Through Lauren's Eyes

First the red-wing blackbirds arrive in February. Then the killdeers. Then the meadowlarks. At first their familiar songs don’t register in my brain, but then . . . oh, it’s spring! And just now, while I’m writing, five goldfinches have discovered the seed heads I left on the flowers in my front bed all winter.   

To welcome the birds, the plants are waking up. I drove into the yard last night when the sun was just starting its slide to the horizon. There it was – a change in the willows. No, they’re not turning green yet, but there’s a new clarity, a fullness. The buds are swelling! And across the pasture the grass blades are popping their heads out, and the tiniest of forbs have pushed up some tentative leaves.

Lauren from Boise State came to stay for a few days and added a little excitement to this busy time of year. She’s working on a doctorate and wanted to experience life on a ranch to help inform her questions around humans, agriculture and ecology. Spring Break is the perfect time because it coincides with our heaviest calving period.  

She rode Sly moving cow-calf pairs into a neighboring pasture. She helped sort and weigh the yearling steers. She cleaned stalls and fed the bottle calf. She bucked hay bales into the calving barn. She fed a few loads of hay and straw to the heifers. Skinny jeans and a long braid aren’t the best for feeding and I’m sure she had straw in every crevice, but she was a good sport. She even helped Mark deliver two calves that needed assistance.

The evening before she left, we had finished our work just as the full moon was rising. We stopped to watch it from the corral outside the calving barn. It was a perfect evening with cold, clear skies. I told her I wanted to experience every full moon I could until I died. She reminded me that not everyone has that chance unless they live in the country. Oh. 

She mostly soaked up a way of living she had never experienced. One evening we went through her formal questions. How do we measure success? What are our plans for the future of the ranch? Are we unique? How has the environment changed over our lifetimes? The queries made us think, and that’s a good thing.

I’ve had some experience working with university researchers, and it’s me that asks the questions. Rarely do they seem very curious about what we ranchers know, so to have the questions directed to us was a welcome change.

She had supper at Seth and Leah’s one night, and spent the last morning with Gary and Anita, going through her questions - and going through their art collection. After meeting individually with all three generations living on the ranch, I wonder what insights she saw that we can’t.

She lost her cell phone in the melee somewhere and spent a day and a half sure it was gone for good. She and Mark had been buzzing around on the 4-wheeler and the battery was dead, so it seemed hopeless. The loss put a damper on her visit. I told her to keep the faith and keep looking for it. And then the next day there it was, half buried in the sand where I was feeding the bottle calf. It was bent in an arc but worked fine! I told her good things happen.

checking out the calving barn               (Lauren Hunt)

                               moving pairs on Sly                                 

not as easy as it looks

the worm moon                             (Lauren Hunt)

feeding time                                    (Lauren Hunt)