Not Sure

I normally don’t post photos of my successful hunting trips. I hope you’re not offended…. While I’m always grateful for the gift of meat, this year’s hunting success is especially meaningful to me.

I grew up camping and fishing. Every summer, we’d head up Sonora Pass to camp. Fishing was so important that I sometimes skipped school. But I didn’t start hunting until I was middle aged.

Sami grew up mostly in Burbank - in a family that did lots of things together, but not camping, fishing, or hunting. And yet, like I imagine the “LA doll” that John Mellencamp married and brought to his “Small Town,” Sami embraced these parts of living in rural (semi-rural, anyway) Northern California. The year before we were married, I remember taking Sami to fish on the Stanislaus River at Dardanelles - she caught more fish than I did! We camped most summers of our married life.  And when I started hunting, Sami started loving to prepare and eat venison.

Usually, I put in for antelope and elk tags when I buy my hunting license and deer tags - I’ve never been drawn, but I’m hopeful! This year, when I put in for tags in May, things were so uncertain that I only bought deer tags - a tag for our home zone, and a tag for Tuolumne County, where I grew up (and where my sister and brother-in-law still live). At best, I knew I’d need to be here with Sami. At worst, I suspected I’d be alone.

On opening weekend (last week, here in Placer County), my brother-in-law Adrian joined me in hunting a property in Colfax that I’ve been privileged to hunt for the last decade. Last Sunday, he got a buck; I didn’t (which is a story unto itself). Yesterday, after a long day hiking through the rainy woods and not seeing many deer, I got my buck.

Killing an animal to sustain myself and my family is always an emotional experience; direct participation in feeding myself and my family is why I started hunting. I’m always grateful. But this year seems different. This year, filling the woodshed and filling the freezer seem to have more significance. 

In years past, I would always text Sami a photo of my successful hunt. She’d be excited for me, and about the venison meals in our future. This year, I texted our daughters and my extended family. They were equally excited - partly, I think, because my success seemed like a normal autumn activity. Or maybe that’s just my perspective.

I’ve come to enjoy hunting not only for the meat in my freezer (and, if I’m honest, the thrill and skill involved in a successful hunt); I also enjoy hunting for the excuse to be outdoors, in an environment I love. I love being quiet and attentive to everything around me - yesterday, I saw a great horned owl, a red-shouldered hawk, an enormous flock of Sandhill Cranes headed south, and exactly seven deer. Including the buck I killed. This morning, as I quartered the buck in preparation for cutting and wrapping my winter meat, I experienced an odd mix of sadness and contentment. I’m not sure why, but getting a buck this year seemed especially important to me - perhaps because it felt like “normal”; perhaps because I knew how happy Sami would have been. Regardless, I will think of Sami every time I make a meal from this buck. 

Remembering Fred Groverman

I was honored to be asked to speak at the Celebration of Life for Fred Groverman on April 23. I wanted to share a bit more about Fred's legacy in the sheep world.

In his outstanding essay, “Let the Farm Judge,” Wendell Berry writes:

“What does it mean that an island [England] not much bigger than Kansas… should have developed 60 or so breeds of sheep? It means that many thousands of farmers were paying the most discriminating attention, not only to their sheep, but also to the nature of their local landscapes and economies for a long time…. The result, when such an effort is carried on by enough intelligent farmers in the same region for a long time, is the development of a distinct breed that fits regional needs. Such local adaptation is the most important requirement for agriculture, wherever it occurs.”

Fred’s beloved Shropshire sheep are the result of “many thousands of farmers” paying attention to local conditions for a long time. More importantly, I think, Fred is the epitome of a wise farmer working in the same region for a long time. He’ll be missed. He is missed.

I was introduced to Fred – as many of us in the greater sheep world were, I suspect – by Cody Heimke. We were trying to rebuild our small sheep flock following the last big drought, and Cody thought Fred’s Shropshire genetics would be a great compliment to our Cheviot mules. And was Cody ever right.

If you ever bought sheep from Fred, you’ll know that it wasn’t just a matter of showing up and loading your sheep. Fred wanted to be sure that you also knew about his management system. He made sure you saw his pastures and his barns – and the rest of his sheep. You were buying sheep, but Fred forced you to look deeper – to see the importance not only of his genetics but of his approach to raising sheep. I learned something every time I visited Fred.

Several years ago, after buying the last set of rams I’d buy from him, I had the opportunity to interview Fred for a weekly podcast I produce with fellow shepherd Ryan Mahoney and Dr. Rosie Busch, our extension sheep and goat veterinarian. I listened to it again as I was thinking about what to say today – what a treat to hear Fred’s voice!

During our conversation, Fred joked that he was proud to have raised twenty-five feet of children – that he was proud to be the shortest man in his family. We talked about his family’s history in northern California (and in Petaluma specifically), about milking cows and caring for chickens as a kid, about going to vet school, and about the Shropshire genetics his father imported from the UK. But the three things I most loved about our conversation were these:

1. We talked about his lifelong love of learning. “Keep asking questions,” he told me. “There’s so much to be curious about.”
2. I asked him what he would tell a young person who wanted to get started in sheep. “Find someone to help you – find a mentor.” Fred was a mentor to many, including me.
3. I asked him how he responded when someone told him, “Sheep are stupid.” He said, “I’d say, ‘You haven’t spent enough time watching them.’” I suspect there were few things Fred enjoyed more than watching his sheep.

Our first set of lambs this year was born several days after Fred’s passing in mid-February – a spectacular set of Shropshire twins out of a daughter of the ewes we bought from Fred in 2015. As I watched these first lambs of 2022 stand on wobbly legs and start looking for the teat, I couldn’t help but feel Fred smiling down at us – sheep and shepherd alike.

A Shepherd's Reflections on the Winter Solstice

As a kid, I knew with certainty that the longest night of the year was NOT the Winter Solstice - it was Christmas Eve! After all, Santa Claus didn't come on the morning after the Solstice. As an adult, however, I've come to appreciate both nights - I love the anticipation of increasing daylight and surprises in my stocking.

In the days leading up to the Christmas holiday, we build a fair amount of electro-net fencing. Our goal is to minimize the sheep work on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day (and again a week later, as the old year ends and a new one begins).  This morning, that meant moving the ewe flock up the road to fresh grass. Tomorrow, we'll take down fence from the old paddock and fence some fresh pasture for the sheep to graze early next week. A hard day's work tomorrow will mean that my only chores on Christmas Day will be to check fence and feed the livestock guardian dogs. As usual, my daughters will join me - with both of them away from home now, I relish every opportunity to share this Christmas tradition.

I know the winter months can be challenging for many - longer nights and days without sunshine can be depressing. For me, though, I like the sense of slowing down. I love the crisp winter afternoons when the setting sun shines through the leafless oaks. I love the sound of rain on the roof when I wake up before sunrise. I enjoy the muffled sounds on a foggy or (even better) snowy morning when I head out to do chores.

Part of my enjoyment, I'm certain, comes from the realization that without the long cold of winter, I couldn't appreciate the warm, bright days of spring and summer. But I suspect I'm actually a winter person. I like cold weather more than hot. I prefer warming myself in front of the woodstove to cooling myself in front of the swamp cooler. I appreciate the excuse to go to bed early with a good book.

Last night, before the rain started, the border collies and I enjoyed a campfire in the back yard. The fire - like the Christmas lights on our roof and the Christmas tree in our living room - dispels the darkness and chill of the longest winter nights. But as a winter person, the campfire also gives me an excuse to be outside after dark with nothing to do but sit and relax. To slow down. To go dormant for a week or two, like the longer dormancy of the grass in our pastures.

Happy Solstice!

Drought and Disease

Okay - so I'll admit the title of this post is pretty depressing. Unfortunately, it also describes the times we're living through in Northern California (and much of the rest of the world). I'm writing this from the desk in my kitchen where I currently spend most of my work week (now that the University of California has mandated that most of us work from home due to the coronavirus pandemic). And as I write, most of the northern two-thirds of California remain in moderate drought, according to the National Drought Monitor. Indeed, we're currently on track (off track?) to have the driest year since we've lived in Auburn - drier, even, than 2013-2014. Drought and disease are our reality.

I'm amazed by how much has changed in California and the U.S. in the last five-and-a-half weeks. I returned from a conference in Denver on February 19 with a dry cough and a fever - symptoms that lasted about four days. COVID-19 was just starting to make news here - I wondered about my symptoms but wasn't too worried about it. We measured just 0.03" of rain last month - the driest February on record. Just three weeks after I returned from Denver, I was agonizing over my decision to inform all of the 4-H clubs in Placer and Nevada County that we shouldn't hold any meetings until April. This afternoon, we learned that the President has indicated that we need to maintain social distancing through at least the end of April.

This pandemic is something with which almost nobody alive today has any experience. My grandmother survived the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic as a child (an experience which, thankfully, she shared with me). Uncertainty and fear cause anxiety; anxiety, for some, causes irrational behavior. And this irrational behavior creates stress for others - at least it does for me. Whether this crisis ends in April or not, all of us will be different when we reach the other side of it.

I see similarities in the drought we're experiencing. From a forage perspective, we seem to be tracking at or above average in terms of grass growth (mostly due to the warm temperatures and false spring we experienced in February). This fact gives some a false sense of security - we'll be fine because we have more grass on April 1 than we normally do! When I look more closely, however, I see that the rangeland we grazed in February and early March has not regrown like expected. When I dig into the root zone on our annual rangelands, I find that soil moisture remains depleted - which explains why the seasonal creeks aren't flowing. And when I look at the forage we do have, I find that it is maturing 30-40 days earlier than normal. In other words, our drought is more than simply a lack of rainfall. We are seeing warm temperatures and dry days much earlier than normal. I worry about what our feed conditions will be next fall.

In many ways, drought and disease are similar conditions. Unlike other "disasters" - fire, hurricanes, floods, etc. - we don't know when these crises will end. And we don't know how bad they'll get. For me, these times have forced me to focus on what I need to do one day at a time. What can I control in my life today? What do I need to do tomorrow? This lack of control, I suspect, is one of the biggest challenges for most of us. We are so used to being able to control our own lives - our work, our social interactions, and our future. Drought and disease remind us that we're not in control - and that's incredibly uncomfortable for most of us.

Yesterday, I needed to visit a hardware store here in Auburn to buy some storage containers so I could clean up an alternative office space at home. The store was only allowing people to enter as others exited - an effort to facilitate social distancing. I thanked the store employee and security guard - which they obviously appreciated. They said they'd been told by some customers that they were overreacting. But isn't that the point?! Don't we all wish that our "overreactions" (staying at home, washing our hands - easy stuff, really) mean that our parents and grandparents (and our children and grandchildren) don't get sick? Don't we really wish that it won't be necessary to sell sheep (maybe this only concerns shepherds!)? We won't know if our actions will be sufficient until all of this is over. For me, that waiting might be the most difficult part.

Coping with Crisis Fatigue

Since last summer, my part of the world (the Sierra Nevada foothills) has experienced the threat of wildfire, multiple multi-day power shutoffs (related to the threat of wildfire), a dry October and even drier February (which impacted the forage available for our sheep), and now the spread of COVID-19. I realized one evening this week that I was inexplicably tired - more tired, even, than I usually get by the third week of lambing season. I realized that coping with one crisis after another has worn me out.

Since the first of the year, I've been worried about the lack of precipitation - and the resulting lack of grass for our sheep. As I write this, my worries are diminished (we've measured just under an inch of rain today), but not entirely eliminated. I suspect the dry, warm February will result in earlier-than-normal maturity in our annual grasses - which reduces the nutritional value and palatability of our forage at the time when we need as much high quality feed for our sheep as possible. And I'm still concerned about the amount of dry forage we'll be able to save for next fall.

More recently, I've been anxious about the spread of novel coronavirus and the resulting COVID-19 infections in California and in Placer County specifically. For me, the pace at which this current crisis has evolved has been especially difficult - every day, it seems, we learn something new about its spread and impact.

I serve on the board of a local agricultural organization that had scheduled it's biggest fundraiser of the year (a dinner and auction) later this month. Our board met Tuesday, and in a split decision, voted to go ahead with the dinner. I voted no, not because I was worried about disease transmission, but because I was concerned that many people would decide not to come and would ask for ticket refunds. Despite these concerns, the board voted to go forward. By Thursday, however, we learned that the California Department of Public Health was asking organizations to cancel or postpone gatherings of 250 or more people. We decided to follow their recommendation.

Also on Thursday morning, a local 4-H volunteer asked if I thought the club should go forward with a separate fundraising dinner scheduled for tonight. After talking it through with her, we decided to postpone this event, as well. I learned second-hand that other volunteers were critical of my decision - they felt I was overreacting. On Friday, I directed all of our 4-H clubs to suspend club and project meetings at least through the end of the month. I was a bit worried about the response to my caution; so far, I haven't heard any criticism. We'll see.

I learned during the 2012-2015 drought that decisiveness is a coping mechanism for me. I find that making and sticking to a specific course of action (selling ewes, for example) is difficult but ultimately reduces my anxiety. Indecision, on the other hand, stresses me out. I have also been told that I'm a very deliberate person (which I take as a compliment, mostly). I do find that I give a great deal of thought to the downstream effects of my decisions. I know that sometimes my decisions may turn out wrong - what if I sell sheep, for example, the week before the rain returns? What if I suspend 4-H meetings and it turns out that our anxiety over COVID-19 turns out to be overblown?

My friend and colleague Leslie Roche helped me look at this conundrum differently yesterday. I had mentioned that I was a little worried that our 4-H families would think I was overreacting. She said, "What might seem extreme now may be exactly what we need in 10 days - and hopefully not less than we need. And if everything turns out ok then, yeah - that's the point, right?!" Coping, I realized, also means sharing our anxieties with friends and family - they always provide perspective and reassurance!

Finally, I find my lifestyle and practical skills help me cope. I told someone yesterday that I feel so fortunate to have freezers full of food that we've raised. And I'm comforted by the knowledge that I have the skills and resources to refill those freezers as necessary. A full woodshed, a fire in the woodstove, and a pot of stew on the stove are reassuring, as well. And sheepherders, after all, are masters at social distancing!