Books in Hank the Cowdog, 6 series

Hank the Cowdog has seen dry summers in his years as the Head of Ranch Security, but nobody on the ranch has seen a drought like this. Ponds have dried up, the creek is down to a trickle, pastures have turned to burned toast, and the cows are kicking up clouds of dust. Then, to top it all off, Pete the Barncat hatches a dastardly plot to ruin Loper's birthday! The last thing the cowboys need is a prairie fire, but that's what they get, and it begins to look like the next roundup might be their last. What the ranch really needs is a good rain to bring back the grass . . . and Loper's good mood!

When the ranch falls on hard times in the winter, Slim the cowboy decides not to be a burden. Slim packs up and hits the road in search of another job. Hank and Drover hitch a ride, thinking they're headed for town. Are they going to Canada? Are those penguins by the road? Will Hank have to get a new job as Head of Chicken Security? Hank and Drover find themselves stuck on Slim's porch in the cold.

Pete the Barncat isn’t known for his reliable story-telling, but when his report about a strange, tree-devouring creature is corroborated by another source—namely J.T. Cluck, the ranch’s head rooster—Hank decides to investigate. However, just as the plot begins to thicken, Pete claims that it was all a joke and that the creature, a Three-Toed Tree Sloth, was really just a porcupine! Fortunately, Hank realizes that that’s just what a sneaky cat would say to throw him off the trail, and his continued investigation soon leads him to a strange, bumbling little creature—the Tree Sloth at last! With the finely-tuned instincts of a Head of Ranch Security, Hank realizes that he must arrest this intruder! However, things don’t turn out quite like he’d planned, and Hank soon has a very serious problem on his hands...

It's scrap day on the ranch - a glorious day for Hank, his sidekick, Drover, and Pete the Barncat. But when two very unusual-looking creatures fly overhead, the glorious day takes a sudden turn for the worse. Suddenly the scraps have vanished and the Head of Ranch Security finds himself dealing with an invasion by a couple of ancient dinosaur birds! There's never a dull moment when Hank the Cowdog is around....

It’s a blustery day in late fall, and Hank decides to sneak into the back of Slim’s pickup and hitch a ride with the cowboys to a neighbor’s fall branding. However, instead of running into either Miss Viola or the beautiful Miss Beulah the Collie, as he’d hoped, Hank finds himself on Baxter’s ranch! Things aren’t all bad though, since Baxter happens to be the very cowboy who owns the gorgeous Miss Scamper the Beagle! Unfortunately for Hank, Miss Scamper has always been a little hard to figure out, and he can’t decide if she’s crazy about him or just plain crazy. And, as the day unfolds, it even begins to look like she’s angling to land him in a heap of trouble with her pit bull boyfriend, Steel!

The weather on Hank's West Texas ranch is hot and dry. So dry, in fact, that they've got to be on the lookout for prairie fires. So Hank bravely takes on the role of Head of Fire Safety and gets to work. But patrolling for fires is dull, and it's hard to do on an empty stomach. Despite a minor culinary distraction, though, Hank through grit and determination is able to keep focused on the job. And it's a good thing he does, because sure enough, things on the ranch start to heat up....