Soapweed's Ranch
Ramblings |
Mrs.
Soapweed and I have participated in quite a few team pennings through the years.
We have even managed to each win three belt buckles while doing it, and this
has been done pretty much using the same gentle cattle working methods we use
at home. Some of the "real" rodeo hands downplay team penning by saying, "it's
all in the luck of the draw on what cattle you get." Well, it is, but no more
so than in the "real" rodeo events. Luck tends to be what you make of it.
A few years ago, I furnished thirty-six cows and thirty-six calves for a ranch
rodeo. Because of furnishing the cattle, I got to "make up the rules" for the
rodeo. The first event was team penning, but it had one wrinkle to it that I've
not seen before or since. It was "pair penning" which meant that each of the
twelve teams had to sort out the three cows with the proper number, and also
the three calves that belonged to those cows. The cows and calves were each double
tagged with easy-to-read numbers, so finding the right critters was easy. Getting
them sorted and penned was the hard part. Have to brag a bit, but our team won
that event--maybe because we've had more practice --but
we didn't win the most points to win the rodeo.
The next event was the calf branding. Only one horse and one rope were used.
All three members of each team had to each catch a calf.
The third and final event was wild cow milking. I never could see pedestrians
getting mauled and stomped on to milk a darned old cow, as it might be "raunchy" but
is not a bit "ranchy". Once again I made up my own rules. It was a head and heel
deal, with the third person doing the milking and running the bottle to the judge.
I think a cow milking of this nature is just as fun for the crowd to watch, better
shows off good equine abilities, and is darned sure more realistic and user friendly
to the cow-people participants.
We had another fun event separate from the ranch rodeo compiling of points. It
was called "wild cow barrel racing". A two person team had to work a cow through
a cloverleaf barrel race pattern. Mrs. Soapweed and I lucked out and won that
event, too. Anyway, it was a pretty fun rodeo, and would have been better yet
had the temperature not been on the wrong side of a hundred degrees.
Copyright © 2005 Steve
Moreland
All Rights Reserved