New Driveway

The 1 mile driveway into the ranch has had  steep grades and was nearly impassable after heavy rains or snow for over 100 years. Therefore I have long dreamed of building a new road up on the ridge so snow would blow off and rain would run off leaving it dry.  Therefore we haven't applied gravel in 20 years so that rocks would sink under the dirt, of course the result was even worse road failure.  A new road is being built on the ridge and raised above the prairie and a culvert will be placed in the one draw being crossed.  192 big truck loads of small gravel has been hauled with many more yet to come and then a final layer of large gravel will be overlaid.  Happy motoring into Wohlers Ranch LLC

Summer grazing

Spring grass has arrived in the cool season grass pastures, so cattle were being moved to summer pastures 5 days ago.  This is a small herd of steers being trailed to a pasture in Dawes County.  Surprise!! We had 6 inches of snow last night so Blake hauled hay to all groups of cattle today.  Hopefully the snow will melt quickly and work for the proper season can resume.  The ranch has received above average moisture for the 3rd year so we should have another excellent grazing season and get good weight gains on the yearlings.  

new hires

After 2 years of synchronizing all of the cows for AI breeding by appointment (This is a lot of work), we purchased bulls to do it natures way.  This is more expensive, but will offer benefits of less labor and debate as to the correct sire of the calves.  After the 12" of snow 2 weeks ago and another 8" 4 days ago our driveway was a mess.  The dually and 32' trailer had to be towed to the corral and after unloading it had to be towed the mile back to the county road.  The bulls have adjusted and  are enjoying life on the Wohlers Ranch.  They will enjoy it even more when they get to meet the beautiful cows that are waiting for them.

 

Winter's first snow

We had our first significant snow--nearly 12 inches.  This meant that we started feeding hay to the cattle as the grass was covered up.  Fortunately some aggressive snow tire were put on the ranch pickup the week before and we were able to get down the road and into the pastures while in 4 wheel drive with no problem.  Dalai seemed happy and quite contend with the snow, he must have remembered stories that his mother told him about the Andes when she lived in Peru.

water thief

Downy brome commonly called cheatgrass is a weed that came from northern Europe in the 1880's as ship ballast and with grain seeds has taken over or at least infected millions of range acres in America.  I remember 60 years ago when cheatgrass was only in overgrazed areas on feed grounds, but it has invaded throughout our native pastures as well as retired farm ground.  University extension has placed a demonstration  plot for herbicide treatment near the ranch driveway.  Blake installed a fence around the plot to keep cattle from interfering with the demo.  Look close and view the flags marking the strips where chemical was applied.  Unfortunately it is so widespread that it will be impossible to eradicate and expensive to control.  The weed grows early and dries down early taking out much water so the native grasses can't successfully grow.

Kate's beauty tip

Kate loves jumping in the livestock tanks for a refreshing dip especially after running along side a 4-wheeler for a couple of miles.  If the tank has been drank down by the cows leaving only 6" of mud she still thinks it is refreshing and will dive her head completely under.  We have to admit that the mud gives her skin a healthy completion and her hair is left luxuriant. But she certainly does stink riding in the pickup back to town after a hard days work.

Bud Box loadout

Today was marketing time for our yearling steers, they were trucked to the market yesterday so they probably had about 50 lbs shrink on the market scale but still averaged 983 lbs.  They pastured 2 miles, 2 county roads and a neighbor's pasture away from the home corrals, so we built a new corral at that location with a "Bud Box" named after the guy that described the best dimensions for a facility to gently move cattle from a corral into an alleyway for load out or processing.  My judgment was the facility worked fair to good as I only got kicked once.  2 trucks were able to take the 104 head to market and we received a very good price even though the market has slide about $12 per hundredweight in the last 6 weeks.