Wyoming Catholic Cowboys

Monday, September 4, 2023

Labor Day

I love to work.

Sunday, September 3, 2023

John and I have done a lot together: worked bison, served Mass, held retreats, had dinner... the list goes on. But we have never ridden horses together. Well, no better time than the present. With both of us having a couple free hours Sunday afternoon, we decided to saddle up and explore the Durham Ranch.

Fr. Bryce and John Flocchini ranching in a free world.

Once unloaded and saddled, we headed east of his house.

The first stop was to see some old teepee rings.

From my understanding, the Indians would use these rocks to hold down the bottom portion of their teepee covering. When they'd leave they'd just roll them off and walk away leaving a ring of rocks. Cool.

Mollie is loving this new bit. So am I.

These segmented rocks are crazy. You often see them perched on ridges around this prairie country.

They sure look like a fossilized sea creature of sorts. Though most people I talk to say they aren't.

Scoria of varied colors is common around here.

It's basically baked clay from ancient burning coal seams.

John's eyes are always fixed on the ground, checking out the soil and the grass.

And even finding an occasional fossilized sea shell.

Seeping springs are not uncommon in the draws between the hills.

Good ride cowboy. Thanks for the tour.

Day is done.

It's hard to beat a couple hours of horse back on the Wyoming prairie. Of course, if you're with a good buddy, all the better. John is a generous man in more ways than one. But he really shines when it comes to stewardship. From the ground to the critters to the guests, this land is your land this land is my land. In the end, John understands that this land is God's land. And he, for now, is it's care taker. Well done, my friend. Keep up the Good work.

Eternal Perspective

Jesus was always focused on eternal life.

https://youtu.be/iBEa8yiAMds

Saturday, September 2, 2023

Copper Time

Back home we've acquired quite a bit of oilfield reda cable. This heavy gage electrical wire is used to run submersible pumps and other motors around oil and gas production. If there's a weakness in it they just get rid of it. And if you know the right guy, you can pick some up for pretty cheap. Having it on hand, we've used it to power all sorts of things, mainly different buildings around the place. I've had a string of in sitting around the rectory, so I thought I'd see how hard it would be to strip and recycle the copper. Let's find out.

There's probably 100'+ of cable here. Stiffer than heck and super hard to work with. But for the right application, it's gold.

8 gage solid copper with and an extra ground wire.

I simply took my sawsall and cut it into 3' lengths. Then the pushed the guts up from one end, grabbed it on the other end, and pulled the wire out of the conduit.

Then separated the insulated wire from the ground wire. The shiny copper sells as #1 copper and the tarnished as #2. #1 is worth more.

Then I grabbed a cold one and went to stripping. With a good sharp utility knife, making one pass across the insulation wasn't that hard.

Then simply pull the two apart.

3 or 4 hours later and we had it all stripped. Our Blessed Mother approved.

45 pounds of copper at $2.35 a pound = $106 of cash.

Not bad. I'm sure the Lord can find a better use for that money than being coiled up in the corner. I'm also all about reusing the earth's precious recourses. Copper, like many minerals in the ground, is a gift from God. It's here for us to use, not abuse. Instead sitting back on the north 40 or throwing it away, might as well get it back into production.

Friday, September 1, 2023

Harvest Moon

Whether you're farming or ranching, September is harvest season. So it is with Lungren Brothers. Wanting to get going on butchering our herd but not wanting to bring them all home yet, Jared and I went out to them.

I've slaughtered cows in the pasture before, but you have to be careful because they'll turn into a herd of elk on you if you don't do it right.

Already bringing one home a couple weeks ago, three of the other four were already in the corrals. So we just cut ole 60 out and laid her down. The cows have really summered well.

It was good to have Jared on board. He's helped me a lot with different projects, but this was his first cow hunting experience.

#60 was about as good of a cow as I've processed. She's off of Peg and Lee Isenberger's ranch south of Wright. I bet she put on 300lbs on Black Hills grass this summer.

Meat's not meat until it's in the truck.

Back in business.

I look forward to doing some cutting this fall. #57 has been hanging for two weeks now. I like to age them for 21 days before I start to cut. If we do a cow a month we should be done by the end of December. Just in time for snowmobiling season.

Thursday, August 31, 2023

Dog Days

With the dog days of summer upon us it’s been hard to find anything exciting to do. Fixing this old gate for Colleen Caulk is about as fun as it gets anymore.

Her son Jim is in town doing some home repairs. Colleen houses my horses for the winter so I wanted to pitch in where I could.

The gate was just sagging, so I set out to rehang it.

Lag bolts were my fastener of choice.

A few bolts in the other side of the hinge and we were set.

They plan to paint the fence too, so fixing the broken board was also in order.

Back in action.

I’m always happy to help reset a gate. Sagging gates are my pet peeve. I was also thankful to find something constructive to do during these hot, end of summer days. On to the next one.