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Drought

T

Tap

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Feb 25, 2006
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It seems the topic in a lot of western SD is drought. We were one of the only places in SD that were dry last year, but now we are one of the only places with good grass conditions this year.

Our crested wheatgrass is about 6 in. high and headed out, and in a waiting pattern. I don't know if we will get much hay yet, but our grass is real good most places. The thing that baffles me is that the places that had a good year in SD last year, think they are already hurting from dry conditions this year. A good rancher ought to be able to stand one year that is dry, but two or more can hurt.

I read Kit Pharo's newsletter, and he says they are real bad in that area. I tend to think that if most people that thought they had it bad, saw some of the real tough areas, they would change their tune. I sure feel for those areas that have been dry for years in a row. This is about our first decent early start in years here, but we need a good rain to make some hay.

How are you doing in the moisture dept. lately Cowpuncher?
 
Tap, in my experience most people don't know what a real drought is.

Many complain about drought when it is just a bit dry. Perspective is everything.

Your right about 1 year not making a drought, or more specifically a couple months.

Texas was the only place I have seen that can go from dry grass to lush in 2 weeks or vice versa...but even then a drought it isn't always.
 
That is very true Tap no matter how dry a person thinks he is there is always somewhere drier. I have driven by Kit's country even on our worst year we probably still look good. We had a good start on things but the wind and heat have taken its toll. We have had one good hay year out of the last five.

In states like Colorado water rights are very valuable for irrigation and survival. I am not sure if SD has any water rights? Do you know how any of that works? (as far as run off water and or irrigation rights)

Have a good one

Lazy ace
 
There are quit a few people shipping cattle out of Kits neck of the woods already... No grass... It is tough to compare one place to another as far as droughts. We were very dry for us here last year. And we had been dry the year before too but not nearly as much... This year started off real good but we are now "dry". I wouldn't call it a drought yet but if June follows May in only getting 1/4 of the moisture than we will be really hurting with lack of subsoil moisture... But one weather system can change things...


I will say I am getting sick of watching those storms sweap from North to south and cutting just to the west of us... 20 miles to the north and the fields have standing water, the irrigators were running around here today on the cornfields... That and the ones that are firing just to the east of us are enough to drive you nuts... Oh wel, it is still early...
 
Tap, You have to remember that we have had several extremely dry years before last year. Last year there was some moisture, but it was all in April and May, and grass started to come back, but there was no real build up in the lacking ground moisture from previous years, and the root systems were greatly diminished. It never caught back up, because the pastures/crops had to survive the rest of the whole summer on that early moisture.

So no rain and all the wind this spring has really taken it's toll on the already taxed root systems of the plants and yes many things are drying up and not growing. It is not just a matter of one dry spring. We have some subirrigated meadows that always look better than a lot of the country and even parts of them are drying up and withering. I know your area is used to dry. We are too, but it is pretty serious in areas.

So the "good ranchers" that withstood 3 years of drought, then got a teaser last year that maybe it was over have earned the right to feel the drought was not broken/is still in effect/or is back.

Just my two cents for what it's worth... :?
 
I think there are probably worse things than drought; floods, fire to name a couple.

But living with drought year after year...gets so OLD.
I've noticed that with some good moisture the blades of the grass
are fuller; the tree leaves are larger; moisture does so many
good things I just don't understand why it is denied us so much.

When we lived in W. Montana, a friend showed us pictures of the deep
snow that was usual in that area. We put our hay up on a bench
behind the house. Because of his advice and what we saw in those pictures, each year we hauled every bale of hay off the
bench and down into different stackyards on the creek.
Only one year out of 18 would we have had a problem getting up
the hill to the hay. So for 17 years we wouldn't have had to do that. It
was quite a job, even with today's machinery. That's how much
the snowfall has diminshed in W. Montana. When we left, creeks and
springs were drying up that had never been dry.

Did I mention I hate drought?
 
I am not really saying that folks are unjustified in complaining about it being dry, just saying that in comparison it isn't always so bad. If it effects your bottom line, it hurts. Period.

We are used to dealing with it being dry off and off here. And when it gets bad, it is tough. BUT, we get about the same precip. as the Miles City MT area, and our droughts (in my lifetime at least) never look as bad as it does in that country. I have seen it where their trees don't even hardly leaf out. Their ground can look as though there was a fire and the rain washed the black off. It just looks plumb horrible. We could have the same precip, and just look real tough, but never as bad as they do. I attribute it to all the bare ground that just bakes over there, and we have some sand that is more drought tolerant. And it is only around 100 miles between us. I think FH would verify what I say. Her area is more simular to ours, and she is closer to MC.
 
Oh, yea, I agree Tap. We have heard the grass is just not as good on the west side of the Powder River; that the calves don't do as well coming out of that country.

I really enjoy the drive to Miles City, it goes fast~perhaps because it
varies so much. But you can sure see some cattle that aren't in good
condition from here to there.

I drove south of Miles City on the road to Broadus and that country
was sure disappointing last year when we were fairly good. When you
get closer to Volberg it seems to be much better country.

But what do I know, we're still pilgrims here! :wink:

Have you ever read any books by John Moore? Anyhow I think that is
his name~he really tells some gruesome stories about drought and
bad winters.
 
Tap,

We have been very fortunate in the last 10 days - almost two inches of rain and it rained again today - in fact, it is raining at the ranch right now.

Most of the wheat in the area has been lost, but we will probably have to cut ours to get insurance coverage.

The last ten days have made an unbelievable difference in the grass. Cows are loafing around a good part of the time. Our summer pastures are just now greening up so we will leave the cattle in the winter pastures longer since the grass there responds much faster.

I guess I am really amazed at how little moisture we really need. If we could get our moisture when it was needed and not when it wasn't, 10 inches a years would be plenty.

Kit Pharo's area is drier than we are, but I think they got a couple of storms today.

Story about the old rancher fron Hugo, CO who mentioned to a tourist that they only get 12 inches of rain per year. Tourist is amazed and allows as how really dry that the country was. Rancher says that he wouldn't talk like that if he would be around on the day they got the twelve inches.

The only thing worse than having to sell your cattle because of drought is selling them and having the trucks get stuck in the mud on the way out. We came real close - only sold a couple of trailer loads of dry cows.
 
Great to hear you are getting some rain Cowpuncher. That must be a bit of a burden to be lifted off your shoulders. You know the funny thing is that our driest year (2002) had some really good calf weights. Rancher found that out a couple years later too. We just had a few inches on some of our summer pastures in 2002, and they were small showers. But our calf weights were at least up to normal, or even a bit better that year. I can't say why exactly. They ate 2001's grass most of the year. And it was SO hot that summer.

You getting the trucks stuck in the mud story reminds me of something that happened here one time. I think it was 1991, but I can't be sure. We were dry and had some pairs waiting to sell in Faith SD at the sale barn. At that time we had some summer pasture about 30 odd miles north of here that we had pairs on too. The day or so before the pairs were to be sold, we had a nice little half inch rain at our HQ, and a little later a neighbor to the far north ranch called and said we might want to come up and have a look at our land up there as they had a lot of rain. We drove up and could see some minor flooding and the further north we went it turned to major flooding. An 80 acre hayfield/pasture had just a few acres that weren't under water, and we were sure glad we didn't have cows in there. The water lacked about 2 ft. of hitting the underside of the hiway bridge, and was pushing thru culverts that were designed to drain water the opposite direction. A neighbors sheep and all his junk pile ended up floating down the creek thru our pastures and into a big lake. They even had to close that lake east of us for a while because of all the rattlesnakes that were flooded out of the hills, west of our property line. And talk about fences that needed rebuilt. :x

They said that there was 11 inches or more of water in peoples 5 gallon buckets after that rain, and that is just 2 inches short of our yearly average. A friend of ours that lives near there is always complaining about it being dry, but I don't think that kind of rain would ever happen in our neighborhood.

We did go ahead and sell the pairs. :wink: :lol:
 
I drove from Eastern ND to Bismarck down through SD and got to Rapid, then from Rapid to Burke, SD over the weekend and it looks dry in the Bismarck area, really dry in The Harried, SD area, dry through Mobridge, T.L. and to Faith. From their it starts looking good again , and looks really good from Newell to Rapid all the way to Burke. But it looks the worst from Sterling, ND down to Mobridge, SD west to Isabel. They are in a hurt bag there. By visiting with ranchers in that area, they are talking about selling pairs.
 
Gettin pretty dry here, again, too. Had some fair rains this spring, but our rainy season doesn't hit till July......last year was the best we've had in about 10, as far as rain and grass goes.....hope we're swingin back to the wetter years again.

Hope everyone that needs some, gets it.........rain, that is..... :P

:cboy:
 
Ranchy's comment of swinging back to wetter years fits with my 2 cents.

How often is it a drought or is it just a normal dry pattern for an area?

Here we are wetter than usual, I have taken on more cows, but I know the numbers are not sustainable. I am taking advantage of an unusual situation.

Some of those areas that look bad are over stocked in my opinion, because the owners are waiting for rain. Rain that maybe isn't coming for a while.

I am pasturing on the indian reserve again this year, first time in many years. The band has taken over the grass leases for the residents and limit the numbers and the time they can graze. Good for everyone in the long run. The residents used to get a big shot of money for purtting in too many cows and over grazing it. Ranchers would take lower calf weights, but greed kept new guys forking out the cash each year. BSE took lots of that out, grass needs to be cared for in the wetter years to carry you through the dry ones.
 
A drought in wetter country is usually a bit harder in some ways-at least in dry country you have drought adapted native grasses-our growing season isn't very long here but you can almost hear it grow. When we don't get rain our shallow rooted grasses are in big trouble. It's not much fun for ten years straight like we had. The only thing that saved us was salvaging crop wrecks from the farmers around us. A couple years they caught enough late rain to grow a bit-as much a pain in the butt it is getting cows out of mud like yesterday it's better than dry-alot better. A drought anwhere though is not much fun.
 
Tap,

You are right about calf weights in dry years. In 2002, our calf weights were higher than normal. We even joked that we might consider not feeding the cows at all!!.

You are also right about having a weight taken off our shoulders. Nothing makes for a good nights sleep like seeing an end - even if temporary - to a dry spell,

We will be taking video of our calves tomorrow. We had held off because we didn't want to have a contract to live up to if we couldn't hang on to the cattle.
 
Just got back from my honeymoon in the Black Hills. It looked beautiful around there with hay everywhere and full dams. All of the hay here and Western Nebraska has been shipped to Texas. After coming home to no grass, I decided that we should have went to somewhere that looks worse than here. We got 0.2 last night and 0.25 the night before, so maybe we are going to get some grass growing here. Things look tough here (Five years), but I think it is worse in extreme western KS and the Burlington, CO area.
 
Ya that is close to the Burke area I was talking about. Looks really good down there. But it ussually does. My inlaws live in that area and they ussually get 3 cuttings, and always 2, sometimes they get to patch out the 4th.
 
A couple more thoughts:

cycles: definately true that those do occur, and love the upside but hate the downside :shock: :o

I think that is part of working with nature... you almost never hear anyone talking about how it was just right... either too dry or going to be too dry if it doesn't start or too wet or going to be too wet if it doesn't stop. What would the folk like my f-i-l talk about at coffee if not for weather cycles. :???: lol

Black Hills: has lots of trees, and tends to get afternoon rain showers often, usually lots of hay in the Valley because they irrigate always looks nice to me till you get closer to scenic, then the rough can show :lol:

Tap: I reread my post and hope you didn't think I was jumping all over you... just pointing out some reasons for the worries... :oops:

East river, yeah I'm not sure they know what drought is... lol k_ranch and I went over there to buy our trailer a few years ago... they had been talking about how dry it was and so on. It really was dry here with not much grass. Everything looked so lush and tall and GREEEN! It was in June like this when the grass is just getting going good here and it's like 9-10 inches tall and there it was past the cattle's bellies. :shock: But there I go saying the same kind of thing I was talking against... You have no idea unless you're from an area, what it SHOULD look like, and so everyone's perspective is different. :wink:

ok, take care
 

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