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Monday, May 30, 2011

Charolais Cattle -- McKenzie County -- The Bakken, North Dakota, USA

McKenzie County, North Dakota, Charolais:


One of the nice things about blogging is observations made by other folks. I never thought about it, but it turns out the oil companies have contracted with a manufacturing firm to provide cattle guards in the Williston Basin.

On one of my first road trips, it was not uncommon to drive across four cattle guards to get to a well site. The cattle guards are identical and it is obvious they are being mass produced by a mom-and-pop operation with five employees. (I'm making that up, but you get the point.)

I was told the cattle guards are individually made at the site, and that may be true, but the cattle guards I drove over yesterday all looked alike. Until told differently, my hunch is they are being mass produced in a steel building somewhere in western North Dakota. [Update, June 23, 2012: being built by Steffes Group, Dickinson-based; business has doubled; recently added capacity west of Grand Forks.]

2 comments:

  1. My first time to hear about cattle guard. Are they really meant to guard the herd?

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    Replies
    1. Cattle won't cross cattle guards. Cattle guards eliminate the need for gates. Vehicles now drive through openings in the fences; no gates. But the grates that the vehicles drive over prevent cows from going through those same openings. I'm sure Wikipedia has a photo.

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