April 24th 1984

[jodywy]

Got told this story the other night, it was April 24 1984 in north eastern Wyoming. The morning was warm and the temps hit 70 by noon, at 3 pm it clouded up and started snowing, by midnight there was way over a foot a day or so later over 3 feet of snow and the wind was blowing. Alan and his Dad owned a feed store and had sold semi loads of cake to the local ranchers all winter, the sheep outfits paid after they sold their wool clip in the spring. Well a few days after the storm and when a few roads got open Alan went and visited an old Basque sheep rancher. The rancher in his 80s came out of the house when Alan walks in from the road on a trail thru the snow. The rancher said" I pay you for the feed but all my ewes and lamb smothered in the shed as they were shearing and the other were buried in draws and canyons and had smothered.
Tens of thousands of sheep had been lost as had late calves, and even horses some in alleyways were found standing dead with the alley packed in snow.
Alan said you don't sue friends to get money they owe you, and especially after they just had lost about everything. They went broke at the feed store but went on and made a living for their families. This last winter Alan's father died, but Alan said he died 24 years ago when all his friends had lost so much...
We still have a foot of snow, but the pushed and feed grounds are bare and dry in most spots. This morning there was 4 new inches of snow and a couple dead lambs on the lambing grounds, one because of the storm the other was a grandmawing ewe pawing a twin from a yearling. Most the other new lambs were crawled in tight next to mom's wool. The dead lamb hurt, but it was only a storm not a spring blizzard.

 

[Soapweed]

That is a sad story, jodywy. Those late spring blizzards are real hard on livestock, especially after they have shed their warm winter hair (or wool). In his book, DAKOTA COWBOY, Ike Blasingame tells of a spring blizzard that started on the 5th of May in 1905. This is from the book:

"Certainly the cloudy warm morning of May 5, 1905 was pleasant enough. But rain began falling before noon, the summery breeze became icy, and the rain changed rapidly to snow, blanketing everthing--the makings of a blizzard growing by the hour."

He goes on to tell that they camped along the river and turned their horses loose. "The tents kept us dry while the snow pelted us continually for two days and two nights. It fell in huge flakes that at times so filled the air that objects ten feet away were not visible."

"After this terrible storm, the sun came out again, the weather warmed up and the snow melted, revealing the frightful livestock tragedy. Range cattle and horses had died like flies in a heavy frost--some of them still standing against a fence or tree. Dead animals lay everywhere. One Indian owner, Herbert, who branded his horses with the figures 24 connected, lost twenty-four of them in one pile. It was the same all over--livestock died due to chilling from the sudden, extreme change in weather so late in the spring. The May 1905 snowstorm remains historically the worst killer of range animals, and doubtless was the worst spring storm ever known on the reservations."

It seems that a rancher can never completely let their guard down when it comes to inclimate weather, in any month.

We experienced a terrible hailstorm on the 25th of July in 2001. If we would have had real young calves in that deal, I know they would have perished. There were a lot of dead deer, antelope, birds, coyotes, and rabbits as a result of that storm. Our Angus cows and calves all had blood running down their backs from being pelted with the hard hail and winds. Those black cattle with the red bloody streaks looked like their given color was brindle.

 

[Silver]

Boy, those are some tough stories. I can only imagine how that would feel as a livestock owner to lose animals that way. We are very fortunate where I live in that I don't believe a mature healthy animal has ever died due to the weather. Hopefully that remains the case.