Frosty's strawberry colt is SOLD!

This boy went to Michigan to be a future sire up there! His new family intends to show him and play-day him, and then use him on their favorite mares... and we've told them we want pics!!!
  We couldn't be prouder of our beautiful boy, who has the exact attitude to be a great buddy while having a ton of fun winning those games!

   We're so pleased with the first results of our roan breeding program focusing on good temperaments... "Strawberry Cowboy" had the happy, friendly personality that makes his mother such a dream to ride, and lightning on cows! No worries that she'll break in two in the middle of a stressful situation, Abi has ridden her break neck after cows in the brush and she's just all business and all there for her rider.
Like a cool drink of spring water, Frosty is a sweet ride and a great partner, and we're so pleased to see her boy is just the same as her.

   We're be looking at another Frosty baby in 2018, so if you'd like your name in the hat, give us a ring!

Current Horse: Major, chestnut AQHA gelding

  Well! It's been a super busy summer! Wow.


     Anyway, here's a few pics of a current horse, photos taken July 2014.

 Major is a sweet, willing, friendly fellow; very sensitive and wants to be included in everything. If you stand around talking with his rider, he'll probably end up voluntarily edging closer so you can pet him more easily. Hint, hint...!

 He's definitely got a gorgeous mind!
  The rest of him's not to shabby either...

Our First TV auction: Superior Livestock Fall Horse Sale 2013

Saturday, November 9th marked the first time Double K Ranch had consigned a few of our good ranch geldings to the TV horse sale put on by Superior Livestock Services. This was a pretty novel step, and a fairly exciting one, to think that folks all over the country could sit in their  homes and watch our horses sell on RFDTV. We were all looking forward to it... (it turned out to be a very good thing that Abi didn't have to lift a finger selling the horses that day... she wasn't up for it at all!)

 Of course, with Abi's accident on the Wednesday right before; and her subsequent days in the "heavy convalescing" stage... the horse auction on Saturday was sort of robbed of it's shine by the whole family fussing over our (mumbling-ly uncommunicative) youngest sister.

  But we still wanted to see our horses "debut TV appearance".
  We don't keep up with a TV here at the house, but we had arranged with our neighbors to the south (retired, and not the same from Ab's teeth ordeal) to watch it with them on their set.
          (A very nice set it is, too!)
 We had planned to ride down, (and I was looking forward to accompanying Abi in the training cart with her blue roan pony she's been harness training...)
  But since she was in pretty sad shape, that was all  out the window.
 
  Nevertheless, we settled in around the neighbors' living room and watched Abi and Anne, with their horses, in their first TV appearances.
 If anyone asks them now if they've been on television, they can both say "Yes."
   (Believe it or not, that was a question we were asked earlier.)

  The phone was ringing and ringing the whole way through, and I can't believe how nervous I felt, even though it was completely removed from the usual hustle and bustle a sale is usually tied to.

 In the end our geldings topped the sale; with WA Apache Como going to a lady in Kansas for slightly over 10k.

 Leo came in at a very respectable 5900, headed out to Virginia.

 And Flynn brought a easily predicted 4500; going to a fellow in Kansas.
  

 After being quiet keyed up with all the events, it was a relief to have it all said and done, and Anne was on the phone with buyers and bidders alike, doing after sale wrap-up.

   We would like to congratulate the winning buyers of these three nice geldings... and also say a big thank-you to everyone who bid on our horses.
  We appreciate your continued confidence in our offerings, and hope to see you around the ranch for something a little later, perhaps!

   And thanks also to Superior Livestock Auctions, for having us!

Abi vs. Heifer: She takes it in the teeth. Literally.

Life in the "hinter lands" can sometimes be startlingly swift with it's lessons... and when you work with big critters the possibility for injury is always lurking.

  Well, last Wednesday Abi tried to stop a cow with her face... and got her front teeth forcibly re-arranged... 

 Some of the family were helping the neighbors work cattle, towards the very end a two year old heifer barreled through Abi's attempt to block the runway... poor kid came out of it with a serious hole in her "smile"; the 2 fronts and one on the left were smashed pretty bad. The teeth looked like they had disappeared, but actually were pushed up into her gum pretty far.
  It looked really, really ugly, blood all over, and some significant swelling going on by the time she got home with the Mrs. neighbor.
 
  She was a trooper through it all, and actually said "It doethen't hurt muth!" while we packed it in ice and then went straight up to the "big city".

  Thankfully we've got access to a great doc and his team, who got her fixed as well as possible right away. They got the teeth back down mostly into place, and set a "cast" on them.  Two are broken somewhat, (I can't see them with the cast on, but they looked like less than half is missing.)  Those two will need reworked at some point, (if they all heal back in at the roots as hoped, those poor things were pretty disturbed!) 
  Spent a good chunk of the day in town with that, but Abi kept saying she had very little pain, so that was a blessing!
  Got her home that evening and she was on meds and ice packs for a few days there; will probably have to have one or two teeth rebuilt a little... but it could have been a lot worse! (So I get to do all her chores for a while! )

  We're so thankful to have such a great oral surgeon here... The doc and his team got her right in as soon as we got to N.P. and had her shaped up first priority. What a blessing to have great people to work with during emergencies like this!

 The moral of this story is, as always: bovine creatures are amazingly powerful, and should never be underestimated! 

  Thanks for your prayers everybody, we appreciate them! And yes, she is drinking healing herb teas and doing everything possible to speed recovery in that way. I have been passing on everyone's responses and encouragements to her, and she really appreciated everyone thinking of her!
  
She went back in on Monday for post-op, and they said it looked good so far.
    So time will tell!

 Again, we appreciate all the prayers offered by everyone... and with the Lord's blessing, I am confidant this will turn out well. She is a great kid, and a good-healer; so we'll go forward from here!

  Contrary to "internet requirements", we didn't take a picture... that is the sort of thing Mom doesn't want to see twice. Once was too one too many!
 

Superior Auction ~ Flynn's Dollar

You may have heard of Superior Auction Services... especially if you have RFDTV. They run a lot of bull sales, cattle sales, and even horse sales, played live on TV. It's an interesting marketing tool, and after Roy and Abi watched the spring horse sale at the neighbors, they reccommended we ought to give it a try with one or two.
 
  Turns out the girls had three ranch geldings they wanted to offer, so three Double K Horses will be on TV November 9th! This is a first for us, so we're all going to go over to the neighbors and have a party in their living room.

   One of these is Flynn. 

 

 LA Flynn's Dollar ~ 2005 AQHA bright bay gelding. 

3 videos of Flynn now up.  #1 Hills,cross water; #2 Saddle up & ride, kids & adult. #3Catch, kids ride & roundpen & more.

Flynn is consigned to Superior Livestock's Fall Horse Sale on RFDTV, Nov. 9th.

Horse of the Past ~ Cowboy

 Since there isn't always a lot worth reporting going on around here, I thought we could run a little something highlighting horses that have moved on long ago. They make their mark, they touch our lives, and each one is a memory worth having.

We'll start with Cowboy, one of the first horses we sold at Billings way back in '06. Can you believe it? That was over seven years ago!

Cowboy, 1996 chestnut gelding. 

High selling horse at the Billings Livestock Horse Sale in August, 2006.

Cowboy went to California.

Why Nebraska?

Some folks wonder "Why Nebraska?"
  Well, that's a long story, but to cut it short, opportunity knocked and sent us to a ranch in south western Nebraska. We had little idea at the time what a fortuitous thing this was going to turn out to be!
  Now when people ask, "Where would you like to live, if you could live anywhere in the world?"
   (Believe it or not, I sometimes get asked this. ;-) )
   ...I answer, "Nebraska."
    
   They generally look at me with puzzled looks. (Unless they're Nebraskans themselves.)
    
     First: the people. I have lived a lot of places, in a lot of states, and have never met a population so thoroughly good-natured as we have been privileged to encounter here. It really is a friendly state, and more than that, it's an "ag-first" state, so that means that farm/ranch folk are made to feel welcome and right at home anywhere they go.
  In some of my travels, it seems that anyone making a living "from the land" is somehow looked upon as "less than".
  Less than a doctor, lawyer, IT tech, software inventor.... Or something.

  But here, it's respectable to have dirt under your nails, or even have a cow from time to time.