by H. Alan Day
“Let’s check out the rest of the place,” said Joe. I forced myself to turn and follow. We crunched down the road back to the main house then veered off toward a bunkhouse and a shop. Both looked weathered around the eaves, windows, and doorframes. The glass in one of the bunkhouse windows had cracked. On the other side of the buildings were the corrals. The roping arena had to be a good five hundred feet long. A corner gate opened into a series of smaller corrals. In the farthest, a black horse and a bay grazed on hay. They raised their heads and looked at us curiously but were too intent on eating to walk over to say hello. Some of the corral posts looked worn and the rub boards that protected livestock were almost nonexistent. The neglect didn’t deter me. Quite the opposite. I couldn’t stop thinking about ways to refurbish the headquarters.
We slid open the gate of the arena and walked a few yards to the entrance of the barn. What a majestic building. One of the first things I would do is restore its proud red. A flash of reality intercepted my vision. How was I going to buy this ranch and what in God’s name would I do with it besides fix it up?
“How you doing?” Joe asked. He looked at me oddly.
“Fine, just fine,” I said, stepping into the dim light of the barn and readjusting my poker face. Joe led the way down the row of twenty horse stalls, then climbed a ladder into an empty, dormant hay loft.
“Pitkin said they baled about three thousand acres of hay in the meadow last summer,” Joe said. In times past, this space would have been filled with loose hay, food for the workhorses.
Back outside, the sunlight glared bright. Joe suggested we drive over to the meadow on the south side of the ranch. The road went over Spring Creek and passed the pond. Joe slowed to allow a flock of wild turkeys to march across the gravel in front of us. A little farther on, the road turned left near a metal Quonset building.
“Don Raymond told me once that twenty vehicles could fit in there.” I mumbled that he probably was right. The building, however, seemed insignificant compared to the scene in front of me. Joe stopped the truck at the edge of the sea of grass that extended beyond the pond. I got out and walked in a few yards. The grass was so thick I barely could see my shoes. For any grazing animal or rancher, this was the gold coast.
“The meadow extends around the back of those hills,” Joe said, “and to the east. Then there’s about another twelve hundred acres to the north.” He dangled the carrot. “Do you want to go look over there? Or drive over to the Little White River? It snakes around for a good five miles through the ranch and is real pretty.”
“That’s okay,” I said. “I’ve seen enough for today.” I didn’t add that it wasn’t necessary because on some level I knew those meadows and places and indeed, they were perfect, beautiful and fit for ownership. Maybe Joe was a good poker player and could read my face because he didn’t look perturbed. We got back in the truck and bounced back toward Highway 20. We passed the flock of wild turkeys, maybe twelve or fourteen, bobbling along the road in single file, heading out on some secret journey. At the gnarled post, Joe popped the question. “So what do you think?”
“Well, I gotta be honest. My rule of thumb is not to tangle with property on the brink of foreclosing. But this is one gorgeous ranch. Not sure what I would use it for.” But did it matter?
“You’re a good cattle rancher,” Joe said.
“I’m not so sure I want to invest in any more cattle. Right now I’m running a total of four thousand cows. That might be putting too much risk in one place.”
“You’ll think of something,” said Joe.
We pulled into Nenzel and I promised to call him within two days.
I climbed in my pickup and swallowed some cold coffee, hoping it would restore my senses. I had my arms wrapped around the old Arnold Ranch in a big bear hug and I couldn’t let go. But this overwhelming desire to own the ranch was totally illogical. It bucked the core principles that guided me in business. I knew that unprofitable, troubled ranches should be avoided like melting ice on a pond. My dad had ingrained that lesson in me before I even broke my first horse, and his dad had ingrained it in him.
Furthermore, it was a family mantra never to invest in unneeded property. I currently co-owned and managed two ranches: the Lazy B, a 198,000-acre chunk of high desert straddling southern Arizona and New Mexico, and the Rex Ranch, a 45,000-acre parcel of prairie nestled in the Sand Hills of Nebraska. My Cessna was getting worn out arcing between the Southwest and the Midwest. For certain, my life did not need this ranch. Plus, I only took calculated risks. Too many times I had seen cattle prices bounce like a rubber ball on asphalt, watched miserly rain clouds disperse drops that barely dented the sand, and felt the slap of governmental regulations that gummed up well-oiled ranching practices. Excessive risk is like a saddlebag stuffed with fool’s gold; it weighs the horse down and doesn’t pay off. So why gamble? Because I sensed that within the boundaries of the old Arnold Ranch lay something special. A journey? A destiny? A fate? My soul needed to know.
That night I made a series of phone calls. First, I gushed to my wife, Sue, who was back in Arizona. During my absences, she was my eyes and ears at Lazy B.
“I think that pen is already in your hand ready to sign an offer,” she said. “I’m already looking forward to seeing the place when the time is right.”
It was a green light, but I needed a different kind of green. I phoned each of my business partners. Beautiful, incredible, productive, I repeated over and over. My enthusiasm must have swayed them, because all five agreed to go deeper into debt. Forty-eight hours later, I made a conservative offer on the old Arnold Ranch. That beautiful, beat-up, bankrupt ranch. It was like rolling a little white marble counterclockwise in the groove of the spinning roulette wheel. I’m pretty certain my dad and granddad did flips in their graves that day and not from joy. The offer did not include the forty head of cattle running on the property, but it did include every machine and building, as well as the big house, home to the Pitkin family.
How was I going to staff the old Arnold Ranch? The question nudged me from a deep sleep one night. Less than a week had passed since Joe Nutter submitted my offer to the bank and already my mind was grappling with management issues. I would need to hire a foreman. I had a fabulous one on Lazy B and a cantankerous one on the Rex Ranch. Joe had spoken highly of John Pitkin. If he equaled his reputation, the job search might end before it began. Regardless, I owed this Pitkin fellow a visit since his future was in my hands and he was probably suffering a bit of anxiety wondering what was in store for him and his family. A call to the Pitkins would be the first order of business in the morning. I punched the pillow, rolled over, and tried to still my thoughts.
Two days later Debbie Pitkin and I sat on the south porch of the big house, glasses of ice tea sweating in our hands. She was telling me what grades her four kids were in when a screen door slammed at the back of the house.
“Here comes John,” said Debbie.
Heavy footsteps echoed inside and a tall man wearing cowboy boots walked through the doorway. “John Pitkin,” he said, extending a hand. He was a handsome man, dark haired, square jawed, with a smile that made him look about eighteen.
Debbie went to refill our glasses, leaving John and me to chat about seasonal rain levels and temperatures and how the hay was growing in the meadows. He asked what it was like in Arizona this time of year. I described the dry, hot climate and the scant grass that poked up through the desert pastures.
“Not sure I could handle days over a hundred,” he said. “Guess I’m acclimated to this country.”
“How long have you lived on the ranch?” I said.
“We moved here about six years ago. I was working for Don Raymond at the time, down near North Platte. Debbie and I both grew up in the Platte River Valley. Don owned a small feedlot and I started working for him when I was a teenager. Over time, I had a chance to wear all sorts of hats—mechanic, farmer, cowboy, vet, truck driver.”
“Which did you like b
est?”
“Oh, I always preferred working with the cattle and horses. That’s why I wanted to tag along when Raymond bought this ranch. He planned to run a thousand head on it, and I thought it would be a good way to learn more about ranching. First time I came up here, I fell in love with the place. Don has four daughters and I’m the closest thing he has to a son, so I didn’t have to twist his arm to let me join him. We had a couple of good years at the start, but then the drinking got the best of him. The last few years haven’t been too much fun. He sold several bunches of cattle at the bar when he was too drunk to make a good deal. I’ve spent more time keeping creditors at bay than I have ranching.” John and Debbie exchanged a commiserating look.
“I can teach you good ranching practices,” I said. John leaned forward like he was ready for class to begin right now. “I’ve always been a hands-on rancher and that’s what I intend to keep doing. I’m not coming in here as a mere investor. Though I do need someone to teach me in return.” John looked a bit surprised. “Having done most of my ranching in Arizona, I’m not expert on what grasses are native to this ranch or how to handle livestock during a blizzard. I spent only one winter on the Rex Ranch and it was mild.” John nodded in understanding.
We continued talking for well over an hour. John had an aura that commanded attention and openly shared his frustrations and accomplishments. It didn’t seem to bother him that I didn’t have a specific game plan for the ranch. As long as he could work the land and the livestock, he would be happy.
The ice tea had long disappeared when I decided it was time to take my leave. “It’s been a real treat to sit here and talk to both of you. I have a pretty strong feeling that my offer will be accepted and I’ll become the owner of this place. At least I hope so. I’d like you to stay on as foreman if you’re interested, John. We can work out the details, but I promise you two things. I won’t fall in the bottle and your family can continue living in this house.”
I could almost hear John and Debbie’s joint sigh of relief.
“That’s the best plan I’ve heard in some time,” said John, and we shook on a future together.
With the property in escrow and the Pitkin family in place, I faced the facts that now stood staring me down. Talk about a holy shit moment. I had persuaded the bank to lend me money to buy the ranch, which meant I had two monthly mortgages but only one ranch, the Rex Ranch, generating income; Lazy B belonged to my family and its profits were off-limits. I found myself waking up in the middle of the night lost in an arithmetic jungle, counting the number of calves I needed to sell in order to cover those mortgages. I felt uneasy about running cattle on a third ranch lest the market nosedive and no profits cross the finish line for anyone. Finally, weary from sleep deprivation, I shifted my anxious mind into creative mode and tried to think of a different way to generate income on the new ranch. That’s when the roulette wheel came to a stop and the little white marble dropped to its destiny.
2.
Opportunity Walks In
“If you move your cattle between pastures regularly—and that might be every two to three weeks or even two to three days depending on your system—you’ll be able to run more cattle because you have more grass. This is one of the tremendous advantages of timed grazing. And it works with animals of all kinds—goats, sheep, even horses.” I paused to gauge the reaction of the hundred people in front of me. Eyebrows scrunched. “I know it may sound strange to move your cattle so often,” I said, noticing a giant of a man slip into the back of the conference room. “But this grazing system works.”
The stranger started waving at me, then mouthing something like “I need to talk to you.” For a moment I lost my concentration. I pointed at him and nodded my head. Members of the New Mexico Cattle Growers’ Association turned in their seats to look at the distraction. Despite the cowboy hat, anyone could see that this fellow, dressed as he was in a Pendleton shirt and khakis, was no southwestern rancher. I took a sip of water and attempted to step back in stride with my keynote address.
After the questions and the blue-jeaned crowd thinned, I was left standing face to face with the stranger who had demanded my attention. He looked to be about six -foot four and at least ten years older than I, with a craggy face that bespoke years spent in sun, wind, and adventure.
“Alan Day, I’m Dayton Hyde,” he said. A slight western drawl draped across his words. “But my friends call me Hawk.”
So this was Dayton Hyde. He had a reputation within the ranching community as an enthusiastic not-quite-born-in-the-saddle cowboy, a fellow horse lover, an outdoorsman, a talented writer, and a dreamer.
“Pleased to meet you, Dayton. I’ve heard your name bantered around these parts.” Our hands met in a firm grip. “I appreciate you waiting. Looked like you had something on your mind.”
“Well, sir, I do. I’m mighty glad to catch up with you.” He leaned in closer and lowered his voice a notch. “There’s a real important issue that I want to discuss with you. Thought after all that talking up there you might need a drink. Can I buy you one?”
He clapped my shoulder like we had already agreed, but in such a friendly way and with such a big old grin that I could hardly say no.
We headed toward the hotel bar and took up residence at a quiet corner table. A waitress appeared to take our orders of scotch and water.
Dayton briefly filled me in on the ranch he owned in Oregon where his wife, Gerta, his son, and his pet wolf resided. Seriously, I said, a pet wolf? He laughed and explained that when things got a little prickly in the house his wolf never picked on him. He had spent the better part of the last fifteen years building a big dam on his ranch and creating what he claimed was the best trout stream in North America, but now he was spending more time on a new ranch in South Dakota, a hilly, five-thousand-acre slice of heaven. I was just going to tell him about the offer I had made a month ago on the Arnold Ranch when the waitress returned. Ice chinked against glass as she set drinks and napkins on the table.
Dayton shifted in his chair and extended a pair of long legs. Before I could utter a word, he said, “So, my friend, how familiar are you with the wild horse fiasco in this country?”
His question caught me off guard. As a rancher, horses had been part of my life forever but I had never taken much interest in government-owned wild horses. “I know there’s controversy,” I said, trying to recall what I had read recently. “I’m thinking it’s similar to the stir we had in Arizona over the wild burros. The Bureau of Land Management determined there were too many inhabiting the Grand Canyon and went and hauled them out on slings beneath helicopters.”
Dayton nodded. “Heard about that. Hope it didn’t frighten those poor devils to death.” A hint of a frown dipped his mouth.
“As I understand the wild horse situation,” I said, “everyone is pretty pissed off. The ranchers. The BLM. The wild horse lovers. But I admit to being a bit removed from the details.”
“You’re right, it extends further,” said Dayton. A little mountain peaked between his eyebrows. “Let me give you the down and dirty.”
Roughly forty thousand wild mustangs roamed and grazed federal lands, too many for the square miles assigned to them. To prevent entire herds from starving, the BLM rounded up horses in a given area and moved them to holding facilities. Cowboys on horseback and in helicopters descended on unsuspecting mustangs. Sometimes the deafening choppers chased the horses for miles down canyons and over hills. Older horses might be injured while frantically trying to escape. Mothers became separated from babies, families torn apart. Once gathered in makeshift corrals, the horses were shipped to facilities around the country. The main sorting facility was located at Palomino Valley in Nevada.
Dayton’s cloud of disgust hovered over us. I didn’t like to hear stories about cruelty to horses, any horses, and I could feel the seeds of discomfort begin to sprout.
“Once captured,” he continued, “the mustangs get sorted. Adoptables, including colts and fillies,
go one way; unadoptables, including most of the mothers, go another. Some get turned back on the range. As you can imagine, the adoptables are pretty as the pictures in a coffee-table book. Sleek, trim, shiny haired. I’ve seen palominos, red roans, black, brown, you name it. Gorgeous creatures. The most desired of all are the Pryors.”
I knew horse people who drooled over the mustangs gathered in the Pryor Mountains of Montana, animals descended directly from horses ridden by the Spanish conquistadors. They are some of the finest, strongest, most regal horses. Most often they are duns, lighter brown, with a stripe running down the back, a dorsal stripe on their shoulder, and distinctive leg stripes. If you get one, it’s kind of like finding a ’57 Thunderbird that’s never been driven.
“But not every wild horse is adoptable. There’s the crippled. The one-eyed. The thin. The shaggy. The old.” He ticked off each description on a finger. “Who wants those horses? Nobody. So the government’s stuck with them. And do they know what to do? Hell, no!” Dayton sliced his hand through the air. “Those horses are warehoused in holding pens where ‘long-term’ turns out to be forever. A lifelong horse prison.”
I knew the BLM gathered horses, though I didn’t know the details of how, and even knew a couple of people who had adopted a wild mustang. But I had never wondered what happened to the extras. The unadoptables. The unloved.
“They’re bored, Alan. So bored they eat each other’s manes and tails. Yeah, that’s the same look I had. Didn’t believe it. So I took a little road trip down to the facility in Mule Shoe, Texas, and I’ll be damned, those animals—the revered icons of the West,” he added with a fist bang on the table, “were stuck in corrals. It’s one big bureaucratic mess where the solution doesn’t fit the problem. What’s more, it’s costing the government $2.65 per head per day to fund this stupidity. Hell, these beautiful animals aren’t meant to live in jail. They’re meant to run on the open prairie, run with the wind whipping through their manes.” His arms spread open like the wings of a large bird. “Sure, they need grass to live on, and grass might be scant, but you know what else they need?” He shifted his legs under his chair and leaned his elbows on the table. “Freedom. They need freedom.”
