Another day another storm

My wife and I were on our way home from the gallery Sunday night when we had to pass right through an ugly storm.  Lots of rain and heavy hail.  So heavy we had to pull off the road and wait for things to pass over.

As we drove away towards the clear skies ahead, I told my wife to keep watch behind us for a rainbow.  The conditions were right since the sun was now out and if I turned to face the storm, the sun would be behind me.  A couple of minutes down the road, Heather got real excited that a rainbow had appeared.  So I pulled off onto a grid road and positioned myself to see the rainbow with some wind turbines that were built in the Moosomin area last year.

Wow!!  Definitely the nicest rainbow I have ever photographed.  I hope you like it!

Brent

Storm Chasing

Last night my wife and I were going to go to a movie for the first time in ages. We were just leaving the house when we both looked up and saw quite the storm boiling over our heads. It was a few miles across and other than where the storm was, it was sunny.

My wife suggested that we chase the storm rather than going to the movie and after a few seconds, I thought that maybe that was a good idea. As it turned out, we followed the storm along its edges for about 15-20 miles taking lots of images along the way.

Here are a few that really made me smile!!

Cattle Round Up

I was fortunate enough to be able to photograph Ken Piller's cattle round up and branding this year for the second time. It is quite the site to see men and women on horseback moving a cattle herd from the top of the Qu'Appelle Valley to the bottom where corrals had been erected to allow them to process this years calves.

This is like stepping back in time and some of the things done would make PETA members unhappy. But this is a traditional event that has been carried out on ranches for countless years. So if you are concerned about any of the images showing things that might be thought of as cruel, please skip today's BLOG entry.

This young man is the Heeler. He goes into the coral with the calves now separated from their mothers and ropes a calf by both of its back feet. The calf is then pulled out of the coral where a device called a Nord Fork is placed around the calve's neck. Between the Nord Fork and the Heeler putting a little tension on his rope, the calf is immobilized so that it may be processed.

Once the calf is being securely held, it will be vaccinated, branded, tagged on its ear and if it is a bull calf, it may be castrated which means it will grow to be a steer intended for our dinner plates. Sounds awful, but once you actually see this being done, there is little too it. This little girl is nine years old and is about to vaccinate this calf.

Here the ear tag is being placed with a small plastic gun that looks like one used for piercing someones ear (only much bigger of course).

And at the end of the day, the spurs get hung up and everyone settles in for a nice dinner before heading home. A long tough day is done and several hundred calves have been processed and and are returned to the pasture with their mothers.

A fascinating day and I'm grateful Ken and his friends let me come out and see the round up.