*Pen Riders and Totem Poles*

It's hard to whistle if you're smiling. Did you know that? Too hard to pucker! I run across that problem from time to time, as I did this afternoon. My husband was supposed to be home in about fifteen minutes, well, give or take a customer or two that wanted to visit. All four of our geldings were penned up in the lot behind our little block barn, a result of their arrogant and what some might call "rude" behavior in the last few days. Well, to be honest, that "some" would be my husband, and he didn't perhaps call it rude behavior, he um--called it lots of things, rude being one of the kinder terms! With the onset of cooler weather and a touch of rain in our last few days, our boys took a liking to their freedom on their little patch of grass. Coming in at night to eat a meager supper of wheat mids had even become less popular than it had before in their little bunch, what with the grass being so green out past the catch pen...
Long story short--they all get a day or two worth of dry lot! I love to watch them, the dynamics of a group of horses is something I could study and comment on from now on. The little idiosyncrasies of each one, where he is in the pecking order, basically, who's the boss!

The herd numbers four these days, my two blue horses, Jackson's "big horse", and my husband's spitfire of a sorrel bronc. As it was when there were just two, it was an even keel. Smoke and Sorrely were fairly amicable to one another, each had his own feed tub and they liked it that way. They had plenty of grass, a shady spot that fit both of them standing nose to tail--life was good!! Then I added a barrel horse to the herd...that threw a kink in the works! He had been a tad higher on the totem pole at his last home so I heard it told, but you'd have never known it to see him out with Dumb and Dumber! It was the most horrendous squealing fit you've ever heard the day we turned them all out, so bad in fact that the newest addition hurt himself with in the first ten minutes of being added to the mix. He eventually secured his spot in the pecking order, but not without taking his share of scrapes and kicks along the way.
Our son's horse gets thrown in with the other three from time to time, just to let him get his fill of grass between his dry lot sessions. He has a better outlook on being a good kids' horse when he's not too revved up on good green forage, so he spends some of his days in the barn lot from time to time. "Romeo" is not one to take an insult lightly, he makes no bones about his spot at the feed trough, and will remind the others just where his spot is as he uses teeth and hind feet to reinforce that point, much to the dismay of those on the receiving end of those teeth or hooves!

As I walked out this afternoon to catch and halter all four of the geldings, I had to smile. I had been whistling as I walked from the house to the barn, and my barrel horse had heard me. He stood with his ears up, standing right by the gate, waiting for me. He's always the first to be caught, especially if there's a feed bucket involved. Even if the other boys decided to throw caution to the wind and ignore the sweet smells of a feed bucket, Woodrow is ever so dependable, making his way into the pen for a bite of feed before the other guys realize they're missing out. He ambles across the pen towards me, as I sort out which halter I'll use on him for the day. I've slowly but surely started to get him back in shape, he's had quite a lay-off since I got pregnant and had our baby girl. Close to six months, so he's had a good break.
He's the low man on the totem pole as far as the herd dynamic goes, so he's always eager to please when it comes to the humans in his life.

My husband's sorrel gelding and my own blue gelding were cowboy's horses, adept at the finer arts of being a pen rider's horse at a feedlot. Both are excellent examples of what "having a job" can do for a horse, and by that I mean they have both put in countless hours with Jason in the saddle, daylight to dark and then some, unloading trucks, pulling sick cattle, dragging the occasional chronic that just didn't quite make it. There's no tougher proving ground for a horse than a feedlot, in my opinion. In the drier days, they learn to tramp through the dust that's always thick in the air, and in the wet days they work in mud that can come up to their knees. They learn to handle their feet on wet concrete, to sidepass to a gate, and how to walk in a bunch of cattle with their head down and their ears up, staying calm and quiet as they go. I've always heard it said that patience is a virtue, and for a pen rider's horse, truer words have never been spoken. Saddled before daylight as the massive feed trucks rumble past, they munch their hay or grain with a hind foot cocked, barely noticing the ruckus going on all around them.

Cattle bawl as they hear the sounds of the routine they've come to know; tractors and trucks that bring them hay and feed make their ways down the concrete and gravel alleys that border the feed bunks that will soon be teeming full of all sorts of bovine dietary concoctions. Distiller's grains, ground alfalfa, molasses, corn, all in the name of a pound of gain. Cattle know no holidays-they can't read a calendar or a clock either, for that matter. Every day is the same to them, especially when it's feeding time. In the western world there's always been a term, "Ride For The Brand." Well sir, when you work at a feedlot, that's not the exception, it's the rule. Trucks with grain arrive to unload at five in the morning, trucks to haul cattle away don't show up until 12:30 at night. Cattle that show up at three in the morning stay in a quarantine pen for an hour to settle, then are worked an hour later to keep them from getting too stressed in the heat of the day. People ask, "What's that smell?!?" as they drive by...the answer that comes from the mouths of the folks I know is always, "Money."