Look ma, my first rodeo

Growing up in Bellevue, rodeo was a foreign word to me. It was something that represented the cruel treatment of animals for the purpose of entertaining crazed spectators who cheered the mistreatment of animals.

I learned this from television. It would show me the worst treatment of rodeo animals available on tape. The programs made it seem logical that a horse or bull would not want a strap around its flank or that a calf would disagree with having a rope thrown around its throat and pulled tight just to have someone put them on their back and their legs tied together.

Even back then I knew it was just one side of the story and an extreme side at that, but the practice of riding bucking animals did make me curious. I knew I would always reserve judgment about rodeos, good or bad, for when I had the both sides of the story. It goes by the old saying, "don't knock it till you try it."

Recently I had such an opportunity as I wrote a story previewing the Moses Lake Roundup Rodeo. I got the run-down on the events, bareback, saddle back, bull riding, individual and team calf roping, steer wrestling and barrel racing. Organizers showed me the stock and explained their routine; eat, sleep, travel, buck for eight seconds, eat, sleep and travel. It sounds like a hard life.

The organizers went on to say that good stock is comprised of animals that buck big and buck consistently or every time their in the arena.

It made me think that the good stock actually liked what they did or would not exhibit the desirable trait of big and consistent bucking.

Those thoughts were reaffirmed when I attended my first rodeo during Grant County Fair week.

If I didn't know better, the horses used in the saddle bronc riding event were happily strutting around the arena after having bucked off their rider or given him a good shaking for eight seconds.

The bulls were especially telling in their body language. They would buck a rider or finish the eight seconds and immediately look for more suitors along the fence and after having been satisfied, would confidently trot through the gate to join the rest of the stock. My guess is the bulls felt superior to the horses because they could buck off their riders more consistently.

I am sure all the stock trade notes on how to achieve a more successful buck.

For the roping event, it is hard to argue for the comfort of having a someone lasso you by the neck and pull the rope tight, but cowboys have been doing such a thing for quite some time and it is a necessary skill in their line of work.

However, from observing the calf's behavior, it seemed they understood the activity as a game.

There is no other way to explain the air of satisfaction they displayed when lucky enough to escape the rope or duck the loop. They would simply trot slowly to the pen with the rest of the stock and no doubt receive kudos for their winning the game.

And steer wrestling seemed imminently more uncomfortable and harmful to the cowboy who is falling from his horse to the neck of a horned animal only to stop its momentum completely and wrestle its body to the ground. A few times the calf got away and made that satisfied strut to the other side of the arena where it would join its fellow stock.

I said it looked like the bucking horses had fun, but I think some other horses had even more fun. Those would be the horses competing with the women in the barrel racing. The horse and rider looked so natural riding at full speed and making hairpin turns around barrels.

The issue of safety comes up at rodeos and whether or not the stock is in danger. Make no mistake, the stock, unless for some freak accident, is in no danger to itself or from anyone in the arena. The riders, on the other hand, are under the constant threat of serious bodily harm or even death from these animals. There is the threat of falling under an animal, getting struck by their hooves or horns or the general stress on the body from the violent rides.

I can say what I saw and experienced at my first rodeo was everything I had never seen on TV before. There were fun events with serious competitors and the star attraction was not just the riders but the horses and bulls they rode.

David Smithburg is the sports editor

for the Columbia Basin Herald.