Category Archives: Animals

Where the Longhorn & the Buffalo Play

I hope everyone had a great Father’s Day weekend! This past weekend we headed out to Abilene, Texas to spend time with Spencer’s family and it was incredible. We beat the heat with some relaxing pool time, enjoyed family time with his parents, brother and his girlfriend, played a round of golf where I particularly enjoyed driving the cart and learned that my time at Top Golf has paid off a little bit!

Saturday evening, we drove just outside of town to a ranch and as usual, I was in PURE HEAVEN! When anyone thinks of Texas, longhorns are one of the first things that come to mind. I don’t think that I’ve ever really been close to an entire herd of them, let alone be able to feed them! Spencer wasn’t kidding when he told the owner I could stay out there all day and was loving every single second. I was – it was paradise! They are so lucky to own this property and these gorgeous animals and you can really tell they love the treasure they have been given. The land has been in their family since 1903 and they’re bringing it back to life. These animals are so incredibly beautiful. Not only did we get to pet four horses, there were two buffalo (Gironimo and Buffy) and between 25-30 longhorn including newborn calves. Ah! Let me just share some pictures and let you see for yourself (although pictures do no justice to how beautiful it was as the sun started to go down). I guess it’s true what they say, an Abilene sunset must be on the bucket list when in Texas as well!

This little fella is a little over a year old. She’s well on her way to growing the iconic horns. She’s a beaut!

Meet Touchdown! She likes to come up and say hello (to everyone)!

One of the newest (and let’s be honest – the cutest) little calves on the property. I absolutely love his color and wish I could take him home. Why can’t they stay small like this so I can?

I can’t get over the color of this longhorn! Beautiful! It even carries into his horns.

We learned so much about longhorns during out short visit. One of the things that owners (and buyers) look for is how the horns curve. It’s usually personal preference but typically the wider the horn, the more valuable.

If I remember correctly, 90% of the growth of the horns takes place during the first 12 years of their lives.

I really want to go through and caption each photo – what do you think they’re thinking?

There were two buffalo on the property, Buffy (left) and Gironimo (right). These guys are in charge around here or at least Gironimo is. Basically, they keep the cattle in check, even the big ole bull! Buffalo can live to be over 30 years old. To give a little bit of perspective, Gironimo is only five years old and still has a ton of growing to do. Beautiful. I can only imagine what it would’ve been like to see hundreds of these together hundreds of years ago.

“Don’t go!”

This was honestly the cherry on top of an incredible weekend. I hope you love these photos as much as I enjoyed taking them. They each look like they’re thinking something, maybe along the lines of “make sure you get my good side” or “If I let her take my photo, I bet she’ll give me a treat!”. Someday, hopefully we make our way about out there and ride a couple of the horses and get to be cowboys and cowgirls for a day. A girl can dream right?

Relax, Rewind and Breathe

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Texas is a lot of things. Dallas is the hustle and bustle which I refer to as the “New York City of Texas”. Austin is the college town where everyone wears burnt orange (Hook ’em!). Fort Worth is the laid-back, kick-back big-small town where jeans and boots are more than acceptable. It’s more about personalities and friendliness than appearance. Small town Texas is small town, sometimes the middle of nowhere. Abandoned buildings are sometimes familiar, old town squares, community and rustic charm is evident. Texas is many things but it’s not Vermont for this Vermonter and sometimes I just miss those dairy farms, country roads and everything being familiar. (As you can see, I’m approaching needing a serious trip back home soon.)

Texas does have a certain charm about it and along my travels find things that bring me back. Whether it be that country road, finding old milk cans, sap buckets or even seeing a tractor in a field and nothing is better than white-face Herefords. I have a special place in my heart for those cows. One of my favorite places has to be a friends ranch because it takes away all that wallpaper, glitz and glam of the world and brings you to what it’s suppose to be.

Beauty. Peacefulness. Nature. Fresh air.

For New Years weekend, we spent some time out on his families property where I shared some photos of some of the magnificent animals that we saw (that we don’t even see in Vermont). In this post, I wanted to share some of the items that remind me a little bit of my home state and some of my favorite things, including those great white-face Herefords.

When you think of home, what comes to mind first?

New Years at The Ranch

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Last August, I may have found one of my top three favorite places in Texas. This ranch in the middle of the Hill Country is amazing. Beautiful, relaxing, peaceful. It’s my perfect getaway. I have way too many photographs to share in one post so I’ll start off with some of my favorites.

Cows. I have a soft spot for these herefords.

There’s also these African animals. Wildebeests, kudu, oryx… amazing.

The wildebeests and the cows, well it turns out they’re friends. They were hanging out peacefully. (I’m still trying to figure out if I should or shouldn’t be surprised by this.) Wildebeests are pack animals. Turns out you can be exiled from the group. We saw a solo wildebeest who was out on his lonesome.

The kudu (the animal with the twisty horns below) were terrified of us. It was hard to grab a photo of them up close. Maybe next time.

Its so amazing to see these animals roaming around. I’m pretty certain this was a day in paradise to photograph and watch.

Then there were the turkeys simply taking a stroll.

Now I’m really excited – the elk! (I’ve saved the best for last.) This past summer, I saw one or two elk from afar hanging out in a lake. This visit, I was in for an incredible surprise. Our tickets were front row and center. First off, there was no fence between us and elk. And they are so beautiful. We had stopped to take some photos of the African game and the elk followed us over. They were ready for their photo-opp and to photobomb. How many can say they’ve been photobombed (or taken selfies) with a herd of elk? I’m fairly certain that we could’ve just grabbed some chairs, opened a cooler and sat and watched them all afternoon.

I couldn’t have thought of a better place to be at the start of the new year. The perfect company, beautiful scenery and the best place to enjoy the outdoors.

Cheers for an amazing 2016 to you and yours!