Wesley Howe

Among my cattle are some Texas Longhorns. While not a grand commercial success compared to other breeds, they are gentle and curious (do not mistake my description of gentle as an invitation for inexperienced people to wander about in a pen full of them, they have huge horns and can hurt you by accident).

I was in a pasture among my herd working on some brush clearing, a nearly continuous need here. I had a pile of branches I had pushed over some long while before that I was moving over to combine with some newer I had just removed. In this brush pile a mother rabbit had parked one of her babies, who was now out in the open by himself, and knew not what to do.

 One heifer, whom I call Blanco (she is white, another imaginative name) saw this small bunny and came over to sniff at it to figure out what it was. Cattle are exclusively vegetarians, so she wasn’t looking for a meal. The poor bunny was frozen in place, and finally as the young cow got close she hopped a few feet away.

Undetered, Blanco moved closer to sniff… the bunny hopped. The cycle repeated down the hill until the bunny got close enough to the edge of the  pasture that it saw where some more brush was, and it scurried into the brush. While the young rabbit was undoubtedly terribly frightened at being chased by a huge animal many times its size, the look of puzzlement on the cow as this thing hopped away again and again was amusing.

I run a ranch here, and I like my animals and pets. Observing animal behavior is a part of understanding them, and some of the things I have observed are worth talking about.

Today brought an event of interest, revealing how animals project their own standards on other animals. I have a small dachshund-cross dog, Ludwig (another abandoned animal rescue) that I am just getting house broken. Because Ludwig likes to run off, and there are dangers to a small dog as him on the loose, I walk him on a leash to do his “business”.

This afternoon, the cattle were all up behind the house at the pens when we walked. Included in the herd is a lone female donkey named (imaginatively) Jenny. Ludwig and Jenny have been curious about each other, but wary of getting too close. This afternoon, they were within a foot of each other, across the fence. Jenny reached out and ate some grass from a tuft next to a fence pole. Ludwig saw this, and wanted to eat some of whatever Jenny was having. However, he would not get any closer than about a foot away, and he kept snatching at a few sprigs of grass and pulling back.

I took him for a walk later on this evening, and he dragged me over to the very same spot he was at previously, and I watched him sniff and explore through the fence the spot that Jenny was eating from. Of course, he found nothing but more grass there, but it is obvious that he thought that the donkey would have tastes parallel to his own, and thus whatever it was eating would be something he, too, would like.

Probably Ludwig still believes that, and just regards not finding anything as being caused by Jenny consuming all that was available, not because she was eating ordinary grass. Who would eat grass in preference to meat and bugs?

Later, I will write my story about the Longhorn cow and the baby rabbit.

We have seen a recent example of the anti-citizen attitude among the big-government elitists that are running this country (or maybe flying it into the ground). I am referring to the recently released report by her oneness, Ms. Napoletano, equating anti-government positions right-wing and dangerous, and further characterizing military veterans as a threat.

This should be no surprise, just look at the vast numbers of former Clinton political appointees that are back in control in Washington and you will see that the same people that shot and killed unarmed people in Idaho, turned tanks with indendriary devices loose on wooden structures in Waco and sent 150 SWAT team members complete with boots, bullet-proof vests and high-power weapons to snatch a boy from an unarmed home in Miami are running the show now.

If the agenda is big government, then anyone that thinks there is more than enough government already must be “anti-government” and these sort of attitudes should be investigated, unless they should spread and infect others with the spirit of self-determination. After all, this tea party stuff must be subversive, and if it catches on it will seriously erode the “mandate” that the Democrats have.

As usual, the Democrats are overreaching, and know it. They are determined to reverse twenty years of  policy changes in Mr. Obama’s first 100 days in office, which are just about over. It appears they have now hit a point of popular resistance to their efforts, and they don’t like it.

Nevertheless, watch the news… it won’t be long before we once again see our goverment protecting us from these dastardly anti-governmental agitators with troops, automatic weapons and armed personnel carriers. Darned civil liberties freaks… up against the wall!