Cattle to the auction

The temperature was at freezing in the morning when I went outside to hook up my pickup to the stock trailer.  Dan came over to help and shortly after so did Donna.  I noticed the cows and Buddy were now in the middle pasture as they walked the river from the south pasture.  I preferred them to be in the south pasture with less of a chance they would see what was happening to their calves.  I hope this isn't a bad omen of the day to come.

I had one bag of apples left and the calves followed me right into the loading corral.  The calves were calm and well behaved.  I backed up the pickup and trailer to the loading chute's head gate then Dan and I went in to herd the cattle into the loading ramp.   Because Dan left his heifer with the crazy steer at the livestock auction he needed another heifer to replace it to satisfy his trade with John.  Dan bought Oreo from me.  So I separated Oreo from the others and Dan watched her as I herded the calves into the loading ramp area.  Donna and I have a soft spot for Oreo and we are glad she went to a good home.

One side of the stock trailer wasn't right against the head gate.  The opening was small and Donna stood watch.  I herded the cattle down the loading ramp to the trailer.  Mama's calf was in the lead.  He is red and a steer - similar to Dan's large steer who escaped last week. When the steer got to the trailer it saw the small opening and made a sharp right turn and pushed past Donna and got out into the corral.  Through that small opening!!!

*sigh*  Not good.

I have a small side gate to the loading ramp.  Dan and I herded the rest of the calves into the loading ramp past the mid gate and I shut it.  Now I could leave the side gate open.  I tried to herd the the red steer through the gate and he refused.  Usually cattle like to go into a corner when they don't want to be herded - but of course not when the corner is an open gate.

Back and forth I went and the steer kept avoiding the open gate.  Dan came to help.  Usually two people will be enough to block but the steer powered past us out into the open corral.  Dan started to run to head the steer off and I told him to let him go. The steer was starting to get excited when all he wanted to do was stand outside the loading ramp fence near the other calves.  I didn't want the steer to snap and try to jump a corral gate.  The corral fences are high enough that he couldn't jump them, but the gates could be a possibility for a crazed steer - especially after seeing Dan's steer go over a corral panel.

I decided to try the large gate into the part where Oreo still stood.  I walked around the pickup and then saw the gate to the NE pasture was open.  Yikes!  We forgot to close it after I drove through into the corral.  I ran over and closed the gate before the steer could see it was open and run out.  If he had run out there it might have been game over and he would have spent the Winter here with the cows.

I opened the gate to the loading corral.  Oreo stood there and Dan was able to herd the red steer through the gate.  *Whew*  No repeat of Dan's crazy steer escapade.

I easily herded the red steer back into the loading ramp while Dan watched that Oreo stayed behind.  Then I re-positioned my stock trailer and made the opening on one side smaller.  Once I got done I learned that one of the calves had climbed into the stock trailer before I moved it and stood in the trailer as I drove forward and backed up.  Thankfully the calf didn't jump out of the trailer.  Another bullet dodged.

Then back to loading.  This time we got the calves loaded.  The last three calves in the back were a pain as they had turned around to face me. The red steer was part of this group.  I couldn't load them backwards.  Dan and I got them turned around, and while they didn't want to go down the ramp we eventually got them to go.  First past the mid gate which I closed, then reluctantly down the ramp and into the trailer.  Donna watched and prevented the calves in the trailer from coming back out.

The calves all fit into my stock trailer.  I could have even gotten maybe two more in the trailer.

For piece of mind I ratcheted a small strap across the lower back trailer door to hold it tightly closed.

I also brought a couple of driving ramps along. I had checked and filled the tires on the pickup and stock trailer, but if I got a flat tire out on the road it would be easier to drive up a ramp to change a tire on the double wheel stock trailer than jack it up with all that weight in it.

It had taken a little over an hour to get the trailer and load the calves.  Dan came and got Oreo after I left and he said he easily loaded her into his trailer.


As we loaded the calves into my stock trailer a number of my cows, especially Mama and a few others, stood in the corner of the middle pasture closest to the corral and watched us intently.  As the calves didn't cry or make a fuss the cows didn't get worked up.  But they watched us.

Then it was off to the livestock auction.  Donna had made some delicious bars for us to eat on the trip as her sister Linda said that was a "North Dakotan thing to do", and I am originally from North Dakota.  We ate all the bars well before we got back home.

The trip to the auction was uneventful.  The traffic was light and I could take my time.  I got to the auction in two and a half hours and got there shortly after noon.  After waiting for 46 cattle to be unloaded from a semi trailer it was my turn.  The calves came out, and the lady checking my cattle in and I, easily herded them though the gate into the auction's runways.

A few more pickups and stock trailers with cattle to unload had arrived by the time I unloaded my cattle.  It is supposed to be a large auction this Thursday with lots of cattle.

Donna and I then walked though the holding pens looking for Dan's steer and heifer.  We found my calves now in a pen and eating hay, and some other cattle in other pens.  Some calves were bawling as they had not been weaned from their mothers before coming to the auction.  Most cattle were quiet.


One of my calves got a "crappy" spot on the ride to the auction.

On the right is the red steer of mine that slipped out between the loading corral and the trailer.

We had to ask where Dan's steer and heifer were.  When I described them the workers all knew of them.  Dan's cattle were in pen #600 up front and off to the side.  The pen was a large wooden pen.

The steer still had two long ropes around his neck.  Sometimes he would step on the ropes as he walked.  The auction workers hadn't taken the ropes off yet.  They planned to do that later in the afternoon.  Good luck with that!  So I couldn't retrieve the ropes - mainly the metal hondo - for Dan.

The lariat has a small reinforced loop at one end, called a honda or hondo, through which the rope passes to form a loop. The honda can be formed by a honda knot (or another loop knot), an eye splice, a seizing, rawhide, or a metal ring.

Dan's steer was on high alert once he saw us. Maybe he remembered me. But he kept an eye on both Donna and I shifting his gaze quickly back and forth when Donna and I were apart. The heifer was joined at the steer's hip and was never away from him.  It was difficult to get close to him for a photo.  We didn't want to get him to agitated that he would try to climb the tall fence at the auction so we left.

The drive back to Kalispell was uneventful. The morning fog had burnt off to clear blue skies.  Newer snow is already on the higher peaks of the Mission Mountains.

Donna and I had planned to stop at the Thai restaurant in Polson for a late lunch but we discovered they were closed until October 25.  *augh!*   So I decided to drive the hillier west side of Flathead Lake so we could eat at a restaurant in Lakeside.  The traffic was relatively light and I was able to pull the stock trailer up the hills decently with my small engine pickup.

We made it home without any problems.  Success!  I spent the rest of the day moving irrigation pipes and getting the water back up and running.  Tomorrow I will wash out the stock trailer as it is filthy with manure.