From Deseret News archives:
Elk are fun, but horses star at Hardware Ranch
Nikki's the prettiest, but she's a little lazy.
Justice drives Littlefoot crazy, but they stick together because they're a team.
You quickly forget that Billy, Nikki, Justice and Littlefoot are draft horses at Hardware Ranch. The drivers talk about them in such human terms, you struggle to remember that man has yet to sit down and have an educated conversation with a Clydesdale.
The horses are what inspire Shoat Roath to work at the ranch.
"The elk are just a bonus," he said.
"I'm a cross between a sheep and a goat, S-H-O-A-T," he explains to help people remember how to spell his name.
Most of the ranch's visitors come for the elk and perhaps glaze over the most colorful and endearing characters: the cowboys and horses.
After 25 years at the Cache County Fire District, driver Kelly Pitcher chose the ranch over retirement. He likes being with the horses because they "have the same work ethic as the firefighters."
And they do work. These are not the long, lean-legged horses that clear jumps. Their legs are thick and appear to sport giant Sherpa boots. A team of two horses pulls a 3,000-pound sleigh full of 20 people (plus a driver or two) through a large field where about 500 elk are calmly feeding on a mix of meadow grass and alfalfa. The contrast between the horses' body heat and the chilly air causes them to steam like freight trains. Many of the elk don't even stand up as the sleigh passes. Some of them bring themselves to their feet, backside first, and take a few wary steps away from the enormous horses, but none of them run.
They look you in the eyes, chewing slowly and looking a bit bored with the whole affair. They seem tired and wise, completely unaware of the cold. The colors of their coats range from a deep walnut to faded sepia and look like they got a $2 cut from a blind barber. Their scarred sides could convince anyone they lived through a run-in with Old Ephraim.
The sleigh rides last about 20 to 30 minutes with several stops to observe the elk. The snow in the field is about 2 feet deep this year, and the horses' hooves slide as they search for traction.
"They're old and tired," Pitcher said after yelling encouragement to Belle, the "sweetheart" Clydesdale.
Belle and her partner, Beauty, are the ranch veterans. They've been there for more than 10 years. "They're solid, quiet. They do their job," said driver Brad Hunt.
But with those years of experience, the team sometimes takes over.
"They've been doing it for so long, sometimes they just get up and go if you've been in one spot for too long," Hunt said.
