Ranch Wife's Slant

Cowboys, kids, and ranch life

Tag: South Dakota

  • Livin’ on the Edge

    Ranch work isn’t as life threatening as say, working on an Alaskan king crab fishing boat but the way my husband and I go about getting our work done could be considered dangerous. We’ve become somewhat desensitized to the risks we take. We put the thought of consequences we could suffer later out of our…

  • A Barrel Horse

    I dreamed of being a barrel racer as a kid but should’ve considered saddle bronc riding instead. I got a lot more practice in on that kind of horse event. The horses of my youth weren’t papered, fancy, or always the soundest, and they each had at least one character flaw but every family member…

  • Seein’ Stars

    The story I’ve been putting together for next week is about sodium yard lights, er, the absence thereof. I thought it was such a co-inkydink (our slang term for coincidence) that I wrote about that particular topic the same time my family and I all slept outside and watched for shooting stars organically, as in…

  • The Hail Blizzard That Rock and Rolled

    A few weeks ago we had a hail storm blow in; literally. The strong winds mixed with hail had me spooked thinking tornado (which is unusual around here) because the wind was blowing so strongly. We had a downpour of heavy rain but the hail was devastating. It’s hard to tell how big the hail…

  • The Pringle Well

    You can’t get a beer at Pringle’s watering hole like you can at the Hitchrail Bar and Restaurant but the town well sees just as much activity as the Rail does. The Pringle well has become an unlikely hub for social activity. It started getting an influx of attention about the time the drought started…

  • Planting a Lot of Work

    On Saturday June 6th the whole family helped put the garden in. It may sound insane to wait so long to plant a garden but the general rule in the higher elevations of the Black Hills and especially the Custer area, is not to plant anything at least until June first. Late frosts are not…

  • Moving the Heifers

    Since my husband and I moved our heifer calves in the fall for the winter months, he’s been planning, worrying and wondering how we’re going to get them loaded to take to summer range. Without having been loaded much, everything we try to get them to do is difficult. Friday, my husband, son and I…

  • Kid Therapy

    I’ve been sending my kids to therapy regularly for a long time now. I’ve insisted on it since they were babies. After spending too many consecutive days indoors, my kids will relapse in behavior; a sign that they need some therapy. Like a woman waiting too long before re-dying her hair, their behavior becomes very…

  • Moving Cows to Summer Range

    Sunday was a long day at our place. The whole family saddled up to move cows onto summer range. My husband and son rode off in one direction and my daughter and I headed in another to get cows gathered up and we all met with everything we gathered up at the pasture’s water tanks…

  • New Job, New Routine

     School gets out this week, but you’d have thought it’s been out for weeks around here. Our kids have already shifted into their summer routine. With the warmer weather, the kids have been spending every evening outside and when they have to go to school in the morning, Pepper is mopey all day until they…