After a brutal summer, we are enjoying a major change in temperature: a high of 87 yesterday and 55 this morning as storms hit the northwest and Canada.
As I’ve posted before, my father’s model for predicting the weather was based on a 30-day cycle beginning with noticeable changes in the month of August. If these changes were confirmed in September, he would count on rain on those days in October and/or November. My brother and I still rely to some degree on his model, but with the volatility of the weather in recent years, it’s anyone’s guess.
We’ve begun feeding as we wait for our first calves to arrive. We’ve moved our calving date back two weeks, from the first to the fifteenth, in response to the trend of high temperatures in early September. Not only is the heat hard on calving cows, but often there’s always a couple of first-calf heifers that leave their newborns in a hundred degree sun.
September also brings the catalogs for bull sales in California that offer a wide array of Genomic Enhanced Expected Progeny Data as well as links to videos of the bulls. I still rely on my eye, but it’s a far cry from the old days when I was starting out.
As the days get shorter, we still expect the temperatures to return to the century mark, but for the moment it’s delightful.
Only one day since the Solstice has the temperature been below 100 degrees, 54 days with a high over 116. Tough on man and beast. With a slight weather change, yesterday was 99. We’ve been rising early to feed the bulls and heifers and try to be done with our chores before 11:00 a.m.
We kids would perch upon the shingle shed roof where my grandfather would dry his few errant Tompson Seedless for raisins from his Emperor vineyard outside Exeter, California, careful not to snag our swim trunks on the nails to watch the July 4th fireworks show in town—a perfect ending to family picnics celebrating Independence Day after World War II, a time when our nation’s history was rich with common sense. The lack of it today cannot be blamed on Climate Change.
The majority of California has been identified as a High Risk Fire Area while insurance companies have raised premiums to offset theirs, and PG&E’s, losses in Northern California during 2018’s continuous conflagrations. Today, fire insurance is either cost prohibitive or unavailable to homeowners and businesses that has impacted home loans and values, and subsequently the State’s economy. While fire fighters risk their lives to keep wildfires contained to protect these interests, we’re still selling fireworks even though the State’s population has more than tripled since 1955 to a more urban population that has little hands-on experience. The Emergency Rooms are proof enough.
California has many problems as people and businesses leave the State—new taxation annually and a Governor who can’t decide what he stands for as he heads to Washington to bolster Biden’s nomination, and should he fail, make himself visible and available.
It’s time for the non-profit service organizations, churches, Boy Scouts, etc. to stop selling fireworks as fund raisers, stop adding to the costs of our communities and look into drone shows or other means to celebrate Independence Day, it’s time to outlaw fireworks.
Due to calve this fall, these first calf heifers will be checked with ultrasound tomorrow morning. We introduced the Red Angus bulls in late December, and trust that most are bred judging by the activity since then.
drycrikjournal 