Today on the Red Desert
photo by Oscar Payano
Almost out of snow,
Last summer’s grass gives nurture,
Corn–but no water.
Tag Archives: Red Desert
Open winter
Jumping for joy
ram heading for work
The rams hang around for ten and a half months, waiting for the day when they are called to go to work, fathering lambs for the next season. We put the bucks in over a period of days and weeks. We figure that the first bucks to go in with the ewes are getting tired, so we send reinforcements. They sometimes resent being worked through the chutes, but are happy to jump out of the trailers to join the ladies. When we were loading them, I said, “Hop in boys–all the corn you can eat.” Meghan said, “All the ladies you can breed!” I added, “…and all the wind you can tolerate.” Such is the life of a buck in the winter.
through the chute
Siobhan and Sadie facing a reluctant ram
Avencio
guard dog on the job
guard dog watching his ewes
Avencio, Pat and Oscar
Guillermo and Pat
Leo
Oscar with the dogs jumping for joy
on his way!
Oscar too!
Romance on the ides of December
Avencio unloading the bucks
The ides of December means that it’s time to put the rams in with the ewes. Romance in December brings lambs in May. A sheep’s gestation is five months less five days. I wish we could predict now just when the shearers will arrive and what the weather will be like on the 10th of May.
on their way…
Bucks in their working clothes
romance is in the air
Guard dog checking out his new charges
Doings on the Red Desert
Pat and Guillermo surveying the desert
Leo and Luis–twins separated at birth
Which one of these is not like the other–flaring from new drilling in Chain Lakes
North to the Red Desert
ewes heading for the Rodewald gate
The ewes have made their annual trek north to the Red Desert, where we have wintering ground on the Cyclone Rim and Chain Lakes grazing allotments. These allotments are part of the vast Great Basin, home to Greater Sage Grouse, desert elk, riparian plants and amphibians, feral horses, many many antelope and, part of the year, cattle and sheep. The Great Basin is named because it is a closed basin. To the north, the Continental Divide splits and runs in separate ranges until it meets again about 15 miles south of Wamsutter near the Haystack Mountains. The country south of there–Church Butte, Adobe Town, Powder Rim–is likewise amazing landscape, but it is not part of the Great Basin, the Red Desert. It is always a relief when we safely cross the overpass over the Union Pacific line and the underpass beneath I80 and head out across the open country for winter pasture. We are a week later than usual on the trail north. We had to wait for snow, since there’s not much water on the trail. Like Goldilocks, we want it to be not too hot and not too cold!
the sheep topping the UP overpass
between the tracks and I80
Almost to the underpass
under the interstate
passing the Department of Transportation shed
Pat and Oscar consulting
new drilling on Chain Lakes
on the Red Desert, at last
Along the spring sheep trails
looking east from Powder Rim
We have started trailing from our wintering grounds to spring country where we have shearing and lambing in our future, and theirs.
The ewe lambs have spent the winter in the Powder Wash country. Yemerson has started them along the Powder Rim trail. In a few days, they will arrive at the Badwater Pasture, where they will hang out until early July.
In the meantime, the ewes who wintered on the Chain Lakes allotment on the Red Desert have started south. Their destination is the Cottonwood lambing grounds. In a few weeks, we’ll have wool in the bags, and lambs on the ground, God willing.
ewe lambs watering on the Powder Rim trail
nooning at the reservoir
leaving the Red Desert
between I80 and the railroad overpass
Pepe giving an early lamb a lift
catching a ride
over the Union Pacific bridge
almost to the Rodewald gate
Timmy–ready for green grass
Sage chickens–sort of
chickens at Chain Lake
So just when you think you’ve seen it all…
A couple of days ago, Pepe called Meghan at the cookhouse. He is tending sheep on our permits on the Red Desert. I heard Meghan say, “gallinas?! domesticados?!” (chickens?! domesticated?!).
Apparently, someone turned loose some hens and one rooster. Meghan called the BLM Range Conservationist, who tried, unsuccessfully, to catch them. The Chain Lakes allotment is checkerboard, with the Wyoming Game and Fish Department owning every other section. Mike, the Range Con, then turned the matter over to the Game and Fish.
They are fowl, if not fish.
What’s amazing is that they haven’t been eaten by coyotes!
Ladder Ranch
