Checking Pastures

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Oldtimer

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Northeast Montana
Since we received about .15 inch of rain last night- I thought it would be a perfect day to check pastures... The one pasture I hadn't been over to since the end of July...
This is the pasture where from some places you can see for miles (horizon to horizon)- without seeing any buildings or anything but cows and coyotes (ran out 3 today)...



I don't think I have ever seen this shortgrass country in such good shape at this time of year before..
 
Limomike":1to67ns9 said:
wow. and here I always thought Montana had mountains.. :lol:
Good pictures.
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:lol: :lol: That's what a lot of people think.. We had a Washington hunter out here one year (a retired State Police Commander) that didn't care if he shot anything or not- he was in such awe by finding such a place where you could see for so far...He enjoyed nothing more than just sitting on a high butte and watching the livestock and wildlife on the prairie....

Parts of this shortgrass prairie in eastern Montana have been rated as some of the best grazing/grass areas in the world- comparing/exceeding to Africa's veldt, Argentine Pampas, and the Mongolian Steppes.... A friend of mine who had grazed cattle all over the west considered this part of the country to have the most "potent" grass for fattening or grazing cattle...

When we have the moisture- you can't ask for much better country to run cattle in- even tho the winters are often quite brutal.... And luckily we've had about 4-5 years with abundant moisture... The years we don't get moisture we turn into part of the Great American Desert.....
 
I dearly love Texas, and it is for this reason, that I will never visit certain western states, including Montana.
It would be so very difficult for me to return home once I had seen those expansive lanscape views with my own eyes.
 
Nice grass Oldtimer. I grew up ranching in shortgrass country and you are correct that good grass gives you a lot of bang for your buck.
 
A question OT from a guy who knows nothing about ranching in Montana. I assume the cattle in that first photograph are yours. Is it custom out in big sky country to check on one's cattle only every 45 days or so?
 
whitewing":35u4eai6 said:
A question OT from a guy who knows nothing about ranching in Montana. I assume the cattle in that first photograph are yours. Is it custom out in big sky country to check on one's cattle only every 45 days or so?
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Some may be mine- some may be the other fellow that runs in the pasture (and some may be neighbors- as these pastures don't have the greatest fences)... But that's just a small amount of the cows I saw. Its a 5000+ acre community pasture- so you are not going to see every cow that's in there anyway- unless you're doing a gather... The other fellow that runs in the pasture- has been thru there a couple of times- and just moved some cows into the pasture a few weeks ago so I knew water and grass was good..

But yes it is common that in many of these pastures where they are 5-30 thousand acre sized pastures that you may not see all the cattle for months at a time... And its not totally unusual for some cows to miss roundup in the fall- and end up wintering out there... When I was working for a large ranch in the breaks as a kid- I can remember finding cows that had not only their calf with them but also their yearling calf.. Usually some of these ranchs will fly in the fall- and look for any strays that may have been missed at roundup -- and when they locate them try to gather them up and sort them out by brands....With these large pastures all joining into each other-- its also not that unusual to have cows show up 100+ miles from their home range...
That's the good thing about brands- as usually each fall- most get about everything they took out back- give or take a few for death loss.... In a couple of weeks I'll start moving mine out of this pasture- and trail them the 10 miles to the north place...
 
Very interesting! Thanks.

Here in Venezuela we trust our neighbors. We also build very good fences and round up and count our cattle every night. :lol2:
 
Yeah- that is why you hear many in this country talk of getting the right type and genetics of cattle that will work for you- not cattle you have to work for.... They don't get a lot of pampering or babysitting...
 
Oldtimer":2p4olujw said:
Yeah- that is why you hear many in this country talk of getting the right type and genetics of cattle that will work for you- not cattle you have to work for.... They don't get a lot of pampering or babysitting...
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Who does the acreage belong to?? Gov't??
 
TexasBred":1hf75bu4 said:
Oldtimer":1hf75bu4 said:
Yeah- that is why you hear many in this country talk of getting the right type and genetics of cattle that will work for you- not cattle you have to work for.... They don't get a lot of pampering or babysitting...
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Who does the acreage belong to?? Gov't??
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Its like a lot of the pasture in this country- a mixture of Deeded, State, and BLM all interspersed randomly thruout it.... It is administered by a local Grazing District- and I have grazing rights in it because I own a chunk of deeded land in the middle of it.... The pasture used to be about 3 or 4 times the size with 6-8 different owners running cows in it - but it was cross fenced into smaller parcels about 20 years ago... Its still a pretty good days riding trying to gather it on saddle horse...
 

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