Monthly Archives: February 2023

SULPHUR PEAK 3,448′

Posted on February 26, 2023 by John | 9 comments

Your robe’s frozen sleeve

reaches the creek once again,

my unending friend,

you carry both storm

and heaven on your shoulders

when I reflect up—

face unwavering

beneath sun and starlit night

always in the morning.

______________________________________

It’s been interesting weather, now half-way through our rainy season, over 18 inches of rain after a decade of drought. Already whispers from the loudest drought complainers for relief as these hills leak crystal rivulets again.

We lost a month in time in January to the Atmospheric River during branding season, and now with nearly 3 inches in the past 3 days and 3 inches more forecast for the next three, it will be at least a week before we can get to our upper country to brand the last bunch, putting us close to the middle of March. These calves will be big, a handful.

The Paregien Ranch ranges from 2,000 to 2,600 with its own light blanket of snow now, time-released moisture soaking into the clay and granite ground that leaks down the smooth rock waterfalls of Ridenhour Canyon, adding to Dry Creek that peaked at 684 cfs last night, that probably washed out some of our watergaps replaced after January’s peak flow over 3,500 cfs.

Job security, but patience until we can get there—you can’t fight Mother Nature, just try to adapt and face the consequences—fully enjoy her luxuriant and persistent presence after so much needed moisture.

9 Comments

Posted in Haiku 2023, Photographs, POEMS 2023, Ranch Journal

Tagged branding, Drought, Dry Creek, grass, green, haiku, Mother Nature, Paregien, patience, photography, poetry, rain, snow, Sulphur Peak, weather

WINDMILL SPRING

Posted on February 23, 2023 by John | 4 comments

How many jillion rains have washed away

the rodent digs from these exposed intrusions,

lichen-stained, fractured magma rockpiles

changing shape in the sun’s daylight and shadow

to appear to be alive for eons, like a trout

breaching a clay wave, free to see the sky?

Some have seen so much that they have souls.

4 Comments

Posted in Photographs, POEMS 2023

Tagged anthropomorphism, Lichen, magma, photography, poetry, rain, rockpiles, rocks, soul, water, Windmill Spring

Weathermaker

Posted on February 21, 2023 by John | 4 comments

The foothill poppies are beginning to show on our south slopes as temperatures hover near 70 degrees. The white popcorn flowers and orange fiddlenecks have begun to claim the gentler ground in what appears to be the beginning of a colorful wildflower year with the ample moisture (Atmospheric River) we received last month.

Beginning this evening, forecasts vary as temperatures drop into the low thirties with a cold front that will engulf California. Weathermen are predicting snow down to 1,000 feet, nearly 1,000 feet below this photograph. There is even some talk of fourteen inches of snow in Three Rivers. Furthermore, Weather Underground predicts rain on all but one day for the next two weeks.

The road to the Paregien ranch has just dried out and cleared of fallen trees, but we still haven’t been able to get to the calves to brand up there. We lost a month in time to the Atmospheric River in January, but two weeks of predicted rain with a week to dry out puts that branding into the middle of March at the soonest and our calves are almost too BIG to handle.

Nothing is certain in this business, but as a weather dependent livelihood we’ll have to be ready to adapt. (Cut another load of dead-standing Manzanita and Blue Oak yesterday, at least we should be warm).

4 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Ranch Journal

Tagged photographs, poppies, rain, snow, spring, weather, wildflowers, winter

COMING ALIVE

Posted on February 8, 2023 by John | 8 comments

After ten dry years, the drought-killed,

dead-standing oaks have shed their limbs

in piles, like clothes at their feet—some

centuries claiming space, offering summer

shade to cows, acorns to a host of hungry

mouths, hidden homes to hawks and lesser

feathered flocks—and have begun to tip

over as the rain-soaked earth lets go

of their decomposing roots to rest

on fences or across the dirt tracks

between us and our children grazing

the ridgetops: like emerald thighs, toes

reaching for the flats along the creek.

Despite the disassembled skeletons

of a generation passing that litters

and melts into the ground, lush canyon

and slope come alive to welcome and beckon

to embrace me for the first time

in a decade—and I overwhelmed, submissive

having spent my penance on unknown sins

I will confess just to prolong this moment.

8 Comments

Posted in Photographs, POEMS 2023, poetry, Ranch Journal

Tagged anthropomorphism, Drought, Dry Creek, guilt, joy, penance, photography, poetry, rain, weather

EAST BEQUETTE BRANDING 2023

Posted on February 3, 2023 by John | 6 comments

As great (for us) as the three-week Atmospheric River was, it put everyone’s branding schedules behind, most roads too wet to get to our cattle. Normally, we’d be at Elko this time of year, but with travel and time away from business, we needed to stay at home before our calves got too big to handle easily.

When I look around our community’s branding pens I realize now that most of the old timers are gone, that we have taken their places going ‘old-people slow’, and we prefer it. Fortunately we have some young muscle to work the ground.

Robbin and I have scaled our operation down, in part due to our heavy culling to adapt to consecutive years of drought and also by selling half of our cows to my son Bob. Branding pasture by pasture, our bunches are now small enough to get by with three ropers, one calf stretched at a time. Our relaxed pace has become even more conducive for old friends to visit while we get the work done. These photos from our second branding of the season, it’s been great!

We head to Tony Rabb’s next week to brand after he assesses the rain forecast for this weekend.