Working Ranch Magazine March/April 2025

Step 1. Double your tie-down rope to make a loop

Step 2. Insert both back legs in the loop above the hock

PAULETTE MASTAD

PAULETTE MASTAD

Step 3. Bring both tail ends of the rope between the legs below the loop (each hock now has a loop around it)

Close up showing the tail end of the rope is below the hock loop

PAULETTE MASTAD

PAULETTE MASTAD

I BY TERRI MASON, VIA MILT MASTAD TIE ‘EM RIGHT THE SAFEST WAY TO TIE DOWN A CALF n one smooth move, Milt Mastad of Single Seven Ranch near McCord, Saskatchewan (just north of Montana) revolu tionized calf handling in south ern Saskatchewan, using a tech nique passed down in his ranch born knowing how to do it that way.’ So, it has come down through quite a few generations in our family.”

these calves,” he continued. “The calves that I had tied down were all fine. But there was one calf that had been tied down with three legs, flat on its side, overheating. Fortunately, it was close to a water-filled pothole. I dragged it into one of the potholes to get it cooled down enough that it didn’t die. If I’d been there a half hour later, it would probably have been a dead calf.” “To me, that was proof that one of the big advantages is that calves tied down this way can regulate their heat and can cool down, whereas if they’re just laid out on their side, tied by three legs, they can’t. If you tie the young calf down by their feet, like you’d see at a rodeo, to tie them down tight enough so they can’t escape, you will actually cut the circulation off to their feet,” explained Milt. “A few cowboys have told me, “You’ve got to start sharing this; nobody knows about it,” he laughed,

“It was probably six or seven years ago; I was helping my neighbor and we had kind of a wreck; a bunch of calves ran back,” Milt explained. “I had a dozen or so tie-down ropes on my saddle. Quite a few good hands were helping that day, and there were cow boys going here, there and everywhere, roping these calves. I just went around behind them and tied the calves down the way that we do,” he said. “Every cowboy asked me, ‘What are you doing there, exactly?’ None of them had ever seen it done like this before and these were experienced cowboys,” said Milt. “That was when I realized that not everybody tied calves down like us.” “When we finally got the cattle in, I went out there with a truck and trailer about an hour or so later to pick up

ing family for multiple generations. This method of tying has saved countless calves that have to be immo bilized for an extended period, whether for one minute to an hour or more. “I thought this was how everybody tied calves down,” said Milt Mastad. “This is the way we did it because this was the way my dad did it. So, I asked my dad who taught him, and he said, ‘I don’t know; from the time that I was a kid, everyone that I rode with did it that way.’ So, my dad, Calvin, went to my great-uncle Doug Eklund who is in his 90s, and asked him, ‘Where did this come from?” My great-uncle’s response was, ‘I’m not sure. We were

48 I MARCH 2025 WORKING RANCH audited readers run 21 million head of beef cattle.