Organic Beef Matters
News from Alderspring Ranch, with an occasional rant about American agriculture
The Salmon River is running chocolate milk, and I think it saved us. I had been clattering on the rough cobble of the rocky shore, threading my way through downfall and impenetrable willow brush with my mare, Sunny, tracking a couple of steers in the early morning light as more rainclouds scudded …
Continue Reading about Sutter’s Mill and Salmon River Sediments
They stealthed upon us suddenly in the silent black of night when we least expected it, as they often do. Ironically, we were just 5 minutes earlier taking about them. And it had been a while. We were all exhausted from a long day astride saddle horses in rough country. For icing on a fatigue …
It’s been a rough week on the range, but all is well that ends well. The country—and this season’s climate simply got more difficult. The crew was thrust into thick forest, in a quest for the green grass of higher elevations. Meteorologists are saying that this is the driest, hottest spring …
Continue Reading about Long Days and Lightning and Lantern Light
Finally, I have a forced sit-down. I'm sitting in the Salmon, hospital ER, at 16-year-old daughter Maddy's bedside. She's reading a novel on her phone, waiting for the doc. I figured I might as well write a novel...to all of you. I think we might be here for a while. Her backcountry …
Three short weeks ago, we woke up to a coating of white on the ranch. Snow blanketed everything. The breaking buds on the willows and cottonwood trees looked hunched and bunched up from the cold, as if trying to stay warm. These species were both used to the maddening duel between winter and …
Whew. It’s been a week. Last Saturday, we began the long trail for the summer. The 440 cattle and their horseback range rider crews commenced a summer journey that will take them over 600 miles through sagebrush grasslands, deep canyons, and up steep forest cloaked mountainsides. They will gain …
