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se montana | Morning Russell,
Good to hear from you,
I made it till 430 this morning so that’s almost a full nights sleep. Looks like you are getting some decent greenup. We are cold and drouthy here, but haven’t given up completely yet. Next 10 days forecast looks hopeful.
I’ll admit, I’ve began to drink the koolaid on the higher grazing management deal. I’ve spent a lot of money and time the last 3 years burying pipeline and putting in storage. This is more than half from grant money, so I’m hedging my risk I guess. I haven’t started fencing everything up yet, as the water is the first devil of the detail. I’m one of the more conservative grazers in my area, I’ve always left a fair amount of grass standing, but I’ve never left a pasture to rest for over a year, and I think I can do that with more paddocks and more choices. I’m moving into it very slow, but the next few years are gonna be interesting. Most of my place is currently in 1 section pastures, and I’ve got deer and elk, so poly might not be a very good tool, but I’m using cable for temporary hotfence, and it’s holding up fairly well.
Here’s another crazy hippy idea to keep you up at night…sheep. Looking at your high desert environment, it looks like sheep would do well on all that sage and greasewood, rubber rabbitbrush, not sure what else you’ve got. Our ranch has never seen a sheep in all of history but I’m starting to see where they would fit. There’s at least a couple hundred years of stockpiled sheep habitat here thats never been used. I think having them for the first 5 years would be pretty efficient use of the range…after that they might need to go down the road.
There I said it. Sheep and intensive grazing management. I’m not doing it yet, but I’m sure thinking hard about it,
Hope all is well with you, Wendy, and the boys. Don’t be surprised to hear that I’m coming over there for a tour, it’s on my travel list. | |
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Woke up couldn't sleep,...
