It’s been a busy couple of weeks here on the ranch. I got the word that we were getting our first loads of cattle and so I hustled around getting last minute chores done. Salt from town, pipeline full of water, our cake feeder back from loan, a few fences repaired, etc. But, we got that all done and Tues, right around noon (they always come when we’re eating lunch), the first truck arrived.
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| The First Truck |
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| Hey!!! Lemme out!!! |
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| Freedom! |
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| The boys worked hard, of course. |
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| Waiting to be moved to the pasture |
The day was not, of course, w/out its share of surprises. I had planned to ride my new horse- Sandyman- to put the cattle out to pasture. He hadn’t been ridden in a month, but he’s a really gentle, well-behaved horse and I had done a little ground-work and saddled him, so I didn’t see any problem. Brianna even gave him a little spin around the pens and all was well.
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| B2 riding Sandyman, before The Incident |
After standing at the pens for awhile, it was time to go. I checked the cinch and thought it a little bit loose, so I took it up a notch. When I stepped into the saddle, he hunched up and then the rodeo started! I rode out 2-3 bucks but it didn’t feel like he was going to stop. Sometimes horses will hop a few times and settle down, but this didn’t feel like that. So, when Sandy reared up, I took the opportunity to bail off the back. I landed- WHAP!!! – flat on my back and, of course, flat on my head. Fortunately, we were in probably the softest spot of the whole ranch and I was okay (although I was pretty sore the following couple of days!).
After getting rid of me, Sandy kept right on bucking and that told us that it was a saddle problem. Later on, our neighbor, Philip, came over. He’s a good horseman and very quickly found a sore spot on Sandy’s right side. Evidently, when I tightened the cinch, I caught a fold of skin there. That was a new thing for me, but now I know to walk the horse after a cinch adjustment to check for pinches and to check both sides before getting on. I’m just glad there weren’t rocks where I landed. After all that, Sandy was his normal calm self and Brianna even rode him a little with her saddle and I sat on him again. But he was sore, so I didn’t ride him that day, but instead, I fired up an ATV and used that. They still work pretty well, too.
On Thursday, we took David into town to the doctor. David has severe chronic anemia and for the 10 years to date, we’ve been just watching him and waiting to see what would happen, with doctor visits every 2-3 years. His last blood count, though, was the lowest its ever been and the bilirubin count was up, suggesting additional breakdown of his blood cells. So, we made an appointment with the local doctor (another new one) and long story short, on Monday we’re off to Albuquerque to the Univ of New Mexico Children’s Hospital. I’m thinking that a partial or complete splenectomy (removal of spleen) might be in order, but we’ll see what the doctors say. In any case, I’m sure we’re going to be driving up and down I-25 to ABQ a few times this spring/summer. And, of course, major organ surgery is never a light thing nor are the results guaranteed. Nevertheless, we're optimistic.
Friday, it was off to look for peregrines again. It’s been a month since our last trip and we were hoping to find nesting activity. Plus I wanted to try out a new spotting scope that I bought recently. In 2003, I bought a really nice banjo at Winfield- a Deering John Hartford. I’ve played it a bit over the years, but in the past few years, my hearing has gotten worse and now it’s actually hard for me to hear the banjo. You’d think that such a loud thing would be easy, but what happens is that my hearing aids shut down and then I can’t hear the high, non-sustaining sound of the banjo. We’re just not playing much, probably never will, and I have guitar, mandolin, and bass to keep me busy. At the same time, we’re stepping up our wildlife activities a little bit. I have a decent spotting scope that I bought used in 1987, but it’s only decent and I was thinking about upgrading. I have a friend who really wanted that banjo and so, with not a little regret, I offered it to him for the price I paid. And then I turned the money right around into a very high ranked spotting scope- a Vortex Razor HD. So, in addition to looking for falcons, I was looking forward to trying out our new scope and the real tripod that I bought with it.
Off to the field we went, meeting up again with a fellow raptor enthusiast. The day was a success and we observed incubation at both sites we visited. The scope performed spectacularly. At home, comparing it to my old one, I was only sort-of impressed, but when it was put to work looking at cliffs… wow!!!! I guess it’s like musical instruments- you often can’t tell much difference at home and it’s not until they get into an ensemble situation that the superior ones really shine. In any case, we were looking at peregrine falcons at 60 power and that’s something I’ve never done before. The old scope goes to 45x, but you can’t see anything there. 30x is really about the most you go before everything gets too fuzzy. At 30x, the new scope is just barely getting warmed up. At 60x, the new scope lived up to its name, being Razor sharp. We were all impressed. (Duh.... I should've stuck the camera up to the scope and taken a picture of the falcons!!!)
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| Angled eyepiece is really nice |
Heading home thru Taos and Angel Fire, we stopped briefly at the Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial in Angel Fire. I’ve wanted to stop here for a long time, but it was always too early or too late or windy or whatever. But, we made it this time! It’s a small but very nice place with an excellent library and display. Glad we stopped. Made it home right at sunset, having spent 14 hours and 400 mi in the field.
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| Read it! |
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| David loves helicopters |
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| David and Dad in the memorial |
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| Elk on the way home |
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