About Barry

Barry is a life-long cowboy and Natural Horseman. His style and understanding was influenced by the Dorrance brothers, Ray Hunt, Buck Brannaman, Bryan Neubert and many other great horsemen.

For many years he lived in the small ranching town of Imnaha next door to Jim Dorrance, Tom's brother.

Jim was a great stockman as were all the Dorrance brothers. He shared a great deal wisdom with Barry ( a young, aspiring cowboy at the time). Many times Tom, Bill and Ray Hunt would come to Imnaha to visit and Barry would soak in the knowledge they shared. Tom would come over to the ranch where Barry worked to see the stock and visit with the cowboys, always teaching and sharing wisdom. When you were around Tom or Jim, it was like being in a classroom, always learning something new.

Barry realizes what a blessing it was to be around these great horsemen and to get to work with some of the old timers that grew up with the Dorrance brothers. These old cowboys are mostly gone now.

Spanish Mustang Influence Barry's Horsemanship Skills

During his ranching career, Barry spent many years working horses and cattle on ranches in the roadless wilderness canyon country of Inmaha, Oregon and the Snake River country, handling large groups of cattle in this tough canyon country mostly alone with a couple of dogs and quite often mounted on a green Spanish mustang or some else's problem horse.

He lived with his horses out at remote cow camps and always had a few tough project horses in his sting. He seemed to be attracted to these problem horses some of them were very dangerous. These kind of horses heighten your awareness to the new level doubled with the fact that you need to get a days work on them. There were no cell phones or radio to get help. No one would know he was gone or hurt for a week so it was important to be aware of his situation.

To sum up what Barry's focus has been on during his career with horses, he would say it has been trying to figure out what is going on inside a horse; what gets him to act the way he does and what it takes to get a horse to respond to our wishes with a willing attitude that says "I want to work with you!"