Beats a Chainsaw

The rancher across the road from us is doing some fence maintenance. He's taking over the operation of his parent's cattle ranch and the fences haven't been maintained properly for several years. One particular stretch, probably a half mile, is overgrown with hedge trees (osage orange) to the point where you can't even get to the fence posts sufficiently to fix the barbed wire. In my younger days this would just mean breaking out the chainsaw and most of the family members and clearing out trees, one at a time. It takes weeks. Not today (if you have the money).

One day a bulldozer and an excavator show up. In the course of about three days the half mile of osage orange trees has been taken out and stacked for burn. They haven't rebuilt the fence row yet, but the worst is over, and it looks sharp. They've already reworked the fence along the road with nice 5-strand tight barbed wire. He knows how to do it right.

When the tree-clearing was finished the dozer was taken to its next job, but the excavator is still there. Last night was a warm night (for March) and I had some time after supper to walk over and sketch this beast.

Old School Baling

When I was out running errands I caught my second cousin Vernie out baling with his son. What struck me is this is the type of baling rig I earned spending money on when I was growing up. Mostly fond memories, some not. Smooth thump-thumping of tractor, diesel exhaust smell (not bad, it grows on you) clanking and banging of the baler, dust, swaying stance on wagon. Then, if it's alfalfa, a sweet smell (and HEAVY bales). Most baling today is the large round bales. More mechanical - less human labor. I chatted with them. They still cut the square bales because horse owners like them. They can feed them out easier. And horse people pay well. They're used to spending mass hordes of money . . . they own a horse. I asked to snap a picture and went on my way. Decided to try a WC paper sketch rather than my usual Moleskine sketch journal, w/pencil, Pitt pen, WC pencils and color pencils.

Some Kind of Wild Flower

I've been working on assignments for Kate's class. When I only use a brush, it's not pretty, but I'm learning. This is one of the assignments and I could use a pen. This is my first watercolor wash, too. Just learned what that was last week.

The back half of our property is a prairie hay field and always has been. There are three or four types of wild flowers that come up every year. This is one of them. I'll need to do some research to see what they all are. Probably will need to sketch all of them over time. It's addictive. The more you learn, the more you want to learn. Maybe I should have just been a couch potato.

Not Mother's Day

This morning I was working in our garage on a woodworking project. I heard the cattle next door screaming out like the world was ending. In a way . . . it was. Our neighbor runs a small cow/calf operation, and today is the day they take this year's offspring to the sale barn. I take a look. Two heavy pickups with horse trailers loading up. They soon fire up their diesel engines, low gear, and haul them out. I made this sketch at 6 p.m. The moms were still bellowing, though less often. Some were still swiftly walking around, calling out and looking for their offspring. I sat down and did this whole entry in one setting. The moms were watching me, too. I feel for them, but it's just the way the world works when you're low in the food chain. That was an early lesson from my childhood when we raised our own beef and poultry.

Pasture Burn Time

We got together with our neighbors and did our back pasture burn this weekend. It didn't quite go as planned, but nothing BAD happened. We raced the fire for a while, lost control for a while.