Git Along Lil Dogies

Just before sunup with the crescent moon still showning

After waiting four and a half hours for the no-show cows yesterday, I almost missed them today.  I was out about 5:15 A. to put ropes across our driveways. Then I came back home to grab, my coffee and water bag. By the time I reached the road, I realized from the sound that they were almost to town.  I speed walked up to the top of the hill to catch a few pictures, then ran back down the hill and stationed myself in what turned out to be a horrible place for pictures because half of it was in the early morning sun, while the rest was in shade from the houses.

Coming round the last bend

A wall of cattle appeared

Volunteer Jim leads the way

Sun's up and turning black cows red

What the heck are YOU doing there?

Cattle and horseman

Some walked and some ran

Thinning out

The tail end with the new chuckwagon

Does that herding tool also work as a broom?

The new horse

Modern chuckwagon.  The herders slept on the road last night 

Heading toward the Utah University part of town

The cattle were around the bend by 6:30 A.M. and I saw the cowboys coming back out from establishing them in their pasture about 8:30 A.M.

The town curves and we can see past the east side. The cattle are doing the last mile to the turn to the pasture. 

The last time I saw the herders as they came back
from getting the cattle settled

Here's a little movie I made so you could also hear the drive.

I spent the rest of the morning hunting an eagle nest to see if they have young. But that's another blog.  I'll still be visiting Yellowstone - a little 3.5 day vacation from all this work -  when this blog comes out. I'm sure I'll have lots to tell  you about that.

Harney Countys Most Numerous Residents

Harney County, with 10, 228 square miles,  is one of the largest counties in the country. However it only has around 7500 people.  The main industry here is dryland ranching.  So cows,  numbering over 113,000 head, are the most numerous residents of Harney County. And since,I've been here, the population has been rapidly increasing with new calves showing up starting in March and continuing through April.

In the summer, the cattle are mostly free-ranging - over 60% of the county belongs to the government and is managed by the BLM or the Forest Service.  Ranchers pay $1.35 per month for each cow/calf unit to run their cows on public lands. What a deal!

As you drive, you often cross cattle guards in the roads. These keep the cows on certain fields. In the summer, they eat grasses and in the winter, they eat hay.  The cows are usually in their home ranches during the winter.

A nurse cow with her charges

The Tuesday before the local Bird Festival began, I was busy finishing up some edits and additions to my Power Point show and showing it to my boss and some of the people who will be in charge of running it when I'm off driving birding tours. Then my boss had me go to Burns to deliver handouts to the elementary school, telling kids about the fun things to come do at the Bird Festival on Saturday.  I had to rush off because I needed to get to Burns before the school personnel left. But rushing was not in the cards when I got to the Narrows, where Highway 205 crosses between Mud and Malheur Lakes.

Cows  on Highway between two lakes with no place to go

Almost all the cows had calves trudging or stumbling behind them, some that looked to be only a week old. Several cows had lost their calves and were standing in the road bawling or turning back to look for them.  One mother stopped in front of me and her baby immediately lay down in the road, almost on the center line. When the mother was pushed on, the baby didn't get up.  The mother realized this and turned back and nuzzled it to get it moving again. 

When I finally got to the back of the line, the ranchers were using one horse and a couple of 4-wheelers to herd the cows along. They also had two large trucks which they used to block the road from the back. One lady on a 4-wheeler had all the lost calves with her.

These cows were going to their summer pasture on BLM or Forest Service Lands.

Cow in the sagebrush - one of their main summer foods

Hay is fed to the cows all winter and is a large feature in the landscape

The best cow picture is the one I missed. I  had gone to Burns and didn't take my camera.  On the way home, I saw a cow standing near the fence holding an empty feedbag in her mouth.  She was nodding her head up and down and waving the bag.  I thought she was saying, "Hey, do you see this is empty?  More food already!"  

I'm sort of hanging out until I do an extra day of work and run some water samples to Bend.  I get to go shopping and get my hair cut so it is going to be another hard day's work. The biggest problem is that I can't leave until 9:00A. M. Hopefully the light rain will stop and I can bird the grounds while I'm waiting to leave. We are getting new species of passerines every day.

Yesterday I got the protocols and most of the equipment to set up 12 bee collecting stations. I'm also supposed to net them and put them in a killing jar before preserving .  We are sending some of them to a regional F&W scientist for identification.  I think there are over 400 species of bees in the region. I'm also going to help get up a pollinator display, and will be collecting some of the plant material that the bees are using to preserve it. Then we are going to make bee dioramas for a pollinator exhibit.  I'm really excited about getting to work on it. 

Moving Day

Cattle are raised on the coastal prairie for their meat and are also used as a management tool.  Grazing  shortens the prairie grass and opens up areas for new plants to come in, thus increasing diversity. But if the cows stay too long in any area, they degrade it and cause species to disappear. Both the farmers and the government use cows to help manage the prairie.

This means the cows have to be moved a lot. Several times a month, I see cows being rounded up or hauled down the road in the large cattle trailers. Some ranchers have permanent corrals while others set up mobile ones. Last month, I drove past a corral filled with cows and saw the cattle trucks coming in.  I stopped to watch the action. I saw this temporary corral filled with cows while horses rested on the outside. They had been used to round the cattle up and get them penned.

A truck hauling a cattle trailer backed up and gates were opened to the trailer in such a way that they formed a chute.

One guy got his horse and went in and separated the cattle into two groups and rearranged the corral to fence it into two parts. He moved around slowly and did a quiet clucking to get the cattle to move.

Then enough cattle were allowed to jump into the trailer to fill it half full. A guy closed a gate that divided the cattle into two parts, I guess so that a cow  at the back couldn't slide all the way to the front in a quick stop.

 The cows  were allowed to finish filling the truck.  I finally got a picture of one leaping in. Then that truck pulled out and a second trailer got the other half of the load.  All this was repeated with two more trailers for the other half of the herd.

 

A short way from that field, hay was being harvested. The rolls of hay look so picturesque but they are picked up within two days and either all put in one corner, or hauled off.  

 

I too am thinking abut moving day. My last work day here at Anahuac will be September 25.  Then I'll be visiting friends and relatives and playing for a month. Then October 30, I'll  leave from Corpus Christi, TX to drive  around 2000 miles to Sacramento NWR in the northern Sacramento Valley, north of Sacramento, CA.  That refuge is very similar to ours in that it provides habitat for ducks and geese of the western flyway and is in a rice-growing area. I'm excited about my new job and new opportunities to learn about different plants and animals and do some hiking, biking, and canoeing while making new friends. I will have to ship some of my stuff so I can fit back into my Honda Fit.  I'll have my canoe and bike on the outside and most of the rest of my stuff on the inside.