Federal transfer delays leave Padres Mesa cattle unsold, ranch hands unpaid
Special to the Times | Donovan Quintero
Gene Shepherd of Rocky Ridge, Ariz., stands on a water tank at the Padres Mesa Demonstration Ranch, where he has continued caring for cattle and maintaining the operation despite going unpaid for months.
CHAMBERS, Ariz.
The cattle at Padres Mesa Demonstration Ranch have started eating things that are not food.
They chew on old bones scattered on the range. They lick metal. They gnawed through halters hanging outside the barn until ranch hands moved them indoors. One cow found a spilled patch of mineral mix and licked the dirt down to a plate-sized hollow.
“They need salt,” said Gene Shepherd, 64, who has worked at the ranch for 18 years. “We’ve been out of salt for about three months now. And mineral, ever since––maybe the new year. That’s why they’re chewing on bones and licking all these metal and whatever they can find.”
To read the full article, please see the July 9, 2026, edition of the Navajo Times.
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Highway 264,
I-40, WB @ Winslow