With apologies to Randy Lewis, I don’t care what any ranch
rodeo announcer has ever said over the loudspeaker. Wild cow milking is not a
common, everyday occurrence on the ranch. While every other sanctioned event in
the WRCA has strong roots in ranch work, the idea that cowboys rope and milk
wild range cows regularly ...
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One of the biggest challenges of ranching and cowboying for
a living is the variety of tasks one must be proficient at in order to keep a
ranch going.
The list of necessary skills on a ranch is not short: range management, advanced accounting, market analyzation, doctoring, horse training, nutrition, roping, stock ...
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Have you ever considered just how unique the cowboy tools of the trade are? Take the saddle alone. Only stockmen use this tool and only the American cowboy uses one with a cantle, swells, and a horn. Drill down a bit more and there are myriad styles even within that narrow subset: Wade, Will James, Association, Buster ...
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Have you ever noticed that it seems like someone is always taking pictures at a branding? Or just how many photographers are either on assignment or freelancing at the World Championship Ranch Rodeo in Amarillo?
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“What a blessing it is to love books as I love them; to be able to converse with the dead, and to live amidst the unreal!”– Thomas Babington Macaulay
Thomas Babington Macaulay was not
a cowboy. He was an English writer, politician, and historian in the 19th
century. But his idea of what makes books special hits ...
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When we talk about Western heritage, what we mean is
something that is handed down from the past as a tradition.
And while many professions have wonderful traditions and
heritage, the Western or cowboy heritage stands tall among them.
From the perspective of a broader view, agriculture could be
considered among the ...
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As everything we do, think, or say is centered around COVID-19, I’m increasingly thankful for my work as a beef producer.
I look around and see people extremely scared of this unseen
enemy. And I understand and share, to varying degrees, that fear. But the one
thing I can do that so many in the urban centers of this ...
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When the ranges were first being fenced up, and big ranches
divvied into smaller ones, the second-biggest indignity a cowboy could endure
was to be placed on a tractor. The biggest indignity? Being killed on one. And
really, that possibility was no joke the early days of farm machinery.
Today, machine operation is a ...
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Despite the COVID-19 lockdown, the cowboy countdown continues. People are realizing that life must go on in some form or fashion. For cowboys, the social distancing and shelter-in-place orders are probably somewhat moot. By definition, cowboys are isolationists and homebodies—not often crossing the cattleguard.
...
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Originally, the 24th best reason to be a cowboy was slated as: a short commute. In light of the COVID-19 health scare, I feel it’s only appropriate to spin it a bit to this new (temporary?) reality.
For 15 years, I endured a two-hour-each-way commute. In full disclosure, it was just one day per week, so I had six ...
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