Cowboys, Cold, and Character



"Headin' Home" Trailing last of the remuda home from summer country. They made the 30 mile trip in 3.5 hours. (available only as s/n limited edition print)

I've learned over the years that my cowboy photos with the most impact are directly related to the amount of pain inflicted on the subject. My husband calls them "cowboy suffering" photos.

Usually they are in winter. It's either 25 below zero with the wind blowing, or 25 above zero with a big wet snow that soaks in and chills you to the bone. There's just a certain character about them that sets them apart from the average.

Now that we've got a nice indoor barn (it's not heated, but at least it stops the wind) we actually spend more time developing young horses during the deepest part of winter. Half of our first-calf heifers also get to have their babies there.

It's not the same though.

We had a 2 day horse clinic this week with Mike Bridges. Dave Stewart from Queensland, Australia was with him.The temperature hovered around 0 both days, and though he never complained, Dave was probably making mental notes that this was NOT the time of year to visit Montana.

I never even took my camera.

First of all, there's nothing like cold to zap the life out of your batteries (yeah, my camera's too)! And second, both my hands were full and I needed to be paying attention. But mostly, the drama of cowboy suffering just appears different in the shelter of a barn than the great outdoors.

I think that's probably why God in His great wisdom put so much beauty in such a harsh environment. It just makes it a little easier to "cowboy up" and wait for the sun.



"Spring Blizzard" A ranch cowboy moves a couple of brand new baby calves and their mothers to better shelter.

2-year old Braxton and his daddy, Clayton braving the cold barn a couple evenings before the clinic.



KISS: Keep it Simple, Sue

I don't know for sure what I'm getting into here. I know my daughter and my niece write these wonderful, funny, inspiring blogs that draw you into their lives, and give you fresh insight for your own. Another relative blogs for a major internet company reviewing products, and yet another just keeps us updated from a distance. I enjoy reading them. I'd really rather keep it that way. Reading I mean, instead of writing.

I've started building a stock photo website for my collection of ranch cowboy photos; and now I'm stuck. So I'm procrastinating by building a blog that's supposed to point search engines to the place where I'm selling my cowboy stock photos: http://www.saddlescenes.com/. I have a few ideas, and if I sit here long enough, maybe they will start to gel. And besides, I'm not trying to point people to my photo site quite yet. It's up and running, but it's a long way from being finished. I'm really thinking I may have to quit trying to do everything on my own, and pay someone to fix my site that knows what they're doing.

Our winter "slow" spot is about over, so my computer days are numbered. I'm ready to crawl out of my computer, and back up on top of a horse. My head stays much clearer there, and I think this blog will end up being more of a journal or commentary about ranch life on a large, historic, Montana cattle ranch. This blog is tentatively subtitled "Photos from a 4-legged Tripod" (yes I know, that would be a...quadpod. Humor me.Technically it's a horse that only has 3 feet on the ground because it's trying to take off when you need it to stand perfectly still.)

Bingo! It's starting to gel.