Trailing Out
Our sheep outfit is moving down the long draw toward Paucum Springs. There's between five and six thousand head in the herd and they're strung out for a mile or more. It's early March and some grass is showing green at the base of the black-brush. Ol' Jug and me is bringing up the drags. Don Brink is driving the team that's pulling the commissary wagon and sheepherder's camp. After awhile the old road turns west and Don makes camp while the sun is still an hour high. Just before dark I gather the sheep in a big bunch on a small rise just south of the wagon. By the time I unsaddle and hang the nose bag on Jug, dinner's ready. Those mutton chops and sour dough biscuits taste mighty good along with canned peas that've been souped up with milk and butter. Don has a pot of coffee steaming but I don't like the stuff, water is plenty good for me.
Next morning before daylight I bring in the team of draft horses along with Jug and two other saddle horses and hang the feed bags on them. Snoop, the sorrel mustang yearling is there to get his grain too. He's inclined to be impatient if I don't serve him first and his ears go back in a mean expression. So I try to humor him, but sometimes I clout him a hard rap so he'll remember who's the real boss. After breakfast Don heads the camp out along the old road leading west by south a little. I let the herd spread out over the hills as they graze slowly along, keeping them headed in the general direction taken by the wagons.
Pacoon Basin spreads out to the west and south as the elevation slowly descends toward Grand Wash, which drains most of this rough desert land. The Bunkerville Mountains rear up, on the north, a rugged barrier to northern winds. About 20 miles west can be seen the Gold Butte range made up of buttes and cockscomb ridges. Southward is where the Colorado River emerges from the Grand Canyon and enters into the eastern reaches of Lake Mead. At this early spring date the desert is taking on a greenish hue as secarty, june grass and others weeds and flowers cover the ground. Heavy clouds move across the sky from the southwest every few days to water the growth and make it even greener. The weather pattern is such as to make this an exceptionally good season for the stockman. As the days go by, we move slowly west toward the Cockscomb ridges on the horizon.
The blue pickup truck from headquarters shows up one day with LeGrand Brink and Glen Lamb to help out for awhile, but the feed is so good that Don and I don't even have much to do, but they'll be good company for a few days anyway. LeGrand's got a bottle of straight grain alcohol that they mix with water to perk up their spirits and tune up the conversation (B.S.), Only Glen and LeGrand imbibe, since me and Don, we're teetotalers.
Dog food has been scarce for a few days and no "old gummer" is about to perish in this sheep heaven, so we're in a dilemma as to how to feed 'em. Bunches of grey burros inhabit this land and one day an old stud jack makes the mistake of standing put on the hillside as Don drives the wagon by. The dogs could eat jack meat if they're hungry enough, he thinks, so out comes the old 30-30 and a bullet through the back bone puts the ol' jack down. But he's still alive and to correct that Don beats him on the head with the back of the axe, still that don't do the job, so he whittles on his throat for awhile, but he's a tough old bugger and don't seem like he'll ever die. This is getting to be a grisly job, even for a sheepherder. Finally, after a lot of hard work he disengages the hind quarters. Now those dogs have got chawing material that will last for a long time.
We move across the Grand Wash and down toward the lake a ways. There's good feed everywhere and the sheep just want to stop and eat. Off in the distance a few miles I can see the white camp wagons of other sheep outfits scattered across my line of vision. There's enough spring feed here for a million head of sheep.
The extra help has been out of town for a week now and they're all hankering to get back, so next morning they leave, taking Don with them an I'm left there alone with Snoop, Jug and the other horses for company. I am in my mid-teens now. Been out of town for a year and don't hanker to go in. There's nothing of interest in there for me. Once or twice a week a gentle rain waters the land and the green feed is growing faster than those sheep can eat it. For days the herd hardly moves. There's enough moisture in the succulent vegetation that the sheep don't even hanker for drinking water.
Our sheep dogs ain't much account, except for "Ma" who is of Australian shepherd blood, and she's a good one. A couple of times a year she goes on a romantic spree. One nice morning "Ma" was gone an she took the two grown up males with her. Only a big pup was left at camp. But aint hardly anything to do, them sheep is in such good feed they act like they're tied to the ground. I circle around them once or twice a day looking for coyote sign, but don't see any.
"Ma's" been gone now for five or six days and there ain't nothin' to do taking care of the sheep, so I think it'd be nice to visit some of the other sheep outfits and while passing by, ask about my dawg. My line of travel is north up along the Grand Wash, then easterly parallel to the Bunkerville Mountain at the north end of Pacoon Basin. The country appears to be level to some extent but that's a deception. About every half mile there's a gully running south, downgrade, that is rimrocked and 50 to 100 feed deep. Most are broad bottomed with the desert grass, brush and weeds growing therein. Indian war parties could sure get up close to a wagon train in this kind of country. Of course there ain't ever been any wagon trains out here. But it sure slows me down as I travel east across those earth-wrinkles. Way over there to the east is a white dot that I take to be a sheep camp. As I keep crossing those gullies, don't seem like that dot gets any bigger. The sun goes down beyond the west end of the Bunkerville Mountain that's bent south and is directly to my west. I'm thinking maybe I can't find that far off wagon in the dark and will have to lay out by a camp fire. The spring nights are chilly but at that time in life it aint no big deal since I've done it before. The gullies ain't so deep now and are farther apart. A faint light appears in awhile and I'm glad that the wagon is positioned so that an end is toward me, with the door or back window my way. After what seems like a long time I get close enough to "hello" the camp and a feller sticks his head out the door and hollers for me to get down and come on in.
The voice is a familiar one, that of one of my previous working partners, Lewis Black. He warms up some fried mutton and other victuals while we get reacquainted with our doings. He says that ol' "Ma" came by his camp several days past and gathered up his two dogs, ain't seen hide nor hair of either since. Course, he's like me, his herd doesn't move much and there's no need for dogs. He expects they'll come back before many days. He's glad to have my company. It's been awhile since the rest of his crew went to town. That mutton and biscuits tastes good and I take on a big bait. It's been a long while since breakfast and I wasn't very hungry then. Finally, after a lot of visiting and B.S. we bed down.
Next morning I ride over to Larsen' s outfit which is only about four or five miles, then to Anderson's where I stay the second night. They both are missing dogs that trailed off behind that philanderer. About noon the third day I circle around my own herd. They've split up into two bunches but only a quarter mile apart. Over at camp "Ma's" there to greet me with a big smile and wagging tail. She's glad I got back to camp all right.
Next morning I hitch up the team to haul four barrels of water for camp use. It's only a couple miles down to Grand Wash, then upstream to a big spring that flows out on the east side. Good tasting water. I just finish filling the barrels when a feller comes along and says he has filed ownership on the spring and I can't get any more water there. I say I don't know about his ownership but when I need water I'm going to get some. Never saw him again although I got water there for another three weeks or more.
It's now getting close to lambing time and that Brink outfit wants to do it east of the Hurricane Rim. There's better feed where we are at, but they think the trailing out to summer range will be too hard on the young lambs. I'm thinking that they are making a big mistake but then I'm not the boss. A few days later we move the herd over to where a shearing outfit is set up. I keep the holding pens full and help tromp wool some. In two or three days there's a big stack of large sacks full of wool and them of ewes look practically naked. Then we move eastward and some north along our back trail toward Paucum Spring and Emily Points where we'd spent the winter. Our rate of travel is more urgent now cause some of the ewes is about to plop out little ones.
Seven or eight days later we passed through the twist hills and the Hurricane Valley then up the Navajo Trail which puts us on top of the Rim where the Brink's own country at Rock Holes. We've gained about 2,500 feet in altitude and now it's winter time again with very little green feed growing and a cold wind coming in from Kolob Mountain. Those old ewes, clothed in their summertime garb, must think that somebody is crazy and that's my sentiments, too. We moved out of a warm balmy land where green feed is plentiful to a cold windy place where an animal has to eat dry, tasteless grass and brush.
Next morning the yearlings are separated from the lambing ewes which hurry on eastward. Another wagon is brought out from town and I stay at Rock Holes with the dries. There's about 2,200 head of yearlings with a few "weathers" for meat purposes. It turns out to be a miserable month and I think that the boss rued his decision to move out of Pacoon.
Ol' Snoop still wants his feed of grain, but LeGrand complains about having to buy oats for a worthless mustang. They don't think I'm earning those extra oats even though the pay rate is just $60.00 per month. I should have told them to take their darn sheep and quit, instead I asked him what I ought to do. "Guess I can haul him to town in my truck and take him off your hand," he says. That's what he did. Fifteen years later he's still using him as his top saddle horse. Guess he wasn't so worthless after all.