Saturated Sonora

We finally got rain!

It’s been tough here for the last year and a half.

It’s been hard for me to keep my chin up and keep thinking positive when it doesn’t rain for so long. I know you all know what we’re talking about because much of the southwest has been in an extreme drought for quite some time now.

I’ve seen plants starting to die, cows losing weight and struggling to maintain their good nutrition, and wildlife disappearing.

Even the creosote was starting to die in places. I’ve never seen it so dry and I’ve been here for close to 60 years. Living in the desert always entails droughts here and there. It’s part of life in the desert, but to go for 17 months with virtually no rain-it’s hard on everything.

At the end of August we were about three weeks from having to make the tough decisions that come with raising livestock - if there is no food to eat, what do we do with our cattle?

We were completely out of feed ; our mother cows need rangeland with all the yearlings, two years and cattle waiting to finish on our irrigated pasture. There were some pretty long faces around here. That thought always weighs heavy on our minds.

Fortunately, it finally started to rain and over the next five or six weeks we got some pretty darn good rain. The grass greened up and started growing again, the Joshua trees started to perk up and the wildlife started to look a lot happier.

Cows got more excited about going into a new pasture and it was nice to see them kicking up their heels again. What a blessing it’s been. It’s starting to dry up again, but everything is OK. And we more or less expect it at this time of year.

Keep your fingers crossed that we get some rain in the spring and/or rain in the summer. Do a rain dance for us ( and for all of us living in this desert )say a prayer or whatever it is you can do to put in a good word for the life that surrounds us and that we live in.

Next week, I’ll show some photos and give more details about the pipeline project that Savannah mentioned in the last newsletter.

On the range,

Kimberley Knight