Cattle Prodding (CTTWWS 1)

 I once saw a steer jump over a fence.

It's one of those images that is etched like a gif in my memory, even though it was well before gifs were invented.  It was such a strange sight, a hefty huge block of meat lighting up off its dainty feet and barely gliding over the slackened barbed wire.  He's smarter than I thought, I thought.  How are we going to fix this fence?  Mom is going to laugh so hard at this story.

I was about ten years old.  A family from church had more steers than they had room for on their property, so they were renting our pasture.  We raised a steer ourselves during this time.  My brother and I named him Pug.  I'm not sure I had ever actually seen a pug dog, but something about this steer's face said "pug."  

The fences around the pasture were old and a bit unreliable.  We reinforced most of the fences with twine cut from hay bales.  That was a huge undertaking, mostly done by Mom.  But every once in a while a steer would find a way through the fence  I don't remember how it became my job to find and chase steers back into the pasture, but I did find it satisfying. For a long time I had a particular old broom handle that was my cattle prod of choice.  I always worried that they would kick me, but they never did.  There was one steer that escaped more frequently, and was especially difficult to coax back into the pasture.  His name was Fruitcake.  If he was feeling frisky, I would need a second person to help get him into the gate.  He wasn't much afraid of me, either.  I had to hit him pretty hard with that broom handle sometimes.

I think I learned a lot about angles from this job.  I had to figure out the best angle at which to approach the steer so as to move him toward the gate but still be able to stop him if he bolts to the right or left.  My dad helped teach me this.  He would tell me right where to stand, halfway between him and the fence.  

Pug tasted fine.  Mom would say, "We're having Pug meat for dinner."  I didn't watch when they shot him.  I'm not that tough.  There was blood in the puddle by the feed trough for a long time.  The following spring, that whole area was solid chamomile.