Training, Western Trails

Some notes from my training experience with horses

Occasionally, people ask me to do a little training on their horses. My specialty is trail training; I turn good horses into excellent trail horses. My training is a little out of the mainstream, because most of what I do is to give the horse some very solid experience on some pretty tough trails. My thought is that when a rider asks one of my horses to handle an obstacle or tough trail, the horse should be thinking, “I’ve handled worse. This is a piece of cake!” Most riders will never ask of their horses the things I ask of mine on the trail. I expect my horses to handle any obstacle asked of them carefully and without undue hesitation. I expect them to carry their rider to their destination and back, safely, whatever that may entail.

As I have worked with horses over the years, I have learned a few things about horse training and some of the mistakes horse trainers, particularly novices, make (believe, me. I’ve made them all). I thought I’d just outline a few of these things, in hopes they may make sense enough to help the average horse owner as they learn and train their own horses.

I’ll start with a serious training mistake I see made most often by novice trainers, who, with good intentions, teach bad habits to their horses.

I’ll explain.  When a cue is given – say the touch of a heel or spur to ask the horse to move its front quarters – the horse feels the pressure of the cue. While the horse is learning what we want from the cue, he may move against the cue or get confused and reactive. He may not initially understand that we want him to move his front quarters away from the pressure of the cue. The normal reaction of the inexperienced trainer, then, would be to immediately stop giving the cue and try again. In his/her mind, the trainer is thinking, “This isn’t going the way I want it to. I will stop and try again, because I want the horse to stop doing it wrong and learn to do it right.” Sometimes the reaction of the horse to a cue is such that the rider’s thought is more like, “I had better stop this now, because this is not going to end well for me!” This is precisely the reason that most riders who claim to have been “bucked-off” of a horse, actually are guilty of jumping off after the third hop.

Now let’s examine why this training error generally results in the opposite of the desired reaction from the horse. When we give a cue to the horse, while we are thinking as described above, which is natural for a human, the horse is actually thinking along these lines: “How do I get this idiot to stop doing that!” A touch with the spur in the ribs may result in the horse moving away from the cue, which is what we want to happen. If the rider, then, instantaneously stops the cue or removes the pressure on the ribs, the horse learns that if he moves away from the pressure, it goes away! The horse’s thought? “Hey, when I moved this way, my rider stopped poking me in the rib! I’ll remember that!”

The keys to training a horse to cues are to teach the horse in stages and to be consistent in the cue.  During training, when a cue is given, the horse will normally begin to move in an effort to escape the pressure, but may not move as desired at first. The cue should be given and held.  If the horse does not react, increase the pressure until the horse does something.  As soon as the horse makes any move or effort, to any degree, approximating what we want it to do (in this case, to move its front quarters away from the cue) the pressure is released and the horse is praised.  With repetition, the horse will begin to recognize what action on its part causes the cue to go away. With each training session, more should be required of the horse before the cue is released. In time and with patience, the horse will learn to perform the move with the amount of precision that is consistent with the rider’s requirements. In other words, if you are teaching the horse to move its front quarters, it will first learn to move one step, then two. Eventually, the horse will learn to move its front quarters as long as the cue is given, even a complete circle around its hind quarters.

In the same way, if a horse reacts with excitement, or balks, or tosses its head and the rider stops giving the cue, the horse learns instantly that he can make the cue go away with that reaction. The rider has trained his/her horse to do exactly that, although unintentionally.

Now, there are times when a horse under training becomes frustrated or belligerent and refuses to respond to a cue. Sometimes the reaction is to balk, rear, or back, possibly even buck. The normal, although wrong, reaction of the rider/trainer is to release the cue and try to settle the horse. The correct response, one that will not teach the horse to continue that reaction, is to immediately switch to a different cue, one the horse understands, but which may be issued with a punitive value.

For instance, I recently gave a cue to a horse to move its front quarters, by giving a touch with the spur in front of the cinch area behind the horse’s elbow. The horse did not respond, so I increased the pressure. The horse then tensed up its muscles and pushed against the bit as if it was about to do something neither of us was going to enjoy. I immediately switched to a stern cue to tell the horse to move its hind quarters, by giving it a quick jab with the spur in its ribs behind the cinch on the opposite side, while turning its head with the reins. This is often called, “disengaging the hind quarters” by some trainers. This taught the horse that when it does not respond to the first cue given, tensing up and preparing to rear or some other explosive reaction is not acceptable (does not give him a release) and that he will get a stern cue in another direction as a result. That second cue is held until the horse is responding in a submissive way. The horse will begin to recognize that if it wants to make the first cue go away, and not get a more forceful cue in exchange, it is much easier and more agreeable to be compliant.

This leads to one of the little one-liner rules of thumb I once heard from the Parellis: Horses learn from the release of pressure, not from the pressure itself.

I have often read responses to questions on various forums in which I participate online, that decry what is commonly called “pain-compliance” training methods. I had one person respond to one of my posts: “You should NEVER hit a horse!”  Another posted, “A well-trained horse does not need spurs!”  In riding with people who hold similar views with regard to training horses, I have found these are often the same people who have the most trouble with problematic horses. I have seen horses that are pushy with their owners, that nip or bite, that kick, horses that are unruly under saddle when their rider attempts to ride away from a group, among many other things. While I respect differing views on how to train horses, and believe no training method can claim to be the only way things should be done, my experience tells me that the most important aspects of training are, first, firmness (firm, but gentle), and second, consistency. Any horse will learn to respond to any cue, if it is given firmly, gently, and consistently. Having said that, a trainer who subscribes to this as a primary tenet of his/her training methodology, will occasionally find the need to discipline a horse in training with more forceful cues or even punishment. These punitive measures will have the desired effect, coming from one who is consistently firm, but gentle. This leads me to another rule of thumb I subscribe to.

This one I learned from Clinton Anderson, from whose methodology I have learned much. It goes like this: “Ask, Tell, Insist, Enforce.” I think that is self-explanatory.  A horse will learn to respond to the heaviest cue it is trained to. It will also learn to respond to nearly imperceptible cues, if trained to them. Therefore, as a horse learns to respond appropriately to a particular cue, the trainer should ask with a progressively lighter cue, but require compliance all the same, using the above rule. Again, with patience and consistency, the horse will learn to respond as precisely as the rider/trainer requires.

Personally, I like a trail horse to respond to a solid, perceptible cue, rather than a light touch. Let me give an example. On the trail, I am often handling things such as a camera, food, canteen, gloves, etc with my hands. Because of this, I like split reins with a knot to join them (I never cared for roping reins, though). I was once riding along on a mountain trail, handling something with my hands and my horse kept trying to turn off the trail to the right, while I tried to keep him on the trail by steering with leg pressure. When it got to the point that I had to pay attention, it took me a few seconds to see what the problem was: Since I was using both hands, I had let the reins rest on the horse’s neck. The weight of the knot had pulled the reins off to the right side, which effectively gave my faithful steed the neck-reining cue to turn right! My mistake! The lesson here is that a horse may be trained to be as sensitive to the cues as its intended purpose requires.  In the arena, before show judges, one wants the horse to respond to cues that are as light and imperceptible as possible. That level of precision, however, can prove troublesome on the trail.

I have heard trainers state emphatically, that a horse should never enter one’s personal space unless invited. Personally, I don’t subscribe to this. These trainers espouse what I call a “closed-door” policy. The horse is allowed in only when the door is opened by the trainer/rider.  Their reasoning stems from concern for safety. Keeping the horse at a safe distance precludes the trainer being pawed, bitten, or pounced upon unexpectedly by the horse. My personal practice is to have an “open-door” policy in which my horse is free to enter my space unless I close the door.

I enjoy a close physical relationship with my horses, but I do not tolerate misbehavior.  My horses learn, because I am consistent in my treatment of them, what they are allowed to do and what they are not when in my proximity. They also learn how to tell when they have overstepped their bounds. They understand when they have been “spanked.”

Which leads me to another of my personal guides for training. I believe in firm discipline of a horse when it misbehaves, but there are proper methods and improper methods. I will state emphatically, that a horse should never be disciplined by use of the bit! Hands on the bit should be steady and firm. This doesn’t mean constant contact on the bit, but when a cue is given, it should be discernible to the horse. The term “soft hands” is often misunderstood to mean “no contact” on the bit.  However, when there is contact on the bit, it should be done such that if there is firm contact, it is the horse that does it. The hands on the reins should give the cue and hold the cue. If the horse pushes against the cue, the trainer should not respond by pulling back harder, but hold the cue firm. The horse should learn that it is causing the pressure, rather than the trainer’s hands. In fact, the methods described above may be used effectively to teach a horse to be supple and submissive to the bit by putting light pressure on the bit and then releasing immediately when the horse lowers its head and tucks its chin to relieve the pressure. With patience and consistency, the horse will learn to be flexible at the poll and supple to the bit.

I discipline my horses generally by a quick jab with the spurs or my heels. I don’t always ride with spurs, but I normally wear them while training and when I ride backcountry trails. My spurs have a large blunt rowel.  With regard to spurs, the smaller the rowel, the more aggressive the spur. I have seen some spurs with a small blunt ball end that some believe to be a gentle spur, when actually it is a very aggressive design. A large blunt rowel is what I prefer. Mine is shaped sort of like a four-leaf clover.

Kennetrek Cowboy pac boots

I regard spurs as a training tool.  One benefit of the spur, particularly in training, is that a finer, more precise cue may be given with the spur than with the heel of the riding boot. While spurs may be used aggressively when necessary, a light touch with a spur may give a much more precise cue than a broad heel. However, when necessary, the spur may be used aggressively, both punitively or to avert disaster on the trail. I find horses learn quicker and respond more precisely when spurs are involved.

The proper bit is also an effective training device. While it is quite the fashion nowadays to go “bitless,” there is nothing inherently cruel or evil about a bit. An understanding of how bits function is an important element for any horse trainer. I wrote a blog post about the subject a couple years ago that may have useful information for the reader.

As I said earlier, there is no perfect methodology for training a horse. Just as people, some horses respond to one training method better than another. I have learned effective elements of horse training from many horse trainers who espouse widely varied methodologies. My experience in training horses has also improved my understanding of the human psyche. Quite frankly, had I become a horse trainer earlier in life, I might have done some things differently in the raising of my own children!

The final commentary on horse training for this post, and I would not have you believe this post is all-inclusive, is this: Every rider is a trainer and both training and learning are taking place whenever a human comes in contact with a horse. A rider who gently, firmly, and consistently handles a horse, providing consistent cues, will train that horse to respond well and willingly to any desired behavior. A similar thing may also be said of those who handle a horse inconsistently, who are impatient, or who manage discipline with anger. One who handles a horse in this way may find the horse responds inconsistently and makes both itself and its owner unhappy. No amount of excellent training will overcome poor handling by the horse’s owner/rider, but a well-trained horse that is handled properly is a happy horse and a pleasure to be around.

For an excellent relationship between yourself and your horse, learn to be a trainer and not just a rider.

TH

 

Good Stories, Good trails

Post #4 Alaska Moose Hunt

Well, it’s time for another chapter of my Alaska moose hunt.

As we left it last week, Derek and I had finally made it into our hunt camp and were getting settled-in. Our hunting buddies had arrived and I was getting ready to head back to the trailhead to bring in horse feed.  That’s where we’ll start for this post.

I’ll apologize right now for the dropoff in our photography. This was a tough hunt trip and Derek and I had our hands full most of the time. Photography was not foremost in our minds unless we came across something particularly spectacular. I’ll try to do better in the future.

Our father-and-son pair of hunters, who were flown in, were there to hunt dall sheep, moose, and if they were lucky enough, grizzly bear. In our hunt area (Wrangell-St. Elias National Park) only Alaska residents can hunt the mighty grizzly. The son of the pair covers that requirement, which allows the father to enjoy the same benefits.

The day after they arrived, Tuesday I believe, Derek and I mounted them up on horses, loaded a pack horse with their backpacks and gear, and led them up into the foothills of the mountain range to our east. It was a tough haul, with a couple river crossings where the water came to near our knees, and steep mountainsides where the scrub oak and brush grew thick. We were lucky enough to come across a fairly well-traveled game trail for the last bit of our climb. We let our friends off after a climb of around 1,000 feet, just before the brush gave way to clear rocky mountainscapes.

Dall sheep about 1,000 feet above us on the hillside

Derek and I bid them farewell and headed back to the hunt camp.  Later that day and the following morning, Derek and I were able to find our friends high up on the mountainside, stalking a herd of dall sheep, through Derek’s spotting scope from the hunt camp.

On Wednesday morning, I saddled up Apollo for my saddle horse and rigged up Ginger, Moose, Shadow, and Missy with pack saddles. You will recall that on the trip in, Apollo came up lame. He pulled the shoe on that sore front right in the river, but I recovered the shoe and re-set it. He seemed to be doing better, so I decided to ride him on this trip back out to the trailhead to get horse feed.

Derek has a very nice aluminum camp kitchen, designed in the form of two pack panniers, that has lots of storage and a built-in cook stove. It is a very nice convenience on a hunt trip like this…when it works. Apparently the regulator went bad on us and we could not get the stove to light. So, we decided I would haul it back to the trailhead, freeing up a pack horse to haul meat at the end of our hunt.

Our camp kitchen

We loaded up the camp kitchen with things we decided we wouldn’t need for the rest of the hunt, so we could maximize our capacity for the final haul out at the end of our stay. Moose was elected to carry the camp kitchen. Not a heavy load at any rate, but she is a strong, hearty mare and would stand carrying a load 40 miles in two days; we knew the loads coming back in would be heavy. The rest of the pack horses were hauling empty soft panniers.

The trip out to the trailhead was one of the toughest rides I’ve ever done. I fought with the horses the entire trip. The problem was that I had Moose first in line, so I could manage her. She is the one that doesn’t like to stay in line and occasionally gets her head on the wrong side of a tree, which is a major cause of pack string wrecks. I figured that if I put her first in line, I could keep that from happening.

The problem with having gaited horses in a pack string, is that gaited horses tend to reach forward with their front feet as they gait along. When you get a horse that holds too close to the horse in front of it, its front hooves will occasionally clip the heels of the horse in front, which is very painful for the horse that gets clipped. This has caused Moose to develop the habit of walking to the side of the pack string to protect her heels.

Moose also likes to try to move up alongside the lead horse to try to get farther ahead of the horse following her, which was frustrating to me, since we were passing through so much brush and areas treed with close-growing saplings, where the paths were quite narrow.  Moose pulling and causing disruptions in the string caused the pack saddles on the other horses to slide back on them. She would pull forward, causing the horse behind her to get dragged by his lead rope, which was tied to Moose’s pack saddle. That would pull her pack saddle back until her breast strap was stretched tight. The same thing would happen to the rest of the pack horses, except for the last in line, which was Missy.

I had initially allowed Missy to roam free, thinking she would stay with the pack string and that leaving her free would keep her from pulling Shadow’s pack saddle back on his loins. Missy, however, not wanting to be left behind, would not stay at the back of the pack string and kept getting tangled in lead ropes and trying to pass between the pack horses. I finally tied her behind Shadow.

Somewhere along about mile four or five, I noticed that the camp kitchen was making a lot of noise. I stopped to take a look and found that the side panel on one of the camp kitchen  panniers had not been properly fastened in place and the pannier had opened and was hanging in place. I had no way of knowing whether anything important had been lost, but I wasn’t going back to look, since I didn’t know for sure how long it had been open. I secured the panel and started on again, figuring that I would just keep an eye out for anything that had fallen out on the way back to camp the following day. As it turned out, on the trip back in I found a bag of Cinnamon Gummy Bears and a can opener that had fallen out on the trail. I am pretty sure that was all that was lost from the open panel.

Just before we reached about half-way, I looked back and found that Missy had pulled Shadow’s pack saddle back and it had slipped to the side. He had empty soft panniers on his pack and one pannier was missing. I had been so busy fighting with Moose, that I hadn’t noticed that Shadow was having trouble. I stopped and got Shadow’s pack saddle resettled on his back and left all the horses tied to trees, while I rode Apollo back to find the missing pannier. Luckily I found it about a half-mile back. It had a broken strap buckle and could not be properly hung on the pack saddle, so I stuffed his panniers in Ginger’s empty panniers and left his pack saddle empty. We started on again.

Not too much farther along, Apollo began limping again, and we were moving along at a slow walk. I finally stopped and switched my riding saddle to Shadow and moved his empty pack saddle to Apollo. Shadow has a much stouter build than Apollo and it was impossible to adjust the pack saddle to fit Apollo properly, but without a load I figured it would be alright for the remainder of the day.

Things went a little better from there, as Shadow held a little faster pace and that tended to keep the rest of the horses in line a little better. I still had to keep fighting Moose, to keep her in line, though, and Apollo’s ill-fitting empty pack saddle slid all the way back onto his loins and the cinch was way back under his belly, but it stayed on. By the time we reached the trailhead, I was beat.

I must confess here that my normally clean and proper vocabulary suffered greatly during this ride back to the trailhead. Regrettably, a number of expressive nouns and adjectives were reintroduced into my library of words that I haven’t used in many years. At the time, my normal vocabulary just seemed inadequate and some words reserved for “special” occasions were necessary.

After such a difficult trip, I was glad to see the trailer. Derek’s trailer includes a very plush living quarters, complete with pressurized hot water. After taking care of the horses and giving them a good bait of alfalfa cubes for dinner, I took a nice, hot shower. I was too tired to head into town, so I found something to eat for dinner there in the trailer. After catching up my journal I hit the hay.

I was awakened about 6:30am the following morning by a knock at the door! sliding open the bunk window, I found myself talking to a couple of Canadian Customs Officers. They informed me that I had illegally entered Canadian territory and that I could be fined $1,000 for not reporting at the border! I explained that I had gotten in late the day before, after a grueling 20-mile horse pack trip and that I would be heading back to the hunt camp that day. That didn’t satisfy them, so I said I would report at their office later that morning…after I got out of bed. They reiterated their stern warnings and left.

After feeding the horses, I drove Derek’s truck to the Canadian border station at the other end of Beaver Creek, arriving at 8:00am. I presented all our paperwork, my passport, hunting documentation, etc. They reviewed it for several minutes and contacted the US Border Patrol station about 19 miles away about my “illegal” entry back and forth into the US and Canada. The US Border Patrol informed them that they were aware of us and that we had done everything properly and they were not concerned. That seemed to take the fire out of the Canadians and it ended up being a pleasant encounter. By the time I left the station we were on good terms and they were wishing us luck in our hunt.

The encounter with the Canadian authorities put me behind schedule. I finally got all the horses packed up and on the trail about 2:00pm, knowing I would be lucky to make it back to camp before sunset. Three of the pack horses carried four bags of alfalfa cubes each, bringing the total to 480 pounds of feed. knowing the pack panniers would get soaked on the trail, I put the feed bags inside heavy-duty garbage sacks to keep it dry. That was then dropped inside the soft panniers. Apollo, being slightly lame, was loaded with food and several other items for camp. His pack was slightly lighter than those of the horses with the feed.

On the trip back out to camp I decided I would ride Moose, thus relieving myself of the single biggest problem I had on the trip back to the trailhead the day before. That worked out much better and things went pretty well for the first several miles.

At one point, as we passed through a narrow spot through a logjam, the third horse in line, Shadow, brushed a heavy branch, which then fell across the path of Apollo, who was fourth. He couldn’t get over the branch, so he stopped and pulled back. This upset Missy, who was last in line, so she pulled back as well. Ginger and Shadow were pulling forward, so Apollo ended up being stretched between three horses pulling in opposite directions. As Apollo struggled, he got himself over the heavy branch, but a small log moved, inserting itself through Apollo’s butt strap rigging. He was really in a mess, stretched over one log with another stuck in his rigging. To his credit, he just laid down and stopped struggling.

This all happened very quickly and I had little time to react to do anything to help the situation. I dismounted and tied Moose to a nearby tree and went back to see what I could do. I was able to get all the lead ropes free and separate the horses, which I then tied to trees. After some work, I was able to remove Apollo’s packs and get the log out of his rigging. With a little encouragement I got Apollo back on his feet. I resettled his pack saddle and repacked him and we got back underway. No serious harm done.

A little farther along,  just over half-way to camp, came the second wreck. As we crossed the river at one of our normal crossings, I found the riverbed had changed a bit, due to the recent rains in the area. We hit a deep spot just before reaching the opposite shore. The water came up near my knees, fully wetting my boots again. As the horses struggled through the hole, Apollo tripped and went down. Luckily the momentum of the pack string dragged him through the deep spot, but, struggle as he might he could not get his feet back under him. Again, he just gave up and lay there, with his head just out of the water and his body still in the river. Missy, with a heavy pack, had enough lead rope to make it to shore, but was unable to go farther, as she was tied to Apollo’s pack saddle. Again, I made a quick dismount and tied Moose to a tree limb. I also tied Ginger and Shadow. I had to cut Apollo’s lead rope off Shadow’s pack saddle, because the wet knot had pulled so tight it was hard as rock.  Missy waited patiently, while I did the same to free her from Apollo’s pack saddle. Then I went to work unpacking Apollo and dragging the water-logged panniers ashore.

By this time, Apollo was pretty tired and discouraged. He didn’t want to get up. I let him lay and rest a few minutes, while I removed his pack saddle.  Then, with a little encouragement, he stood up. Again, no injuries, just tired from struggling. I tied him to a tree and started working on getting him repacked.

While I was working on Apollo, Moose freed herself from the branch she was tied to and began heading on down the trail toward camp. There was nothing I could do but watch her go. I let loose a few of those special words at her, which I reserve for just such occasions,  as I watched her round a bend and go out of sight. I was envisioning myself trying to cross the river numerous times on foot, cold and wet and spending a night on the trail without provisions, as I walked the last seven or eight miles back to camp.  I finally got Apollo re-packed and I headed out after Moose.

Most of you know that I am a religious man. During my pack trips I have learned that God, our Father in Heaven, is very much aware of and involved in our lives. He loves and watches over each of us very closely. I have had numerous experiences in which He has answered my earnest prayers, helping me when I was in need during my pack trips. This was one of those experiences. As I watched Moose head on down the trail, knowing I could do nothing about it as I worked to get Apollo re-packed, I said a quick prayer asking the Lord to stop Moose for me, so that I might not have to spend the night out on the trail without provisions, wet and cold.

I left the other horses tied and headed on down the trail on foot, following Moose’s tracks, hoping I could walk her down and that she would let me catch her when I found her.  I was very surprised and grateful to find her just around the bend in the trail, about fifty yards from the rest of the horses, where she was calmly nibbling on the sparse grass just off the trail. She had stepped through her reins, which had become caught in some undergrowth. It was another humbling experience and a further testimony to me of our Father’s great mercy and love for his children.

A few minutes later, we were back underway and moving down the trail.

We had one more incident before we reached the camp. Just over a mile from camp, while ascending a short bank, Missy, last in line, went down. Somehow, her front legs had become tangled in her lead rope and she went down. She struggled and her pack slipped to the side. Luckily, no other horses were involved. Again, I had to cut Missy’s lead rope loose from Apollo’s pack saddle, as the knot had pulled rock-hard. I got her packs off (she was loaded with 160 pounds of feed) and got her up. She had a pretty good cut on her shin, just above the ankle on her front right leg. It didn’t look to serious, but it bled well. I put some pressure on it for a minute and got most of the bleeding stopped. Then I got her pack saddle re-settled and got her panniers back on the saddle. By this time I was beat! I mean I was really tired. I got back in the saddle and on we went.

We dragged into camp just after sundown at about 7:00pm, after a little over five hours on the trail. Derek had arrived back in camp about a half-hour before, having been out hunting all day, and had a nice fire going and supper warming. He helped take care of the horses and we got them put away. I was very happy to get a hot meal ( BBQ ribs, I believe) and sleep in a warm sleeping bag that night.

I very well might have spent the night on the trail, wet and cold, without a sleeping bag!

That was a very tough forty miles in two days.

TH

 

Land Use and States' Rights

Here they go again. Another political land grab.

So, after the conclusion of a far-reaching cooperative agreement between all affected parties regarding land use in southern Utah,  which came as a reaction to President Obama’s self-serving and abusive designation of nearly two million acres of land in southern Utah, including the seizing of private lands, mining claims, range leased lands, etc,  under the Antiquities Act, Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois has violated the conditions of that agreement while he seeks political support from the environmental special interest group Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA), by introducing a bill in Congress supporting the creation of a huge wilderness area in Emery County Utah. Senator Mitt Romney (R Utah) is trying to fight the bill on behalf of the residents of Emery County and all other impacted participants in the above mentioned cooperative agreement. Thank you Senator Romney!

Romney, Curtis, Bishop Condemn Durbin Bill that Harms Emery County

 

Good Stories, Western Trails

Alaska Moose Hunt, Chapter 3…

This is my third post about my 2019 Alaska Moose Hunt.

So, at the end of the last post, Derek and I had made the horse pack trip in to our hunt camp. I said in my last post that we made it to camp during early afternoon on the second day, but as I was reviewing my journal for this post, I saw that we actually arrived at camp about 4:00pm the second afternoon. It was a tough 20 miles, involving deep river crossings, overloaded horses, pack problems, a lame horse, and quicksand, and a night’s camp on the trail. I wrote in my journal that the trip in was “an ordeal.”

Also, I neglected to mention a wreck we had on the way in that could have been a lot worse than it ended up being.  It was significant enough that I thought I’d talk about it in this post.

It was the second day and we were still making progress toward our hunt camp. We had run up against a logjam and were trying to make our way through a thicket to clear the jam. We found a way out to a clear area on the shore of the river, but it entailed crossing several downed logs and a large berm of sand that had washed up against them, creating a steep bank. Derek made it through on Finn, so I came behind him on Apollo, leading the four pack horses. Apollo and the first pack horse, Ginger, carefully walked through the jam, crossing the logs and descending the bank without trouble. The second pack horse, Moose, however, decided to jump across the logjam, rather than walking through it. When she jumped, she pulled Shadow into the logjam without giving him a chance to see where he was going, so he fell across the logs and went down. The trailer, Missy, who was just making the turn toward the logjam, saw the wreck and immediately pulled back and started fighting her lead rope.

We ended up with two pack horses, Ginger and Moose, pulling against Shadow’s lead, with Shadow down on the ground on his side with his head downhill, stretched out, and Missy pulling against him backward. Missy had fought until she was in a sitting position with her pack saddle completely off her rump and on the ground, with cinches and rigging still hooked up and tight around her hips.  After a few intense seconds, the horses stopped fighting and just held their positions with all the lead ropes taught and hard.

Derek and I immediately dismounted and tied our horses and started working on freeing the horses. The wet lead ropes had tightened until the knots were impossible to untie. We ended up having to cut some of the pigtails to free the lead ropes. Once the horses were free, we tied Ginger and Moose to brush and went back to work on Shadow and Missy. We were relieved to see that Shadow was uninjured, despite his precarious situation. We were able to unload him, remove his pack, and get him back on his feet without too much trouble.

Missy was another problem. The way she was sitting, it was a simple matter to get her packs off, since they were already sitting on the ground, but getting the pack saddle off of her was another matter. After several minutes of work, I was able to access the cinch rings and loosen the latigoes, allowing the pack saddle to fall away. I was then able to untangle the mass of rigging from around her legs and clear it all away. Luckily, she, too, was uninjured.

After getting Missy through the logjam and down onto the shore of the river, we were able to get all the horses repacked and back underway.  As we were both quite busy and the adrenaline was high, sadly, neither of us thought to get photos of this wreck.

After another couple of hours with no further serious wrecks, we made it to our hunt camp.

Our hunt camp was in about the same condition in which we left it when we departed last year.  The meat pole, unused last year, was still standing. Much of our scaffolding for the tarp roof was still there, but we had to cut a couple new poles. Our makeshift corral was still standing, so we let the horses into it, fed them, and went to work on the camp.  Our first task, after unloading and caring for the horses, was to set up the camp kitchen and the tent. By that time, it was getting dark and we were tired. After a good dinner around a campfire, we hit the sacks for a good night’s sleep.

The weather for the trip in was quite pleasant, clear and probably in the mid sixties. The problem with the pleasant weather, however, was the bugs!  The “noseeums” and mosquitoes were so thick that one breath with the mouth open would get you half-a-dozen bugs for dinner! The flies nearly drove the horses nuts! We had plenty of fly spray concentrate, but it seemed to have little effect. A couple of the horses reacted to the fly bites and had welts all over them. The best deterrent to the flies and mosquitoes seemed to be the smoke from our fire. By about the end of the first week we had a couple nights of low temperatures, which greatly reduced the bug problem. Later on we had a couple of hard freezes, after which the flies and mosquitoes were almost non-existent and both we and the horses were much happier.

The day after we arrived at camp, we went to work improving our camp. We had packed in some landscaping spikes, which we used to nail up the rails to our makeshift corral, making it much more secure. We gathered driftwood for the campfire and got things situated in camp.

I took the opportunity to take a look at Apollo’s front right hoof, to see why he was lame. I picked up my hoof pick and started toward Apollo. He decided he didn’t want to be caught, after the previous day’s hard ride, so he started walking away from me. Derek brought two dogs with us, one of which likes to nip the horses’ heels when they are causing problems. That one was following close behind me as I walked toward Apollo. As I caught up with Apollo, and was near his rump, he moved his rump toward me. I reached out my left hand to push his rump away . He apparently felt that hoof pick and thought the dog had nipped him. Apollo immediately kicked out with both hind legs, catching me just above the knees on both legs! I hit the ground like a sack of potatoes, moaning and groaning.

Once I was sure nothing was broken, I looked around at Apollo. He had walked off a step or two and was looking at me with this contrite and apologetic expression on his face (yes, horses have expressions) that said, “Sorry boss, I thought you were the dog.”

Derek was on the satellite phone with his wife during all this. He looked around and saw me on the ground groaning and figured that since I was groaning, I was still alive and would survive, so he just continued the conversation with his wife and didn’t even come check on me. Some friend!

That night both Derek and I slept so well that neither of us wished to get out of bed in the morning. We finally got ourselves up around 10am. We had a couple more hunting buddies that were to join us in camp. They were to be dropped off by bush plane, so we spent a couple hours preparing a landing strip near our camp. While doing so, we had let several of the horses out to graze on our little island. About the time our friends were to arrive, I went to saddle up a couple horses to bring them to camp. That’s when we noticed our horses weren’t with us anymore, so I saddled up Ginger and went looking for them.

Sure enough, Moose, Shadow, Apollo, and Finn, had all decided to head back to the trail head, 20 miles away. I caught up with them about a mile and a half from camp, headed north at a pretty good clip. They didn’t run from me when I approached on Ginger, so I caught up Moose and turned back for camp, thinking the rest would follow us, but they didn’t. So, I tied Moose and went after them again and caught Finn. Shadow and Apollo just kept on going. I stopped and tied Moose and Finn to some deadfalls and went after the other two. I finally caught up with Shadow and caught his lead rope, but it was a chase. Leading Shadow, now, Apollo decided to follow. I went back to where I had tied Moose and Finn and tied each lead rope to another’s halter, and in that way was able to lead them all back to camp. In all, that was a 3.7 mile jaunt for me. After that, we made sure never to allow more than two horses free to graze at a time. The rest remained safely secured in the corral.

By the time I got back to camp, our buddies had arrived. These are two friends, father and son (the son is an Alaska resident), who came to hunt Dall sheep and grizzly bear, as well as moose. Derek and I were to support them with the horses, hauling them up to the foot of the mountains and packing their kills back to camp. After arriving back at camp, I saddled Apollo to help them get their packs from their drop site to camp. En route, Apollo lost his front right shoe in the river. Luckily, we saw it and were able to recover the shoe.

Back at camp, and everybody settled in, I took a look at Apollo’s hoof and discovered the reason for his lameness. I could see that the farrier had trimmed him too closely and that one of the nails had caused bruising on the outer side of the sole from being placed too far into the white line. I reset the shoe, hoping it would help, but the damage was done. Apollo remained sore on that hoof for about the next 10 days. Eventually he lost that shoe again I replaced it with a new shoe. After that he walked without a limp and was useful again as a saddle horse.

The following day Derek and I put the extra saddles on two of the pack horses, and hauled our buddies up into the foothills east of our camp and dropped them off. We did some bushwhacking to get them to where they could start their hunt. It was pretty tough going with no trail, other than a couple game trails. Derek and I made our way back to camp and again spent a relaxing evening around the campfire.

The following day, Derek and I made a 19-mile tour around the area he has hunted for the past six years. Derek rode Finn and I rode Moose. We passed through some beautiful and difficult terrain, but the horses performed well. We came across the hunt camp where a local outfitter drops his clients. They land their planes on a makeshift landing strip in the riverbed of Cottonwood Creek. The pilot and one of the guides was there when we passed. They came out to talk with us. They were none too happy that we were hunting in “their” area and they were somewhat rude to us, bordering on threatening. Derek and I weren’t much intimidated, though, and we ended up letting them know we were there to stay, that we could easily reach their camp with our horses, and that they could not prevent us from hunting anywhere we wanted to hunt within the limits of our legal hunt area.

We continued on and made our way around our loop, having traversed some areas where we had previously not ventured to take the horses. On the return trip, we traveled through areas Moose was familiar with, so she set a blistering pace, occasionally hitting around 10 miles per hour in her awesome fox trot through tundra sometimes knee deep! We arrived back at camp after dark. Both we and the horses were tuckered out. It was quite a day.

Last year we were unable to pack in sufficient feed for the horses for the time we planned to stay on the hunt, so, the plan this year was for me to take the entire pack string and head back to the trailhead, where we had our feed stacked in the back of the pickup. I would pack up about 700 pounds of feed (alfalfa cubes) and bring it back. I took off early the next day to do just that. My next post will document that 40-mile trip and a few more days of our hunt.

So stay tuned!

Western Trails

Time for another post about my Alaska moose hunt

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This is the second post about my 2019 Alaska moose hunt.

Derek Habel, a good friend of mine, invited me to return this year to go on his annual moose hunt in southeastern Alaska. I went with him last year, but not as a hunter. I made myself useful helping with the horses and clearing trails. As it turned out, Derek didn’t get a moose last year.  What we did find, however, was a pack of timber wolves 24 strong! I took a pretty good video of the pack. Turn up the volume to hear them howl.

While seeing the wolves was pretty amazing and hearing them howl checked one of those “bucket-list” boxes for me, it essentially signaled the end of Derek’s hunt. The wolves had pretty much decimated the moose numbers in the area. Even the mighty grizzly bear had left the area.

This year, Derek invited me as a hunter. We both bought a wolf tag each, in addition to our moose tags. It wasn’t until later that we discovered that the Alaska Fish and Game had designated the area as a predator reduction area and was allowing 10 wolves per hunter to be taken without a game tag.

So, this time I was going as a hunter.

Just like last year, we loaded up at Derek’s place in Diamond Fork, near Spanish Fork, Utah, and headed north. We departed a little earlier than last year, though. We were on the road on September 5 this year.

I took Apollo, my 7 year-old Tennessee Walker, as my primary saddle horse. Derek took his TWH, Finn. We took four more of Derek’s horses for pack animals. We loaded all six into Derek’s 4-horse living quarters trailer. By removing the dividers in the trailer all six horse fit comfortably with room to spare. Derek’s trailer has a manger built into the head side with storage beneath, so we were able to keep them well-fed during the four-day haul up to our trailhead in the Yukon Territory, Canada.

On the way up, we stopped near Monida Pass, on the Idaho/Montana border for the first night. We took a short ride the following morning to give the horses a break and to just see some beautiful country. We made this same stop last year and it is a pleasant break from the long drive.

I rode Apollo that morning, Derek rode Finn, and we trailed Missy, Derek’s lovely paint Missouri Fox Trotter mare, and Shadow, a MFT gelding, along behind. We had gone about a mile, when we found Apollo to be limping on his right rear. Looked like he might have gotten stepped on or kicked in the trailer. I got off to switch saddles to Shadow. I was just about ready to mount, when suddenly, Missy decided to head back toward the trailer and off she ran. As Apollo and Missy have become somewhat of a pair, he ran off following her. The problem was that they headed in the wrong direction! It wasn’t long before we could barely see Missy running down in the flats below us, among a herd of cattle. Apollo, who was dragging a lead rope, got behind a bit and apparently lost sight of Missy.

I had been training Apollo to come to my whistle, so I started whistling as loudly as I could. Shortly, Apollo’s head came up. He heard my whistle and came running! It wasn’t long after that Missy returned as well. We continued our morning ride without further problems.

Continental Divide Trail near Monida Pass, ID

The views were beautiful! We scared up several deer, including a couple small bucks, and came across several hunters on the Idaho side. It was a nice ride.

By about noon we were back on the road. We passed the US/Canada border about 4:00pm at Sweetgrass. Last year we passed through the border without any problem, but this year they required a full search of the truck and trailer. Interestingly, the search was conducted by one officer, unassisted, and we were not allowed to witness the search! That would never fly in the US.

Of course, we had done everything legally and we had nothing to hide, so after about an hour at the border station we were on our way again.

We made camp that evening at a pullout off the highway near Mcleod, Alberta. The third night we pulled off near Toad River, BC, after another loooong day on the road.

The following day, Sunday, we made a stop at Liard Provincial Park for a short break. There is a hot mineral spring park there, so we took the time for a very nice swim. After that, we drove through the night, arriving at our trailhead near Beaver Creek, Yukon Territory, Canada, at about 3:00am. En route we were treated to a very beautiful display of the Northern Lights.

Upon arrival, we watered and tied the horses near the trailer and hit the hay. We got a late start the following day, of course, and didn’t get started on the trail toward our hunt camp until late afternoon.

The trail in isn’t actually a trail. We follow Beaver Creek southward for 20 miles (19.9 miles, to be exact), to where Derek has established his hunt camp. This was his sixth year to hunt moose in the area. The trip in entails probably 25 river crossings and it is quite a challenge to minimize the number of crossings while avoiding the tangles of logjams created by the spring flows every year. The river bed changes a little every year as well, so the path in is never the same from year to year. While the way is recognizable and certain landmarks remain, it is largely a new experience every time. This year the river was running quite a bit deeper than last year, so some crossings that worked last year were not available this year.

Packing in this year was also complicated by the fact that we were to meet two hunters, father and son, who were to be dropped off by bush plane near the camp. We had to pack in extra saddles and supplies for them. We ended up packing the saddles on top of already heavy packs on two horses. Our horses were a bit overloaded, but they are strong, well-built Missouri Fox Trotter horses and more than able to handle the extra weight for a 4-5 hour trip into the backcountry.

However, this trip in was not a smooth one. We hadn’t gone a mile, before we had to resettle the packs with the saddles on top. The extra weight on top of the packs made them top-heavy and caused them to slip to the side with frustrating regularity. Then, just before dark, when we were only halfway to our destination, We hit quicksand.

I was following behind Derek, who was on his big Tennessee Walker, Finn. Just as we were coming out of the river after a crossing, I saw Finn go down and begin to struggle. I recognized right away that it was quicksand! Experience has taught me that with quicksand, the first couple of horses will generally make it across if it’s not too wide a stretch, but after that the sand becomes a gel-like substance that simply sucks a horse’s hooves and legs in and holds them. I know of one fellow who lost an entire string of mules in the Gila River in Arizona, because he could not free them from the quicksand before they drowned. Luckily, our patch of quicksand was at the edge of the river, where water had settled in the sand like a puddle.

Upon seeing Finn begin to struggle, I immediately spurred Apollo past him, pulling the pack horses behind me. Apollo, Moose, and Ginger made it, but Shadow went down and could not rise. Missy was behind him, but was lucky enough to be only at the edge of the quicksand and was able to struggle out of it, though she was still tethered behind Shadow. Shadow was stuck, but luckily, he too was only at the edge of the quicksand.

Derek and I were able to untie all the pack horses and get them to a safe place, where we tied them and went back to help Shadow. After unloading his pack, we were able to dig his legs out of the quicksand with a shovel. The sand held form long enough for Shadow to be able to extricate himself without injury. We were lucky on that one.

By the time we got Shadow free, the sun was setting, so we decided to make camp where we were. We let several of the horses free to graze, while keeping others tied. None of the horses tried to make a break to return to the trailhead that night, so we ended up passing a nice evening on the trail, sitting by the fire, then sleeping under the stars.

The following morning, we packed up and got moving fairly early. We made it to our hunt camp by early afternoon. In all it took us nearly 14 hours to pack up and make it from the trailhead to the hunt camp. It was a very tough trip in.

By the time we made it to the camp, Apollo was nearly completely lame on his front right hoof. He was limping badly and I suspected he had been quicked by the farrier when he was shod a few days before, and that it had become irritated by the pounding on the river rock of the trail in. It was nearly 10 days before he became sound enough to use again. We’ll get into that in the next post.

It was a tough beginning to what was to become a very tough hunt trip.

TH

 

 

Tack and Gear

My First Post About My 2019 Alaska Moose Hunt

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Well, I guess it’s about time I got a few posts up about my 2019 Alaska moose hunt. I’ll start off talking about some of the gear I took.

This year’s trip was a little different than last year’s. First of all, I had a lot more time to prepare. I knew I was going to go on this trip for a full year. Last year I didn’t know until about two weeks before the trip. Plus, having been on last year’s trip, I knew what to expect, so I was able to prepare with foreknowledge. That’s a big deal on a trip like this.

On last year’s trip, for footwear I took my favorite heavy-duty riding boots. They are Hathorne Explorer packer boots, made by White, the same company that is known for their excellent fire-fighter and logger boots.  I seldom ride in any other boots. They have very heavy rubber soles, cowboy heels, and heavy leather uppers. I treated them with neatsfoot oil and Fiebing’s Snow-Proof Weatherproofer to prepare them for the dampness they would carry me through. I had no idea, then, just how much water they would encounter and I ended up living with wet and cold feet almost from the start of the trip to the end. I spent nearly every evening trying to dry out my wool socks and the boots over the camp fire. I’ve said before that there is no way to keep water from penetrating leather with prolonged exposure. I knew that! What was I thinking?

So, last winter I bought myself a pair of Kenetrek Cowboy pac boots.

Kenetrek Cowboy pac boots

These boots have a waterproof heavy rubber foot with a leather upper and a heavy Thinsulate boot insert. The soles are configured to allow for easy insertion and removal from a stirrup. They fit into my stirrups and have a cowboy heel to keep them from going too far into the stirrups. They also have a good spur shelf. Just what the doctor ordered for a trip like this, right?

Well, here’s the test report.

Our hunt camp is 20 miles back into the backcountry of southeastern Alaska, in the Wrangell-St. Elias National Park. Our trailhead is actually in Canada, at Beaver Creek, Yukon Territory. We cross the border into Alaska after about 16 miles in the Yukon, by following Beaver Creek. There is no trail. We just follow the river bed. We crossed the river numerous times en route to our camp. My Kenetrek boots kept my feet warm and dry…at least for the first couple of miles. After that the leather uppers, despite my treating them with the Fiebing’s Weatherproofer beforehand, began to soak up the water and pass it through to the Thinsulate liner and eventually my wool socks like a sponge. The leather initially repelled the water, but after a few good wet river crossings in which they got splashed pretty well, they simply allowed water to pass through them almost unrestricted. Again, I had two “soakers” for much of the trip.

I had thought the leather uppers of the Kenetrek pac boots was silicone impregnated and would offer a high degree of water repellency, but that was not the case. They are simply high-quality heavy leather with almost no water resistance.

I will allow, however, that even though my feet were wet, the heavy  Thinsulate inserts kept my feet warm. The thickness and absorbency of the heavy inserts and my wool boot socks, in combination with my poly liner socks, kept my feet less wet than my leather Hathorne boots, but they were wet nevertheless. At least they weren’t terribly cold, which kept me from getting chilled.

Additionally, the Kenetreks, being pac boots, are not made for hiking around. They are very comfortable in the saddle, but quite heavy and bulky for walking around in camp or hiking around the hills. I normally wear a 9 or 9-1/2 D width boot, depending on the boot. When I plan on heavy socks, I sometimes go for size 10. Depends on the boot and the fit I want. I ordered my Kenetrek boots in size 10, as half-sizes were not offered. They were quite roomy, but felt good with heavy boot socks on, especially while in the saddle. They felt a little large and ungainly while on the ground.

The liners are removable, so I spent some evenings holding them over the fire to dry. However, drying out the inside of the rubber boot foot was difficult. There was no way to safely heat them up over the fire, without fear of overheating the rubber. There is an insole inside the boot that soaks up water and does not allow one to dry out the inside of the boot by using a towel. The insole is not removable. All I could do was to dry out the liner and just let it soak up the remaining moisture in the boot foot.

I have worn these boots on winter rides where there was snow on the ground and they performed perfectly, keeping my feet toasty warm and dry. That is what they are designed for. No complaints at all for that.

They are not well suited to direct exposure to water, at least not above the level of the rubber foot. These boots are, indeed, well-made boots, but they are most definitely not waterproof.

If I had a recommendation to Kenetrek to improve their boot, it would be to line the leather uppers with Goretex. For boots that price out at above $300, I would think that would not be too much to ask. They might also offer a Goretex boot liner sock to go over the boot liner as an accessory. In fact, I have been looking for an appropriate liner sock to do exactly that. So far I have only found Goretex socks that go over a bare foot.

So, I will give the Kenetrek Cowboy pac boots five stars if they are used for their intended purpose, which is pac boots for riding and work in cold weather and snow. But, for water resistance, they get 2 stars. They are not water resistant at all above the rubber foot, but they still kept my wet feet from getting too cold.

By the way, these Kenetrek Cowboy pac boots are also offered in women’s sizes.

TH

Training, Western Trails

Finally got started on Chief!

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Those of you who have followed my blog and facebook page, Western Trail Rider, will remember my beaut of a colt, Chief. He’s a gold-registered Missouri Fox Trotter out of my mare (well, she was my mare at the time) Danney’s Hot Tin Lizzy V and the fine stallion, DM’s Cherokee Witch Doctor C.

Chief, whose registered name is Touch the Clouds, after a Sioux war chief of the late 19th century, is now two years old…25 months to be exact, and it’s time to get him started.

Now I know some folks out there are going to be dismayed that I would  start a horse so young. I have stated my opinions and position on that matter in a previous post. Suffice it to say that I start my horses at age two (by actual age) and ride them lightly for the first year. At age three I start putting mileage on them. At age four I put them to full use. Keep in mind, they are trail horses. I do no competitive riding of any kind, no shows, no roping, no jumping. I do trail riding and horse pack trips and that’s what my horses are trained for.

So, getting past that, as I said, it is time to get Chief started under saddle.

Chief has been hand-raised since birth, with a lot of human contact as well as socialization in more than one group of horses. He interacts very well with horses, understands horse etiquette and behavior, and is well adjusted among them. He also interacts well with humans. While he, at this point, is more like a puppy than a horse, he is not pushy nor is he disrespectful in any way that presents a danger to people. While I treat my horses like friends, I am as well a disciplinarian not afraid of “getting after” a horse that misbehaves. For that reason, my horses tend to like to be around me, yet they are careful not to cross boundaries I have set.

I must confess that I have spent far too little time in ground training with Chief. He was halter broke within his first two weeks and taught to lead. I have spent a number of hours with him over the past two years giving him some basic training, teaching him to respond to pressure cues, lift his hooves, etc, but far less than I would have liked. Still, he learns quickly and has shown no propensity to getting excited or panic. I have saddled him several times and ponied him on trail rides. I have allowed him to follow loose on trail rides, teaching him to cross streams and handle difficult obstacles on his own. He shows great promise as a top-notch trail horse.

He is easy to train and I expect him to progress quickly. In fact, I have a training ride scheduled for next week in which I will ride Chief on a trail ride with a friend who has a young filly in training.

When I start a horse, I generally start them in an egg-butt ring or D-ring snaffle bit until the horse is reliably responding to a few basic cues: Go, stop, turn left, turn right, and backup. Once that is accomplished, usually within a few hours of training, I usually go to a 3/4″ braided rawhide bosal with a 5/8″ horsehair mecate. I will keep him in that for as much as a year.

Braided rawhide bosal with horsehair mecate

The bosal allows me to refine his response to the bridle without working on his mouth, while the horsehair mecate is especially effective for teaching a horse to respond to neck-reining cues. Once the horse responds lightly to the bosal and reins, I will transition to a bit specifically designed for gaited horses, which I have used for several years with good results. As I said, this may take up to a year before I transition to the bit.

I have discovered in the past several years, however, in working with gaited horses, that Missouri Fox Trotters have so much head motion in their gait, that the bosal sometimes wears a sore on the nose under the noseband. In such cases I transition to the bit early and just work on the fine-tuning with the bit.

One thing I decided several months ago that I wanted to teach Chief, since he seems so eager to learn and is so easy to train, is to lay down and stand on command. I have seen horses and mules trained to lay down to allow their rider to mount and dismount from the ground. I have reviewed various sources for good training helps toward this end, but have been disappointed in what I found. I have been working on it by simply urging him to approximate the motion of preparing to lay down and rewarding him with release of pressure and gentle rubs as he does so. I haven’t yet gotten him to actually lay down on command, but I have lain him down several times and he is figuring it out. I expect that he will begin to lay down on command very soon. Then I’ll have to figure out how to train him to stand up on command. That should be the easy part.

So, today I went out to mount up on Chief for the first time. I asked my wife to come along to video the whole affair, as I really wanted to be able to keep that for posterity, not to mention my blog. She did well in capturing about ten minutes of the end of the training session, which was the most important part.

To start the session, I worked a little on leading, pressure cues, and laying down. Then I saddled him up, led him around a little, lifted his hooves, worked on lowering his head on cue, and a number of other minor things, just to get his mind working. Then I started putting weight on the stirrups, one side, then the other, to get him used to it. Not that I thought he would react to it, but I just did not want to startle him.

After a few minutes I stood up in the stirrup on the on-side, putting my full weight in the stirrup and leaning over his back. When I did, Chief started moving a little, so I put pressure on the reins and gave him the cue to back up. When I did, he apparently decided that was a cue to lay down and he simply stretched out and plopped down on his side as I stepped off. It was quite humorous.

Chief lay there looking at me as if he were going to take a nap. I took the opportunity to sit on his side for a few minutes, rubbing and patting him in various places. He obviously was not bothered at all by my sitting on him while he lay there (I had done that before bareback). I got off him and urged him to stand, whereupon he simply moved into an upright laying position, rather than on his side. I got back on him in hopes he would stand up with me on his back, short-cutting my training to that end. No such luck. He seemed very pleased and comfortable just to lay there. I finally decided I might need to pick up my training crop and give him a little more incentive to stand, but as I turned to pick up the crop, he stood up.

At that point, I decided there was more chance that he would lay down again than buck, so I went ahead and mounted for the first time. His reaction was to simply stand there. No excitement, no concern. After a minute or two I was able to urge him to move a little, so we started working on moving his hind quarters off the pressure of my heels and to turn to the pressure of the reins, and eventually to stop. By the end of the session, Chief was accepting the cue to move forward, was turning to the rein pressure and my heel pressure, and coming to a stop to the rein pressure. That was all I asked of him today.

Here’s the video Linda shot for me. Have fun watching.

Tomorrow, I’ll adjust the bosal to fit him and start him in a snaffle bit. I’m looking forward to it.

I think Chief and I are going to pass a lot of happy miles together!

Good trails, Western Trails

Horse Packing and Fishing in the Jim Bridger Wilderness, Wyoming

A couple years ago, a very good friend invited me to go with him and some of his buddies on a fishing trip into the Jim Bridger Wilderness area in the Wind Rivers mountain range of Wyoming. I just could not get together with them until this past August (2019). I finally was able to get some time squared away to help them put the trip together and it was well worth the effort!

As it finally worked out, we decided to take four horses, three under saddle and a pack horse. As we were going to be out one week with one pack horse, we had to plan with weight and bulk in mind.  Freeze dried meals and fire-baked fish (hopefully) were on the menu. The three riders, Sterling Beus, Roger Toronto, and myself, would horse pack in, while a couple others, Bob and Dean Bauer, father and son, would have an outfitter take them in and drop them off. Another of Bob’s sons, Paul, was to meet us up there later.

Bob was actually the instigator of this whole thing. You see, he’s been packing into the Wind Rivers to fish for more than forty years. He’s now 86 years old and still backpacking in. For this trip he and Dean decided they’d have a local outfitter take them in on horses and drop them off. Many thanks to Bob for graciously inviting the rest of us along to enjoy this trip.

Now, to camp in the Jim Bridger, it is required that you apply for a backcountry camp permit, which is free of charge. I called the ranger district office at Pinedale and found the rangers to be very helpful. I got the permit filled out and submitted online and it was approved with no problems. In filling out the application, you must indicate how many are in your party, how many horses, and where you plan to camp each night. There are some simple regulations, same as all designated wilderness areas, that regulate how close to the trail and to water sources you may make camp. The application allows the rangers to manage areas, so that they don’t suffer from overuse. If an area seems to be getting too much traffic, they will change your designated camp area on the permit. The permit must be kept with you at all times and must be presented to rangers if asked.

Our plan was to go in on Monday morning and make our way about 17 miles into the mountains to Lake Victor, where we would stay for a couple days, then move down to North Fork Lake for a day, then on down to Lake Ethel for our last night, before returning to the trailhead. The rangers informed us that there was no appropriate area to camp with horses at Lake Ethel and suggested we move a couple miles to Ed’s Lake, were we would find better areas to camp with our stock. We accepted that and adjusted our plans accordingly.

When we arrived at Pinedale on Sunday evening, where we met Bod and Dean. We discovered that a nearby fire had required closure of the USFS road that leads to the trailhead at the foot of Boulder Canyon. After speaking with the Sheriff’s Deputy at the road block, and understanding the road would likely be opened with a couple hours, we decided to wait.

Sure enough, just after dark we were allowed to drive on down to the parking area at the trailhead. There is an area for horses that has a corral and a parking area sufficient for trailer rigs, however, that area is normally used by the outfitters. We chose to drive a little further to the large field, where hikers and campers usually park. There was plenty of room for my truck and four-horse trailer and room to leave the horses tied to the trailer overnight. Boulder Creek is nearby and easily accessed to water the horses.

The following morning we discovered that the outfitter who was going to pack in the Bauers had decided not to bring their stock to the trailhead, citing fire danger. We were quite disgusted, because the small brushfire had been extinguished the day before and had not even come within several miles of the trailhead to begin with. It was apparent the outfitter just didn’t follow through on his commitment.

So, change of plans. We decided Bob and Dean would hike as far as they could and we would return and pack them on in to our first day’s campsite.

Well, that certainly changed our campsite plans. We decided to just do what we had to do and take the consequences, if any, despite the details on our permit (Bob assured us that in forty years he’s never seen a ranger up there). Sterling, Roger, and I got packed up and were heading up the trail by about noon on our horses, for the 7-mile trip up to Lake Ethel. We were riding Tennessee Walkers, with a Missouri Fox Trotter as a pack horse, so we moved along pretty quickly for the first several miles. Not far up the trail, however, the condition of the trail deteriorated to pretty poor condition, so we slowed our gait to spare the horses.

We made it in to Lake Ethel by about 2:30pm, where I left Sterling and Jim and returned down the trail with the horses in tow to retrieve our hiker buddies. I found them about 3.5 miles back. We loaded their backpacks onto the pack horse and headed back up to Lake Ethel. We made it by about 5pm. By the time I unsaddled, I had ridden 14 miles, and made a total elevation change of over 2,700 feet – twice! Our camp was at about 8,700 feet elevation.

Now, I know the rangers told us we would not find good camping areas at Lake Ethel, but it was apparent they either had not been there all summer or they simply did not know what camping with horses was like, because the northern side of Lake Ethel has a large expanse of grassy fields, just perfect for horses, as well as a variety of very nice campsites with existing fire rings. Ed’s Lake, another mile or so farther up the trail, had no areas appropriate for horse camping, beside the fact that the area was covered with standing dead trees, making camping there a dangerous proposition. We made our camp for the night at Lake Ethel.

Not being able to resist, a couple of us wet our fly lines and made a few casts into the lake that evening. I hooked a beautiful little cutthroat, but it was too small to keep.

The following morning, Sterling, Roger, and I loaded up our horses and headed on up the trail toward Lake Victor and North Fork Lake. We made the 8 mile trip in about 3 hours and were settled in camp and had the horses out grazing by late afternoon. Our campsite was above 9,800 feet elevation, but the weather was nice. We decided to just take it easy for the rest of the day.

Our camp was located not far off the trail, between Lake Victor and North Fork Lake, about a half-mile from the shores of each. Again, there was plenty of grass for the horses, as well as a nice stream just down the hill from us. We let them graze freely, keeping a sharp eye out, just in case they should decide to head back down the trail. As it turned out, they were quite content to stay in the vicinity and our fears were unfounded.

Apollo, my Tennessee Walker, and Missy, the Missouri Fox Trotter, became quite a pair and stayed together throughout the trip. They would graze quite far from camp, but would return to me when I whistled for them. That is one of the things I try to train into my horses for times just like this.

The other two horses, Trigger and Bandit, Tennessee Walkers both,  were raised together, so they stayed together as well. We generally kept two horses tied and let two graze, just to be cautious. As I said, we had no trouble.

The following morning, Wednesday, we headed over to Lake Victor for a day of fishing. We made our way cross-country to the south end of the lake, which saved us more than a mile over the route the trail would have taken us. We ended up at a place that I suspect sees very little fishing pressure, to say the least.

We enjoyed our day of fishing. I must have been holding my mouth right (that’s what my grandmother always said was the secret to fishing), because I pulled in 13 nice cutthroat trout, all between about 12 and 16″. We kept several nice ones and took them home for dinner.

On Thursday morning, we decided to try our hand on North Fork Lake. We saddled the horses, letting Missy follow along free, and headed toward the lake. We first tried the northeast side of the lake, but found it unfavorable for fishing, due to a stiff breeze. We then rode around the northern end of the lake, making our own trail, crossing shallow  (some not so shallow) flats, and making our way through rocky passes, until we found the trail that leads to the southern tip of the lake.  It was enjoyable for me, as I consider challenging the horses in this way to be good training for them.  Sterling has followed me through some pretty hairy trails before, but this was Roger’s first time following me. He was quite impressed with what horses can do. I think we all enjoyed it. There is something  truly satisfying to me about trusting yourself to your horse and feeling his muscles and strength under you as he powers and picks his way through tricky trail obstacles.

At the south end of the lake, we found a nice place to tie the horses. This is where the stream leaves the lake and heads down the mountain. It is a beautiful area, but for some reason the fish were not active at all. Sterling got one strike and Jim and I got skunked. It looked like the entire lake was dead. It probably had to do with a cold front that moved into the area that day. It was quite cool, breezy, and cloudy all day. After several frustrating hours, we called it quits and headed back to camp empty-handed, although the ride offered some spectacular views and was very pleasant.

On Friday morning, we packed up and headed back down to our buddies at Lake Ethel. We made it back to our first camp by about noon.

We unpacked the horses, put them out to graze, and decided to head over to an area known as “the narrows”, where the lake narrows a bit before it drains on down the mountain. We each had a few strikes and brought in a fish or two, but it was nothing spectacular. On the other hand, Paul Bauer, who had arrived while we were up at North Fork Lake, went to his favorite spot on the other side of the lake and had a great time. I think he said he landed 22 trout in a matter of about a hour.

We enjoyed ourselves that evening. We stayed up pretty late telling “fish stories” and talking about past good times at camp and on the trail. There is nothing quite like sitting around a camp fire in the mountains with good friends.

On Saturday morning, we all headed down the mountains. The hikers, Roger, Paul, and Dean, headed down first. Bob enjoyed the ride back down on Trigger. We packed as much of the hikers’ gear on our pack horse as possible, but they each still had packs to carry. We figured we’d do the same thing we did coming in, but to our surprise, the hikers made it in to the trailhead before we could get unpacked and return for them. In fact, Roger actually beat us down! They had about a two-hour head start on us, but still, that was making tracks!

For us with the horses, our trip mileage, in and out, came to about 34 miles total, with an elevation change of more than 4,000 feet.

So, after caring for and loading the horses into the trailer, we headed into Pinedale for a very nice Mexican dinner at Los Cabos restaurant. We then said our goodbyes and headed back to Utah.

What a pleasant trip it was! I hope to be able to do it again next year.

Just a few notes for those who might wish to take horses into the area we covered:

There is plenty of room for parking and turn-around for even large rigs in the general camp area near the Boulder Canyon trail head. I would advise not using the corrals, as these are available to the public only when they are not used by the outfitters, from what I understand. Boulder Creek runs right past the general parking area, so there is water available for the horses.

The trails are, in general, in poor condition and extremely rocky. I would highly recommend steel shoes. boots would also do, but I would expect to lose one or two. I would not recommend barefoot horses on these trails. The outfitters keep deadfalls and blowdowns off the trails, though. I consider the trails appropriate for experienced horse people, or for inexperienced riders being led by experienced horse people. There are a few spots that will get their heart rate up if they are not used to it. Having said that, there was nothing a decent trail horse could not handle. There are also several wooden bridges, so make sure your horses are accustomed to crossing bridges over water.

While there are no Grizzly bears known to be in the area, there are black bears and wolves, so precautions are necessary with regard to food storage in camp.

Much of the area is quite high in elevation. This year the snow did not expose grasses until late July. This should be considered when planning for horses. By mid-August there was plenty of good grass for the horses at Lake Ethel and between Lake Victor and Mary’s Lake. While we were in shirt sleeves during our entire trip, snow storms and freezing temperatures are possible at that elevation any time of the year.

Despite the information provided by the rangers at the district office in Pinedale, there is no place to camp with horses near Ed’s Lake. Several of the smaller lakes we passed had either bug-kills or past fire kills, which leaves dead standing trees, making camping in those areas very dangerous.

As for fly fishing, we had pretty good luck with elk-hair caddis, about size 14-16, and other similar dry flies, mosquito nymphs, about size 18-20, and olive damsel fly nymphs about size 14, fished wet. Check with local fly shops before you go.

TH

 

 

Good trails, Great Western Trail, Western Trails

Flagstaff to the Grand Canyon National Park

I’m finally getting around to it.

Last May, Jeff Palmer and I completed another leg of the Mexico-to-Canada horse pack trip my father and I started in the spring of 2015. Dad and I made two legs of the trip, starting about 19 miles west of Douglas, Arizona, with our horses actually tied to the border barriers between the United States and Mexico in April 2015, and ending at Flagstaff in May, 2016.

Dad and I stopped there at Flagstaff, at the home of a friend, Gwen Kahler, to resupply, get the horses re-shod, and to get fresh health certificates for the horses, in anticipation of a crossing of the Grand Canyon the following week.

Dad and me just north of the US/Mexico border 2015

However, Mother Nature is unpredictable and sometimes fickle, and as she would have it, northern Arizona was in the midst of a severe drought and wildfires were everywhere. In the last 20+ miles into the Flagstaff area only days before, Dad and I had come across not a single drop of water, no, not even a damp place in the earth. We had to call for help from Gwen and her husband to haul water to our camp, so we could water the horses. We had narrowly escaped one forest fire and had already been re-routed around another. We decided to call ourselves lucky and stop there at Flagstaff for a season.

The following year, my primary horse, Lizzy, was in-foal. That, along with several other unrelated factors, made it necessary to hold off another year for the next leg of the trip. During the intervening time, Dad, at age 84, was bucked off his horse and had sustained some pretty severe internal injuries. After his recovery, he let me know his horse riding days were done. He was ready to call it a great run and hang up his spurs. I have to admit that was a tough time for me. At the same time, I feel very blessed to have been able to ride the trails and mountains and valleys, and cross the streams we have crossed, horseback,  with my dad.

On the Mogollon Rim. Thanks to the Bergs for the photo

What a blessing it has been to me, and I hope to my dad as well. We have seen things and experienced things few fathers and sons will experience together.

So, as I started planning the next leg of the trip, I began to plan without Dad. Luckily, my good friend Jeff Palmer stepped up and said he wanted to give it a try with me. We began to plan for a trip of just over 100 miles, by my calculations, from Flagstaff to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon National Park.

The fact that the two of us would travel to Flagstaff separately made logistics simple. I went down a few days early, during which time I scouted out our route and was able to place jugs of water and sacks of feed at strategic spots along the trail, to ensure we had sufficient feed for the horses and sufficient water for ourselves. As I was traveling along the path we would follow, or as close to it as the ranch roads would take me, it started to rain. Solid dirt turned to deep mud and I found myself at risk for getting stuck out in the middle of nowhere with my horses back at camp near Flagstaff. I found that if I kept my speed up I could float right through the mires and bogs I encountered along the way. My main concern was just keeping the truck on the road as I powered through. To say the least, though, it was a lot of fun! Late in the afternoon I arrived at Tusayan, where we would finish our trip, having scouted the route and placed our feed and water along the way. My odometer read 86 miles.

My truck at the end of the day

While I was looking for a place to stash feed and water near the trail at the Grandview lookout tower, just outside the park boundary about 16 miles east of Tusayan, I came across a couple hikers who had been hiking the entire Arizona Trail. They identified themselves by pseudonyms, wisely, so I do not know their true names, but Southern Comfort (he) and Groceries (she) were making 25 miles per day and were just finishing their day, having passed some of the stretch I had just driven. They were out of water, so I shared my water with them, saving them a couple miles of hiking at the end of a long day to find water. A hearty and happy couple. Their story is enchanting. He is from North Carolina and she is from California. They met on a hike and were married a couple weeks later. They have been hiking together ever since.

The following day, I saddled up Apollo and, leading Calypso, went for a short ride through the trees north of Flagstaff. It was a very pleasant ride. Apollo required a little work to get him used to crossing water again. I’m not sure he had any appreciable experience outside an arena before he came to me, however he was progressing well. Calypso was fine on the trail.

In the past week or so I noticed Apollo was losing weight. I expected him to trim down, due to the mileage I had put on him over the past month and a half, but he was dropping weight too quickly. After our ride, I noticed he was acting like he had pain in the kidney area and was having trouble urinating. That concerned me. It was not colic, as he was passing manure normally. I decided a trip to the vet was in order.

Jeff arrived about 3pm that afternoon (Sunday). I explained the problem, so we put off our departure for the pack trip one day, so I could get Apollo in to see a vet. I was able to contact a vet and received a call-back. I was able to get him in to see the only large-animal vet in the area at 8am Monday morning. The vet’s assessment was that Apollo had a urinary tract infection, possibly occasioned by drinking brackish water on the wagon train expedition we had ridden a couple weeks before, north of Salt Lake City, Utah, for the commemoration of 150 years since the Golden Spike celebration of the joining of the railroads. He prescribed a regimen of antibiotics and a pre-biotic food supplement and sent us on our way. To save explanation later on, suffice it to say the antibiotics worked and Apollo made the trip in good health without pain.

On Monday afternoon, Jeff and I drove our vehicles to Tusayan to stage my truck and trailer at the end of our trail. We parked it about a mile east of Tusayan, along USFS Road 302, where primitive camping is permitted. That evening, Jeff treated me to a mouth-watering medium-rare bone-in ribeye steak in Flagstaff. Jeff is a great guy to have along on a horse pack trip!

We got our pack trip underway around noon on Tuesday, May 14, 2019, which was still within our planned travel dates. The first day of travel was in the foothills of the San Francisco Peaks on the north side of Flagstaff, at an elevation of just over 9,000′, heading northward. This was the most beautiful part of our trip and we took a lot of photos and truly enjoyed the ride. (Click on a photo to see larger versions)

The horses performed well and gave us no trouble. We moved right along and made nearly 21 miles before stopping for the evening.  Surprisingly, we found little water along our route. We made camp near Badger Spring, where we found a little water in the stock pond there.

Camp the first night, near Badger Spring

Jeff and I became aware early on in the trip, that his horses and Calypso would waste no time in heading back toward our camp at Flagstaff at any opportunity, if left free, but Apollo would stay with Calypso, no matter where she was. That evening, while Jeff and I made camp and had our freeze-dried dinners, I let Apollo graze loose, while the rest of the horses were high-lined.  After dinner, I went to check on the horses and give Apollo his medicine and discovered that Calypso had slipped her halter and she and Apollo were nowhere to be found.

Calypso under pack and Apollo under saddle

Jeff and I quickly saddled his horses, Cottontop and Tank, and headed back down the trail to try to head off my horses before they got too far. We found them less than a mile from camp, but they kept ahead of us and would not allow us to come up to them. Finally, about another mile down the trail, they came up to a cattle guard and fence line that stopped them in their progress. They turned and headed along the fence line. As it was long after dark and my horses are black, we could not see them and did not know how far they had gone along the fence line. I had been working on teaching Apollo and Calypso to come at my whistle prior to coming on this trip, so I decided to give that a try. I whistled as loud as I could. Within a few minutes, I heard them coming, with Apollo in the lead. They let me come up to them and seemed glad to see me. We led them back to camp without trouble. After that experience, I tightened Calypso’s halter and we were careful about making sure all four horses were tied securely at night.

The following day we made 24 miles, which included  a stop about 14 miles back, at a ranch where I had staged feed. We were now down out of the pines and into the cedars and junipers and sage. While our campsite had no water or grass, the horses had been fed and watered well around mid-day, so they were fine. We had planned to make it to Lockwood Tank that day, but the horses were tired and so were we. We made the wise choice to camp, rather than push further. This camp was not ideal, but it got us out of the breeze for the night.

The following morning, as we were packing up, we had our first wreck. It wasn’t much, but it added a little excitement to our trip. While Jeff was packing up Cottontop, the pack saddle slipped to the side before he got his second pack on and Cottontop went to bucking!  He finally got it all off and settled down. No harm done and no equipment broken. Those bear-resistant hard panniers, from Outfitters Supply, are tough! We picked up the gear and re-packed Cottontop and all went well from there.

We made Lockwood Tank that day around noon. I had cached feed there, so we took a lunch break and watered and fed the horses.

Taking a nap at Lockwood Tank

After Lockwood, our next waypoint was Moqui Station, where I had staged more feed and a jug of water for ourselves. Since we were making more miles per day than anticipated, my staging points were out of sync with our actual travel. We reached Moqui Station in the early afternoon. Our water jug had been turned over and leaked and was empty. We fed the horses again, but they weren’t much interested. We decided to keep going another 8 miles to Russell Tank, where we would find water for ourselves and another sack of feed for the horses.

My followers will recall that last year, my best trail buddy, Clancy, my Blue Heeler, passed away. Since I had no appropriate place to bury him, I had his body cremated and had planned to spread his ashes somewhere along the trail between Mexico and Canada. As I moved along the trail on a hilltop somewhere between Lockwood and Moqui Station, I decided the time and place were right.

There was a light breeze and the smell of sage was pleasant. I took out the small velvet bag that held Clancy’s ashes, said a small prayer of gratitude for having had Clancy in my life, and gently poured the ashes out along the trail. It was a spiritual experience for me…that is until the breeze picked the ashes out of the air and covered me and my horse in them! Ugh! Ashes in my nose, in my mouth, on my face, in my eyes, on my glasses, all over my saddle and my black horse!

I guess Clancy had the last laugh after all!  So long, buddy. See you on the other side.

Russell Tank is actually a small lake and a beautiful place. It is a place commonly visited for fishing and picnicking and camping. The USFS has built a nice restroom facility, which is where I had cached a sack of feed. We watered and fed our horses and settled down for a nice evening. We had again made 21 miles and we and the horses were tired. We decided a little rest in this place was needed, so we planned for a short day of travel for the following day.

Our arrival at Russell Tank

We enjoyed our camp at Russell Tank. Jeff braved the very cold water and took a bath in the lake. I satisfied myself with a simple cowboy shower (spongebath). We relaxed and spent the morning just resting ourselves and the horses. We all needed it.

In the early afternoon, we packed up and headed on down the trail to Grandview Lookout, only about 12 miles away. That would be our planned travel for the day.

We made Grandview about 5pm and set up camp just off the USFS road. It was a good camp. We got sprinkled on a little, which was the first precipitation we had experienced since Flagstaff.

The following morning, we packed up and started out on the last leg of our pack trip. We knew it was only about 15 miles to the place where we had staged my truck and trailer and we were two days ahead of our planned travel schedule, so we were pleased with the way things had gone, but we were not in a hurry.

It was then, when we were most relaxed, that we had our big wreck.

It was Jeff’s turn to open the next gate and we soon came upon a cattle guard and gate we needed to pass through. Jeff dismounted from Tank and snubbed Cottontop’s lead rope to the saddle horn. Apparently, Cottontop decided to try to graze, which caused a pull on the saddle horn, which caused Tank to pull back, and soon both Tank and Cottontop were galloping away down our backtrail together. As Tank ran, Cottontop ran to keep up, which caused Tank to speed up all the more. I had also let Calypso follow loose along with our string. She joined in the excitement and headed off down the trail, following Tank and Cottontop.

I whistled for Calypso, at which she stopped and looked back, not knowing what to do. She didn’t immediately return to me, but stayed in the area. By this time Tank and Calypso were at a full run. Luckily, I was still mounted and Apollo, although excited, was handling the excitement well. I turned to follow the horses, but they kept well out ahead of me.

Eventually, they turned through the trees and Cottontop’s lead rope pulled loose from the Tank’s saddle horn. Tank then slowed down and turned back toward us, but Cottontop’s packsaddle was slipping by this time and things were flopping. The hard panniers banged loudly on trees as Cottontop ran.  Finally a strap broke as Cottontop ran past a pine tree and banged one of the hard panniers. Things began to unravel at that point.

Finally, both panniers came loose and Cottontop circled back to his human partners, looking for help. I had followed the horses on Apollo, while Jeff followed on foot. Cottontop came right to me and let me catch him, still huffing and puffing from his fright. I tied Apollo and held Cottontop, while Jeff caught up. Tank and Calypso also came back to us. I figure the horses ran nearly two miles in all, maybe that’s an exaggeration, but it can’t be far off. We were lucky they circled back, rather than heading straight down the trail.

We checked Cottontop over and found he had a pretty ugly scrape on the backside of his left front leg, just below the knee, but it wasn’t serious. We were very relieved to find he had some bangs and bruises, but no serious injury.

We were also pretty amazed to find that the only damage to the pack saddle and panniers was that one pack ring in the side of a pannier had pulled out. We were able to make a quick repair for that and shortly thereafter had Cottontop repacked and ready to move on down the trail at a more reasonable pace.

We stopped at Grandview Lookout tower for a few minutes, but, after the excitement of the morning, neither of us had the gumption to climb the stairs of the tower for a look. We decided to just head on down the trail toward Tusayan. Grandview Lookout is, in fact, only a couple miles outside the Grand Canyon National Park boundary. We had thoughts to head down the USFS road to enter the park and maybe get a few photos of the canyon, but we decided to forego that and just finish our pack trip. We will get plenty of photos of the canyon in May 2020, when we plan to cross the canyon and make our way on up to the Arizona/Utah border.

Shortly after leaving Grandview Lookout, we came across the only significant wildlife of our trip. We surprised a fair sized herd of elk, grazing in a meadow. A little later we came upon another, smaller herd of elk. Other than the elk, on the entire trip we saw one coyote, a couple squirrels, a couple horned toads, and a snake. That was it! I have no explanation for it, but it was disappointing.

We made our endpoint near Tusayan at about 3:15pm on Saturday. In all, our GPS units generally agreed that we made approximately 94 miles, beginning to end.  After unloading and brushing the horses down, we loaded them and our gear into the trailer and headed for Flagstaff. We stopped at the McDonalds in Tusayan for a bit of refreshment and feel-good food to enjoy during the drive.

End of the trail near Tusayan, AZ

Back at our base camp at Flagstaff, we highlined the horses, separated our gear, and got ready for the trip back to Utah. We left the horses and drove into town, where Jeff rented a motel room. We each enjoyed a hot shower, after which Jeff again treated me to a steak dinner.

The following day, Sunday, Jeff and I said our goodbyes and separated. He headed back to Utah, while I headed for Eagar, Arizona to visit my parents for a few days.

So, another leg of my Mexico-to-Canada horse pack trip has been completed. As I mentioned before, Jeff an I are planning the next leg for May 2020. We will begin at the Grand Canyon National Park, cross the canyon south-to-north on the Arizona Trail, and make our way up to the Utah/Arizona border…maybe even farther.

Many thanks to Jeff for being a great trail partner and friend.

Good Stories, Western Trails

To Alaska and Back, Part 3

I am about to head for Alaska again next week. Decided I had better finish my posts about the last trip – it’s been almost a year! So here’s part three from last year’s Alaska Moose Hunt Trip. The other two posts can be found here and here.

As we left the last episode, Part Two, Derek Habel and I were in camp on Beaver Creek in southeastern Alaska.

The hunt camp on Beaver Creek, southeastern Alaska.

We had been in camp about a week, when one evening, two of the horses decided they had had enough of the Alaskan adventure, and they headed back down the trail to the trailer…18.7 miles by my GPS. That was on Sunday, September 23, 2018.

Our first hint that the two horses were gone, was that my gelding, J Golden, had been grazing with them, but returned to camp alone that evening. We had heard him calling a couple of times in the distance, which must have been when they crossed the river and headed out. J just let the other horses go and turned around and came back to camp. I tracked him back and found the place on the other side of our island where  the two horses had crossed the river and headed north on Beaver Creek.

One of the horses, a mare named Ginger, had been on four previous hunts to that same camp, so she knew the route back to the trailhead very well. The other horse, Shadow, was on his first trip, but he willingly followed Ginger on her way. Why J Golden, who was also on his first trip to Alaska, turned around, left the other two, and returned to camp, I cannot guess, but I’m sure glad he did. In fact, he saved us two more times that way, when other horses ventured off the island to find other pastures.  A priceless trait for a backcountry trail horse!

The following morning it was decided that I would take J and head out after the two missing horses, while Derek continued his hunt; the moose rut had started and our hunting days were numbered before we had to head home. If he were successful, we would need those two horses to pack out the meat and rack. After a good breakfast, I saddled J Golden and said so-long to Derek. He kept Lucky, the trusty bear dog, with him, since he would be going through the thick forests, while I would have to depend on my horse’s senses and a .457 Marlin Lever-action saddle gun for my own protection. I have to admit I was a bit anxious, having spent very little time in grizzly country in my life.  So, trusting to J’s senses and divine protection, I headed out.

I hadn’t gone very far, when I began to see bear tracks superimposed on the tracks of the two horses in the sand along the river shores. It seemed that I found those tracks at nearly every crossing for nearly eight miles. I’m pretty sure most of the tracks were those of a large black bear, although there might have been tracks of a grizzly among them as well, as we saw some grizzly bear tracks near the trailhead as we departed the week before. I tried to speed up my chase, although cautiously, hoping to come upon the horses before they became bear food. I have to admit that I wondered about my decision-making processes, as I hurried to catch up with horses that were being followed by a bear!

I pushed J along pretty quickly, averaging about 5 mph or better, crossing the river upwards of 30 times. I found myself enjoying the ride and becoming less and less concerned about bears and more and more enthralled in the wilderness and beauty around me. I enjoyed the feeling of a good horse under me and his strength and effort in making his way through difficult water crossings, over and around log jams and blow-downs, and picking his way through rocky terrain and thickets. J gave me all he had. I was very pleased with my gelding and pleased with my surroundings. I thoroughly enjoyed that ride, and I think he did as well.

By the time J and I reached the trailhead, it was nearly 2pm, leaving me very little margin for safety in getting back to camp before nightfall. I found the two wayward horses calmly grazing on the sparse grass on the shore of the creek, near the bridge. As evidenced by their tracks, they had been up to the trailer, but finding nothing to eat there, had come back down to Beaver Creek and settled down to wait there. I contemplated staying overnight in the living-quarters trailer (fantasizing about a hot shower), but decided against it, since Derek would need me if he had killed a moose. Both J and I were tired, but I could see no alternative than to return to camp immediately. I moved my saddle and bridle to Ginger, grabbed some soda pop and snacks from the trailer, and headed back up the trail. I also grabbed some dog food for Lucky, as our supply at camp was running low.

Ginger wasn’t very willing to be heading back to the hunt camp at first, but after a few hundred yards on the trail, she settled-in and headed off down the trail at a good clip. I ponied J, and Shadow followed along of his own accord.

Heading back down Beaver Creek to camp

Back along the river we went, backtracking our trail, river crossing after river crossing, mile after mile.  On one river crossing, Ginger stepped into a deep hole and ended up swimming the last few yards to the far shore. I went in up to my hips. My rifle scabbard filled with water and had to be dumped out. I pulled the rifle from the scabbard, emptied the action and magazine and let the water drain out of it as well. Luckily, my saddle bags stayed dry and my pants, which were waterproof, stayed dry as well. My leather boots, however, were soaked and my feet were wet and cold most of the ride. I decided then that I would buy myself a pair of waterproof boots for the next such trip!

We arrived at camp just before darkness settled in. I had been in the saddle nearly 9 hours. I was ready for a hot meal and some rest. I had ridden approximately 38 miles, through some very tough country, crossing the river nearly 60 times. Both myself and the horses were pretty done-in.

I found it interesting that I had seen so many fresh bear tracks along the way throughout the entire day, but didn’t see a single bear.

Derek had only arrived back at camp minutes before I had. We found that a gust of wind had come through and quite thoroughly destroyed our camp. The tarp was blown aside and the framework had been knocked down. Some of our gear and supplies had been blown around the camp. Luckily, I had staked-down our tent when we set it up, so that was still in place.

We set about getting the camp back in order and rebuilding our camp lean-to frame and roof, after which we made ourselves a quick meal and headed for bed, as the wind began to rise. We had no sooner laid ourselves down, when the wind began to howl. Since it was still early evening, we laid in our sleeping bags and watched some video movies Derek had stored on his digital tablet. It was tough to watch the movies and tougher to hear them, with the wind howling like it was. Eventually, we gave up on that and just tried to go to sleep. Sometime around 10pm the wind rose to around 50mph, with gusts passing 70mph, in my estimation, and our tent collapsed. Derek has broad shoulders, so when the tent side collapsed against his shoulders, I was left on the downwind side of the tent with a bit of headroom, quite comfortable. We heard our tarp and the roof frame again collapse and we knew our camp would be in shambles in the morning.

Then, just as quick as it came upon us, the wind was gone. There was one last heavy gust, then all was calm. The storm had lasted about two hours.

We found one of the dome tent arch poles had snapped under the weight of the wind. We were able to do a makeshift repair that night, using a fiberglass rod from Derek’s electric fence parts, that kept the tent upright through the remainder of our stay in camp.

The following morning, we again repaired our camp roof frame, re-stretched the tarp, and reinforced the braces. We also took some time to sink a couple posts to use as tie posts for the horses, which proved extremely useful over the remainder of our stay. Later, we also  built a makeshift corral for the horses, which we will reinforce and improve on our next trip.

The following day, which would be day 13 of our stay in camp, both Derek and I packed up a couple horses, me riding J Golden, and headed back up into the foothills. Derek had seen a couple bull moose the previous day and was excited to find that the moose rut had finally begun.

On that day we did, indeed see a good sized bull moose, but it moved away from us into deep forests, where it would be impossible to hunt. After a long day, we started back toward camp. On the ride back, J got going a little fast down a slope. He stepped into a bit of a hole and came up solidly short on a front leg. I was nearly unseated from the saddle. However, he just kept on going and never missed another stride, as we made our way over the next four or five miles to camp. The next evening, however, I noticed J’s front right knee was swollen like a football. I believe he hyperextended his knee coming down that slope. He was not limping, but his knee was stiff and obviously sore. I gave him the next couple days off to rest and by the time we packed out, the swelling had gone down quite a bit. We packed him light and he made the trip out just fine.

The day after J hurt his knee, which was Thursday, Derek and I headed back up into the foothills, intent on coming out with a bull moose. About five miles from camp we came upon the same bull moose we had seen the previous day, along with a smaller bull and several cows. However, this time Derek decided to keep looking, as this bull was not in the trophy class Derek was hoping for.

On one particular hillside, we parked our horses and Derek headed off around the crest to scope for moose. Shortly thereafter, he came running back, yelling in a whisper voice…I think you can imagine what I’m trying to describe…that there was a pack of wolves on the next hill over! We made a plan to try to take a closer look at them and possibly to get a shot at one, as Derek had a wolf tag as well as a moose tag.

I crossed the crest of the hill and set myself up in a good spot. I attached my iphone 7 to an adapter and fitted it to Derek’s 20-60X spotting scope and began watching the wolves. They were lounging on the adjacent ridge, just relaxing, apparently after a good meal. The range was about 700 yards. I counted 16 wolves on that ridge.

Derek set himself up on the other side of a saddle. He had an electronic coyote call that he hoped would attract the pack to come closer, as wolves and coyotes are mortal enemies and wolves will attack and kill coyotes at every opportunity. I got my iphone camera set up while Derek got himself set up. When he turned on the coyote call, we were treated to one of the most spectacular scenes I have ever witnessed. Below is the video I took, in its entirety, with my iphone 7. If you turn the volume to 100%, you will be treated to a wonderful and eerie chorus of the voices of 16 Alaskan Timber Wolves.

By way of explanation, at about 1:37min, you will also hear the electronic coyote call and will see the wolves respond to it. You will also see that the wolves were quite content to remain on their ridge and just howl warnings at the intruding coyotes. These wolves were fat and happy and not in any mood to be off chasing coyotes.

Derek was unsuccessful in scoring a wolf kill. However, we knew from that moment that our moose hunt was over. About 30 minutes later, we saw eight more wolves come down from the hills above us and join the pack, bringing the total to 24 wolves in that one pack. We realized we would see no trophy bull moose in that area for quite a while.

Wolves, beautiful, but devastating when uncontrolled

When a pack of wolves, especially one of that size, moves into an area, they decimate the wildlife in the area, then move on when there is nothing left to feed on. Even the mighty Grizzly Bear had moved out of the area. We saw one Black bear and cub on a far mountainside during the entire hunt. While some would have one believe that wolves only feed upon weak and injured animals, that is actually far from the truth. There simply aren’t enough weak and injured animals to feed them. The wolves will feed on the bulls and the calves, the largest bulls being the most vulnerable. The wolves will chase them into the dense forest, where the bull is less able to maneuver to defend itself, due to the breadth of its antlers, then the kill comes quickly. While wolves seldom kill bear, they will harass even the Grizzly until they simply leave the area. It was a great disappointment to find this wolf pack in our hunting area, uncontrolled and overpopulated. It will take years for the game to be re-established in this particular region.

We made plans to pack out the following day. We came out without a moose, but I wouldn’t call it an unsuccessful hunt.

Breaking camp didn’t take long. It always takes longer to set up than to take down. We had everything packed and ready to move by about 1pm. We headed back up the trail to Beaver Creek at a very nice pace, even for a Missouri Fox Trotter. Despite not having a designated trail to follow and the 30 or so river crossings on the way out, we made excellent time.

 

The 18.7 miles took us three hours and 40 minutes from the hunt camp to the trailer. That even allowed us time to feed and water the horses and head over to Buckshot Betty’s for a nice, warm, steak dinner.

We slept in the very nice living quarters of Derek’s trailer that night, after taking nice hot showers, and rested very well. Before noon the following day, we were on the road, headed home.

 

We retraced our route heading south, with one alteration. We stopped at the hot springs at Liard River Hot Springs Provincial Park, British Columbia, where we took an hour to soak in the hot springs. That was a stop that was well worth the time. Wish I had gotten some pictures, but we left the phones in the truck.

The trip home was a fast one. While we were on the hunt, a devastating forest fire burned in Utah County, completely surrounding Derek’s ranch in Diamond Fork, east of Spanish Fork, Utah. The fire had taken out most of the vegetation in the hills surrounding his place, but he had lost no buildings, thanks to the efforts of several fire crews.

However, as we headed south from Alaska, a severe storm warning was in effect for Utah County and Derek feared is ranch would suffer more damage from uncontrolled runoff from the storm, including landslides and flooding, that was caused by the fire itself. We spent two nights on the road in Canada, then drove straight through overnight to Idaho Falls, where we made a stop at the home of Derek’s daughter’s family, 22 straight hours. The horses were glad for a rest and some grazing time in a grassy pasture.  After a little breakfast and a short nap, we hit the road again. We arrived at Derek’s place that afternoon, in time for Derek to make some preparations for the storm to protect his home and buildings.

I was glad to be home as well. It was a wonderful adventure, but very tough on both men and horses.  The horses all lost quite a bit of weight on the trip, but all came through healthy and well.  The horses did very well in the trailer both up and back and we had no injuries to horse or man, outside the normal bumps and bruises.

Going into and out of Canada was painless. We had our paperwork in order and nothing to declare other than horses and rifles. Handguns are prohibited in Canada, so we left those at home to begin with.

Derek and I are heading back up to Alaska again next week. Looking forward to it. I will be taking Apollo as my saddle mount, since I sold J last spring.  I’ll try to be more diligent in getting my posts and photos up in a more reasonable timeframe.

It’s just that I have been having so much fun on the horses this year that keeping up my posts sort of fell by the wayside.

Stay tuned for posts about my Flagstaff to the Grand Canyon ride last May and my trip to the Jim Bridger Wilderness last month.

 

 

 

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