Welcome to our Branding, 2003!

Many friends and Web visitors are astonished to find no pictures of cattle on our Website.  To satisfy those folks, I took my camera to our branding on April 18th, 2003.  Our calves are branded for identification purposes.  This may be the 21st century, but cattle rustling is still quite common out west.  

  The weather forecast was grim nearing the end of the week, and Friday was to be rainy and cold, with 70% chance of rain or snow.  It's tough to make everyone's schedules work out, so canceling a branding can cause problems.  We got lucky again this year, and the rain held off until we finished.

Hope you enjoy the photos...

Once the cattle are rounded up and the calves split off from their mothers, the fun begins!  Step One is get the little buggers heading down a narrow alley toward the calf table.  (The calf table is designed specifically for this operation, and allows us to handle the calves quickly and efficiently with minimal stress.)  In this photo, from left to right, are Seth, John, and our neighbor Terry.  This can be a shitty job (pardon the pun)!

Here, Justin is "convincing" a calf to enter the calf table.

Neighbor Travis is working the table with Pete, who's about to give the calf a vaccination with that vaccinating gun.  Our ranch hand, Martin, can be seen behind Travis, tending the iron heater...

That's our brand, called "Spear Lazy H".  The one on the left is properly oriented. 

You can just smell the burning hair!

A different iron, but you get the idea what's underneath.  Leather.  On Friday, we handled almost 2 calves per minute.  Our record was 22 seconds, from entering the calf table to being released.

Once branded and vaccinated, the calves "hang out" in this area below the calf table.  Scroll on to meet the crew...

Here's Pete and Magoo.  "Can I have some beer Dad, PLEASE!"

Justin, Martin, Travis, and Pete.

Terry, Seth, John, and John David, Justin's boy.

An hour after finishing at the corral, Mother Nature finally let go and gave us some much-needed moisture.  It was great to sit back, enjoy a wonderful meal, and suck back a few "cool ones" while the rain came down.

Here's Travis diplomatically explaining the whereabouts of some of the crew (to their wives and girlfriends) after they'd been gone for many hours.  Thanks Trav!