Tag: irrigation

MARCH QUARTERLY ROUNDUP

On By Marci WhitehurstIn My BlogLeave a comment

WINTER BLUES–NOT!

Usually, winter is a tough time for me–short daylight hours, cold days and colder nights, but this winter hasn’t been, well, winter. Our southern family members in Tennessee received more snow this winter than Montana did, and they may have had colder temps for much of the winter, too! Highly unprecedented. We need moisture in Montana–and across the entire West and into the Midwest. However, the warmer temps and lack of constant snow has been nice.

The wind however…up to 90 miles per hour on some days! It blew a building down on the ranch, but it did need to come down.

Here we are, fixing to head into spring, and it’s felt like spring already. I don’t remember this ever happening before. Maybe spring will bring snow? Time will tell! Rain would be okay, too. Anything to keep the entire west from being consumed by fire.

WINTER PASTURE

The warm temps mean that are ground hasn’t frozen, which is another anomaly we’ve never experienced. Our winter pasture needs to be frozen in order to use it because its a little swampy-like otherwise. My cowboy has been working to keep the cows moving on fresh land, but without the ability to adequately use that pasture, it has made for some complications. Considering the impending drought, my cowboy has spent time on grazing plans and possibilities, planning for the ranch cattle’s best upcoming forage with the reduced pasture possibilities. It’s quite likely we won’t be able to graze several pastures this spring or summer due to lack of moisture. Dryland, native grasses need care anyway, but the lack of precipitation will definitely impact cattle rotations.

EMPTY NESTING

We’ve always enjoyed dates however we could get them. When the kids were little, we made trips to the dump because that was the only place they didn’t want to go! Ha! Local trash pickup isn’t an option on most ranches, so we made regular trips to the dump to dispose of trash.

Cattle supplementation is arguably a wonderful date. I especially enjoyed a recent trip to put salt and mineral out because it was near the swan ponds. Trumpeter Swans floating and flying nearby makes for an graceful excursion! Even the cows were at peace…

FROM THE HORSE’S MOUTH

While the horses are definitely more up Billy’s alley, I do enjoy them. With the strange weather, they’ve been in the corral more, so I bought them a ball so they could horse around. Here’s a picture of Bannack checking it out. They’ve been carrying grain pans around and playing with them, so I figured a ball would be perfect. They did not agree. They checked it out and then promptly left the scene. How rude!

LOOKING AHEAD

Our calving is set to start in May, so we’ll likely be getting some babies by the end of April. It won’t be long now! Soon the irrigation will begin and the summer fun will start. It’s busier in the summer, but I enjoy the weather and the activity!

What are you looking forward to? What has happened in your corral these past couple of months? I’d love to hear from you!

Until then, bless you!

Surprised by Kindness

On By Marci WhitehurstIn My BlogLeave a comment

What a ride the last few weeks have been! In my last post, I mentioned needing surgery for endometriosis. I’ve since been to the Mayo Clinic for appointments and the surgery and am now back home recovering. While we were gone, grandparents were staying with our three kids. The kids were taking care of the ranch.

In the two months before we left, we had to redo our entire irrigation system. The old system was struck by lightning and was in desperate need of repair anyway. In the 18 months that we’ve lived here, there’s been so much to repair that we were hoping to eek by one more summer before overhauling the irrigation system, but when nature hit, rebuilding the system seemed better than bandaiding it for another year.

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Getting new power for our irrigation system.

Nothing went right. Every single step took twice as long and cost us twice as much. Water ought to have been going in early May at the latest, but…

We were set to leave June 13. We prayed. We worked sun-up until sun-down every day. Our neighbors kept showing up to help.

The week before we left, I got sick. I couldn’t do much of anything. A good friend took me to get groceries. When I got home, there were people in our fields. Quite a few. A few hours later, 40 teenagers showed up. (Our daughters’ youth group showed up in full force.) They helped us lay pipe. They helped fix water leaks. They did it with joy. We started a bonfire to celebrate the gift our land is to us and the joy of friendship. They worked without expectation. I fed them hot dogs and s’mores and they thanked me. Really, I was thanking them.

We left and the water still wasn’t going. It was supposed to be one more thing and then it could get turned on–neighbors showed up regularly to help. We hired people to come out. Nothing worked. Engineers couldn’t figure out why it wasn’t working. Grandparents tried everything they could.

The water never did get going until the day we got home. The field wasn’t as dried out as we imagined, but it doesn’t look like it ought to by early July.

Over the time we were gone, we were fighting health battles and the kids kept trying to get the water going. Plus our cattle kept getting out in Houdini fashion. We never had a problem with that pasture last year and we checked all the fences before we left. It felt like blow after blow after blow. There were little fiascos I won’t mention.

I cried a lot. With the stress of a major surgery, I didn’t want the ranch falling apart. We were sixteen hours away and could do nothing. I felt bad for all my kids were dealt. Yet even so, many blessings popped up. Not only in Minnesota for us, but also back home.

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Outside one of the Mayo Clinic buildings. Mayo is huge!

I’m surprised and utterly amazed by the kindness we experienced. Neighbors offered hours of help. People volunteered to help our kids. Friends took our youngest on an adventure or two. Our new community wrapped their arms around us like we’d lived here forever.

We’ve been in many communities and always experienced kindness by others in some fashion, yet it often takes awhile to break in and be accepted. Here we were, “newbies”, and we were treated like family.

Acts of kindness really do go a long way. I’m blown away by the love and help we received, as well as the calls we continue to receive as people check on us. Thank you my sweet community. Thank you. I look forward to being able to return the favor.