THICKETS

over the course of my life ive worked cattle in a lot places. feed yards, sale barns  dairy s , rock piles and last but  not least mesquite thickets.  from where the san pedro joins the gila all the way down the gila to where  the salt river joins the gila!  no matter where you are a thicket isn't a fun place to waller around in chasing the forked toe ox.  the best thing a puncher can have in those big dense thickets is a pack of good  dogs and and a good thick skinned horse with a long rope on your saddle.  some fellers like that rope tied to the horn hard and fast, others like it dallied, either way hot ot cold you better have a thick denim jacket, chaps and taps.  straw hats don't last long in those thorn infested thickets.  your hide as well as that horses better be thick and your pain threshold high!   some thickets are long , and narrow some short and fat and a few like the famous new York thicket between bapchule and gila crossing on the gila river indian reservation is 20 miles long and 10 wide.  if you catch the wild ox  deep in the thicket there are no corrals or roads to load the cow brute in a trailer.   you saw the horns off to a blunt end and trim up a good gentle mesquite tree and tie that ox to it with about a foot of slack.  the next day that ox s head is sore and tender. you untie him, snub him up to your saddle horse. if your careful and patient  you can teach that animal to lead. he learns that the safest place for him is next to that horse.  in the process you must be sureto give the cow brute the trail while you and your horse take the punishment of the brush along the way. many times when reaching the edge of the thicket a animal that has led for several miles will balk at going out into the open. they have lived their free life in the thicket and wont leave.  even when hauled to a corral and fed clean water and good hay many will stand in the middle of the pen and simply starve to death.  many times while prowling a thicket, following a bunch of cattle hoping to get something for my efforts I have been tempted to drop a match and ride away. as a matter of fact I have swore to do it, promised to do it, but for some reason never could bring myself to it.  ive seen where fires were started in thickets. they might burn a acre or so but never seem to go far. very few folks exist that will work in a thicket in wild country, after wild or spoiled cattle. most folks now a days just let them go. financialy it is a loosing proposition. you work for 2 days, long and hard to get one animal in a corral, that's if you get one caught in the first place.  most of those wild or spoiled cattle when run through the sale ring don't come close to top market prices. would you buy a 1000 pound bull with his hornes sawed off, a piece of nylon rope dangling from them, a greyhound look about them sucked up in the flank, and scratches , cuts and ears that have been chewed off by a pack of good cow dogs? not many folks would and then at a discount. the puncher who risked his life, that of his horse, and a pack of dogs, who worked two 12 hour days might make 200 dollars if he is lucky.  but who cares about the cash? wheres the next one?