Is there a doctor in the house? I repeat, is there a...

Last Sunday we had a pretty nice day with our afternoon temperatures in the upper 50's. Our nighttime lows were in the 40's all last weekend. Late Sunday afternoon our horse trainer Travis Webster came by the ranch to begin his work with Rosey. For about a half hour he worked on sacking Rosey out, keeping her feet moving. After that she was pretty comfortable with having a tarp hanging around her neck.

Monday this week we had a beautiful day, day time high temp was 60° -much like springtime. We found a new home for Walter Pigeon, with a local fella that keeps and races about 250 birds. I talked with him for over an hour about racing pigeons and found that very interesting. I feel that Walter will be happy with a new flock of bird to make home with.

Tuesday morning Travis was back out to work with Rosey again,
























as we are prepping her for spring and summer show times. Again he worked on sacking her out then they worked on lead handling, because Kittee has had some trouble with Rosey balking when Kittee drops the lead rope. After this Travis worked Rosey on turns -- inside and outside turns. We found that Rosey was quite responsive and by the end of the training session she had worked up a sweat. This was the first time she had worked this hard.

Wednesday we went back into a usual gray January winter. Off and on, day and night the fog has been rolling by the ranch leaving a fine mist of white on everything. We are now in a perpetual covering of fog frosting, not rime ice or snow. Daytime highs are 36°-40° and nighttime lows being 28°-30°... usually January weather.

Thursday morning after make my early a.m. bus run, I was able to flag down Meryl Demaris as he was going up river. We chatted for awhile, and he asked me if I had seen the 7-point bull elk hanging out in the backyard. Well no I hadn't, but that day while eating a quick lunch, looking out our kitchen window, I noticed what seem to be a large rock moving on the backyard bluff.


I quickly grabbed our field glasses and saw that the movement had a massive set of antlers. WOW!! Those antlers were as tall as the bull elk at his withers. These pictures are made from our kitchen window of the bull elk about a half mile upriver. Wish I had a telephoto lens for this little video/still photo camera. Our field glasses really brought him into view-- up close and personal.

Thursday also found me having to take Derby to the vet's office to have a hoof abscess removed, running my MidCo midday pre-kindergarten bus route, going back to pickup Derby in mid-afternoon, running my afternoon M-F school bus route, and then taking the Mac-Hi basketball teams to Athena for their evening basketball games. Quite a full day of running.

Friday was the beginning of a four-day Holiday weekend!!! Yep, working with the school system... Friday was an in-service work day for teachers, so I had no students to transport, Monday is MLK holiday -off, Saturdays and Sundays are always free. What a neat system to work in. After all of Thursday's running around, I was looking forward to Friday being a laid back, take care of the horses kind of day. Most of Friday morning, I took care of paying mid-month billings, dropped by the library to pickup a book and some videos for the long weekend. Friday afternoon I worked on a pasta sauce for dinner, and waited for Kittee to arrive home. When she got home we shared our day over a beer and she had a McKuster Ranch Cider. Since I am sporting a head cold right now, Kittee offered to go out and do the evening feeding of the herds. As I was about to take the pasta off the stove, Kittee came through the back door and said she had fallen, and wanted me to look at her left wrist... this did not look good.

I turned off the stove and we headed for St. Mary's ER.


Calling Dr. FRANCIS, Calling Dr. BOB... you have a patient in the ER.

Calling Dr. FRANCIS... now where is Bob when we need him?

Well Dr. Bob was not here to help Kittee this evening, neither was our other TWO local orthopedic surgeons; so now we have a third orthopedic surgeon we can now call on in times of need. Yep, we are keeping these guys busy as we reach 50-something. It was about 8:00 p.m. when we determined that it would be best for Kittee to go to surgery for the evening to repair her broken wrist...

She came out of surgery doing fine, but hurting so I stayed with her in the recovery room until her pain was under control and we moved her to a room for the overnight lodging.

I was able to get home just a bit after midnight and went out to take care of the herd and turn off the barn lighting.

This morning I awoke alone and ready for a nap, (GEE those late nights out are getting rougher as I get older) but I got up, made a pot of coffee, fed the herds and headed for the hospital. Found that Kittee had a good night's rest, a wonderful breakfast, and was bright eyed and cheery, ready to go home.

We won't be playing any fast, furious hands of double solitary tonight. I'llbetcha Icouldawon every game this evening;>)

So now we are home on a 4-day Holiday weekend to watch a few videos, read some new magazines that came in this week, have a shot or two of whiskey, listen to a PHC this evening with Garrison Keillor, bringing us a new program-- the story/news of life in Lake Wobegon this past week.

And that's the way it is.
Five Kats laid back on the living room sofa, and Kittee reading about Dewey - The Small Town Library Cat.

A week in the life at the ranch --- Dale

Made a trip into Milton-Foggywater today

Making my first rise out of bed before daybreak this morning, to put on a pot of coffee I found the outside temp to be 15º once again, and the stars were shining brilliantly. At first light the air was calm and all the vegetation above ground level was covered with rime ice... a beautiful sight. After the coffee was made, Kittee and I had probably our last cups of eggnog lattés for this season, as eggnog is becoming harder to find around the area.

When we finished our lattés, Kittee headed out to feed the herds and I worked on breakfast. This morning's breakfast was second cutting grass/alfalfa hay for the herds, and for Kittee and I it was wild huckleberry hotcakes w/maple syrup, sausage, and coffee... Mmmmmm good stuff.

While Kittee was outside feeding I notice from our home office window a beautiful sunrise at 8:00 across the backyard buff.Yep, it looked like it might be a beautiful day. While Kittee was out feeding a breeze developed and the temperature rose to 42º before she got back to the house. Some strange weather lately.

Right after breakfast we went back out to pet and grain horses. As soon as this was done we opened the gates to the back/riverside pasture to let the horses run. Coming soon to the McKusterRanchLife YouTube Channel I will be posting the video of the herd romping, running and playing in the snow today. We were out with the herd for about an hour before we decided we need to go to town for some more barn wrapping wire. With the current weather and snow ground coverage/conditions our guys get bored and spend time chewing on the barn wood. It felt like it was getting colder while we were out with the horses and we noticed th Walla Walla to Milton-Freewater (Columbia River) fog bank was moving upriver towards us. Before we left the house the temperature had dropped to 27º. I repeated myself to Kittee...
it's January.

Now, there has been so many times that horse boarders from Milton-Freewater, College Place and Walla Walla, WA have made comment on our ranch weather when those areas were covered with fog and freezing. Today with Kittee driving, I took the camera to see how much difference there might be between here and town/ Walla Walla area.

I will let these pictures tell the story of our trip to town in less than a thousand words...Looking back over our shoulder to check on the herd as we head out...

and into the fog bank a mile and a half down the road.

While downtown the temperature reads...






















Crossing the river bridge leaving town looked like this...










Returning home the ranch house looked like this...










When we get home our temperature reads...

Yep, this is a bit of what it is like to go to town in December, January, and February while living at McKuster Ranch. It is a bit sad to think that most of the folks in our area, not living in the Walla Walla River Canyon, see cold and gray days all winter while we enjoy these sunny ones. Do we and our horses love living here? Youbetcha.

After getting back home for the day, we had lunch and worked on armoring the barn wall with heavy wire mesh from the herd of horse nibblers. While finishing that job, the winds began to blow once again and once again our outside temperature rose to about 37º. It was really a day of up and down temperature range, but we had our very usual dose of sunshine.

It was then about 2:30 and I had to go to work... on the school buses to get them outside the inter-gate double-fenced-system of our equine pasture works, and prepare for travel on Monday. Winter vacation is over at 5:30 a.m. tomorrow.

a day in the life --- Dale

What a differences a day makes...

January 2, 2009 - 8:30 a.m.

January 1, 2009 -- 1:30 p.m.

I was really hoping that we would get a bit more of a break from winter weather than this...

This morning at 4:30 temperature was around 40º, with some rain overnight.
At first light of day the temperature was 38º and the great outdoors was turning white... once again.
The most I can say for this situation is that the horses are not walking around in as much mud today as yesterday.

Enough is enough already... now waiting for spring.

Yes, what a differences a day makes...

Best not to come out to walk around the ranch unless you are wearing you high top muckers, as our morning snowfall added to the mud is getting deep around here.
I am ready to start running my garden tiller again, as I did last January. I do enjoy working in the garden when it is not 100º.

a day in the life at the ranch --- Dale

New Year '09

Just a brief entry to post a Happy New Year to all and to say that since Xmas we have now entered the Mud Season of '09.

Last week we were covered with 12" of snow and everyone around here was getting pretty tired of the stuff.

Then The Chinook winds began to blow, the snow disappeared in about a day. Then for a day where we had had snow; almost all of it turned into a 1" puddle of water, now it is mud where the horses trod. Except for the places that the snow had drifted to 2' everywhere now shows grass and soil once again.

The horses have gone back into the "let's eat the barn" mode again this winter. Silly horses. Tuesday I had the siding contractor that worked on our house this past summer back out to the ranch, and had him take a look at siding our barn in metal this spring. Hopefully we can match the earth tone color of the bluff with new siding ASAP.With the break in the winter weather, my thoughts have turned to outdoor chores around the ranch this spring. From temperatures in the single digits, now nighttime lows are in the 40's and daytime highs have been in the upper 50's. We even had a couple of day of sunshine, springlike weather since Xmas.




One morning the past few day at 8:00 the thermometer outside our bedroom window read...

Actually that morning it was warmer outside at daybreak than inside our house.

Oh, it does feel good to be out from under that blanket of snow.


We are still looking for a new home for Walter. I have been in touch with a couple of pigeon organizations via the Internet this past week. I have made a couple of local contacts that might be interested in taking "him" in. We did find out that Walter was a racing pigeon, but still no idea where his leg bands come from. Today Kittee and I went down to a neighbor's place and picked up a bird cage/house for Walter to live in for the time being.

This morning Kittee as awaken by pigeon coos. As we laid in bed drinking our New Year eggnog latté, we could hear a continuing puff of soft coos coming from the guest room. Pretty neat morning serenade from the bird in the next room.

This past week Rosey turned VIII months old. This is hardly the time of year to have a photo op of a little horse in her scruffy dirty winter coat, but we have got a couple for the record.
Rosey is now over 12 hands tall. It has been very interesting to watch this little horse grow.

Amazing as this may be, for the time being Misty with all her white is the cleanest horse on the ranch.
So as we have come through 2008 all is well. I am enjoying running my school bus routes and having fun with the little ones. Kittee's law practice is going well and even in this time of economical distress, she has five new clients come to her office in the past week or so.

This past week and holiday activities have been very close to home. Last Tuesday morning, while doing nothing I bent over and strained my lower back... stopped me in my tracks. OUCH!!! So all of our holiday activities have been canceled as I shuffle my feet about 6" at a time just to get around. Back is getting better now, hope to be back in shape for next week's "let's go to work" schedule.

As we look at 2009 we are looking forward to working with Rosey and putting her into as many shows as are available locally this next year to get AHA points added to her record. I have made inquiry to find out about the Mark Rashid horsemanship clinic being held this spring near Spokane, WA, and we have a Rusty - Goldie foal on the way... due here in late May.

Happy New Year --- Dale & Kittee