Julius Caesar was warned beware the Ides of March by a soothsayer and failed to listen. I wish a soothsayer had warned me to beware the Ides of April. Times have been tough up here on the Slope. I guess that into each life a little rain will fall. I am fine with that and I love April showers but this has been the most painful and expensive April I can remember.

As a “day working cowboy” I get to see a lot of beautiful sunrises and maybe some of the most beautiful country that is still around. I get to ride a good horse and have a hard time classifying the job as work. When I got the call from Krebs Livestock to help process a few hundred cows I viewed it as a paid vacation. Part of the job required a couple of trips to Cecil, Oregon and included a day sturgeon fishing on the Columbia with a guide. The fishing went fine. We hooked six and landed four sturgeon, two too small and two too big but at least we didn’t have to gut any.

My job was to gather and sort cattle for a technician to AI (artificially inseminate) a few hundred cows. There was no room for error as the job is very time-sensitive, down to a margin of less than an hour. I recruited Tio Simmons for the first Cecil trip and with help like Tio everything went better than smoothly.

It was the trip home when things started to go south. Climbing the grade out of Elgin my Ram Cummins with only 109,000 miles blew black smoke and engine parts out of the tailpipe. Had it towed to La Grande and Wendy Simmons rescued the trailer and horses. The quote to fix it there was $15,200. I ended up having it done locally and saved about $6,000. I got no less than six calls from rancher friends offering me a spare pickup to use while mine was fixed. Vicky and Rob Olson wouldn’t take no for an answer and delivered a pickup for my use as long as I needed it.

I headed back to Cecil to finish the AI procedure, again time-sensitive, but without Tio’s help. He needed to prepare for pasture cattle he had coming. Things were going fine till I forgot that Vicky’s pickup had a short box and as I backed up and turned my trailer, knocked out the back window and dented the roof, $1,654.60.

We had two days of gathering and processing the same cows, again time-sensitive. The first day went great, but while gathering for the last day things deteriorated. Had the cattle to the corrals and they stalled. I went to start the lead and some calves started a run back. I was gaining on the lead calf and thought I would go by and turn around to bring them back. The calf was on the fence and when the calf stopped, my new horse made a great move to turn it and I didn’t. I managed to hold onto the reins causing my horse to walk around on my arm and back for a while. Five broken ribs and an arm that looked broke but wasn’t. It really hurt getting back on and pushing the cattle into the corral. Found out about the ribs a couple of days later. Couldn’t have got the job done without the help of a 13 year truant. Eli really stepped up and saved the day.

Others in the area are also having their problems. Tyson Mclaughlin lost round two with his horse and is moving real slow. Might have to sell that one to a good home out of state. Dan Warnock failed to mark out his bronc at a branding this week and received a no-score. He didn’t make the eight-second whistle anyway.

After my wreck I received many phone calls from rancher friends offering to help with anything while I convalesced. Not a single call from an environmentalist. I have never met more decent and caring people than the ranching community. They will give you whatever they have if you are in need. It is heartbreaking that there are those that would try to deprive these decent people of their livelihood. I can’t help thinking that if they knew these people like I do they might change their minds and not be so vindictive.

Barrie Qualle is a working cowboy in Wallowa County.