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You are here: Home / #Agchat / A day in the life…

A day in the life…

August 18, 2014 by ~The South Dakota Cowgirl~ 5 Comments

I seriously live the best life.

I get up and most days do whatever I want. Sometimes I do have writing assignments to make deadline, and sometimes there’s must-do ranch work. Like capture a bull from a one pasture and move him to another, or gather and sort horses, or gather bulls when their 60-days with the cows ends, but usually my day goes something like this: I get up, have coffee, breakfast, feed Medium Rare, the bottle calf (because our milk cow went on strike), feed the dogs, feed my barn cats (Rafter, and now Bob, because Kitty Perry has disappeared), and bring the saddle horses in. From there, I may ride colts, ride through the cows, go to barrel races, ride my horses through the barrels, go visit the mares, edit photos, catch up on my crime dramas, clean house, do laundry… The list is endless depending on the weather.

And then there are days like Friday, where we had a “must-do” job. We needed to move a bull from the pasture with our first calf heifers, to the pasture with our cows.

Burt (our hired-right-hand-man/cousin of the boys), and I loaded our horses, a couple panels and headed out to sort off one of our handsome Brangus bulls. We needed to load him into the trailer, and then haul him to a pasture with the cows.

Loading him was pretty much a piece of cake, though it also involved cake: the cow kind! I swear that stuff is like crack for cows. Plus, all our bulls are gentle and will eat it out of your hand. So all we had to do was trail him about 200 feet into the makeshift corral by the trailer, jump in shake a bucket full of cake at him, throw him a piece or two and he was like, “Girls? What girls? There’s cake to be eaten boys!”

After we got him loaded, we jumped our horses in the back of the trailer, put our panels back on the side, and headed to a river pasture to find the cows and dump him out.

We needed to trail him down to the cows. Once there, my Friday morning view looked something like this:

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We rode through that pasture looking for anything out of place. Once I got to the top of the biggest hill on the ranch, I saw this:

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Someday, from a horse, I’ll take a photo of the scene from all angles. It’s a site to behold, trust me!

I didn’t end up eating lunch until about 3 that day because once I covered 2/3 of the pasture from the top (Burt rode the river bottoms), I trotted Dino the four miles home while Burt covered the rest of the pasture and brought the trailer home. I was just unsaddling when he pulled in.

It was a lovely day to be horseback, doing a job, albeit was a bit muggy and hot. I don’t know where this humidity has come from this summer, but there plenty of it! I feel like I’m back in Texas!

And that, my friends, is just another day in my life.

Happy trails!

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Filed Under: #Agchat, cowgirls, horses, ranching, summer Tagged With: a day in the life

About ~The South Dakota Cowgirl~

Jenn Zeller is the creative mind and boss lady behind The South Dakota Cowgirl. She is an aspiring horsewoman, photographer, brilliant social media strategist and lover of all things western.

After a brief career in the investment world to support her horse habit (and satisfy her mother, who told her she had to have a “real” job after graduating college), she finally took the leap and stepped away from a regular income; trading the business suit once and for all for cowgirl boots, a hat, and jeans. She has not looked back.

When Jenn first moved to The DX Ranch on the South Dakota plains, she never imagined she’d find herself behind a camera lens capturing an authentic perspective of ranching, and sharing it with others. Jenn has always been called to artistry, and uses music, writing, images, home improvement, and her first true love of horses to express her ranching passion.

Horses are the constant thread and much of her work centers around using her unique style of writing to share her horsemanship journey with others in publications such as CavvySavvy, the AQHA Ranching Blog, the West River Eagle, the family ranch website, and her own website.

Using photography to illustrate her stories has created other opportunities -- Jenn’s brand “The South Dakota Cowgirl” has grown to the level of social media “Influencer”. This notoriety has led to work with Duluth Trading Company, Budweiser, Wyoming Tourism, Vice, Circle Z Ranch and Art of the Cowgirl, to name a few. She also serves as a brand ambassador for Woodchuck USA, Arenus Equine Health, Triple Crown Feed and Just Strong fitness apparel. Her photography has been featured by Instagram, Apple, TIME Magazine, The Huffington Post, and Oprah Magazine. Jenn’s work has been published internationally, has been seen in several books and has graced the covers of several magazines.

Jenn became a social media influencer by accident when she started to explore Instagram as a way to share her life on the ranch with folks that don’t get to experience it. It’s grown into an incredible platform that she uses to empower women, create an environment for self improvement and share life on the ranch.

When she’s not working, she loves to drink coffee, play with her naughty border collie named Copper, start ranch colts, and run about the country chasing cans. Her mother still thinks she doesn’t have a “real” job.

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Comments

  1. Robyn says

    August 18, 2014 at 8:03 am

    It’s always nice when the bulls cooperate. J’s Dad still helps him do most of the bull work. We will pull bulls a week from today.

    I love the happiness your “voice” expresses about your life. We really do have a lot to be thankful for.

    Have a great time at AgChat. We have a common friend who told me you were going to the conference. She will be attending with you! I’m excited to hear about your experience.

    Have a great week, Jenn!

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    • the south dakota cowgirl says

      August 18, 2014 at 9:57 am

      I’m actually teaching a class at the conference, Robyn. It should be super fun.

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      • Robyn says

        August 19, 2014 at 7:49 am

        I would love to take a class and learn more about photography from you. Your view of the Big Mo always “stops me in my tracks.”

        Tomorrow, we are headed to NE to visit my folks and show sheep at the State Fair.

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    • the south dakota cowgirl says

      August 18, 2014 at 10:00 am

      I hit enter too soon! We don’t turn our bulls out until after the 4th of July, and then I’m pretty much responsible for getting them home 60 days later- at least I have been the past 3-4 years. It’s good work for the horses, and certainly keeps you honest about cow handling. Usually though the bulls are pretty good to work with and gather up well. 🙂

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  2. Robin Jerde says

    August 19, 2014 at 10:00 am

    Love the views from your horse, Oh how I would love to spend a day with you doing the ranch thing, Don’t get those kind of days in Minnesota.

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