After many years of drought and learning about the difficult decisions ranchers were forced to make as they sold off their herds and breeding stock in recent years, it was time to check in after our rain this past summer. It was wonderful to see that beautiful green in every direction after those rains. However, was it enough?
Philip Boyd of Dixon Water Foundation on Mimms Ranch said they do have grass, have leased their land, and are very judiciously grazing some cattle. They are still not bringing back their own herd. With about 11 inches of rain last year, there’s a hint of cautious optimism in his words, yet a very sober look on his face as he explains they will see what unfolds going forward before any more decisions are made in terms of their own cattle grazing operation.
Chip Love, Marfa National Bank president, has grown philosophical stewarding his ranch through the drought with these words: “There’s been less and less rain since 1991 with some decent rains scattered in between. Even if rain comes back more consistently, the lack of grasslands can’t be solved all at once. After 30 years of not much rainfall, 30 years of above average would be nice.” Love has come to the realization he won’t be around to see the land the way he remembers it, with creeks flowing year around. He’s decided to pretend it’s just going to keep raining. In response to my asking if he has a rain gauge he said, “It’s either enough or it isn’t, just look at the land.”
Three years ago Bobby McKnight told me they would need four good years of rain before they would have enough grass established to support cattle grazing again. So far we have had one good year, for some ranches.
There’s nothing like hearing the ranch manager on the O2, Will Jewett, talk lovingly about the different grasses on the prairie and rangeland out here. Jewett, formerly of the USDA office and a long-time advocate for healthy watersheds through sustainable land management and rotational grazing, does exactly that. I skip along with him to keep up, as I don’t know the names and spellings of all the grasses he lauds. What he does say, that I catch, is the ranch he now manages is lower in elevation than Marfa, and hence more shrubs and fewer grasses, even with the recent rain.
When there’s a bare patch of dirt, some desirable grasses are unable to reestablish even after rain without an anchor grass such as blue gramma. Luckily, blue gramma will pop back. Like much of the Marfa area, parts of the ranch Jewett manages got about 11 inches of rain. However, some parts only got 3 inches, so they have suspended their cow-calf operation to a solely stock operation of leased land.
Ranchers match rainfall to stocking operations, and due to the previous years of drought, they are taking it easy this year. Like all the ranchers I spoke with, it’s a wait-and-see long game over the next few years.
Because the O2 is a working ranch, as opposed to a hobby ranch, they turn to hunting operations to sustain them economically when the cattle numbers have been radically reduced due to drought.
Ranchers are not alone. Julie Speed, not a rancher, has a studio that looks out on the field at the Chinati Foundation with the Judd concrete pieces. Years ago when Julie and her husband, Fran Christina, bought their property, the field was primarily grasses. With the years of drought the grasses have turned to tumbleweeds and amaranth. Speed was unsure if the grasses would ever be able to re-exert themselves over the weeds. I turned to soil conservationist and all around know-it-all of the natural world Jim Martinez to get her an answer. Martinez feels sure the grass will come back. He was recently pulling tumbleweeds and amaranth on a ranch down south and said underneath all that growth, there was about 30% grass. Coupled with Will Jewett’s confidence in blue gramma, given a little rain, the future could hold more grasses again.
Speed and Christina unsurprisingly also found their fence line was covered in tumbleweeds after these recent winds. The couple hauled them to the street in front of their dumpsters, chopped them up, drove the truck back and forth over them, gathered up the bits, drove over them again and again, and finally swept up the leftovers and deposited them in the dumpster. I know this because they made an Instagram post documenting their endeavor. We should all be engaged in similar defensive actions related to tumbleweeds in this extreme dry (8% humidity!) fire and high wind season. All a wildfire needs is a few tumbleweeds and it’s off to the races.
It’s not just the herds of cattle we are missing, it’s also the trees in Marfa. I drove around taking in all the trees leafing out, and it sets in sharp relief the trees that are dying and also the ones that are full-on already dead. Last year Jim Martinez issued a plea to soak drought-stressed trees to try and save them. Now he adds it seems many folks in Marfa don’t understand the gravity of this drought and the effect on even well-established, very old specimens. Shade, one of our most precious commodities in the high desert, will be profoundly missed. Soak your trees if you can.
Out on FM 2810, the first lone blossom of a chocolate daisy showed itself March 2. TxDOT had mowed a few days before, so it was alone and flat to the ground and yet, there it was.
Masses of migrating birds sitting on fence lines flutter up as we pass, and a handful of cattle have appeared in the pasture on one side of the road, widely scattered apart. It’s been hot, almost 90 degrees for several days, a tad surprising in March. The first mosquito banged into my face at dusk, and a fly appeared in my kitchen. The clouds and skies have been dramatic and beautifully windswept of late.
On yesterday’s walk I saw the most precise and defined cloud that was surely the tail of a rattlesnake, clearly an omen. They are climbing back into our lives. While rattlesnakes brumate, I can study the sky and horizon with ease. When the snakes reappear, my eyes are trained on the ground surveying ahead of where my dog and I step, my vigilance fully engaged. Although I will miss the more relaxed walks of the winter months when I get restorative clouds and sky time, I tune into the surprise of wildflowers and beetles. Maybe even tortoises and horny toads will appear underfoot this year. We, along with the ranchers, begin the watch to see if enough rain will come, to see if the anticipated historic monsoons of July arrive on time to set our worry aside and think on how only a few more years of this and we’ll get our grasses back. Grit is everywhere. Onward.