CAUTION! CURSE WORDS AND STUFF LIKE THAT USED IN THIS ENTRY!
A few weeks ago I called Kings Ropes and ordered a 45 foot, triple extra soft, nylon, 5/16 rope. Also a folded rawhide hondo. It came a week or so later with the honda already on the rope. I didn’t even have to tie a knot, which I had second thoughts about, but what the hell, they are a rope company and tie knots all the time even if they tie a rose instead of a turks head or whatever I tie.
Fast forward to Saturday. Chance is here and we go rope and doctor yearlings. I rope several yearling bulls around the head and he heels them but really has hell catchin’ two, what with the wind and the tall grass and all the sweet clover that is from 2 to 3 feet tall and real thick.
About the 3rd or 4th bull, I got him snubbed up and he is settin’ back and Chance is havin’ hell when BAM! The knot comes untied and turns him loose!
I never lost the hondo so after cussing I get off my horse and slip it onto the other end of the rope where there is another knot. (I usually don’t keep a knot on the tail end of my rope. That way if it ever goes off the horn it don’t grab your finger so much) We finish up doctoring cattle and come home and Monday and chew some knot tiers butt. Just think of the danger if that bull had been on the fight and one of us had been afoot! But of course, by Monday I had forgotten.
This afternoon I ride out to this same bunch and rope this 8 weight heifer around the neck and am trying to get her choked down or tangled up or whatever so I can tie her and doctor her for her sore foot. She is setting back and it reminds me of the bull on Saturday when BANG! The damn knot comes untied and this time I lose the expensive rawhide hondo!
I am calling Kings tomorrow and they better hope I am in a better mood than I am at the moment!
Sons a bitches ought to tie a damn turkshead instead of their fancy shmancy rose knot!
From now on I will tell them to just send the damn rope and I will tie the fricken knot!
They ought to send me a new hondo for free, seeing as it was their sorry ass knot that came untied that caused me to lose the other one!
Dennisranch 
Robert, wonder if you could get there E-mail address and send what you wrote on your blog,and I bet there will be no problem,in sending another out.With out the knots!!.Say when it gets all figured out lets know how it went.Debra
It sounds as if you’re pretty lucky. I’ve seen wrecks, back before everybody dallied, where that nylon would come back at you just like a coil spring. Saw a team roper hook his rope on the chute, luckily it was on a flat bar, and it cut the rope. His back looked like he had been whiped with a cat-o-nine tails. This was back when you’d get down and tie the knot. Hope they replace the hondo for you. Allen
You’d think you could trust a rope company’s knots — but their might not be a roper (or a boy scout) among ’em … a nation of specialists, taking care of their own …
We always buy the rope and tie our own, safer that way:) Can’t get help these days let alone good help:(
I don’t blame you for being pissed, and I can definitely say you ought to stick to your own knots.
I did ropework a lot of years ago- I never did roping or that sort of thing, I mean splicing and knotting and such. To this day, if I find myself with a length of rope in my hand, I’ll absentmindedly play with it- make a sling, or crown end splice the rope, or whatever. I have a woman who comes to me eveyr couple years to make one piece spliced rope bridles, and it makes me a little proud that she trusts me with her horses.