It’s been a great week for wildlife encounters. I was driving down the highway and watched a group of swallows wheeling and flying quickly, with a Swainson’s hawk in their midst. The group flew near the New Fork River bridge and I actually saw the hawk grab a swallow! The hawk flew with the small …
Tag: rural life
Accidental addition
We fell into a new adventure today. Jim and I went out to feed the dogs and check the sheep. We’d just settled all the adult dogs in with separate piles or bowls of food and decided to take a few treats to the burros, which we’re in the middle of the herd, in the …
Grizzly wake
Attracted by the foul-smelling carcass of the calf he’d killed the day before, the grizzly bear climbed into the green metal box to resume feeding. As he grabbed the carcass with one huge front paw, the metal door of the cage slammed shut behind him. Trapped, the bear sprawled atop the carcass to wait out …
New range
We got the sheep herd moved to new range today. We’re in the foothills of the Wind River Mountains, and this private pasture is about seven miles from where a black wolf was seen in another sheep herd the day before. Federal control efforts on this pack of sheep-killing wolves continues. Wolves in Wyoming are …
Rolling with the changes
Today I was supposed to be residing at a luxury hotel in Cody, Wyoming, scheduled to give a presentation about using livestock protection animals to the Western Association of State Agricultural Directors. Instead, I’m sitting in a pickup truck on the edge of my sheep herd, pounding the keyboard on the laptop and waiting for …
Wool harvest
Yesterday was shearing day for our herd. First, we crowd the sheep up the loading chute and into the shearing plant. My lead sheep, named Assistant Sheep, sticks her head over the top of the chute to let me know of her displeasure. As the crew of shearers work, each fleece is kicked out the …
Prey base decline
We’ve noticed that our western Wyoming jackrabbit population has crashed in the last few years, and that makes us wonder about cohabitating wildlife and livestock species, and what the impact will be to those animals. With so few jacks last winter, our wintering golden eagles didn’t stick around long because there was little for them …
Cherkassov at last!
After several years, I am happy to announce the publication of A.A.Cherkassov’s 1865 Notes of an East Siberian Hunter, translated by zoologist, eminent cynologist, and “dog in law” Vladimir Beregovoy of Virginia, with a little help from me. It is available as a large format, good- quality print on demand paperback of 439 pages, for …
Spring silliness
Warm temperatures have been welcome, but our snow cover is long gone, and the resulting mud has dried. The animals seem to be enjoying the spring weather. In the photo above, Rena greets Buck, a bum lamb raised by a little girl who recently moved to Oklahoma, so Buck returned to the herd. Rena is …
December in the sheep pasture
The Wind River Mountains are magnificent in their snow-covered spendor, but the sagebrush rangelands still contain only a scattering of snow. The image below is our New Fork River pasture where the sheep are currently located, taken at sunrise earlier this week. It was about -8 degrees that morning, which is a typical overnight low …