Tag Archives: Sulphur Peak

Snow on Sulphur

Posted on March 7, 2025 by | Leave a comment 






Snow comes off the mountain
on the backs of trucks,
white caps on compacts





like trophies
to melt on roads
into town—





cold hands
shoveled dirt driveways
steer downhill.











							

	
			

				
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						Posted in Photographs, Poems 2025, poetry, Ranch Journal					

								
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SULPHUR PEAK 3,448′


			

				Posted on February 26, 2023 by  | 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.


 
							

	
			

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

								
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DOLLARS AND SENSE


			

				Posted on January 29, 2021 by  | Leave a comment
			


				

				






1.
We feed on numbers,
irrigate and harvest plans
with shaved efficiencies,
 
measure our well-being
by more or less
with what’s on paper
 
so easily burned
or suddenly erased—
we forget who we are.
 
 
2.
We share amounts of rain,
compare numbers
with the neighbors,
 
too often disappointed
with what we need most:
just enough moisture
 
to revive this ground—
this flesh and our more
common senses.


 

							

	
			

				
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						Posted in Photographs, Poems 2021, Ranch Journal					

								
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HELPLESS


			

				Posted on September 20, 2020 by  | 1 comment
			


				

				
 




 


On the other side,

all the current dangers rage

unseen that words cannot


assuage.  Isolated here,

hands busy with simple

tasks, we cannot breathe.


On the other side,

an unknown future waits

to reshape us to survive.


Fifty years ago,

I was afraid

I would become proficient—


integrate guilt and hate

into my young soul

to become the best


at squeezing death

before a soldier’s

impromptu grave.


On the other side,

we pray for clarity—

for humble purpose.


 

							

	
			

				
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						Posted in Photographs, Poems 2020, Ranch Journal					

								
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Sulphur Ridge


			

				Posted on April 1, 2019 by  | Leave a comment
			


				

				
 




 


Robbin and I spent most of yesterday checking the cows and calves in Greasy, scattering salt and mineral beneath the Golden Poppies on Sulphur. Colder and under quite a bit of snow this winter, the grass and wildflowers are just getting started.  Note all the drought-killed Blue Oaks in the foreground.


    

							

	
			

				
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SIGNS OF PLENTY


			

				Posted on February 18, 2019 by  | 1 comment
			


				

				
 




 


Low snow up canyon, cold

rain at dawn, vernal pools

in the pasture stand full

waiting for Wood Ducks,

waiting for spring.


Sycamores stripped naked,

their white limbs wave

from across the creek

upon these ponds of water

in the evening sun.


Headlights slash the darkness,

a caravan of jeeps

and 4-wheel drives

whine down canyon—

weary songs back home.


 

							

	
			

				
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						Posted in Photographs, Poems 2019, Ranch Journal					

								
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Sulphur Peak


			

				Posted on December 25, 2015 by  | 6 comments
			


				

				
 


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Overnight rain, wind, hail and a light dusting of snow down to 2,000 feet for our Christmas present on Dry Creek.  Fairly rare, especially during the last four years.  


Whole family here jamming into the late night hours (10:00 p.m., 3 hours past my bedtime), Robbin and Bob with guitars, Jaro and I with harmonicas, all singing what lyrics we knew. 


All good, beautiful morning, Christmas 2015!


 


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Bagels and lochs on the deck.


 

							

	
			

				
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DARK LIGHT


			

				Posted on October 22, 2015 by  | 2 comments
			


				

				
 


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Errant gods return

to paint earth and sky, bring

dark light after dry.


 

							

	
			

				
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						Posted in Haiku 2015, Photographs, Ranch Journal					

								
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DAWN ON THE MOUNTAIN


			

				Posted on October 17, 2015 by  | 2 comments
			


				

				
 


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October slips away from the sun

sliding south down the ridgeline

after a quick rain clears

               the air,

settles summer’s dust,

erases tracks

               for a day:


                              another beginning

                              to another adventure—

                              nearly 25,000 now.


No calls from beyond

Sulphur Peak:

                              old friend

to generations waking

from dreams and restless sleep.


On top in the brush

a 2” x 2” surveyor’s pole,

a Challenge Butter buck

               not quite in rut.

Spring poppy overlay of gold

winter cap of snow—

               never naked,

always changing clothes.


                                        ~


 


Weekly Photo Challenge: “(Extra)ordinary”


 

							

	
			

				
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						Posted in Photographs, Poems 2015, Ranch Journal					

								
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Good Day @ Ragle Springs


			

				Posted on August 22, 2015 by  | 3 comments
			


				

				
 


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To complete our documentation of last week’s efforts to improve the availability of water for cattle, Terri Blanke stands beside the upper concrete box last Wednesday, one of many constructed by Earl McKee, Sr. and Lee Maloy in the 1930s when they packed cement and sand on mules from the Kaweah River, five miles and 2,500 feet in elevation away. 


From the bottom, the upper box was plumbed to the lower box with 1½“ steel pipe too rusty and leaky to repair, rendering the lower box useless.  In the 1990s, Earl McKee, Jr. and Chuck Fry constructed the pond below with dozers to collect all the leaks plus seasonal runoff.  Dirt tank dry by the end of June for past two years, I installed the little galvanized trough last year to provide clean water by utilizing a hole in the side of the upper box.


While David Langton was mucking out the pond at Grapevine last Saturday, I plumbed the second concrete tank to the overflow of the little galvanized trough with 1 ¼“ PVC and galvanized riser.  On Monday, while David was covering the PVC, he bumped the rock beside the galvanized trough with his backhoe’s outrigger, which moved the empty trough and snapped my PVC fill pipe.  We plugged the flow from the upper box with a plastic bag and I went for hose at the corrals a mile below to syphon water into the galvanized trough rather than lose it, giving me time (2½ hours) to get to town for galvanized pipe replacements.


There wasn’t enough water stored in the little galvanized trough for the fourteen head of cows living at Ragle Springs, yet the little trough filled and overflowed at night.  Assuming the lower box doesn’t leak as it fills, we will have enough water stored for the fourteen cows—a good day for all.


 

							

	
			

				
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						Posted in Photographs, Ranch Journal					

								
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