Holy Cow!

Holy Cow!

And I mean that in a lot of different ways.

This past week I had the unique opportunity to participate in a “back to the ole west” 3-day cattle drive where we drove over 200 head of cattle 30 miles to their summer grazing pastures just outside Bryce Canyon National National Park in southern Utah. Holy Cow, over 200 cows!

But before I go to far, let’s get some particulars on “we drove” cattle. About the only thing I drove was a 4-wheel ATV. You see, this cattle drive was for an upcoming 30 minute special for the national PBS agriculture show Americas Heartland. I was part of a two camera shoot along with Director of Photography, Brad White. Brad rode horse back along with Reporter Jason Shoultz, audio tech Chris Hall and the cowboys from Heaton Ranch in Alton, UT who actually did the “driving”. Producer Tyler Bastine and I hop-scotched around the cows to get shots Brad couldn’t get while in the herd. Now don’t get me wrong, Tyler and I worked our tails off. Yes we rode ATV’s, but you cannot take the ATV’s down the Federal forest lands mountain side to get the actual video. Up and down, down and up we went over hills, mountains and streams. I haven’t breathed that hard since mile repeats for Cross Country at Arizona State. Holy Cow!

Boy was it worth it. What beautiful scenery. Every so often Tyler would just say WOW! I would answer, “Welcome to Utah”! I have known how beautiful this state is, but this cattle drive confirmed yet again and confirmed as well, how blessed we are to have the freedom to live, work and play in this beautiful country. Holy Cow!

Americas Heartland shot this story due to the fact that Dustin and Harmony Cox (Alton, UT) are so insistent on sharing their love of being cowboys with the rest of us city folks. As they told me over and over, that nostalgic scene of cowboys kicking up a cloud of dust while riding their horses, driving cattle miles upon miles over the dusty desert floor still exists today. Hollywood thankfully dramatized that scene so much that now people from around the world want to be paying “clients” and be apart of it. Heaton Ranch teams up with Jason Bauer from Glendale, UT to bring these working clients along and let them work like cowboys even if it is only for a few days.

We had a couple of gals along for the ride, one from Atlanta and the other from Long Island. The four guys were from Las Vegas, L.A., somewhere? and Ireland. All of these “dudes / dudettes” worked extremely hard driving cattle. On their way home this week I am sure they will be working on finding their voices after yelling at the cows to “move-on cow, get-get, up the hill, hee-yaw”!

An interesting moment came during an interview over dinner with one of the clients. Pat shared that being a cowboy was on his bucket list, although he is not planning on kicking the bucket any time soon. He traveled all the way from Ireland to cross this off his list. I commend a guy who is working on his list early in life. And Pat gets the most out of life. Although we didn’t film it, (mainly because we were sleeping), he would wake up at the crack of dawn, go for a hike, then take a bath (without Irish Spring soap) in the freezing cold creek all before any of us were awake. Now understand that this cattle drive got the best of us. We were all exhausted from the trail at the end of the day. I got to hand it to Pat for getting the most out of life. I was taking notes.

Other notes from the drive came when I was behind the herd, or when we would stop for lunch or for the evening. At these moments the cows would call for their calves. Imagine what it is like for us as parents when we are at the mall, Disneyland or any where else that is full of people squished together. That moo sound is what the momma cow uses to call for her calf who is lost in the mayhem of walking up a hill. I witnessed frequently when a momma and baby calf would find themselves by moo-ing back and forth at each other. Just like us, both the momma and the calf have a distinct sound to their voices. To me all of the brown Angus-Hereford mixed cows look about the same, but they have a distinct sound to their voice. I for example know what my mom’s voice sounds like and could pick it out in a chaotic crowd just like out on the range with these cows. It might seem silly, but where as we humans find it trivial to teach our children that a cow makes the moo-sound that sound is actually a call for help to find it’s young.

At one point Dustin Cox and Jason Bauer worked to cut one of the cows away from the herd. A spry 65-years young Karl Heaton, who owns the cows, explained that the cow had lost it’s calf. By sending it back the way we have just come, the cow and baby will both go back to the last place where the baby fed off of its mother and reunite, themselves. It could take a cowboy days to ride around and find the calf, so they send the mom back to find the baby. This particular cow traveled back with another mother who was in the same situation, traveling in a “small” herd.

Traveling was the name of the game on this and other drives. These cows travel long distances to feed on grazing lands. Imagine how healthy a cow is by walking in this manner and grazing on good grass. This also keeps the fire danger down in our forest lands. In my opinion they create fire breaks, at least where the grass in concerned.

All of this happens while I, the city slicker enjoy the confines of my home with my family. Until I had this opportunity to tell the story of the Heatons and Cox’s and other ranchers like Bud Adams, Hamilton’s, Dickinson’s or those cowboys up on Padlock Ranch among others, I never knew that there were people who still stoke up a lot of dust and travel a lot of miles pushing cattle from one side of their region to the other just so that I can enjoy a good tasting steak. That is how it has been done even before Hollywood got a hold of this image and it will be that way even after I’ve got my images.

Life lessons learned while out on the trail. Yes we captured some amazing footage which you will see in the upcoming Season 6 of Americas Heartland, but beside the footage that I shot, these are some of the thoughts that I took away from a memorable shoot.                                          Holy Cow was it a great one!