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Tag Archives: Tiarnan

Docking Days

docking lambs

 

May and June bring us lambs, and lambs mean docking–cutting the tails, castrating the males, eearmarking,vaccinating and paint branding. This requires our crew to gather the ewes and lambs into portable corrals, which we move to the various areas on the lambing grounds. We sort the lambs into a smaller pen, then carry them, one by one, along an assembly line where they are  prepared for their future lives without tails. The last stop is a paint brand. This year we have an exceptional multi-national crew, which includes Peruvians, Mexicans, South Africans and Americans, including our grandchildren and employees. We have had fair weather and great lunches. Soon the ewes and lambs will be ready to trail to their summer pastures on the forest.

Rhen, bringing up the lambs

ewes in the pen

Rhen and Aaron with the Dickum Docker

Maeve, Riley and Tiarnan docking

Maeve, Riley and Tiarnan docking

Robyn, Oscar and James

Riley and Seamus

Liza with lamb

Seamus and Riley

ewes and lambs at Cherry Grove

wagon at Cherry Grove

 

 

 

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The Last Lament (hopefully)

sheepherder on the horizon

I haven’t put up many posts this winter, mostly because it has been so overwhelming. 2022-2023 is one for the record books, not just for us, but all the way from Elko, Nevada to Rawlins, Wyoming. All of Wyoming, and parts of surrounding states were hit pretty hard. Interstate 80 was closed 55 times between October and early March. It seemed like every time they opened the interstate, someone died.

As this blog shows, we had to evacuate our sheep in January and early February from their usual wintering grounds on the Red Desert to safety on our hayfields north of Dixon. Normally, they spend December to mid-April grazing on the Cyclone Rim and Chain Lakes allotments before heading down the trail, first to the Badwater Pasture south of Creston Junction, then on to the lambing grounds near Dixon. Often we are worried about finding enough water and snow drifts along the trail. If the shearers show up on time, we usually shear at Badwater. If they are delayed, we set up the traveling shearing sheds on the lambing grounds. Sometimes a few lambs show up by the time we finish shearing.

This year our cows wintered on a friend’s ranch near Laramie. Who’d have guessed that Laramie would have a relatively mild winter with not much snow.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, we were buried. The Snowtels were measuring record snowfalls. The story that the Snowtels (measuring devices for snow and water content located high in the mountains) didn’t tell is the amount of snow falling in the lower country. The wildlife normally spend the summers in the mountains where there’s lots to graze. That’s where our cows and sheep spend the summers as well. In the fall, we all move down together.

In 2022-2023, the snowpack was “inverted.” It piled up in the lower landscapes where the deer, elk and antelope can usually dig down to dried grasses and be sustained through the winter month. Usually, especially on the high desert, winds blow the snow into drifts and leave bare ground for grazing. This winter, it started snowing in mid-December, then warmed up briefly allowing the surface to turn to liquid, then ice. This formed a solid layer which the animals couldn’t  penetrate with their hooves.

We usually turn our rams in with the ewes on about December 13th. We were worried because we had to wait a few days since the roads were closed. I said, “Well, if it’s a stormy spring, we’ll be glad to be lambing a few days later.” Little did we know how prescient those words would be.

As chronicled in earlier posts, the ewes spent the winter on full feed on our snow-buried fields. We have brought in truckload after truckload of alfalfa to keep them alive. Family, employees and friends have done an heroic job. Some of the neighbors fed elk alongside their cattle, and we even had Greater Sandhill Cranes picking alfalfa alongside the sheep.

Deer and antelope are not very adaptable in their diet. They cannot digest hay and alfalfa, and we have watched them die. Now that the snow is finally melting, we find their emaciated bodies alongside the roads and piled under Juniper trees. Some few deer have survived by staying in town and foraging there.

It has been a slow warm-up so far. This is generally good because it slows down the flooding, but much of the snowpack is still in the mountains. We pray for warm days so the grass will finally come, but not too warm so we’re not inundated. Water managers in the Lower Basin States of the Colorado River are happy as they anticipate the runoff. However, Mother Nature is taking her due, soaking runoff into drought-dried soils, and evaporating into the sky. Even so, we hope to see significant rises in reservoirs large and small.

Today, I was in the feed store in Craig. An older gentleman, there loading up bags of feed, said “It sure is a nice day.” I agreed. It made me look around and appreciate it.

I went inside to sign the ticket and chatted with a young lady, there to pick up calving supplies.

We commiserated and told war stories about the winter. She told me about the scores and scores of dead deer, antelope and elk that she had counted along the roadside.

She said that she and her husband had thrown valuable alfalfa to antelope sheltering in a draw near their home. “They’re all dead now,” she said.

Finally, finally, most of the ground is bare and we are seeing a green sheen on the pastures and hillsides. The surviving deer, antelope and elk are looking a little better as they are able to forage. Most of them will make it now.

As for the sheep, they too will look a lot better once the green grass comes.

I hope now to spend the next months posting about sunshine, grass, lambs and great weather.

barn in late March

Tiarnan trailing the horses home (Rhen, Siobhan and Trevor helped too!)

Sheep Mountain and Flattop in late April

brush hedged by deer and antelope

winter-killed antelope

more winter kill

three more dead antelope

Sandhill Cranes on the Dixon Ranch–better days ahead!

 

 

 

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Adventure trip with AG

AG and Pat with the handyman jack

Our friend AG Kawamura came to visit us from California, and to represent Solutions from the Land at the AgroForestry tour Pat organized. He had an extra day and we wanted him to have a true range agriculture experience while he was here. AG raises strawberries, green beans and other tasty commodities, so he is a true farmer, but had never tended sheep camp before.

Sure enough, as we were pulling the sheepcamp up the VERY rocky road to Bridger Peak, we heard a bang, followed by dust billowing out to the side. Soon we were looking at a really really flat tire. We had a handyman jack and a spare tire (and Alejandro’s pet lambs, Susan and Cunadita) in the back of the truck.

After a lot of jacking by AG, Pat and Tiarnan, they managed to get the flat tire off and the spare tire on. I was indeed helping by sitting in the driver’s seat with my foot on the brake.

Pat and Tiarnan taking a turn

AG and Tiarnan removing the lug nuts

a teaching moment

AG with the spare, and Susan the lamb

Susan supervising

 
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Posted by on August 14, 2022 in Animals, Family, Folks, Folks who help us out, Sheep

 

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Yearling ewes, and Solano, from Badwater to the Forest

Alejandro on the trail with the yearlings

After lambing, we trail the ewes and lambs to grazing allotments on the Routt and Medicine Bow National Forests, where they find green grass, fresh water, and bears and coyotes. The on-date is the first of July, and we stage the trailing, one day apart–one bunch after another. When the ewes, lambs and herders and settled on their summer grazing grounds,  it is time for the yearling ewes to start on the trail. They have been grazing in the high desert Badwater pasture since shearing in late April. They follow the traditional trails, including the Savery Stock Driveway, to their high mountain allotment in the Medicine Bow.

Solano with his backpack

The yearling herder Alejandro likes to keep an orphan lamb each year, and raise it as a pet. This summer he has two bum lambs, including one which was lost on the trail and picked up by our neighbor, Jock–an avid bicyclist. Alejandro still has his pet from two years ago, Solano. I was startled to see that Alejandro had “repurposed” a dog food bag into a backpack for Solano. I’m not quite sure what he was meant to carry. Solano is quite the sheep. Sometimes he follows Alejandro on his horse, and sometimes he hangs out with the dogs or the sheep. I like to say that Solano is “no ordinary sheep.”

Jock bringing me the lost lamb on his bicycle

Tiarnan with Alejandro’s pet lamb

lamb and Tiarnan

midday break at Loco Creek

Guard dog mom and pups catching a ride

yearlings on the march

 

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Branding Time

McCoy bringing in a calf

 

 

It’s that time of year again. We have lots of baby calves who need vaccines, brands and earmarks before they head up to the Forest with their mothers. We have a great crew this year. Everyone knows how to work together to minimize stress on both cattle and people.

 

calves gathered in the Elephant Corral

Bubba, Tiarnan and McCoy bringing in the calves

Siobhan at the ready

Rhen on the water tank

Bubba and McCoy

branding crew

McCoy and Eamon

 

 

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March lambs, and homecoming cows

Hampshire ewe and lamb

 

It’s March, so it must be lambing season at Powder Flat. We raise our own rams, and have a farm flock of Hampshire and Rambouillets–known as the “early lambers.”

Here’s a look at this busy time. We are glad that our intrepid Peruvian crew is on the job. Several of them just came back from a few months at home.

It’s also time for the cows who have spent the winter in balmy Laramie to come home.

 

Ladies in waiting

Hampshire and Rambouillet ewes

twins!

Tiarnan practicing child labor

whiteface ewe with crossbred lambs

bring in the cows

cows at Powder Flat

lambs, lambs, lambs!

 

 

 
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Posted by on March 14, 2022 in Animals, Cattle, Family, Folks, Sheep

 

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More Heifers to the High Country

Cowboy crew (Chandler, McCoy, Tiarnan and Rhen) waiting to unload

 

 

More heifers came in and we were there to unload. Since it was a Saturday, McCoy, Tiarnan and Rhen were mounted and ready to help.

off the truck and heading for groceries

Tiarnan, Meghan and Chandler counting the heifers off the truck

one heifer headed the wrong way, of course

Rhen and Jake on the job

 
 

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On to the Forest!

Leo trailing the sheep up the road

July 1st is the on-date for most of our sheep grazing permits on the National Forest. We have to stage them on since we have several bunches which graze on federal permits in the summer, and it is the on-date for our neighbors as well. They usually trail one day apart so we go up the line and move each camp to the next spot until everyone is settled

There is always a grateful sigh when we know we are through lambing, through docking and through trailing. The next challenge is withstanding the predators which view our ewes and lambs as tasty snacks, especially in a year when the deer population is low. My Dad’s cousin once said, “Well, you’re up there in the nice cool flies.”

Now we are up in the “nice cool bears.”

We have grass and we have water. The grazing greatly reduces the fuel load and the fire danger. We are worried about fire in this year’s drought conditions. So it begins.

 

Pulling the wagon and flagging the sheep up the road

crossing the South Fork bridge

Leo

closer than they appear

lambs hitching a ride

It was an early morning for Meghan!

Tiarnan helping Leo

 

 

 
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Posted by on July 1, 2021 in Animals, Dogs, Horses, Sheep

 

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Trailing to greener pastures

Heifers and young bulls, Meghan, Eamon, Rhen and Tiarnan

 
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Posted by on June 14, 2021 in Animals, Cattle, Family, Folks, Horses

 

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Sheep Mountain branding

Rhen mounting

 

It’s branding time! We have lots of baby calves who need brands, eartags and vaccine so that they can be ready to head to the National Forest next month with their mamas. We have a great crew this year, which includes a lot of home-grown child labor. Sheep Mountain is a pasture which we graze spring and fall. Sheep Mountain itself is an extinct volcano which has provided us with rich soil and great pasture.

hard-working crew

Eamon, Rhen, Mike and Karen

Meghan and Mike Buchanan

Rhen bringing in calf on Jake

German and Mccoy

Tiarnan on Sarah

Siobhan multi-tasking

Siobhan and Kathryn

Rhen, Megan and Eamon

 

 

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