A Good Fence

Dad – Cattle Rancher, Veterinarian and Architect of “Good Fences”

  

When I was 13, my father sold the Milk River ranch and bought a ranch near Fort Macleod.  We then went through the myriad tasks that are part of the moving of cows, equipment, tractors and horses to our new oasis.

The new ranch was minus corrals needed to feed young bulls and heifers. Once we were moved in, dad purchased rough sawn 2” by 8” planks for coral rails directly from a sawmill about an hour from the ranch. The term rough sawn meant that the boards had not been planed and they were very close to the 2 inch by 8 inch dimensions. 

They were also very heavy.  

We also salvaged truckloads of railroad ties from the railroad who had just refurbished their tracks nearby.  At the time, the used railroad ties were just left beside the rebuilt track and farmers and ranchers encouraged to load up as many of the ties as they could use.  It saved the railroad from having to gather up the used ties and dispose of them.  The ties may have lost their soundness for railroad lines but they were ideal for corral fence posts.

Once we had gathered our fence building materials, the building commenced.  We used the posthole auger to drill holes in the ground for the posts/railroad ties. Once the posts were in the holes, we nailed the planks in place with very long spikes.  It was a labor intensive task, but we had the corrals constructed in about a week.  At the time, I wondered why dad used such heavy materials.  Most of the other ranchers had corrals that were made with lighter materials. These ranchers had wilder cattle. Our corrals were for our semi-comatose polled Herefords and they would rather you scratch their backs while they ate large quantities of grain and hay.

I should say most of our Herefords were comatose.  Everyone once in a while there was the one nasty bull or heifer that somehow missed the ‘nice and comatose’ class. 

About 2 years later one of the bulls that had obviously missed that class turned on his ‘I’m not going to be a good boy’ attitude when we were trying to separate him from his pen mates and move him to another pen. Perhaps, he had a pile of grain and hay saved that he wanted to consume or maybe he wanted to say goodbye to his pen mates or perhaps he was just wanting to get his exercise for the day. What ever the reason, as we tried to move him through the open gate, he dodged to the left.  My brother moved in front of him so he dodged to the right. I stepped into his path so he spun around and plowed directly into the fence.

At this point everything went into slow motion. 

The young 1500 lb. bull turned into a large red and white blob against the fence as hind parts seemed to merge with front parts. The fence...bent...as the full force of the bull was thrown against it.

I stood there holding my breath as cracking sounds were emitted by the fence.  I started to think that maybe we needed to make the fence stronger.  Then suddenly there was a ‘boingggg’ sound and the blob flew off the fence and landed heavily on its back in the middle of the corral. 

The bull scrambled to his feet shook his head then meekly walked through the gate to the intended pen.

All motivation to resist had disappeared.

I learned 2 important things that day.

1. Dad knows how to make good fences, and 

2. The work in building a strong fence is worth every sore muscle and effort made to construct it.

I believe that Robert Frost said in a poem “good fences make good neighbors”.

I think we should add that they also keep would-be rebellious animals where you would rather they went.