by Jan Fielden
Over the last part of the week we had a bunch of guests at the ranch for a “Ranch Day”. The guests came from South Carolina, Texas, Ohio, New York and Italy via Maryland/Washington DC. We had a Texas BBQ with all the trimmings and a hayride with a tour of the ranch. It seems that people in Italy believe that all Texans have BIG ranches and are “punching cows” all day, every day!
Needless to say, these folks enjoyed themselves tremendously even though we didn’t punch one cow; just a little calf! It was a wonderful time with The Colonel telling some of his famous “tales” and some of the guests, who know him very well, adding tales of their own about him!
After the hayride tour and the BBQ, the three young ladies who were in the group wanted to feed Sundance some carrots so off we went. We traveled down in the back of the pick-up truck; a real treat for the four adults and three young ladies, to the Yearling Pasture where the herd was running
The man from Italy rode “shot-gun” inside the truck and at the very first gate, The Colonel explained the duties of that position; opening and closing all gates! The carrots were handed out much to the delight of Sundance and the girls. Even the adult guests loved that part too.
We had noticed on the way down that a tree had taken out five wires of the fence so the cows and Sundance would have to be moved out of that pasture. We had cubes for the girls to feed the cows and told them to rattle the bucket so the cows would come.
The cows came running and Sundance moved up to take over the herd. We were going to take them in the second gate but Sundance pulled them all into the first gate. Well, all except one calf. I got out of the truck, ran to the gate while one of the men in the group got out to “punch the calf” in!
Two days later they were all still talking about the Ranch Day and the man from Italy now wants a ranch and to be a rancher just like The Colonel of the Red Oak Ranch!
