The tale of the cow is...

[Ranch Dog]

I made reference to loosing my Kelpie dog this week, my forum namesake and ranch dog, Sheila. I was telling Cast-N-Blast this story after making reference to it in the Group Buy thread for the 44cal Ranch Dog Group Buy starts now (http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?p=64287#post64287)

http://home.awesomenet.net/~ranch-dog/Dirty_Dog.jpg

The tale of the cow is...

I had an Brangus cow that lost a calf to a rattlesnake bite. The cow had actually came and got me and took me out to the calf but by the time I got out there, the calf was dead. From that time on, I really had to watch that cow as I think it somehow blamed me for the death of the calf.

This cow really started to cause problems and you had to watch yourself around it. In the mean time a fellow gave an orphan chalf to one of my hands that lived immediately next to my ranch. He had a pretty good set of pens so we thought we might try putting the cow and orphaned calf together to see if things might mesh. Well they didn't so I brought a cattle trailer to his pens to haul her off to auction before she hurt somebody. Things didn't work with the loading and she went over the top of some very high pens. Next thing I know she is up on the back porch of my hand's house. I could just see her going through the picture window so I was up right behind her and grabbed her by the tail to turn her.

Well, I turned her off the porch but received the full rath of her anger. I went through a couple of good head butts that started breaking some ribs and I was hollering at my hand to get a gun and kill this gal. She got me down on the ground and started to grind me up real good when I realized that my Kelpie dog was now latched on real tight to the cows throat. The one thing my dog had was a damn fine set of jaws and she seemed determined not to let up on her grip. The cow left me alone and started to try and shake her off. Couldn't do it despite some mighty head swinging. In a blink of an eye the cow dropped off her front legs onto her chest and started convulsing. Next, she came off her back legs and rolled over on her side... deader than a hammer. The vet said the cow died of a stroke. Probably upset and the dog latched onto her drove her over the edge. The damnest thing I ever saw especially my dog trying for all she was worth to drag the durn cow after it was dead. Of course it took a tractor with a front end loader to get it on a trailer.

Along with the ribs the cow tore both of my rotator cuffs and cracked my stertum real good. It also ruptured my heart sack (there is a medical term for that body part but I don't think I could spell it). Everything mended but I did have to have operations on both shoulders several years later as both rotator cuffs eventually severed. One while I was working on a fence and the other throwing a dead deer in the back of the truck. I'm an airline pilot and have to get hooked up once a year so they can look at my heart which is strong but just looks odd.

Only had the cow about 9 months so I was out $500 plus medical. Bottomline is it was worth seeing the dog take her out!

[nighthunter]

Ranch Dog .... I'm pretty sure that most of the best friends I have had during my life have been dogs. The last Treeing Walker hound was one of the best. He's been gone for about 5 years and there isn't a day that goes by without me thinking of him. I'm sorry for the loss of your friend.
Nighthunter

[357tex]

Ranch Dog
How do people live with out ever having a good dog.They are rare.

[steveb]

Im sorry to here of her passing....Steve

[versifier]

Ranch Dog,
This was written some years ago for a friend in a similar situation, maybe there is some comfort in it for you, too. There is no replacing a loved one, but the healing is easier when you have a little skunkbreath underfoot to keep you busy. Got a name for the next puppy yet?
That's Freddie under my name. She's been gone a few years now, but the love and all the good memories are still with me.

Strider

By this stream
there is the music of a waterfall
the singing of trees
the timelessness of granite
a pool to look into and make forever wishes
there is that inner peace
of love, of trust, of memory,
of the bond that is not broken
by the shedding of a body or a tear….
Where you walk, I walk with you now unseen
I lay by your feet as you sit here
for honor, duty, and selfless love
are the interface between dog and man
so we can run in each others’ dreams.

copyright 2004 TJDiegoli from the book Interface


Tex,
There is a difference between living and existing. Having never known the love of a good dog, there are too many of the most important things in life that one would never get a chance to learn. That's not living. Not even close. I am a better friend, a better father, a better person thanks to the dogs that have shared my life. They don't abandon you when you can't walk and go screw your "friends", they stay by your side until their last breath, always feel like going hunting, and consider it an honor to put themselves between you and anything that doesn't seem right. They just love you for who you are. Anyone who says, "It's just a dog", I know right off is "Just an a$$hole", and doesn't make the cut as a human being.

[Ranch Dog]

Thanks fellows and all your words are wise!

[cast-n-blast]

Someone once said if heaven don't have dogs, I ain't going. Maybe Roy Rogers ? Anyway, good words of wisdom.

[redneckdan]

i think that was rodney dangerfield

[drinks]

Someone once said if heaven don't have dogs, I ain't going. Maybe Roy Rogers ? Anyway, good words of wisdom.
Will Rogers, statement was"If dogs don't go to Heaven, I want to go where they go".

[nighthunter]

Thanks Drinks ....... me too
Nighthunter

[cast-n-blast]

Thanks Drinks !