Home On The Range (excerpt, 1942)

[Music] thank you [Music] foreign yes we like to sing about the Beauty and the Romance of the Old West but there's a West you might not know about just coming out in June season that's the work a day range country busy making your beef steaks and your lamb chops there are two facts of life out here one's grass the other's water there's no prettier water in the world and you'll find in the range country coming down out of Mountain snow but there isn't always enough of it and it isn't always in the right places the idea is to get the grass and the water together where the cattle and sheep can use them if nature doesn't provide the ranch it had to we've been building a good bunch of water holes in the last few years puddles will do out here it takes a good Big Dam and you got to move quite a pile of dirt it's so costly a lot of us couldn't hardly do it until the government Reigns program gave us a lift lots of places there's water underground too and With a Little Help From The Rains program we put in windmills and water and tanks when you got water you can spread your stock and use all the grass not just wear out the best rains floats around the water holes and ruin it with erosion you get more beef when the cows don't walk it all off blowing 10 miles to get a drink you get more beef on the herd when the grass is good one of the things we're doing in the range program is to plow Contour Furs across the slopes to make the rain soak in so the grass gets all the good of it it's good grass and water that puts the beef on there we're looking for the kinds of grass to do best for us one new kind the rains program has helped introduce his crested wheatgrass there are other kinds adapted to various parts of the range country too they hold the soil they're good for grazing some of them like crested wheatgrass are good for hay [Music] I don't suppose Hollywood ever showed you a cow hand putting up hay but we do it we've even got it mechanized maybe the song says the skies are not cloudy all day but the rains country does get some mighty rough weather and if you want a good calf crop and a beef pound it's coming off the ranch every season you don't just let the cows rustle through the winter no you feed them every stack of hay on the place is just like another insurance policy [Music] if you read some of the story books you'd think barbed wire from ruined the range country back to the matter is a good part of our job is keeping fences up in shape you see we're using barbed wire to make the rains country better keep the cattle off a different piece of it each year until the grass is made of seed and gotten a new star deeper grazing we call it in the range program along with proper stocking it's putting new life into a lot of rages good grass and water mean more lambs and wool too sheep hurting on the Range is a hard lonely life living in a wagon All Season keeping the flock moving along the grass and water bringing them up to the shearing floor with thick fleeces to help keep the world warm that's all part of the year's work in the rains country though and all folks know their jobs they're working harder now because so many things from the rain's country foreign it takes a lot of hands at Roundup too out at Daybreak breakfast at the Chuck Wagon and then get the horses in get a rope on the first Pony in your string and saddle up for the morning's work man's got to be able to take it all day but he'll wear out a couple of horses he must have heard me [Music]