cowboy,

Oooh, that got me P.O.ed just reading it. I think that seeing that they were on your land, you had every right to block the trail when they came along. I'd have taken their quads and set them afoot for good measure. Then I'd have called the local law enforcement representative and let him know what went on. What are they going to say to the local sherrif? "Jeez, sherrif we was riding our quads on this guy's POSTED land after we cut his fences and let the cattle/horses out and he just takes out quads!" I think not! Do they still hang cattle/horse thieves out there? If not they should start again!

 

Man I tell you! That's one of the problems though. My land is surrounded by the reservation. As a result, the tribal police is the nearest law agency and they just look the other way. In fact, part of the tribe cut down some of our fences and turned the cattle out a couple weeks ago. They stole 8 of our horses, then ran them some 25 miles up the valley and proceeded to sell them to anybody who would buy them. We ended up getting lucky that one of the guys who went to the supposed "horse sale" ended up recognizing my horse, and 7 of my cousins. He immediately called up my cousin and said to get down there right away with the trailer.

My cousin found a few places the fence had been cut, and was down and just figured that the horses were wandering somewhere on our 1,200 acres. When he got down there, he drove right into the place and loaded them up. All the guys involved just stepped aside and didn't say a word to him. Keep in mind my cousin is a 66 year old cowboy who has run himself over with his own tractor a couple times, driven himself to the doctor with broken ribs and punctured lungs. Now, when he pulls up and loads up the horses and they don't say anything to him at all, don't even try to stop him, that says a lot for my cousin. He does the best he can to keep the place up, but it's a lot of ground to cover, and at his age he don't get around as good as he used to.

My dad and I spent 5 days last week up there fixing fence and taking care of the stock, making sure things were OK for now. We got all but one of the horses back. His best was stolen and sold somewhere. A full black appy with a white blanket over his rump, and lepard black spots. Beautiful horse and great in the mountains. You are right, horse thieving is punishable by death in the state, though when they're already sold, or given to someone else, how do you prove it. As for the long piece of rope, well, the back hoe is much faster, well, you get the point.

Hope everybody has a great labor day weekend, take care and be safe!

Mike