ArizonaRealCountry.com 33 March 2018 CHECK OUR FACEBOOK ABOUT RANCH SORTING AND LESSONS! ALL GIRLS TIMED EVENT CHALLENGE JANUARY 14TH & 28TH Breakaway roping, goat tying, Barrel racing OPEN BULL AND STEER RIDING every Saturday and Sunday obvious than helicopters. The U.S. alone used over a half a million pack mules in WW I and WW II and many thousands of these heroes gave their lives without having the slightest idea why they were doing what they were doing. 300 years ago the early mountain men and westward explorers preferred mules over horses for their sheer toughness and the fact they could stay fit and healthy on whatever forage they could find to eat. 150 years ago mules were preferred for pulling the covered wagons during the westward movement. When the wagon reached its destination the mules provided power for farming. Oxen were cheaper but really slow. Horses required more feed and simply couldn’t take the brutal daily work on the poor feed a mule could. It’s well known that General Crook preferred to ride a mule during the Indian wars in the late 1800s. Many a farmer in the early 1900s could not have made it through the depression without a team of trusty mules. Mines, road and dam construction, and loggers used mules in the hundreds of thousands building the west. Up until the industrial revolution, anywhere efficient raw power for hard, monotonous work was required you could find mules in abundance. All through history the average mule has always (and actually still does) brought more money than the average horse. In many early civilizations, it was considered beneath the dignity of royalty to ride anything but a mule. They have even contributed to our modern slang. With a mare (or a horse) for a Mother and a donkey (or an ass) for a Father, where do you suppose the term “half-ass” came from when describing something that isn’t conventional or just sort of make shift? It takes an even number of chromosomes to reproduce. A horse has 64, the donkey has 62. The mule is a hybrid with 63 so it cannot reproduce. Unfortunately, in the modern world the popularity of the mule, a truly unsung hero, has taken a back seat to the “classically beautiful” horse and become something jokes are made about and it is so wrong! These heroes were never paid a dime but none of what we have today could have come about without them. Seldom were they given even cursory credit for their sacrifice. As incredible as it might sound, the descendants of those untold and unknown heroes still live among us to this day.