Chapter Sixteen: Dwelling in Safety and Taming Horses

  Watching Thomas take one of the horses to demonstrate several times, Ju An also practiced several times, and then decided to make a move on the bean grass.

  After finishing brushing the horses in the morning, Wayne and Nancy continued to take care of the cattle and sheep, while Thomas and Juan drove the bean straw into an enclosure surrounded by a circle of large wooden boards.

  Away from the herd, Beanstalk was a bit restless, kicking at the wooden boards that surrounded her and running around the enclosure every now and then. Quiet Anne and Old Thomas stood in the middle of the pen.

  "Don't rush, An, wait for it to calm down first, look at you in the past, pay attention to make sure it's looking at you, focus on you," Thomas and Guanbi said as they rowed.

  The bean grass ran for a while and seemed to feel that it couldn't run out, so it came back and forth in the field, occasionally making nasal sounds.

  At this time, Ju An swung out a lasso and looped it around Dou Cao's neck. Dou Cao immediately sprang into action. Wanting to get rid of the noose on his neck, following Old Thomas' hint, after loosening several rounds of the rope, Dou Cao stopped moving. He looked at Ju An and Thomas.

  "Now it's quieted down, approach slowly, easy does it, take the noose, don't let him shift his gaze" Old Thomas gave a gentle push to Ju An.

  Jū an took a few steps towards Dòu Cǎo and stopped. Then he found that Dòu Cǎo had already turned his whole body around, with his head facing him directly.

  They remained in a stalemate for several minutes, and then Ju An took another few steps forward, now only about four or five steps away from Dou Cao. Dou Cao's gaze was still fixed on Ju An.

  After a few more minutes, Ju An took another step forward and stretched out his right hand. At this time, Dou Cao also took a step closer to Ju An and stretched out his nose, as if he wanted to sniff Ju An's scent.

  Standing still and waiting for Bean to come over, as Old Thomas had instructed, Bean's head suddenly twitched a little, and Standing Still knew that he was going to move forward, something had caught Bean's attention.

  Xiao Xiao took a small step forward, refocusing Bean Sprout's attention on himself, bringing the safe distance between them to only about two steps.

  At this time, Bean Grass finally took a step forward, sniffing at Ju An's hand with his nose, and then moved forward a bit more, so that Ju An's palm could touch the bridge of Bean Grass's nose.

  Gently stroking the big horse's face, Bean Grass was thoroughly enjoying this moment and took another half step forward, bringing his entire head into Ju An's embrace.

  It took more than half an hour of effort to get the bean grass completely relaxed.

  Next, under Thomas's guidance, the first time to put water reins on Beanstalk, then put on reins. After comforting for a while, the sweat pad was placed on Beanstalk's back.

  All this went unusually smoothly.

  Old Thomas also said: "It likes you, An".

  After waiting for a few minutes to see if the bean grass would resist, Ju An picked up the saddle and swung it onto the horse's back. Then he observed the bean grass, muttering in his heart, "Don't jump, don't jump." It was unclear whether the bean grass could understand Ju An's mind, but apart from standing there shaking its head, it didn't move at all.

  After cinching up the belly band, Bean showed no resistance to the saddle.

  After tightening the bellyband, one end of the lasso was lightly tapped on the bean grass, and the bean grass immediately jumped up, then jumped a few more times before stopping, letting Ju An breathe a sigh of relief. If it didn't stop jumping, it would mean that the horse was very resistant to the saddle, which would be a bit troublesome. Fortunately, the bean grass's performance was okay.

  After finishing all this, it had taken over an hour, Thomas and Gwain left the corral, leaving Bean in the corral to get used to the saddle on his back for a few hours.

  Wait until evening to take off the saddle from the back of the bean grass.

  The next morning, it was a matter of driving the cow and two or three horses into the corral, then saddling up the cow, all of which went very smoothly.

  Ju An leaned on the saddle, put his left foot on the stirrup, tried it out, and saw that the bean grass did not resist, so he flipped onto the horse.

  Then stroked the neck of the bean grass, giving the bean grass affirmation.

  With a gentle push on the saddle, the bean grass started walking, its pace very light and nimble.

  "What a beautiful little guy, look at its high-stepping action, it's really great!" Old Thomas also praised on the side: "It's indeed a royal horse, with elegant posture, what a pity if only it were black."

  "The black Friesian is four thousand dollars but can't be bought," said Ju An with a smile as he sat on the back of the bean grass.

  After a few paces, Old Thomas opened the gate of the enclosure, and Jefferson shook the reins and walked out, with Old Thomas getting up behind him, protecting Jefferson.

  Arrived at the pasture, Ju An let go of the reins and let Dou Cao run freely for a while. The practice of these days was not in vain, with chest out and belly out, he quickly adapted to Dou Cao's pace.

  "Giddy up! Giddy up!" Ju An shook the reins, clutched the horse's belly, and the bean cart accelerated.

  Soon, the horse's mane fluttered in the wind, and it seemed as if there was a humming sound in my ears. The four hooves of the bean grass under me flew up and down, pounding on the grassland with a rapid "hui hui" sound.

  "The horse" neighed loudly and happily as it galloped. It seemed to be enjoying the run as well.

  Looking back, I found that Old Thomas was also riding closely behind, and when Ju An turned his head, Thomas lightly touched the brim of his hat.

  Yu An also looked at Thomas and stroked his own hat brim.

  Two men and two horses were galloping across the pasture. All that could be heard was the refreshing sound of the wind, and from time to time, the loud shouting of Old Thomas.

  When two horses galloped past the herd of cows, Hui En shouted loudly at Ju An: "BOSS! Alfalfa Perfect!"

  After running for a while, Ju An stopped the horse and patted the neck of Dou Cao, who was already slightly sweating and breathing heavily. He then gently stroked him.

  "Great, congratulations to you, your riding skills have improved a lot. Just now my hands were always on the reins, it seems that in the future I won't need to accompany you, you can already ride alone." Thomas said with a smile.

  "Thanks, Thomas. Handing me so much, if it wasn't for the things you taught me, I reckon my thigh skin would have been worn out from riding for so long." said with a serious expression while looking at Thomas.

  "Thanks for the compliment," Thomas said with a pleased smile that creased his face.

  Taking deep breaths of the fresh air, I looked up to see the snow-capped peaks of the giant house mountain, and then gazed at the sky's brilliant blue without a single cloud, my entire body seemed to be jumping with every pore.

  "It's really too beautiful!" exclaimed with heartfelt admiration.

  "Yes, An, I've lived here for decades and I still think Montana's sky is the most beautiful." Thomas also smiled and said "Otherwise how can it be called Big Sky Country?"

  After admiring the beautiful scenery, Ju An and Thomas rode their horses back and forth.

  As they walked to the herd, Huai En was examining a pregnant cow. Seeing Ju An and his companion approaching, he greeted them and said: "There are several cows that will give birth next month, I think we should increase their nutrition, these days we'll prepare more oats for them, this group of cows is really good, basically no parasites after my examination."

  Jū ān nodded and walked over to the mother cow, stroking the cow's ear with a large yellow plastic tag, saying "Hmm, I'll do as you said."

  Raised her head and looked at a group of cows scattered eating grass, each ear had a palm-sized sign nailed on it, with the words "Xi River Ranch" written on it, followed by a number.

  "These past few days I've been busy with this, giving each cow a number, it's easier to manage and control diseases." Thomas saw that Juan was interested in the tags and explained "Once all the cows are gathered, we'll brand them with the ranch's mark."

  This is clear to prevent cattle from running into other pastures, ranchers usually brand their own marks on the cattle, especially fierce bulls. With a brand, unnecessary disputes can be avoided.

  Old Tom stayed behind with Wyan to continue checking the cows, while Juan rode back to the stable, removed the saddle and bridle from Bean's back, and let him go graze in a nearby herd of horses.

  Watching the bean grass leisurely mixed with several horses, big mouthed and eating the green grass, Ju An stroked it twice. At this time, Xue Hua also walked over from one side, gently rubbing its head against Ju An.

  Patted these two guys casually, and then prepared to go back to cook.

  Just then Nancy led her black horse over, and she had spent the whole morning taking care of that group of sheep and several divine beasts.

  "Hi! An," Nancy said with a smile and waved at Ju-an.

  "Hi Nancy!" Nancy also waved back at her.

  After a period of getting to know each other, Thomas and Wayne also got to know Nancy. Nancy grew up on the ranch below, didn't attend much school, basically just graduated from high school and helped out on the ranch.

  She doesn't even know how to get online and doesn't have an email account. Her boyfriend works as a DJ at the radio station, so on Sundays, Nancy usually goes to see him. Anyway, for the past two weeks, it's been Nancy who has gone over there every weekend.

  Old Thomas didn't think much of this relationship. In the eyes of old cowboy Thomas, not working on a ranch was basically equivalent to being unemployed. Moreover, according to Thomas, Nancy's boyfriend was quite handsome, so naturally there were more girls around him. Fortunately, Nancy seemed to love him very much, and their relationship was still stable for now.

  Wayne was a shy young fellow, very industrious, always busy with something to do, and in his spare time he would be found in his little workshop making saddles, the trade which had been handed down from old Thomas's father. Thomas used to make them too, but as people bought fewer handmade saddles in recent years, he stopped doing it.

  Nowadays, most are brand-made saddles, which are much cheaper than handmade saddles. Of course, in terms of comfort, handmade saddles are much better, and the price is also more expensive than machine-made saddles by about a third. In addition, now everyone talks about efficiency, so handmade saddles have gradually fallen out of favor.

  When Nancy untied the reins, Ju Anhe walked with her back and forth. At noon, it was usually the collie's turn to watch over the cattle and sheep. Everyone else would return for lunch. Then they would bring food for Hu Tou and the others.

  Three guys' task is, Hu Tou watches the sheep, Suo Tou and Pi Dan are in charge of the cattle, many people reflect that the three guys are still relatively reliable, diligent and hardworking, Ju An thinks he didn't waste his efforts on these three comrades.