So I have been really frustrated with my complete inability to get Rippa on livestock more. I’ve put ads on craigslist, and I take lessons when I can, but I don’t have the time even to do as many lessons as are offered. So . . .
As I said, I did put an ad on craigslist and so far nothing has panned out until this week – I met someone who has a small family farm with a large herd of sheep and goats and some cattle that she has worked her three cattle dogs on. She seems really cool and while I am terrified to take my willful little red dog to someone else and use her animals, if anyone is going to be patient with it, it’s someone who owns cattle dogs. So that happens Friday. Apparently I need a four-wheel drive vehicle to get there and it’s a half-hour off the highway so if you don’t hear from me, call the police. Otherwise, a grand adventure.
But anyway, I’ve been kind of jonesing to see this whole thing through the right way and ever since Kathy was supportive of me taking my show on the road, I’ve been trying to figure out how to get access to livestock.
The kicker is that I do a lot of work on this 14,000 acre working cattle ranch. The cattlemaster uses his dogs daily as he does pulse grazing (ie, moves them each day to a small place so the ranch never gets overgrazed), and the owner keeps telling me that the guy would love to work with me, but let’s just say I don’t think he does. He probably thinks I’m a yokel and that’s fine.
So, anyway, I told my husband that for my birthday I wanted sheep. My birthday is in two weeks. Obviously it won’t happen that fast, but he talked to the ranch owner who then said, “You know, I have a 2-acre parcel of land in the middle of town that I have nothing to do with. Fence it and it’s yours.”
So, here it is:
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It’s the lot that’s between the train tracks and H street, flanked by Encina and a park. You can zoom in and get street view of it, too. It looks quite a bit different from this now – this photo is many years old. The trees have grown quite a bit and the field is now a lot of scrub along with grass. The animal science degree I almost got tells me that if I want this to sustain my little baas, I am going to have to work on making that field a lot nicer, but that’s a fun project since I never got to use any of that stuff I learned in college.
So, anyway, I’ve got to figure out a water system for the sheep, we’ll have to feed them, and I need to build them a shelter, some pens, and – oh yeah – fence a full two acres to keep kids, dogs, coyotes, etc out.
I was sort of hoping to get a plot of land actually ON the ranch because I would LOVE to take the little guys for long walks in the hills, but it is just down the road to a gate into the ranch so maybe when the time comes, the owner will let me do that. Anyway, it’s at least a good place to start a flock and work on arena trialing. It’s also a good place for now because people are all over that and they’re good neighbors. I can make a little sign asking them to call me if there’s trouble and it’s not so much in the huge, expansive ranch where they’ll get eaten. Just today as I was driving out from there, I saw some coyotes hassling the calves, right along the road.
But this is a whole other ball game, and I do know something about keeping sheep, but am looking forward to learning from Kathy how to manage them so they stay ideal for what I need them for. I’ve got some friends already interested in having them graze their land, too, so I think I could probably make it work in my favor and maybe turn that into something as there’s definitely a demand for grazing animals in the area. Anyway, as my husband says, we should just focus on getting them there and living well and come what may.
So . . . end of summer, if all goes right, I will get my own flock. And in the mean time – maybe this gal in the boonies is going to be my new best friend.
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