get things done think of the skill used and the immediate outcomes as the goal. They don’t think about what excessive pressure is creating in the future. They also will criticize those that use skills that are different than the ones they use. With the extreme conditions livestock handlers have to work in, it takes tough people to do the work, and those that are tuff like to be tuff, and are proud of the skills they have.

When we work livestock, it is very important to be able to get the job done. I feel like I really got along good starting colts. I got to figuring out how to really help a colt to keep from bucking by the way I rode them. Some need to have lots of pressure to keep them moving and some need very little. I was willing to get on most anything, and if I couldn’t help them and they had to buck, I had the skill to ride them and help them through that. For me this created a better outcome father down the line because I didn’t take all the life out with to much groundwork or round pen. Not everyone has the skill to ride a bucking horse, so it’s not for everyone. I helped many of them to not buck and really got along good with very little pressure, but hardly anyone complimented me on that or even saw it. If you made a mistake and a colt really bucked and you rode him everyone could see and appreciate that.

 

Hopefully these examples will get you to thinking and talking to others about changing pressure with animals for immediate and future results, and hopefully “bad will not be normal” in the future.

This to me is the real rewarding part of stockmanship.

Been doing some different work the last few weeks. I presented at the Black Hills Horse Expo last weekend. I enjoyed the interaction with everyone. The people in that area are great, and I had lots of Native American interaction with our friends the Ducheneaux family and Phillip Whiteman. I really like spending time and learning the ways of the native people to help improve my quality of life.

I just don’t feel as comfortable presenting to horse people as I do cattle people.
I feel my ideas are not always what horse people are looking for. I think folks are so into performance, they can’t see how important the balance mentally and physically is to all aspects of horsemanship.

I took a horse I have been riding I call Jaxson. He is a real good lookin horse that I was given because he would get real scared and run off. He was real hard to catch and was not very much fun to ride.

I’ve been really working on getting him hooked on to me and not panicking when he had to make a transition in his mind. What would happen when you were riding him is he was always on alert. If you rode through the brush and your hat brushed the trees he would panic and sell out. Then he got to just going in the brush made him panic. He got to wear he was making himself panic. So I really worked at getting him to transition from standing to the walk without panicking. If I used my legs it was to much pressure, so I would lead him to a walk from his back. Going from a walk to a trot if you used your legs he would grab his butt and run off, but if you just drew him to the trot with your seat, and didn’t get out of time with him when he went to the trot he could take it, and would make the transition with out much trouble. He was real sensitive and if you did much more than think about it, it was to much and he would run off.

I really worked at getting him to settle and find a comfortable spot with me on the ground or on his back. After he got to really hunting that spot, I could use that to my advantage when he got scared. If he got to grabbing his butt I would take a hold of him and put lots of pressure on him with my legs and body until he was hunting for a way to get out of pressure, and then he would start to look for a way out rather than just running off completely.

I haven’t ridden him much in the last few months because I was on the road so it was fun to load him up and take him to Rapid City. I had never ridden him in an arena or inside so that was fun. He got a little bothered, but did great and really looked to me for support. I really like him and am learning lots from him.

The thing that I try to do with him is get the mind first and then the feet, but if the feet are going to fast I have to slow them down so I can get the mind. I have to get out in front of the mind to get the feet.

I flew from Rapid to Calgary and spent last week working with Troy Sauter of team Zoetis and some of his clients. They were all backgrounding lots and the calves have started coming to town. I heard lots of bawling calves and smelt lots of burning hair from branding.

I got to visit about fresh weaned calves with lots of these folks. This is a spot in our industry that is very important. This is the most stressful part of a calf’s life and the place we have the least understanding and skill of how to take care of it.

Zoetis has a product called “Draxxin”. If you give it on arrival, you have a window of time before you need to treat a sick animal, 14 days more or less depending on the opinions of management. I have found this is a very good time to get these calves settled down and accepting the new life they know nothing about.

Most of the time by the time these calves get to the lot, they are very stirred up from to much pressure. They have lost the comfort of the momma cow, their diet has changed from milk and grass to some strange feed they may not like or even know what it is, and if they have never drank from a water trough or ate from a bunk it may be real disturbing to them to try either one.

They have always followed momma and now she is not there and there is a human yelling or hitting them or scaring them to get them to go in a truck or through a gate. Every experience is extreme and very different from what life has been for them up until this time.

Now we receive these calves and they get sorted, put through a chute, vaccination, branding and some dehorned. More stress. They have everything in the world against them, in their mind, and physically in their body.

These calves need help. Science(Draxxin) is a huge help, but if we can add stockmanship and stewardship to it, then we are getting something real positive happening.

If we could get everyone to understand how important it is to get these calves weaned properly, with good handling as well as keeping the calf with proper nutrition and rest through the whole process. Having good facilities that allow safe and effective handling until the calf gets to its new home pen.

This is not happening. So many of the calves that get purchased are really challenged with stress. They are much like the horse Jaxson I talked about earlier. They can’t take the pressure, so we need to help them and get them to where they can survive and thrive in the new life they are in. We need to help take away some of the pressure.

Many of these calves have been over pressured and they think that is what every human is to them. You need to change the way they think of you. If you are in a pen with them and they have lots of movement, I like to get in front and get them to looking at me with both eyes and back up to draw their mind to me, and try to stop them with them looking at me and not turning back. This is very important because of the way they have been handled, they want to escape the human pressure, and you are changing that to following the human and paying attention rather than escape. I call this “hooking cattle on”. It is real good for the cattle to change the mindset from running away from you to looking at you with their feet still. You have just changed from a predator to something of interest.

This is so important for getting the calf in a state of mind to do well. If they think about running every time you are present, they have stress. Just like my horse needing to get his feet still and not wanting to run off, before he can progress, it’s the same with the calf that is being weaned.

The first step is just getting them to stop and wait. They may start again and you can do it again if they stop soft, they will leave soft. If they stop fast they will leave fast.

If you are a caretaker of livestock I think this is something very important to think about. This is so hard to get people thinking about with stockmanship.
To me I feel what we have been discussing is the most important part of effective interaction with animals that we are trying to get to improve in performance. We can go on with what to do next, but I think it would be good to wrap your head around this first.

I wrote part of this while sitting in first class, and am finishing it in the United room in Denver. Because I fly so much I sometimes get upgraded to first class, and with my “platinum status” on United, when I fly internationally I get to go to the United Room.

It’s real nice. There is a bar, food, real nice chairs, and some of them even have showers. It is a very nice place to be when dealing with the stress of traveling.
Why not wean your calves like they are in first class, and give them as everything they need just like they do here in the United Room? It won’t cost you money, it will make you money and you will be doing the right thing. Why wouldn’t you?