Seven Unexpected Lessons From A Ranch

When we originally decided to go from neighborhood living to ranch property, a lot of people questioned our decision. Nevertheless, living on acreage property with our animals has taught us some of life’s lessons that we might not have otherwise learned.

Firstly, what we were taught in storybooks as children proved completely wrong for us. A pig and a wolf (hybrid in this case, but still very wolfy) are not natural enemies. In fact, they can love each other. It all began when we picked out our wolf hybrid from a rescue. We had asked the gentleman who ran the rescue whether he thought the wolf could live peacefully with our children, pig, horses, goat, cats, other dogs, and chickens he would have to share the ranch with. The man said he thought this wolf could totally fit in, so off we went to see how it would go. Luger, as we named him, actually was surprisingly trustworthy around everyone. He was especially good with our chickens (which our other dogs sadly were not)


and was even super gentle with every creature from wild ducks who flew into our yard to hang out by him to tiny kittens who were inadvertently born to a stray cat who had recently adopted us.
What really was extraordinary though was what happened between our pig, Perdy, and Luger. When the young pig went into heat, she chose Luger as her man and chased him around our ranch so much, she got heat stroke. We had to have her emergency spayed, and even after her spaying she would frequently hang out with Luger but not with the other dogs. It was hilarious watching them in the yard because as Perdy grew, she would go underneath Luger until he would get high centered, and he would look awkward and embarrassed as he unwillingly would have to ride along on her back until he wiggled free. Consequently, we had to believe that pigs and wolves can fall in love or at least be good buddies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIUWXF4pWsc

Secondly, another thing we learned is that kingsnakes are really good to have around. They will eat rattlesnakes and yard pests, so they are actually very welcome in our yard. In addition, tarantulas are pretty cool too. We have several, and although I thought they were freaky at first, I found out that ours are pretty mellow and some are even beautiful. Each tarantula actually has a unique and sometimes beautiful pattern, and they even have different personalities. Another local Realtor tells a story frequently about a tarantula who was apparently friendly as he visited a family year after year and lived in their home as a welcome guest. She said he would hang out on the couch and watch TV, but sadly I don’t think he returned this year.
Thirdly, another super useful tidbit that we learned is that one can relocate gophers somewhat humanely although the end result is a bit strange. We truly love animals, so when our horse pasture was becoming overrun by gopher holes, we knew we had to do something. Horses can easily slip into the holes which cave in under the horse’s weight and it can cause a devastating injury. Regardless, we didn’t want to hurt the gophers because they actually are somewhat cute. We discovered that if you turn a garden hose on and let it run into the gopher holes, sooner or later a gopher will pop up wet and angry. Since they don’t have very good eyesight, one can grab them pretty easily and pop them into a shoe box or other suitable container. That is where it became a bit weird though because we found that we quickly had a box quite full of gophers. Luckily we had state land nearby where we could let the little guys resume their gopher lives freely, but alternatively a box full of gophers could maybe make an interesting gift for someone? Nonetheless, it seems to be better than killing them.
Fourthly, there is also a goat lesson we regrettably learned that if a goat gets out of her pen, she will always seek out only the newest and shiniest vehicle to climb upon. Moreover, if she can add danger to her outings it is all the better as glass sun roofs and glass patio tables are super desirable to a goat as climbing areas.

Fifthly, we also just learned that what we thought were mosquito eaters are actually crane flies and do not eat mosquitoes. I just googled that one because we relocated two “mosquito eaters” last night which is a kind of freaky thing to achieve. We saved them from our cats and set them free so that they could keep helping the neighborhood by eating mosquitoes. Lo and behold when I googled them today, I was amazed to see that according to several websites such as Wikipedia, mosquito eaters do not actually eat mosquitoes.
Sixthly, don’t always believe the person who tells you, “This horse is 16, bombproof, and a perfect kids horse.” This lesson is especially useful because after you buy him (stupidly without riding him because someone had to rearend us on the freeway on our way to look at the horse putting my back out of commission for two months…) invariably “Teton” will really turn out to be 6, wildly unpredictable and untrained, and will let your child ride him happily for two days before bucking him off just when you are really enjoying introducing them to the “love of horses.”



Lastly, the most important lesson we learned from living on a ranch, is that life’s drama is sometimes entirely unavoidable so we truly have to make the most out of every day. After dealing with various animal tragedies, we ultimately realized that one truly has to enjoy every day as much as possible regardless of what life throws at us. We found that it was extremely important to make sure we are doing a job that makes a positive difference in the world and that our hearts are truly passionate about. My husband and I soon realized that we had inadvertently gotten caught up in working endlessly to try to make a living as having our plethora of ranch animals proved to be somewhat expensive. We were working countless stressful hours without reprieve thinking that down the road we would get a chance to relax a bit and enjoy life again. After dealing with the inevitable dramas that ranch life entails, we realized that we have to appreciate and enjoy life right now, and we definitely have to try to laugh as often as possible and make what we can of the present.