Drought Causes Big Problems for Ranchers

The USDA says that the drought in Texas is now officially over for the first time in a decade  with all but a few areas of Texas, having ample moisture. The effects of the loss from the drought will be felt for many years by Texas ranchers.

The photos below show just a few problems the drought caused at the Chapman Family Ranch of Clarksville, Texas.   Near the ranch house, 12 Oak trees and one Pine tree died.  The largest oak to die was over 12 feet in circumference.

We had to hire a forester with experience in felling trees to make sure one of them did not fall on the ranch house when they were being cleared.

The drought caused many other problems.  Two examples are the loss of grass roots and grass cover and ditches washed in the pastures from the lack of ground cover to hold the soil in place when rain did arrive.

The Chapman Family Ranch spent $225 per acre planting Max-Q Fescue grass in the Uncle Bill Fescue pasture.  It was the most wonderful winter time grass the ranch has ever seen growing through the first winter.  When the summer hit with 90 days of rainless skies and high temperatures, we lost the entire pasture of Max-Q Fescue.  Now, we will need to replant the pasture at some point in the future --- another cost of the drought.

The Chapman Family Ranch even had to send part of our cow herd to the QRI Unit in Bosque County to allow some of the Clarksville pasture land to recover.  We were more fortunate than many ranchers in Texas who had to sell their cow herds for lack of water, grass or hay.

The springs at the Clarksville, Texas ranch never stopped running even during the driest part of the drought, and both of our wells held up during the driest times.  Both of these are bright spots for the future.  We constructed a new, very long tank that was filled by springs even before the winter rains finally arrived.  We now have it stocked with our bate fish.

The Chapman Family Ranch hired Strateck Underground Imaging to find underground water for future irrigation.  They found a zone of water in the NW quarter of the Mamma D Coastal pasture 45 feet deep and only 55 feet from the surface.  When we are ready, we know we have water for a pivot irrigation system in the Mamma D pasture.  Without the drought we probably would not have even thought of looking for a large underground water stream for future use as irrigation.  We always have the Red River for watering the lower pastures should the need arise.

Log skidder arriving at theranch house to clear away the dead trees from the drought, Bubba Stringer is the owner-operator.

One of several trees that had to be removed. Tree is falling as photo was taken. Bubba Stringer did the cutting.