Snatched by cmsix

Chapter 25

When Denac, Lanita, and I arrived at the horse and donkey ranch is was apparent that the donkeys were not dissatisfied with their new accommodations. There were fourteen of them, and six were following the guys around while the other eight were leaning against the pen's fence to visit with the large cashda in it.

Jortah came over as we dismounted.

"What did you call the small ones? They don't act a bit like the larger ones do."

"They are donkeys, and they are usually a little curious when they don't feel threatened," I said.

"Well they don't seem to feel threatened at all then. Most of them tried to help us eat our breakfast. We actually had to shoo them away, and some just wouldn't go," he said.

The smallest of the bunch proved his point for him then. It was an adult male but barely larger than a Great Dane. It came directly up to Lanita, to introduce himself I guess.

Lanita was not put off by its forwardness, and soon it was rubbing its head against her as she petted over most of it. Finally she must have remembered what I'd told her.

"I want this one Daddy. I'm going to name him Nosey," she said.

"It looks like a very good name for him. Do you want me to put a halter on him so you can teach him to follow when you lead?"

"Not just yet. I think he will follow me anyway. He seems to like me," she said, and grinned.

"Have it your way then. Nosey is your donkey."

Nosey took this opportunity to show us all what kind of sounds donkeys made. He gave us several lusty Hee Haws and Lanita, though surprised at first, loved it. She was laughing along with him in seconds and the rest of us joined in. When Lanita started walking away from him, he fell right in step beside her, heeling almost as well as any dog I'd ever seen.

I told one of the guys to keep an eye on Lanita and Nosey and then turned my attention to the new arrivals. There were even more than I'd thought.

As I mentioned, fourteen of them were donkeys, three males and eleven females. One was a large male, probably fourteen hands or better, one was medium sized at around eleven hands, and then there was Nosey. He was the runt of the litter and couldn't be much over nine hands, if that. Most of the females were between ten and twelve hands. I could tell right away I'd end up with some big mules if that large male would cooperate.

The horses in this bunch looked to be quarter horses, though they couldn't actually claim to be, since the AQHA somehow owned the term. No matter, they couldn't sue us here and if these weren't quarter horses there ain't a cow in Saltillo.

There were two mature stallions among the band of sixty-one horses. One was clearly dominant but he tolerated the other. Of course the other had already learned to keep out of the dominant's vicinity. The lead mare, a big bay, was also easy to spot, since she seemed to be busily herding the others, especially as I walked near them.

As I approached, the dominant stallion headed my way. He wasn't being especially aggressive, just doing his job. He interposed himself between the herd and me while the lead mare bunched them and moved them further from me. I noticed that the other stallion took up what you might think of as a secondary defensive position.

This action was normal, since they knew by now that they couldn't hope to flee and get away. It wasn't even a bother, since all I wanted to do was get a feel for what we had.

Along with the stallions were twelve yearlings, sixteen foals, and thirty-three mature mares. They all seemed to be in good health and were remarkably large for quarter horses, all of the mature ones seeming to be at least fifteen hands. The stallions were larger, and the dominant one was nearly sixteen hands.

They were all well muscled too and I knew they were a major asset. Even though quarter horses had poor working shoulders for harness work, they could still drag a travois if necessary and they could certainly carry riders, hell, that's what they were for. I was anxious to get a halter on the dominant stallion.

That was going to be a trick though. We still had the larger models in the pen to deal with and I didn't intend to release them to try getting the new arrivals in process. Besides, there were too damned many of the new ones to put in the pen, especially before the others were out of it.

The smart thing was to be patient, finish with the Clydesdales and let the Quarter Horses become more accustomed to us. No one told you I was smart though.

"Denac, I think that these are going to act a little more like I'm used to," I said.

"What do you mean?"

"We're going to have to earn rides on their backs, with hard work," I said.

"How can we do that?"

"I think your part is going to be holding on to a rope. My part is going to be roping one for you to hold onto.

"First thing, I need to get two of the lariats; then I'll try to rope the one that's keeping between us and the others. If I can get a loop on him I'll hand you that rope as I try to get the other on him while you're hanging on and trying to slow him down," I said.

"Are you sure this is the normal way to do it?" he asked, and I couldn't lie.

"No, it isn't. The normal way to rope a wild cashda is from the back of another cashda," I said.

"Then why don't you do it from Buster or Candace?" he asked, logically.

"Because the normal way also includes a saddle for the roper to sit on. A saddle is a leather seat that has a band going all the way around the back and chest of the horse you are riding on to rope from. Without the saddle, if I rope him he will just drag me off," I said.

"I see. Are you sure this is safe, roping from the ground?"

"No, but I hope it is. At any rate, the most we're likely to lose is the rope," I said, explaining.

"Can't we just pick it back up?" he asked.

"Yes, we can, but it will probably be shorter."

"How would it get shorter, just from this roping," he asked.

"If the horse gets loose after we rope it, it will run off. While it is running the rope will still be around his neck and it will drag on the ground behind him as he runs. Sooner or later he will step on the rope with one of his four feet. When he does the rope will tug hard on his head and neck and he will tug back and the rope will probably break," I said, explaining again.

"I see. So I should hold onto the rope if I possibly can, but release it if I feel in danger?" Denac asked.

"Exactly. It is a judgment call on your part. We should go back to camp first though."

"Why should we?" he asked.

"We have left an important piece of equipment there."

"What have we left?" he asked.

"Our new gloves and the lariats. It will be much better if the rope slides out of your gloves than out of your hands. If you don't have your gloves on we will be treating your cut up hands a little later," I said.

"I am very glad that you can plan ahead so well. I can see where the rope sliding through my hands could be painful."

"The way I know so much about it is that I once tried something similar without gloves. I'm not exactly planning ahead, I'm remembering how much it hurt that other time," I said, and damned if he didn't laugh at me.

I spoke to Jortah to let him know what was going on and then called Lanita over to tell her, and asked if she wanted to go. It was horseback riding so of course she wanted to go, but that wasn't all.

"Daddy, can Nosey come with us?" she asked.

"Well, he can't ride with us, there isn't room."

"Daddy, I know that. He can follow us though," she said.

"He might run away if we let him out of the fence."

"I don't think he will. He likes me an awful lot, I can tell," she said.

"Well, he is your donkey and if you want him to follow us we will let him. We can probably catch him again later if he runs away, and you might be right about him staying with us."

The guy who'd been watching Lanita and Nosey gave Denac and then me a leg up and then handed Lanita up to me. He headed to the gate then to let us out and Lanita asked him to please let Nosey out also. He was happy to, and I'm not so sure he was looking forward to Nosey coming back.

The only snag was when we reached the river. Nosey wasn't convinced that he should bail off into the water. He had been trotting along right beside Lanita and I until then, but he balked for a second at the water, but when we rode on in he finally followed, and then Lanita laughed.

"Poor Nosey. No wonder he didn't want to follow us, his feet won't reach the bottom. He has to swim," she said, and laughed some more.

When we reached the other side we turned around to wait for poor Nosey but he made it with no trouble. I should have known what was coming but I didn't think about it. Poor Nosey came up right beside Lanita and then shook his skin all over like a dog shaking off water.

Lanita squealed when the water hit us, but we weren't drenched or anything. She told him "Bad Donkey" but Nosey didn't seem like he felt chastised in the least. He just stood around waiting until we rode on and then he fell right in step.

When we reached the campsite it didn't take five minutes for Nosey to draw a crowd. All the adults came around and looked but the other children were enthralled. I let Lanita down and she went over to them with Nosey following. He was in hog heaven soon since they all wanted to pet him and scratch his ears. I could tell he reveled in the attention.

My three mates were paying attention too and they could barely keep from laughing.

"Is that what you called a donkey," Nita asked.

"Almost, but smaller."

"What?" she asked.

"It is a donkey, but it is by far the smallest one I've ever seen," I said.

"Did Lanita decide that she just had to have it?" Nita asked, trying not to start laughing again.

"I'm not sure."

"Look at them, what do you mean your not sure?" she asked.

"I'm not sure if Lanita picked Nosey, or Nosey picked Lanita. He came right over to her as soon as we dismounted over there.

"I just hope she doesn't make us let it sleep in the hut," I said, and then they all did laugh at me again.

"You can't be hungry again so soon, why did you come back now?" Katia asked, since she was the first to regain control.

"Denac and I came back for our gloves, and two lariats. We are going to try roping one of the new cashda," I said.

"What is roping, and why are you going to do it, whatever it is," Shaeta asked.

"And why will you need your gloves," Jekaycey asked, as she walked over to join the inquisition.

"Roping is catching something with a lariat. We need the gloves because it won't want to be roped and it will surely try to run away, lariat and all, after we rope it," I said.

"Oh, that would be very hard on your hands. I see why you need your gloves. It's a good thing you showed us how to make them," Katia said.

"Yes, and it's a good thing Jekaycey made Denac a pair if he is going to help. I can imagine what shape his hands would be in when he got to me or Darita," Nita said.

Katia and Shaeta went to our hut then and came back with two lariats and my gloves while Jekaycey went to fetch Denac's gloves. We mounted up with the aid of some of the log furniture then, and I called to Lanita.

"Are you and Nosey going back with us?"

"I think I'll stay here and make sure everyone gets to meet Nosey. After we have finished petting him we want to take him over and introduce him to Buttercup," she said.

"That's fine, but get an adult to go to see Buttercup with you. He and Nosey might play too rough together at first and I don't want anyone to get hurt," I said.

"We will watch them closely so you don't worry," Caloe said, surprising me, mostly because she was right in with the children petting Nosey, and damned if Shata didn't seem to be waiting for a turn.

When we were back inside our giant cashda pen I decided to try this out on the largest male donkey first. I hadn't done any roping in years, and I knew it was a hell of a lot different on foot than it was horseback. It would be a little easier but it would still be different.

Surprisingly the donkey seemed to be cooperative. He didn't try to run away when I approached, even though I was already swinging the loop. He saved the biggest surprise for next though. When I dropped the loop over his head on the first try he just stood there and gave me such a look. I was almost embarrassed from it.

The big sorrel stallion preformed more like I expected. When Denac and I approached he was suspicious and soon enough, he was between the mares and us, and the lead mare was herding them again. It was obvious that he'd never seen a rope before, how could he have? Still he was eyeing the way I was swinging it and he tried to jerk his head away when I threw it toward him.

He didn't get it done though and the loop settled around his head and then fell down on his neck. I jerked it with my wrist before he pulled it tight and managed to get it snugged around his neck, up near his head. He was not amused, and began backing away from me right away.

Denac had been ready for this and he took hold of the rope at once; handing me the other one that he'd been holding. The stallion's instincts saved the day for us.

His natural inclination was to try backing away first, and it gave me time to get another loop on him before he turned his ass to us to really run. With two on him we were able to move apart and pull from each side, keeping him from turning. That did not mean he was done. In the end it was a close thing as to whether he was going to tire before Denac and I did. We won, but only by the hardest.

He was still wary after he gave up on the pulling, but his sides were heaving from the effort, and after all, we weren't really doing him any harm. As he stood there spraddle legged, huffing and puffing, I began approaching him slowly, talking to him softly and making sure not to get too close too fast.

It took half an hour for me to work my way up to Red and he was well rested by the time I got there. I guess he had decided to give me the benefit of the doubt though, because he didn't pitch a fit when I finally got a hand on him to stroke him gently and scratch around his ears. They all seemed to be suckers for that.

Luckily I'd remembered, just after Red got tired, that we didn't have a halter for him yet and that we wouldn't have one until my mates made it. I asked Denac to ride back to camp and see if they'd come over and fix me up. By the time they got back, Red and I were almost pals, but I wasn't doing nearly as well with him as Lanita was with Nosey.

Yes indeed, Lanita and Nosey had come back across with Nita, Katia, Shaeta, and even Caloe and Shata. The hell of it was Nosey was now obviously dry.

"How did he get across the river without getting wet this time?" I asked, when they were near.

"He rode on the raft with us," Caloe said, "He didn't seem to want to at first, but when we all got on he decided he would too."

I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing at that picture, but I had to. I didn't think Red would get the joke, and I didn't want any static out of him right now.

My mates must have been giving the halter situation some careful thought in the past day or so. They had several partially made models in hand. I saw that the halters were finished on one side and ready to be put together on the other side after the size was determined. I also noticed that these were eight-strand plait instead of six-strand. I guess they figured that out for themselves because I knew I hadn't showed them an eight-strand plait.

Red was not amused to be getting fitted for a halter, even though he didn't know what it was. Katia gave him some pleasant attention first though and he was convinced to soldier on. She took it back off him to finish most of it after she had the size right and it only took a few more minutes to finish it completely after it was back on.

When they handed me the lead they'd already made I saw it was eight strand too, and it was probably a good thing.

Red gave more excitement for the dollar. He did not want to learn to be led and he didn't want to learn to stop when I said whoa. He was a fine horse though and I knew it would be worth the effort, no matter how long it took. In a situation like this, the horseman had to have the patience, because there's no advantage to the horse to have any. The worst thing you can do is get into a fight with it.

There is a tremendous amount of difference between training a horse and breaking a horse. Breaking one will work and it is a lot faster, but training one without any fighting always leaves you with a better horse. It is often tempting to ball up your fist and give one a good whack, but it is usually counter productive. It's usually better to just be insistent and not give up. The horse is the one that needs to give up, every time.

After about an hour and a half Red was doing much better. He would follow when I led out and he would stop when I said whoa and stopped myself. That was plenty to teach him in this first lesson. The snubbing tree was next.

Teaching a horse to stand when tied is another very important lesson. The best thing you can do is make sure it never breaks away the first time. If they are able to break their rope or halter it seems that they always give it another try when they are tied. I was glad that the girls had learned the new eight-strand plait, and I went ahead and tried it with only one lead.

Red went ahead and did his damnedest to break free. He was calm enough when I tied him to the tree and he stood there quietly until I'd walked away and left him alone for about ten minutes. After that the pulling match was on, and it was Katie bar the door. He worked himself into even more of a lather than he had when Denac and I had been holding him with the lariats. It was a little more than half an hour before he gave up the ghost.

"These smaller ones fight much more than the bigger ones did," Shaeta said.

"I told you I thought it was strange how Buster and Candace gave up so quickly. Apparently Red was not inclined to let us get by so lightly."

"I think we were lucky that he didn't break the rope or the halter. We'll have to make some changes to them, make them stronger. I was sure something was going to break any minute," Nita said.

"I was worried about that myself, but it wouldn't hurt to make a few that are stronger," I said, agreeing.

"How long are you going to leave him there?" Caloe asked.

"Probably for the rest of the day, at least," I said.

"Why so long?" Shata asked.

"I don't know why it does it, but leaving them alone and just tied to a post seems to always make them behave better," I said.

"Maybe it is like with young children. If they get fractious it almost always makes them act better if you make them go into the hut and lie down, and stay there," Caloe said.

"Isn't it lucky that I never make you do that, Mommy?" Lanita said, and every one of us just howled.