I'd heard a lot of people talk about the good kinds of cattle dogs. I'd heard them brag about Border Collies, and Australian Shepherds, and McNabs, and Kelpies, and I had been wondering what kind of cowdog I should get.
It was just a freak of nature that my oldest boy, Mark, had found this dog tied to a fence at this guy's ranch. It had been tied there for quite some time. The guy said he wasn't gonna turn him loose because he had too much trouble catching him and had too many problems with him. So he sold him to my son pretty cheap. He might have even given him to him.
My son brought him home, and I asked what the heck kind of dog he was. My son said he was a quarter Border Collie, a quarter Australian Shepherd, a quarter Kelpie, and a quarter McNab. I thought, "Well now. I've got it made. I've got a quarter of every kind of dog I've ever heard bragged on. That will make one whole really good dog." It never crossed my mind that there was the possibility that I'd get four quarters that weren't any good at all.
My son had started workin' this dog, and he named him Blue. He had one blue eye and one-half of a blue eye. The reason for this story is to kinda give you an idea of how Blue came to earn is official name, Psycho Blue Dog from Hell. But, when we first got him, his name was just Blue.
Now, I hadn't been in our country too long, out in northeast Oregon, and had heard that the best outfit to work for was the Stirrup brand, an outfit run by a family ranch name of McClarren. So I'd been tryin' real hard for a chance to ride for the McClarren outfit, and I finally got my chance. They had a bunch of yearlin's that they needed to round up, and gather in and sort off the heavies, and they needed some extra help.
Now, previously, the McClarrens had asked me to start a couple colts for them, which I had done. I thought, I'm really going to impress these guys and get a chance to work for them full time. I'm gonna ride one of the colts I started for them, and I'm gonna take my dog, and I'm gonna go out there and put on a show. I'd been working with this dog. He was working alright for me, but I did have a little bit of a handle problem on him once in a while.
So we get out there to the McClarren's Ranch, and we get these yearlin's gathered up, and we're kinda easin' them back toward the corrals so as not to get them too stirred up. We're lookin' for heavies, and we don't want to run the fat off of them. We're easin' them off this hill, and this Blue Dog all of a sudden decides that, for some reason or another, he needs to scatter this bunch of 800 yearlin's. So he just bores into the middle of this bunch. He's yappin' and bitin' and takin' ahold, and I'm cussin' him and hollerin' and probably not doin' much to help keep the herd gathered up because I'm after the dog, and we're scatterin' cattle every which direction.
By now, I'm thoroughly
embarrassed, and the only thing I can think of to do is get that
dog out of there, and he ain't gonna let me catch him, so I break
down my rope, and I ride up there. He's so busy chasin' and bitin'
these yearlin's that he don't see me comin'. I ride in there
and danged if I didn't probably throw the best loop of my life,
and I snagged this dog bigger than heck right around the middle.
Well, I just take a dally, spin this horse around, and take off at a full run back for headquarters. I'm ridin' hard, headin' for the ranch house. I'm gonna lock him up in the horse trailer when I get back there. And, of course, by now everyone is watchin' me because they've seen all this crap goin' on anyways.
So I'm goin' along there at a pretty good gallop, and the colt's workin' good, and the dog's dragging on the end of the rope, and I'm thinkin' I've got things together really good.
Now, Blue ain't likin' it back there. He's growlin', and snarlin', and yippin', and kiyiin', and just havin' a fit. All of a sudden, he realizes he can run faster than this horse. I feel some slack in this rope, and I look back and there's a big belly in the rope and that Blue Dog's comin' right up behind me.
Not only does he realize he's faster than this horse, but he realizes he can heel this horse. He runs right up that rope and starts bitin' that colt on the heels, and this colt breaks in half and goes to buckin' and launches me, with my great bronc ridin' abilities, about 15 feet in the air. I come down on my back.
I had the McCarty tucked up through my belt, and the pigtail somehow had worked its way down through the loop. I get the whiplash deal out of this thing, and I get one of them crack-the-whip on the end of my McCarty as the horse is bouncing me along, and the dog's still on the end of the rope because the dallies didn't come off. By now he's done bitin' this colt, so he comes around the front of the horse and decides to bite me.
So I'm gettin' drug along the ground by my McCarty while the dog's chewin' on me on the end of my riata. It was not a pretty sight.
The cowboys are thinkin' this is a pretty good deal, and the patriarch of the family, Jack McClarren, kinda rides over towards me. By now the wreck is over with. The dallies came off, the dog got loose, and I got the horse calmed down. I climbed back on him and was coiling up my rope, and Jack rides up to me.
"Havin' a little trouble with your dog?" he asks.
So I figured by then that I'd never get hired by these guys. But, to make a long story a bit shorter I took Blue and put him in the trailer, we got the cattle rounded up and sorted, and danged if they didn't hire me. I think it was for my entertainment value.
I gotta say my son really came out well on this deal because he was still usin' Blue once in a while and he was still livin' at home. He found out about this whole wreck, and he found out, too, that after I roped and dragged that dog that day, that Blue didn't like ropes anymore. But he wasn't like the typical dog that, when you pick your rope up and spin it he runs under the pickup or the shed. When you'd pick up a rope and spin it, if you looked at Blue Dog, you were gonna get bit. You could rope the ropin' dummy or cattle and you were fine. But if you looked at Blue, spun your rope, here he'd come. If you were horseback, he'd jump right in the saddle with you.
Now, my son, Mark, was tryin' to be a professional rodeo cowboy. And those guys are pretty good at findin' ways to make money because they're not really into work that much. And so he came up with this great idea to make money. He plays off the rodeo cowboy ego and starts bettin' people 20 bucks that they can't rope that dog without gettin' bit.
Well, they were tryin' things like climbin' up in the dog catcher on the pickup and havin' Blue walk by and throw a rope at him. Blue would jump up on the hood, jump up in the dog box and bite 'em. One guy, one day, got inside his pickup, rolled down his window, waited there, had Blue come by, reached out and roped him really quick and rolled the window up. Blue waited there, underneath that pickup, till the guy finally got out, and Blue nailed him.
Mark made a lot of money off of that dog because it was hard to find a cowboy who didn't believe he could rope that dog without gettin' bit. The cowboy ego worked against them. Finally the word got around, "Don't do it!" and cowboys quit tryin'.
I always had a deal with Blue that I would leave him in the pickup, and I wouldn't chain him up, but I had to be back in two hours. If I wasn't back in two hours, the deal was off and he could do whatever he wanted to do.
Well, rodeos usually last two-and a-half hours. I was at the Chief Joseph Days Rodeo, and it was rolling up on bull-riding time. I was there at the buckin' chutes and my son was ridin' an exhibition bull that night because he was too young to be in the PRCA. We were kinda gettin' ready to go. Rob Smets is the bull fighter, and he's out there in the arena protecting cowboys and fightin' bulls.
Then I hear over the arena loud- speaker, "SOMEBODY GET THAT DOG OUT OF THE ARENA."
At first it didn't dawn on me, but then I hear my daughter who is out there in the grandstands. There are 3,000 or 4,000 people in those grandstands, but I can hear my daughter, holler "HEY DAD, THAT'S BLUE."
I'm thinkin' "Oh, no!" So I jump up on the buckin' chutes and I look and there's the Blue Dog standin' out there in the arena. This bull comes out of the chute about then and starts buckin' and Rob Smets goes in to make a pass at this bull to get him to turn back the other way.
Blue's thinkin' that Rob needs some help, and so Blue runs in there to grab the nose on this bull while he's buckin'. He trips Rob wipes him plumb out on the arena floor. The bull sees that and comes around there and mucks Rob Smets out big time.
Rob
jumps up, and he's runnin' around there, and Blue takes off through
the out gate.
Now, everybody, including me, thinks Blue's gone, but he just ran outside that gate and he's laying down there and just waitin'. By this time, the bull has bucked the cowboy off and he sees Rob so he swings back around toward him. Rob starts to make another pass at him, and Blue comes out from under the gate and nails Rob this time!
Down Rob goes again! And, WHAM, that bull nails Rob again.
I'm sittin' up there - It ain't my dog. I never seen that dog before in my life.
Somebody next to me on the buckin' chute says, "Ain't that your dog?"
"Nope. Ain't my dog. I ain't never seen him before. I don't know where that dog came from."
People are throwing things at the dog, the rodeo announcer is yellin' at the dog, everybody's hollerin'.
Finally, Blue, who is pretty good at figurin' out when it's time to go, has done his thing so he just disappears out into the night.
I leave there, and my daughter is still yellin' "DAD, WASN'T THAT BLUE?"
And I'm goin' "Shhhhhh! Shhhhh!"
So I go out to the parking lot, and Blue is sitting in the back of the pickup, just as good as he can be.
Well, I've got other Blue Dog stories, but now maybe you can
understand how he earned his official, full, complete name of
Psycho Blue Dog from Hell.
