North Dakota Cattle Rustlers

[7shooter]

Rustlers beware in North Dakota. When I was a kid in Burleigh County North Dakota my uncle and I were driving along a seldom used narrow dirt road toward dusk when a man with a Winchester rifle stopped us. Some of his cattle had been rustled recently and he was doing his own neighborhood watch program. He checked the bed of my uncle's old pick up and then asked us to keep our eyes open for anything out of the ordinary. My uncle who was also a cattleman told me he admired the man's action. Here is a link to a story about modern day cops and cattle rustling. I didn't know the Cattlemans Association was still active in that field.

North Dakota Stockmen?s Association still investigates cattle rustling

 

[Herknav]

The Oklahoma Cattleman's Association sure is.

 

[Texas Star]

Was this man on his own land, or did he stop you on a public road?

 

[7shooter]

It was a public road. It was also the 50's. Things were done different then. I once watched my Dad throw a drunk through a closed door who had been making obscene remarks to one of the women who worked for him . There were no legal repercussions. Another time a burglar was spotted in our store late one night. The cops used tear gas and the next day they offered to give my Dad the crooks car to make up for the damages. It was a 1950 Ford with a big Olds engine. He didn't take it because when the guy got out he might seek revenge. My brothers and I argued strenously for keeping it but did not prevail. Another situation was when the son of a friend of my grandfather came home drunk as usual to find his wife in bed with an oil man. He pulled out his revolver and shot the oil man in the butt as he was diving out the window. No charges there either although it did spawn some great jokes such as the one about how that already well to do family had finally struck oil. It was also an era when from time to time there would be an article in the paper about how a cowboy had gotten drunk and ridden his horse into one of the saloons near the local stock yards.

It's easy to get nostalgic just thinking about the 50's.

 

[The Last Standing Knight]

Have a similar set up here in Texas.

If I remember the name correctly, it is The Texas Southwest Cattleman's Association. I don't know if they do in this day and age, but they had range detectives at one time who were often commissioned as peace officers in a manner similar to railroad police.

The Original Texas Rangers still investigate cattle rustling and horse theivery (among other things). Rustling and cattle go together like dogs and fleas; where there's one, there's the other. It's still a problem down here...it just doesn't make the headlines very much.

 

[Damn Yankee]

I hope Mr Iggy see's this thread, I'm sure he will have some great stories to tell when he was in his youth.

 

[Iggy]

You wouldn't want to be caught stealing cattle in Wyoming.
You might get to lie in the mud or a snow drift until a Deputy Sheriff that never gets off the highway figures out how to get out there and rescue you from the landowner.


I must have been typin at the same time as DY... *G*

The livestock board kinda wanted me to hire on as a range detective, but I ain't to keen on bein' listed with the likes of Tom Horn and Ed Cantrell in the history books and archives.

 

[Kelly Green]

I currently have thirty-six head of Angus. Four years ago a couple of scumbags cut the chain on one of my pasture gates and drove a stock trailer onto the property. They loaded up eight of my girls and drove off. My neighbor was driving down the road at the time and saw it happening. He just assumed that I had sold some of the cattle. The rustlers and cattle were never found. I now have two big collies that stay with the herd all day.

Under Texas law, cattle rustling is still a hanging offense even though hanging ended in the state in 1928.

 

[cass]

Every time I take livestock to the sale barn, each head is inspected by a inspector looking for brands of reported stolen stock. The ones found always come from several counties away.

 

[Iggy]

The brand inspectors don't see the ones that go in someone's freezer.
If it weren't so difficult to get rid of some rustler's pickup and trailer, there might be a few less of them rascals still around.

 

[jlrhiner]

We'll have no more of these shenanigans, I'll get my rope.........