The following is a step-by-step photo essay of our branding on Thursday.
First, ready your cedar firewood for the branding fire. We prefer cedar… it burns hot and is much quieter than a propane burner.
Put your irons in the fire to heat… we have an “A” and a “bar”… since our brand is A bar A.
Get ’em HOT… I mean HOT.
Get your roper to swing his loop…
Make sure he quickly jerks his slack and dallies…
You try and rope both hind feet… but one will do…
Drag him to your wrestlers…
Good wrestlers have good technique… On a one legged catch, the guy getting the rope is opposite of the leg that has the rope on it… Here that’s Brandon. The other guy grabs the tail, and hopes there isn’t any cockleburs in it! That’s Daniel.
With a coordinated yank on the tail and a downward circle and then lift with the rope, the calf is quickly on his side. The tail guy covers the head, the rope guy continues to lift on the rope and moves into position on the tail. Good wrestlers make it look easy. I used to wrestle a lot in my day…
The brand is quickly applied.
The calf is vaccinated and marked with “chalk” to show it.
Quickly and efficiently… the calf is finished and released.
Ta-da!
We’re finished for another year.
It’s a big job but one we enjoy.
Especially when it’s over!
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