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Ranch weeks, what is that?
The Horse Drives and Cattle Drives bring the horses and cows back to the ranch in the spring. Ranch weeks are everything that happens on a ranch for the rest of the year. We don’t like to say the word “work” and so we use the more interesting words like activities and adventures. Ranch weeks are the heart of a real ranch. This is when we settle down and make the ranch work.
Riding never ends as cows like to wander to find that favorite spot where the grass and water are perfect. Bulls fight and tear down the fences and riding is the only way to keep track of what and how our cows are doing.
We take care of 21,000 acres of native grassland country and have four or five neighbors who ride on larger numbers of acres where all of our cows get mixed up. We do a lot of "neighboring" with our neighbors and spring branding or fall gathering weeks are great social events.
Our ranch lays on the southern boundaries of the Crow Indian Reservation. We enjoy the rich history of one of the largest buffalo jumps in the west and we gladly share the stories and buffalo bones that lay deep in the canyon soil just down from the main house. These bones are dated back 500 years or more and are great source of interest.
The Dryhead Ranch got its name from the Indians who called it "dry skull" because of the many years of using the Buffalo jump. There are also nearby teepee rings and picturegraph writings along the canyon walls that add to the sites to see. Many guests find arrowheads and other interesting artifacts long since forgotten in the ground. These historic sites are part of the daily rides that take us to each corner of the ranch each week while we check on bulls, cows, fences and grass.
The Dryhead house that sits in the center of the ranch yard begins the cowboy and ranch history also very deep and strong in the Dryhead Country. The Phelps family built the main house in 1898 and made a gathering place for all ranchers and settlers for miles around. The history book boasts of a ballroom and well stocked library and local bands that came from Billings to entertain at summer and fall social events.
Many years have passed and many ranch families have lived at the ranch since then and now the Bassett family has owned the Dryhead Ranch for the past 20 years. We share the untouched vistas and remote mountain pastures with friends and guests from all over the world. Our guests ride with us each day and experience the real ranch life of moving cows and riding truly solid ranch horses.
Your horse becomes your partners as we walk the canyons and mountains of the Dryhead country. Guests return year after year to experience the peace and quiet, the beauty and awesome spirit of the Dryhead Ranch.
Fencing begins in early spring so we can keep our cows and horses home and our neighbors cows and horses on their grass and pastures. Good fences make our work easier. Branding calves is a top priority as soon as we get the cows to the ranch and it is important when we ride through our cows each week that we keep looking for newborn calves that need a tag and a brand. All required by law to prove ownership and help in the processing and sorting days ahead.
Branding large numbers of calves at the ranch has changed in the last several years. We brand most of the calves at the farm in Lovell before we trail them into the ranch in the early spring. Our branding days are mostly for late calves that were born on the trail or at the ranch after the spring cattle drives. This is always an exciting activity that most people like to see.
Our cowboys and cowgirls rope these calves and drag them to the branding fire where they receive the ranch brand, ear marks, shots and all bull calves are castorated. Lots of competition is witnessed on these branding days:
who has the best cow horse and who roped the most calves by both hind feet and who wrestled the biggest calves and who got the dirtiest. Lots of extra cowboys come to help and the best food of the season gets put out to enjoy.
All kinds of cowboy stories are told and branding is a social event of the spring.
Each day on a ranch week sends us in a different direction to check cattle and water and grass so that by the end of the week we have looked at each pasture of the ranch and looked to see if the calves are growing and the bulls are circulating and the cows are getting to the best grass, our watering holes are running and fences are up and nothing has escaped or invaded our boundaries. It is a rare week that all of these things are perfect.
Our summer months are memorable days on the ranch. The sun comes up at 4:30 and not long after that our cook starts their day in the kitchen. Coffee is ready to push the button for anyone getting up earlier than that. Our wrangler is not far behind the cook as bringing in the horses is the first best experience of the morning. Everyone will want to capture this thrill on their camera not to mention getting on the list to ride with our wrangler at least one morning out of the week.
Breakfast is at 7:00 and everyone meets to eat and get ready for the day. Horses are soon caught and everyone gets saddled. Most days we will take lunch and soon we are off for the days adventures. Most of our pastures are far enough away that they require an all day ride. Once in awhile we will have more work than we can accomplish in one day so we will arrange to camp overnight. It is great fun to enjoy a campfire on a summer evening and cook tin foil dinners and roast marshmallows around a campfire and sleep under the stars. This puts us close to our pastures that are far away from the ranch so we can do some extra riding or fence mending.
In July and August the heat of the day will require that we do our riding earlier in the morning and later in the evening. We will take a siesta for several hours during the hottest part of the afternoon and ride in the evening when it is cooler. It is much easier on the horses and our guests to ride when it is cooler not to mention how beautiful it is in the early morning or in the late evening.
We will have mini horse drives during the summer months of May, June, July, and August. We will be moving studs and making mare bands in May. June requires us to rotate young horse colts that are in training and need to have their feet trimmed and worming medicine given. July requires vet scheduling and our horse colts will be brought to the correl for health checks and castorating of horse colts. August is the month we remove the studs from the mare bands and each mare band needs to come into the correl to have the stud removed and the mares then turned back out to pasture.
We have designed these mini horse drives for our inexperienced riders who would like to learn how to move horses but don’t feel confident enough to come on a week long horse drive. These drives will be a one day experiences or possibly a two days experience in that week. We will move these horses at a slower pace for building riding skills and confidence in controlling horses.
Ranch Rodeo
As part of our 2010 ranch week schedule we are adding "Ranch Rodeo" competitions. Ranch rodeos are a popular activity in the Montana area these last few years. The Nile Rodeo and Expo that Billings, Montana hosts in October has made Friday nights the Ranch Rodeo competition evening. Here at Dryhead Ranch we thought we would challenge our guests in a smaller competition where they could try out a few of these events. Two days during 2010 ranch weeks we will focus on doing three events that will sharpen your riding and working cattle skills. The most challenging event will be roping and branding a calf, the next event which is equally as challenging in a different way will be the team penning event, and last but not least we will have a ribbon race event. These are all done on horseback and are timed for more excitement and challenge. So look on our ranch weeks schedule for the weeks during the summer that we will offer these Ranch Rodeo events.
Dates:
May 30-June 5, June 27-July 3, August 1-7, August 22-28, 2010
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September and October thankfully brings cooler temperatures during the day and a welcomed change of riding schedules. Cooler weather makes it possible to ride all day and our afternoon breaks disappear into serious fall gathering. Two of our September weeks are scheduled as cattle drives while extra cowboys come to help us gather and wean our calves. These are another time when ranches host gatherings that were social events and huge times to enjoy ranch life and activities.
In addition to our cow work we will also be bringing in the mares and colts and getting the registration papers made out on each of our colts for the 2010 season. This is a great time of year for those interested in seeing what the breeding season has developed.
We will take pictures of all the colts and their mothers for the registration papers that we send to AQHA and for our own personal records. One whole day will be devoted to getting these papers made out and pictures taken and horses sorted into various groups. We will be moving horses around in various pastures and it is an exciting week. We will not wean the colts until November when they have had time to grow more.
We offer a real cowboy experience. One that you will never forget.
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RANCH WEEKS 2010
May 09 - 15, 2010
May 16 - 22, 2010
May 30 - June 05, 2010*
June 06 - 12, 2010
June 13 - 19, 2010
June 27 - July 03, 2010*
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July 04 - 10, 2010
July 11 - 17, 2010
July 25 - 31, 2010
August 01 - 07, 2010*
August 08 - 14, 2010
August 22 - 28, 2010*
Aug 29 - Sept 04, 2010
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Sep 05 - 11, 2010
Sep 12 - 18, 2010
Oct 03 - 09, 2010
Oct 10 - 16, 2010
Oct 17 - 23, 2010
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* Ranch Rodeo weeks
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