Share my blog and photography website links with anyone you know who loves animals and the western way of life. Thanks!

and "Ghoul Night"

The Big Push

Bobbi n Jigs

Just Hangin'

The 'Do It All' Man

Goats are funny critters

Curtis Tollefsrud helping the Murpheys

Curtis is fun to work cattle with! 

He's a great teacher with young folks learning the ropes...patient and good natured. 

 Always smiling and enjoying the situation. 

It's good to know him.

See ya in Winnemucca, Curtis.

Big Daddy

Ranch Work !?!?!?!

Sometimes things get out of hand!!!!!

Ranch Goat

 Billy goats stink, nannys are sweet, and kids are sooooooo darned cute!

Mosey on Home Little Doggies

I do love a cattle drive.

River Ranch Sunset

This is one of my all time favorite places to ride, gather cattle, and train young horses.

Ground Crew

They're a tough bunch!

Ranch Rig

I rode in this big rig with Dave Murphy at Hot Creek.  I thought we'd be rolling slow across the desert but he could drive those roads in his sleep and it was a FUN ride.

The Last of the Dust.........

Ranch Rooster

Ranch Cat

We call him Garfield.  He sleeps everywhere, all the time.  The rain began sprinkling this morning as he slept on the hood of my truck.....just outside the window of my studio.  I was taking photos of him sleeping when he sat up and looked around....likely wondering where he could go to find a drier place to sleep some more.

On a side note.......Natural Horsemanship

I love horses!  I love natural horsemanship!  I love Parelli Natural Horsemanship!  I'm so thankful for Tom Dorrance and his blessed gift with horses and for passing it on to the wonderful Ray Hunt and now many other great horseman.  Horses are amazing animals and partners.  That's where I get a natural high....playing with and training and riding horses.

All my horses learn the 7 games with me.  And my main levels mare in the Parelli Program can be ridden like this.  It's waaaaay fun!   And she went from a dangerous hot headed bucking horse to being a partner with me in natural horsemanship.  It simply works!

This young lady and her horse travel with Pat and Linda Parelli on their Celebration tour to show people what a horse can be like with it's human partner.

Horses are people, too .....jk.....but they do have feelings and emotions and fears and uncertainties and dominance issuses and respect/lack of respect issues, etc.  The 7 games develop a respectful working relationship.....a partnership that can be further developed and enjoyed by both the human and the horse.

And it doesn't matter what kind of activity you do with your horses, they can all have this foundation and be the better and happier for it. 

Be Patient with me.....

I have a new laptop....VERY NICE one too.  I'm going to be loading ALL my photography onto this one laptop.  I have photography on 3 computers right now ... and, of course ,backed up.
I want it all in one place for editing and uploading.  Thus, the new BIG DOG.
I'll finally get more of the Hot Creek Ranch photography uploaded this coming week.
Also, please share my Blog with all your friends and ask them to also share.  I'd like the world :) to enjoy my photography of Ranch Life in the American West.  The only way for my work to get OUT THERE before I'm long gone is if you will help me by sharing my blog and my photography website.
Thanks so much!
Vicki

Ranch Kid

I love it when little kids discover and play with their shadows.  This is my granddaughter Emma.

The old Hot Creek Hotel

Home Sweet Home to friends who visit Hot Creek Ranch.

High Desert Sky

The clouds over Hot Creek Ranch are the BEST!

High Desert Color

One Loop One Throw One Calf Down

The end of a long day.....

Our workday ended at 9:30 pm by the time we hauled the last load of bulls away, trailered all our horses and rigs back to the ranch, and put our horses up and fed them.  A hot shower and bed never felt so good.

From the home corral.......

Well, I said I'd give you photography tips and techniques and ideas once in a while so here's one for you....

If you have a photograph that isn't quite up to par...a little blurry, too dark, color not very good, etc....go into your photo editing program and begin playing with these editing tools:  I adjust levels, brightness and contrast, lighting, saturation, sharpness, etc.  One at a time.....experiment.  If you like what you have with one adjustment then move on to the other.  If one doesn't help, move to the next tool. 

When you have that part about as good as you can get it....go into your filters.  This particular photo was very dark, too busy, and blurry.  But I liked the action so I found a way to save it.  I played with all my editing tools, as I suggested, and then experimented with one filter at a time.  I happen to have a few favorites and the one I settled on is the DRY BRUSH filter.  When a photo just won't turn out nice enough, I add a filter and make it art :)

This is the final outcome.  Not gallery worthy, but a fun photo.

*** Bad or dark lighting is sometimes hard to fix so.....try the Auto brightness and contrast, Auto Levels....if no good then go into the manual (Touchup) tools and manually play with Brightness, Contrast, Levels, and Lighting.  One of those will do the trick for you.  It's fun to make digital art out of a bad photograph!

There REALLY are cattle out there........

The heat worked in our favor.  Corriente cattle can be snakey, high headed, and FAST.  But on a hot day they would rather poke along.  We loved it!   Me and Kathy had to drive our bunch about 10 miles across the big, wide open, and they were kind to us and went where we pushed them.

And then the rains came....

We were sweating, and eating dirt.....literally.  Open your mouth to speak and get a mouthful of dirt blowing in the wind.  But the wind helped keep us a little cooler so we didn't mind.  By afternoon black clouds grumbled across the sky and we got hit hard.  By the time it passed, my hooded sweatshirt was soaked and the wind howled and I was COLD.  Crazy desert weather.  This image was taken right before hard rain hit.

On a different note......

I'd like to mention here that all images I post on my blog are basically thumbnails, not high resolution.  You will find the original high resolution photography and fine art images on my photography website next week.  I wanted to share some of my favorites from the trip right away so I'm sharing them on my blog early.  I'll let you know once they're on my website.  Also, if you order any images from my website they will not have Ranch Life Photography across the front :)

Gettin' the job done....

Marc sorts from the back of one of his big Hancock bred ranch horses.  The corriente cattle can get 'hooky' after being worked in a big bunch....they get tired of being ridden thru, sorted past and around and by, and near the end of the day you have to watch the ones that start getting cranky or your horse just might get hooked.

The Power of Orange

It just isn't possible without ground crew!  We take turns being horseback and working the ground.

Takin' a Break

Jason and 'Rob' heading for the creek after several hours in the dusty sorting and roping pens. 

Hot Creek Critters enjoy life.....

To quote my son-in-law Ken...

"I believe our world is God's canvas, and I constantly try to appreciate the beauty of this world."

That pretty well says it all for me.  I love the beautiful world God has created for us to live on and enjoy.  Every 100 miles the earth is a new place to see... the colors in the sky are a little different, vegetation changes, hills and mountains and desert are new as the terrain alters, lakes and rivers provide a whole new beauty and grandeur.  Our planet is truly amazing!
That is just one reason I love being a photographer.  I can 'catch' some of the beauty for all time....for everyone to enjoy.  Another major reason I photograph what I do is because ranch folks live by the land, love the land, work with the land, make their living by the land and it's creations, and enjoy the land.  It's an adventure to work with others who love the land as I do, to work alongside them, and to capture some of that wonderful experience and adventure for others to enjoy through the years.
We get tired and dirty and it just makes water all the more precious and welcome, and we sleep sound.



Me and Cooper

Here's an image of me on my roping horse Cooper.  What a good guy!  He can be counted on in any situation.  Thanks to my daughter-in-law, Tricia, for taking this for me.  I rarely have photos of myself out working cattle.  I kept the original but love making Fine Art Images out of photography and this one was a good photo to play with.

We're in the trap sorting the cattle....bulls loaded here, weaning calves loaded there, cows and young calves through that gate to that pen, roping steers thru this gate and into this pen, etc.  Great way to spend a day!

The road back to the ranch house..........and dinner........

Horses and riders are hauled out to allotments and dropped off to gather cattle for the day.  There are traps all across the desert here for corraling and working the cattle before turning back out or hauling in the ranch semi to a different location.

The horses are more than happy to load up and head back to the ranch for their dinner, too.

They can run but they can't hide...........

Mitch waits patiently for Dave to come back.  This cowdog rides miles across the desert as Dave zigs and zags thru sagebrush, up and down draws, flying low to the outskirts of the allotments checking on cattle.  When they find some, Mitch gets down and helps drive the cattle while Dave herds with his bike.

And there they go again!  The most fun I've ever had herding cattle is working with Dave on his bike and Mitch on the ground.  It was fun and easy riding with them because they didn't really need me at all. And now I want a horn on my horn!

Pushing Cows

Cooper and me pushing cows down a long dusty cow trail to the water tank and trap where we will doctor and tag a big bunch tomorrow.  Riders are scattered for miles across the desert riding draws and washes gathering one cow here, two cows there, 30 sometimes.......pushing them all to the same trap all day long.  If you look far down the trail ahead of the cows you can see the trap.  The cattle in this allotment go there for water each day so they're pretty accomodating in the heat.  And it was a hot one that day!

Cowgirl Up

  Husband and wife team...Shane and Kathy....getting the job done!

Kathy was my riding partner most days last week.  We had fun gathering cattle and moving them across the desert for miles to a trap; which gave us time to catch up on visiting.

See ya in a few days.....

That's what she said as she rode away :)  Three riders were heading for those hills to gather cattle and drive them miles to water and the trap later the same day.  A trap is a setup of corrals to hold the cattle while they are worked....doctored and branded.  Long days in the saddle.  Great friends.  Great horses.  Hard work.  Lots of fun.

You'll notice the sky is a different color of blue in this photo.  Each day presented a new sky.  High clouds and rain mist, wind, dust, heat, cold....all affected the color of blue in the high, wide, and wondrous sky of Hot Creek Ranch.

Fall Gather at Hot Creek Ranch

It's simply awesome!  The skies over Hot Creek Ranch are the most beautiful I've ever seen.  Surrounded by mountain ranges all around, the clouds and thunderheads gather over that expanse of high desert  providing a different breathtaking view every day.  Some days the skies are the brightest blue you will ever see....the turquoise blue of Carribean waters, with pristine white clouds floating above riders as they search ridges and gullies for cattle. And other times the sky turns dark and threatening with black thunderheads creeping slowly across the ranch bellowing and spewing lightening and rain.
On our stay there last week, helping with the fall gather and branding, we saw both.  It was simply awesome!