Published in Graze

 

Covid-19 is deadly for my age cohort. It can be even more severe than the 300,000 deaths attributed to it as of mid-December would suggest, given what some of the survivors have been dealing with in terms of long-term debilitation.

Knowing this and more about our situation, I decided to retreat. This was to be grandson Andrew’s first shot at being in charge of the farming. He didn’t need me looking over his shoulder, and I needed to be out of the house doing something useful.

I really did. Ask my wife.

So I told the family that had offered us their 120-acre farm for grazing that I would spend the season getting ready for cows in 2021. I could be outside, away from others, doing the kind of work I understood and pushing toward an important goal, which was making sure that land coming out of CRP would not go to row cropping. I could also, and did, work at old man’s speed — maybe six hours a day, five days a week.

I have written before about the shocking effects of row crop agriculture on this kind of land, a gravel subsoil covered with a thin layer of loam. One corner of the property has a six-foot drop between the grass and the adjacent cornfield that grabs my attention every time I drive past it.

The trackhoe brought in last year by the landowners had blazed an area 800 feet long and 50 feet wide for the fence through trees adjacent to the slough east of the property. The slough is a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service waterfowl production area, and that adjoining land also includes about 70 acres of upland. This strikes me as an opportunity for the future, as Fish and Wildlife is one of the easier government agencies to get along with for occasional grazing, as they perhaps understand land health better than the USDA.

This is no small matter. Few truly understand land health, and I very much doubt that even us graziers have it all squared away. But we do have a strong clue in that we understand some of the effects of grazing on the root systems of perennial plants through improvements in both water and the carbon cycles.

I spent several hours explaining to a reporter and the landowner why grazing animals were needed after all those years in grass, showing them the short brome standing on the hilltops and higher ground compared to the much taller and lusher stands of it near the bottoms, as well as the five-foot tall reed canarygrass and cattail in the lowest ground.

I said the cattle would restart the biological system and begin the process of rebuilding the root systems on these hilltop plants, and that those much more extensive roots would keep more of the water where it landed, keeping some of the moisture out of the bottoms and encouraging better plant growth on the high ground. We should, I told them, be able to reduce runoff.

So to work. I spent the first week cutting five strands of barbed wire loose from a mile of steel posts, perhaps 250 to 300 of them spaced no more than 20 feet apart. They were all driven by hand, no doubt, and I immediately respected the farmer who built the fence. Whatever else he was, he wasn’t lazy.

I started to roll up the brittle old wire. Some of it broke in my hands as I tried to start each roll. Surprisingly most of the bottom strand came loose of the sod, although here and there I had to cut and leave it.

Several weeks later, after half a dozen pairs of gloves, several ripped shirts and assorted cuts, I was ready to hire a tree puller for the skidloader, and made a one day job of pulling the posts. The pile of wire rolls and old posts on the yard would have buried a Farmall M. It is yet to be hauled to the salvage place.

Next, I needed to spend several weeks cutting small trees here and there and dragging them out of the way of the perimeter fence with the utility tractor. I was beginning to notice a distinct shortage of some of the wildlife I am accustomed to. Snakes I saw, and sometimes mice. I stumbled over more than one pocket gopher pile.

I heard crows and saw hawks circling down by the slough, but not so much over the grass. Most startling was the complete lack of songbirds.

The grassland seemed dead. No bobolinks or dickcissels. Meadowlarks, either western or eastern, were not heard. No killdeer’s song, nor savannah sparrows that I could detect. I do wonder what this grassland will sound like after a year or two of grazing.

The last step ahead of the coming of the crew to do the perimeter fence was to mow a strip around the entire farm. This I accomplished with a brush mower on the skidloader. The fence crew showed up the next day, and spent three days constructing an excellent, four-strand fence around the 120 acres, including five bends to dodge around the sloughs on the east side.

The landlady immediately started to get compliments on the property from her relatives who live all around the area. I think she was a little startled at the size of the check she had to write, though.

I questioned the hammering I had been hearing all summer, and it finally dawned on me that it was not hammers, but rather guns on the firing range at the lake. I had once again lived out of my own world, and into the next one.

Hammering on nearby farmyards around home was part of the sound of my youth, but no more. The places around me now are empty most days except for the several occupied by old people who mostly stay in their houses.

But it was also around this time that the neighbors started to show up in pickups and four-wheelers to talk. The retired cousin of the owner walked across the road to visit.

Two fellows nearby who work in town called me, wondering about hunting and if they could help with the cattle. This was a considerable relief, as I had worried a great deal about cattle 25 miles from home, even placid stock cows behind a good fence. Apparently I had a team if I wanted it.

This was neighboring the way I remembered it, long disappeared from my home farm surrounded by crops. I wonder, “Why the difference?” Most of these people were not farmers, either. Crops were planted and harvested around there, too.

Perimeter done, I went on to cross-fencing, using lighter wire in a single strand. The 109 pastured acres were split into seven roughly equal paddocks.

I paid careful attention not to get the fence in the way of someone wanting to break-graze these big paddocks in the future. Large paddocks for a herd of nurse cows reduce trips to move cattle, but they will not optimize grass or beef production.

Creeks are a novel experience for me. This one enters the farm from the east, crosses the entire thing and then doubles back, following a diagonal path to exit the south boundary. The first run of the creek coming out of the slough on the Fish and Wildlife land is wide and soggy. I fenced it out, both sides to the crossing that is about a third of the way across the farm.

Then, preserving the crossing, I ran fence along the north side of the creek to the road on the other side of the farm. This enables me to limit cow access to the creek to just two paddocks, which I hope will lead to good control of cattle behavior.

Next season we bring the cow herd, possibly calving them there, and then will install what we need for watering. I am beginning to feel the satisfaction that goes with building something useful, which is a blessing in these rancorous, Covid-stricken times.