Cows and Calves

You know me.  I hate to disagree with the “experts.”  However, I must!  According to the “experts,” the phrase, sucking hind tit, means to feed from an inferior source of food; to be the youngest or most neglected child; to be last in line. (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/suck_hind_tit). 

 Let me set the record straight! 

 I grew up learning about life from my Grandpa.  He homesteaded on the Judith River and became a prominent rancher in Montana.  My Grandma was the first white child born in the Judith River basin country.  My great-grandfather was the subject of one of Charlie Russell’s painting.  (The painting now hangs in the C.M. Russell museum in Great Falls, Montana.)   All that to say, I come from a long line of fiercely independent individuals who never backed away from a challenge or adversity!

 When Grandpa would use the term, sucking hind tit, to describe a yearling [calf], it meant that, literally, “that s.o.b. has to go!” and the yearling would be separated from the mother.

 Here’s why.  The hind-tit-suckers were calves born mid-summer and were too young to be separated from their mother in the fall.  Rather than risk the calf being unable to survive the winter, Grandpa would allow the calf to stay with its mother during the winter.

 The problem would arise when the cow would have another calf and the older calf would continue to nurse along with the new calf!  The older calf, much to the dislike of the mother, would continue to nurse the “hind-tit.”  If you’ve ever milked a cow, you know that a larger amount of milk is stored in the hind quarters of the bag! 

The older calf, fully able to grow and mature on grass, was supplementing its diet by sucking the hind tit robbing the needed nourishment of the younger calf thereby putting it at risk. 

In “cowboy vocabulary,” sucking hind tit is not a term used to describe someone that needs our concern, sorrow, or help.  It means someone who is fully able to fend for themself yet chooses to remain dependent thereby using valuable resources needed by those who truly need them. 

Want a couple of examples?

I’ve recently talked to two active users who told me with the extended unemployment benefits they have no desire to go to work.  Why work when I can continue to use without working?  That’s sucking the hind tit! 

I know of a young mother living with a young man who has a good paying job.  They live in a nice house, drive fairly new cars, and the three kids from different dads are well dressed, well fed, and have numerous new toys.  The reason they won’t get married is because they would lose all the government benefits paid to a “single mom”!  That’s sucking the hind tit! 

Hear that sucking sound?  That’s the sound of the resources needed by those in need being sucked up by those who are ‘sucking the hind tit’!