Around here everyones just starting to ship cattle. I went down to a neighbors and he had his grandkids over. Helped him grain his steers and watched his other neighbor chasing a steer on a four wheeler, ran it right through the fence. ruined the fence, and he came into our pasture to chase it back through. I had to run out and catch my horse and volunteer to get the cow for him before he ran our horses through the fence too. i got on and he left the field, the steer was so worked up that it wouldnt slow down for love or money, and ended up jumping through another fence and i had to chase him back. I went to walk him through the gate and he was still worked up enough that he chose to jump a wheel line run down the fence, and bust back through the fence he came in through. Caused me all sorts of problems and wasted my time. I was gonna go work with a colt im starting for a guy, but by the time i got the steer back in and rode over to his house it was dark. So dont chase your cows on a four wheeler please, you only cause problems for your neighbors, and run the pounds off of your beef.

Yeah, it's getting hard to find even a free day's work of pushing cows. Everyone around here would rather run'm with 4-wheelers. I was taught that the object of raisin' cows was to put weight on'm, not run it off. Maybe it's that new lean beef marketin' plan.

I agree with you on 4 wheeler, which we call quads, here in KY. All my horses come to our quads because they get grain and goodies from them. They know the sound of our quads, which are rarely out of 2nd gear and we would never round up our horse with them.
When our neighbors come up on their quads, the gelding does point on the fence, while the stallion circles the mares. My gelding has even attacked people on quads. This is a baby horse, usually, but we have had people let our neighbor cattle out, cutting their fence and they wind up in our yard. I had the nicest Black Angus herd you ever saw one morning, from 12 miles away. The game warden said they were driven with quads to our place and when our Rotweiller's started raising cane, the quads left and we had 30 Angus in our front yard.
Quads are a useful tool, but they must be in the right hands, like a gun.

I used to have a neighbor that we all used to amuse ourselves by watching over the years. This guy had about 10 cows and a bull on 40 acres. He would invite 5 or 6 of his co-workers and their horses over to help him "gather" every year. It was hilarious to watch him go out the morning of the gathering at daybreak to chase the cattle out of the pens and lock the gate so they would have something to do later.

The gathering always filled my house with folks as my porch had the best view around. Keep in mind we were all folks that worked on ranches, in feedlots, or at the stockyards. We had a blast watching these poor people who maybe rode two or three times a year get bucked off and run over all day. This guy was so excited about this day every year and he let everybody in town know about what was going on "out at the ranch" as he said. He would go around to the feed store and coffee shop talking about how he was in preparations "for round-up." I had seen him many times saddle and load a horse, complete with a rope and piggin strings, go have coffee in the morning, talk about the day of cowboying to come, and then go home and unsaddle his fat, dumb horse and turn him out.

All of the fun stopped the day he bought a big ol' Polaris 4-wheeler. After that, it sounded like we lived on a racetrack was always telling him to keep his stock at home, and if he did get something on my side, keep that (fill in expletive here) 4-wheeler OUT of my place. One day, he decided to rope a young bull. I happened to be outside and watched him chase the young bull over a small hill swinging the rope, kind of, and trying to steer the wheeler with the other hand. I saw the bull go out of sight over the hill, the four wheeler in hot pursuit. Then, an enormous cloud of dust, the bull came back over the hill dragging the Polaris on it's top and my neighbor chasing along behind. HE HAD TIED ON!!! The 4-wheeler was ruined, it took myself and a team of 6 other neighbors to get the bull and the Polaris separated and the bull hauled to town. I moved away a short time after that, but my Friends tell me things have reverted to a more traditional gathering again and no-one has to keep an eye over their shoulder for a fast approaching Polaris coming down the road when they are riding colts between pastures anymore.

A fellow who had land adjacent to ours passed away and his heirs were selling off his stock and land. So one Sunday, the young man who rents a trailer space from my dad called and told my dad that there were some "cowboys" at his house. They were gathering the deceased cattle and had run one over on us and were wanting to come on our place and get her. When my dad and I drove up to the gate, there were these "cowboys" with a bunch of slab sided underfed gaited horses, a bunch of pit bull cross "catch dogs" and a bunch of (recently)empty beer cans in the bed of the truck. My dad told them no way in H#!! were they going to chase cows on our place, he'd pen the cow directly and call them to come get her. The poor old cow had had the switch on her tail and the ends of both ears chewed off by the dogs and for the next few days she was ready to fight anybody and anything that came near her. We wound up buying the cow since she was impossible to pen. If she saw anyone on a horse coming around her she'd take off for the woods. Our cows are mostly gentle and can be penned with a bucket of range cubes. This cow has finally come around so we can pen her with feed too and she no longer takes off when she sees horses and dogs.

Whether you're working cows with a 4 wheeler or a horse, taking it slow and easy is the way to go.

The key to working cattle is slow and easy and getting them used to whatever it is you want to work them with. I've seen cattle go nuts when a horse walked into the area because they wern't used to seeing a horse. Like wise when someone was around on foot. It depends on what they're used to and how you go about it.

Paul