We moved them a hundred yards yesterday and they managed to tear down the fence in two places, so in addition to high blood pressure, I have a smashed thumb from pounding staples.

I assume the instructor of this class is a cow whisperer who uses hypnosis or some such technique. Otherwise, how does he get a cow to care how much stress she's inflicting? I've always been of the opinion that they delight in causing heartburn.

Our Black Angus are nothing compared to the exotic breed phase that blew through here in the ’80s and early ’90s. Limousin, Gelbvieh, Saler ... tall, big-framed cows that produced hefty calves but had the temperament and athletic ability of an irritated elk. Talk about inflicting stress. Those cows could wreck anything, including your nerves, your corrals and a sizeable number of marriages.

One day when we were still living in South Dakota, my brother-in-law called. "That red cow got out again. Could you bring a horse over and help me get her in?" My husband asked if I'd come along since my horse needed the exercise. In retrospect, it would've been wise to ask a few pertinent questions, but I was a new wife and still gullible, so I said, “Sure.”

The cow, a big red Gelbvieh, spotted us from afar when we pulled into the driveway. By the time we got the horses unloaded, she'd cleared three fences without touching a wire and was moving south at a fast clip. Since I hadn't gotten around to training my horse to jump four vertical feet, every time the cow hopped into another pasture, we had to detour half a mile to the nearest gate. This went on for most of the afternoon. Finally, she began to tire. We could tell because she started tearing down the top couple of wires and busting off posts with every leap.

We eventually got her turned around and headed back toward the barn. She demolished one last wire gate for the fun of it, then tried to jump a steel stock panel, which is now permanently U-shaped. She teetered on top for a moment, then went end over end into the corral. It must've stunned her when she landed on her head because she staggered around the corner and into the lean-to beside the barn, right where we wanted her. We got the gate shut before she regained her faculties.

While she tried to wedge her body through the foot-wide gap between the top of the board fence and the lean-to roof, my brother-in-law backed his stock trailer up to the gate and threw open the rear door. Lured by the possibility of an escape route, the cow jumped in. He slammed the door behind her and barely got it latched before she realized her error, spun around and tried to bust her way out.

We eyed the bouncing, rocking stock trailer. "You gonna haul her back to the pasture?" my husband asked.

"No dang way," my brother-in-law declared. "I'll shove hay and water into the trailer until the sale in Aberdeen on Wednesday; then they can deal with her."

Too bad that was back in the unenlightened days. Would've been fun to take her to one of those cow whisperers instead, to watch him work his magic when we turned her loose in that little pen with him.  

Kari Lynn Dell is a third-generation cowgirl, horse trainer and rodeo competitor. She writes from her family ranch on Montana's Blackfeet Reservation. For information on her novels, short stories and other writing projects, visit her website.

PHOTO: I never would have thought this cow could hurdle so many fences. She's definitely a candidate for the cow whisperer. Photo by Kari Lynn Dell.