It's tourist season

The highway to a popular tourist area goes right by our place. Since our ranch is surrounded by public lands and is not visible from the highway, tourists often decide to take our ranch access road in search of a "wilderness experience." Most turn around at the locked gate and look for their adventure elsewhere. One or two decide to set up camp in the middle of the road, blocking traffic of exhausted ranchers returning late at night. Some take the time to vandalize the gate. A few dare to look for the key and come through the gate only to leave when they realize there is someone actually living here. Their first clues are the barking dog and dancing mustang rounding up the churros.

It is a sad fact that the few who vandalize the property or leave the gates open are the reason we dread the tourist season. If the tourists would use common courtesy when dealing with locals, they may have a better "wilderness experience." The locals can usually tell the intrepid adventurer where the best trails for hiking are; where they have the best chance of sighting wildlife; etc. Locals are usually proud of their area. If they weren't, they wouldn't live where they do. So talk to them. Don't turn around and drive away when you suddenly find yourself in someone's front yard. The locals may even let you park in their yard while you are backpacking in the back country for a few days.

And close any gate you open! There is a reason those gates are closed. If you go through an open gate, leave it open. Again, there is a reason the gate is open. And please don't vandalize a gate. Private lands are scattered throughout public lands and they are usually defined by fences and gates.

Don't park in the middle of a road even if it looks like it hasn't been used since 1492. I don't know about you, but I don't care to come home in the middle of the night and find my driveway blocked by a passed out camper. "I didn't know it was a road" is not an acceptable excuse. If you can drive a vehicle on it, and if there is no vegetation growing on it, it's a road in the desert. Just because you can't see the end of the road doesn't mean it's a dead end road.

Ratmobile

I just got my pickup back from the garage. The mechanics there have dubbed it the Ratmobile because the only time I have trouble with it is when the rats have been chewing on the wiring or hoses. It's amazing how much damage a rat can do to an EFI engine over night.

We tried using poisons but that only seems to attract more rats. Then they carry the poisons where the cats and dog can get at them. We've even found stashes in the hay stack. Poisons are not an option for rodent control.

Drakar, our Aussie-Chow cross, goes after rats with great determination and he usually gets his rat...after digging three holes that look like bomb craters.

The barn cats, Gabby and Spike, have their paws full just patrolling the barn and the stack yard. They do a pretty good job considering their collection of trophies piled in one corner of the barn. Not just rats, either. Ground Squirrels. Rabbits. Birds. All trophies in a neat pile. Things are pretty safe in the barn now. We haven't seen any damage by rats in there for the last couple of years.

Until we can get a few more cats, I will have to remember to leave the hood up on my pickup when I park it for the night. Oh, and my most recent bill from the garage... in addition to replacing the ignition wire set, I was charged for evicting a rat family from the air cleaner housing. No wonder they call it the Ratmobile.

Oh! They are so adorable!

A frequent reaction when I show photographs of the new babies at work. Only instead of grandchildren, I show photos of my new lambs. Yes, Navajo-Churro lambs are cute and so adorable, just as any breed of lamb is. The difference is Navajo-Churro lambs know they are cute and adorable.

Aria, pictured here with her mom, Diva, is less than seven days old. The guard dog and the male barn cat turn to putty whenever Aria gets close to them. Even Hussa, our recently purchased ram who arrived after Aria's birth, nuzzles her gently through the fence. Yes, Aria knows she is cute and adorable, thank you very much for noticing. Even the guard mare, Ruby, has noticed how cute and adorable. Why else would a half-wild mustang allow a lamb to nibble on her fetlock without kicking it into the next county? And people wonder why I am going gray.

An Avenging Angel

We were recently forced by nature and circumstance to pen two weanling ram lambs with their sire, a large, aggressive ram with magnificent horns. Dad was pretty rough on the boys until we hung a large white rubber boat fender in the ram pen just above Dad's eye level. We hoped he would use that as a punching bag instead of his sons, but reverse ovine psychology prevailed. The adult ram is terrified of the "avenging angel" and the lambs sleep peacefully under its protection.

Not so bright lights

With the increase of energy bills, people ask us advice about converting to alternative energy when they learn we live with solar and wind power. Their eyes cross when we suggest they practice energy conservation first. We use alternative energy because we have no choice. The grid isn't close enough for us to hook onto it. We conserve energy out of habits we established to extend the life of our equipment prior to moving to the ranch. Those habits cost us $60 per month in utility bills back then, compared to $150 to $300 per month utility bills of our neighbors. We all lived in trailer houses of similar age, size, and configuration. The structural differences were very subtle. It was our habits that made the difference in the pocket book.

First, we replaced all the incandescent light bulbs with flourescent ones. They may be more expensive but they last longer. The Department of Energy estimates a 12 % reduction in electric bills just by switching to flourescent lights. And all lights in unoccupied rooms were turned off. The hardest part of developing this habit was making sure the room was unoccupied first.

The thermostat was set on 68 degrees in the winter and 80 degrees in the summer. If we were chilled, we would add a layer of clothing. If we were hot, we would remove a layer.

Insulated curtains made a big difference. Heat exchange through trailer windows was a big drain on the pocket book. Using the curtains as a means of temperature control can be tricky during the spring and fall with sudden temperature changes, but summer and winter use are pretty straight forward. In the winter, the drapes are open during the day and closed at night to keep the heat where it does the most good. It's just the opposite in summer; open at night and closed during the day.

Placing bulky furniture and bookcases against exterior walls increases the R-value of the insulation. Thicker walls means less heat transfer, which translates into lower utility bills.

We were never big fans of television. We prefer reading or talking to each other, so our TV wasn't on much. We gave it away once we got to the ranch. And we don't miss it.

Since moving to the ranch, we have propane appliances rather than electric -- with the exception of the clothes dryer, which drys by wind and solar power. There are energy efficient models of refrigerator and freezers out there and the prices are comparable to propane appliances. It's just that we don't need, or want, all the bells and whistles that come with the electric models.

Using wood and coal for heat during the winter doesn't cost us much. We live at the edge of a pinyon-juniper forest. Live trees are carefully pruned as a fire control measure while dead ones are removed to reduce the risk of fire by lightning strike. The wood is stacked and allowed to cure for winter use. Coal costs $50 per ton, which will last us 2 years.

If you are serious about cutting your energy costs, practice energy conservation for a while. You will need to develop the habits anyway if you decide to go with alternative energy. The transition is easier if the habits are already in place. As a dated saying goes, "Try it. You'll like it."

A rose by any other name...

Names are easier for me to remember than numbers. I think it comes from working in the medical field for so many years. Heaven help you if you ever referred to a patient by a room number rather than by their surname. So all the critters must have names.
I don't pick names out of a hat when a new lamb hits the ground. I watch the lamb for a few hours to see what name is most appropriate for the newest arrival. Some times, the name is obvious, like Red Ear for example. She is a white lamb with one red ear. Salt and Pepper were obvious; twin ewes with one being black and tan while the other is white with tan spots. Pirouette took a little longer to name. Her favorite pastime is spinning in circles like she's chasing her tail. Princess Speed Demon liked to race the length of the corral when she became steady on her feet.
Conventional names come to mind sometimes while I am watching the sheep. Ruth is one of our starter ewes who didn't have a name until she arrived at the ranch. Abraham was named for his birthdate, February 12th. Other names, like Rudy pictured, come from a physical characteristic. His nose turned red a few days after he was born.
Still others never reveal their names so we have a No Name and a Nameless.
The barn cats get named, too. Spike wasn't named for her punk rocker markings. She was named because she held her black tail erect whenever she was on the prowl as a kitten. It looked like she had a spike stuck on her hip bone. We had two others named Spitz and Growl because they could spit and growl like cats 4 times their size. And Gabby doesn't shut up.
The hard part about coming up with names for critters on a ranch is trying not to get rhyming names or names that sound similar to a name already being used. We train our critters to respond to their names. If the names sound alike, the critters get confused. We knew a couple who complained that half their team of horses for a six-up hitch wouldn't respond when called unless all three were called at the same time. The names rhymed. It may sound cute to our ears, but it's a confusing jumble of sounds to an animal.
Names determine how we react to individuals whether they are two-legged or four. You wouldn't react kindly to a name associated with a known villian-type like Snydly Whiplash, but you would react with favor to a name like Sweet Nell. Biblical names are especially good for a favorable response. Native American names are good, too, but I don't think Sitting Bull would be appropriate for a ram lamb. Sitting Ram? Nope. Doesn't sound quite right.

You know you've been in the desert too long when...

1. Somebody says it's raining and everyone runs outside to see what it looks like.
2. Rain is measured by inches between drops.
3. The dog has a tarantula for a pet.
4. You stack rocks for shade.

Building a sheep ranch in the desert is definitely challenging. Selecting the right breed of sheep for the environment wasn't difficult. We chose Navajo-Churros, a breed that was developed in this region for the past 500 years or so. The breed was nearly extinct in the 1970's, but through the dedicated efforts of Dr. Lyle McNeal and some Navajo-Churro fanciers, the breed is on it's way to recovery. Months were spent researching the Navajo-Churros to see if it was the right breed for us. Nowhere in the limited literature did we find mention of:

1. These sheep have a sense of humor and will play tricks on one another as well as their shepherd.
2. They are more like their wild cousins, the desert bighorns, than they are like other domestic breeds of sheep.
3. That they bite when you nick them during shearing.

We didn't think too much about the comment that Navajo-Churros breed out of season until lambs started showing up in the corral in November. The older siblings of these lambs shown in the photo below are only 6 to 11 months older.


As you can see, Navajo-Churros come in an assortment of colors.

If you look closely at Pepper, the little black and tan ewe in the foreground, you can see the horn buds characteristic of this breed.








Fortunately, Pepper's horns won't be as impressive as her sire's, PDF Black Hawk.

I haven't seen a four-horned ewe yet, but I'm told they do occur. Our foundation flock of ewes do carry the four-horn gene so I'm waiting.