Cowboy Prank

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A young guy we thought a lot of had come to help us do some sorting and other cow work in preparation for branding. His name was Scott and he was darned sure a cowboy and good hand. Him and his Dad before him, staunchly believed in not riding mares. Scott and I had argued about it for years, but neither one of us likely to ever change our minds. He’d grown up on geldings only, and I’d ridden both geldings and mares.
He’d gotten to the ranch at dusk and we were headed in for supper. We’d gotten horses in that afternoon and they were on feed in the corral. Scott’s saddle and gear were in his pickup, as I’d told him
we’d provide a horse for him. Breakfast was served the next morning at 3 a.m., and then we headed to the barn to get horses caught and get going.
It was darker than the inside of a black cow yet, as it was overcast. I caught a horse for Scott and one
for me and led them both into the barely lit barn to brush off. I’d caught Cody for Scott. He led Cody out
to his pickup and saddled up in the dark. I handed him a bridle on my way outside, and we all stepped on and hit a trot.
We proceeded to gather all the pairs out of the handful of springers left and got them moved, then moved all of the pairs to another pasture. I’d brought up the mare vs gelding discussion while we were
working, so every time we rode close to each other, a wise remark was made.
Scott noted that in spite of my fondness for mares, I was riding a gelding, as was my husband. I
agreed that we sure were. We kept working. We had some country to cover to get everything situated for the days after branding as well, so we’d hit a trot or a lope and kept going.
Scott was sure bragging on Cody and noted how cowy, handy and easy moving the horse was. Cody
was a top horse in our bunch, but it was nice to hear a compliment from Scott, whose opinion I respected.
Cody was about 15.2 hands and weighed a solid 1250-1300 lbs. Of Hancock and Wimpy breeding, Cody
showed that pedigree all over. Whether you needed to rope a bull, sort yearlings, or have a short horse
race, Cody was the right horse for the job.
As we finished our circle for the day, we’d ridden up to a gate. It was Scott’s turn to get off and open
the gate, so he did. While he was shutting the gate, Cody took that opportunity to spread out and urinate. Imagine Scott’s horror when he saw just how Cody was doing it, as Cody, being a full fledged mare, was peeing accordingly.
We laughed hard at his expression, as we’d waited all day for Scott to discover Cody’s gender. As he
pointed out in his defense, he hadn’t had occasion to look underneath for plumbing, nor had he been
behind her. He swallowed his damaged pride and stepped back on and rode the first mare he’d ever ridden back to the corrals, without any apparent damage to his manhood or cowboyness. I can’t recall that the subject of mares vs geldings has come up again in the nearly 40 years since that day. Also, I don’t know if he ever rode another. At least if he didn’t, the only one he rode was sure a good one.

Posted in: Featured, Ranch Life


About Jan Swan Wood

Jan was raised on a ranch in far western South Dakota. She grew up horseback working all descriptions of cattle, plus sheep and horses. After leaving home she pursued a post-graduate study of cowboying and dayworking in Nebraska, New Mexico, Montana, Wyoming and South Dakota....

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