Productivity. It’s all I ask for in a day. And finally the other day we actually physically seemed to get something done.

Fences are a pretty big deal out here. And when you see a Smith fence, it’s more than likely that you are looking at a century or more old fence. A common phrase around here is, “That’s older than your grandfather.” And Josh’s grandfather passed away thirty years ago at the age of 70. I’m still trying to grasp how the plots of land out here work, but they basically are set-up as a checkerboard, squares being divided between the Bureau of Land Management (federal), the railroad, and private. We don’t have lots of land, but we are able to lease from the feds and the railroad. With that we potentially should be able to run about 100 head of cattle. The wide open west is just that, cows roaming and then rotating within these patches.

Josh and I went out to check the miles of fence line and make sure that other ranchers cattle weren’t in our sections that we’ll be using for late summer and winter feed. Lo and behold, 30 or so cows were in the School Section (Smith land), having meandered straight through a downed fence. Here are a few pics of us repairing fence and trying to communicate with Diego about how to appropriately move cows, not just tease them.

You can see how I like to discuss with her on her level, pointing out the cow we are going to push into another area. She mostly was focused on the rabbit that just might be to her right. Or left. Or really just about anywhere. I seemed to do most of the running on foot, encouraging her to “Push ‘em”, “Get ‘em”, or signal to head a certain way. She seems to think her job is to chase rabbits, but only because she doesn’t think she’s allowed to chase cows. She’ll figure it out one of these days. She’s real smart. But until then, I really want a horse. All that running wore me out.