Long days working cattle often lend to solo, often contemplative days.  Whether they are hours in the saddle or minutes sorting on gates, working cattle always seems to come with some kind of life lesson behind it.  Social media is full of funny quips from cattle work like, “You can’t hurt my feelings.  I grew up sorting cattle with my dad and let the wrong steer get by,” and “If your marriage can handle sorting cows with your husband, it can survive anything.”  

And as funny as they are, they are 100% right!  

Recently we were sorting our weaned calves that we will be shipping soon.  The goal of the day was to group together the steers ready to sell, the heifers we want to keep, the heifers we will sell, and anything that isn’t going to ship.  It can be a long process sorting through so many calves, making decisions, making more decisions and sorting them again, and this time around was no different.

There are a few key things to understand when sorting cattle, especially young calves.  Every animal has what we call a point of balance and a flight zone.  The point of balance, found at the shoulders of cattle, is an imaginary line that determines how they will move relative to the handler’s position.  Standing behind the point of balance will make an animal move forward, standing in front will stop them or make them back up.  The point of balance is established largely due to the blind spot directly behind cattle.  In an attempt to keep things in their vision or to move away from things they no longer see, they will move accordingly.

In simplest terms, the flight zone is the safe space around a cow.  It is their personal bubble and if someone or something moves within that bubble, it will make them move.  When people remain at a distance outside of the flight zone, they remain still and unconcerned.

Unlike the point of balance that remains constant, the size of the flight zone can change.  The safe space depends on multiple factors but there are two leading points.  First, the flight zone will always depend on past interactions an animal will have had.  If a young calf grew up being bottle fed or a cow has been hand fed treats, they have learned to allow people into their safe zone.  On the other hand, cattle that have had little interaction will be far more wary and nervous about someone coming close to them.

The second part to determine the size of their flight zone is the attitude or energy of the person coming into their space.  Someone loud, aggressive and forceful will cause a larger safe zone than a handler that moves slowly and quietly.

Knowing how to use these two points of cattle makes all the difference in working with cattle to get the job done.  And not just getting it done, but getting it done with the least amount of stress and work.  When it comes down to it, the more an animal can trust, the smaller their flight zone is and the more accurate their response will be relative to what the handler wants. 

The alternative to less stress sorting is a chaotic ram-’em-and-jam’em style that forces cattle to go where and how someone else wants.  It triggers their fight or flight response, which will put them on the fight and go against everything the handler wants or they will turn tail and run.  Either way, the work won’t happen and there is usually a mess of broken corrals to put back together.

We might not be sorting people into various pens like we do cattle, but everyday we have to sort out how we will work with people.  In their own way, people have their own points of balance and flight zones and if we can learn to work with them, we will accomplish more with less stress than we would have otherwise.

In a similar way, people will move, change, shift, and alter themselves when things are moved beyond their point of balance or the point they can’t see or understand, when they feel pressured, or in danger.  Understanding those pressure points in people helps us in our interactions with them to know what will turn them to us or what will turn them away.

Just like past interactions can determine the flight zone in cattle, past experiences always determine how much a person can be trusted.  Similarly, as minimizing the flight zone takes time in cattle, it will take multiple interactions to build up a consistent expectation of how that person will act.

Whether it is a relationship with a coworker, a casual friend or a close family member, recognizing a person’s point of balance and flight zone will be key in learning how to sort things out with them.  Knowing the way to approach a problem, what sort of energy to bring, when to step back and when to press on are invaluable components to any relationship.

Now I don’t encourage comparing anyone to a cow.  That happens too often at our house and it rarely ends well.  But I do encourage everyone to take a look at their relationships and find the times they could better understand the person they are working with, especially in the instances that they might be using the ram-’em-and-jam’em method.

One way or another, things will get sorted out.  You will either be satisfied and proud of the work you did or you will be left with a mess of corrals to clean up.