Repeating history

Whenever I walk into the shop at my family farm in Illinois, I see the sign that points out the way our family celebrates anniversaries of our country’s founding. Someone painted a white piece of leftover building tin and posted the sign along the main road in our section of the county announcing: Dowell Brothers. Site of the Bi-Centennial Round Up.

It all started with two semi-loads of freshly weaned beef calves. They arrived at our farm on a hot, muggy July day. They came off the truck very confused; only a few days earlier, they were wandering around the wide-open range land in Oklahoma, still nursing from their mothers. Now, they were bawling for their mothers, bumping into hot wire fences as they wandered around their new surroundings. We figured they would settle down in a couple of days. Besides, it was summer, and we kids were heading out to go camping.

We don’t know what exactly happened, but we think a raccoon may have spooked the calves. Since they didn’t know you needed to open a gate before going through, they stampeded right over it in a rush to find freedom and their mothers.

The window air conditioner in my folks’ bedroom drowned out the noise of 150 head of cattle running through the yard and down the driveway. The cattle scattered into tasseled corn fields and down waterways. It wasn’t until the next morning that we discovered an empty feedlot.

Word of the great escape spread throughout the airwaves. Every citizens band radio, party-line telephone and local radio talk show was abuzz with the latest sightings of cattle. Everyone was on the lookout for our missing feeders. Our farm yard felt like Grand Central Station as they came by truck, motorcycle, horseback and even airplane.

I went up in a 2-seater plane with the local funeral director from the grass airstrip outside of town. When we found a group of cattle in the back corner of a field, we would start circling overhead, like an eagle. Eventually, the ground crew would arrive and drive them to someone’s corral for holding.

The first few days were intense. Eventually, the fever started to fade, but we continued searching. Four weeks to the day of the great escape, the last feeder calf was found and returned. We took the sign down from the road and hung it in the shop as a reminder of how great our neighbors are. We closed out the summer with a huge beef BBQ to thank all the people who helped.

It’s hard to believe that this happened 50 years ago when it feels like only last week we were chasing missing cattle. Wait. We were chasing cattle last week, only it was in August this time. It appears history has repeated itself.

I got a call from Austin, asking if I could come out and help him put some cattle back. He had cornered a group of fat heifers in a shed. Sure, I’ve had practice moving cattle over the years. I pushed the cattle out of the shed while Austin positioned them in the right direction. In they went. That was easy, but as I surveyed the lot, I thought it looked a bit thin on numbers. Apparently, every fat heifer wanted a different scenery and walked through a gate they managed to open. We were still missing 43 head.

Austin and I scoured the ground around the yard, looking for tracks to give us a clue as to which direction they went. Nothing. We both jumped on the four-wheeler and started circling the farm. We were looking for trampled weeds in the ditches, rows of corn out of line, manure piles splattered on the road. Nothing. We were almost ready to think that someone may have rustled them out of the lot when we spotted a group of black heads peeking out from under the branches of a tree row. Whew. Now we needed another four-wheeler so we could move these critters across the road and back on our land.

As we were starting to formulate a retrieval plan, a truck pulled in the driveway. He asked if we had cattle out, because a group just crossed the road from a corn field and ended up in a yard. That was our group. Off we flew to sneak behind them to work them northwards to our farm.

There were about 20 head aerating Nick’s yard with their hooves and leaving fresh fertilizer. We started grouping them together for the push home, and then it happened. They took off running, not knowing which way to go. Austin started sprinting to pressure them away from the open hay field. As long as the group stayed together, we were going to be able to handle them by ourselves — that was until one decided she was more interested in what was behind her instead of what was ahead.

Austin kept the group moving into our ditch and through our fields. He even managed to keep them from trampling through the flower garden. Meanwhile, the straggler and I developed our own chase as we found our way home, too. I was surprised at how easily this group worked its way back to the pen. I thought, “We’ve got this.”

We were puzzled at how quickly the group we first found in the tree row had made it to Nick’s yard. We knew we had more cattle to find, so back to the search. Sure enough, we found our lost group just where we had left them. They just needed to cross a quiet road, walk through a recently harvested field and be funneled into an opening in our tree row to find their way back home.

That was our plan. Theirs was a bit different. Just as we had them at the edge of the field and trees, they split. We let those few go back and kept our focus on the ones moving home. We flew across the field, cutting back and forth like a giant slalom skier as we funneled the cattle to the opening in the trees. Another group found its way home.

We went back and attempted three more times to get the last of the lost cattle home. Once we quit and gave them space, the other cattle called them home. By the next day, 18 hours later, everyone found their way back home to feed and fresh water. Apparently, the grass wasn’t greener on the other side.

Schmitt Farm. Home of the Semiquincentennial Round Up

As their four children pursue dairy careers off the family farm, Natalie and Mark Schmitt are exploring new adventures on the farm outside of the milking barn at their farm north of Rice, Minnesota.