- Author: Daniel K Macon
Since the millennial drought of 2012-2016, I've developed a habit of periodically checking the U.S. Drought Monitor, especially during our “normal” rainy season. Sometimes, I've found that the weekly map doesn't reflect the on-the-ground conditions that I've observed – when this is the case, I'll log onto the Drought Impact Reporter and provide local data and observations (aboutrangeland vegetation, seasonal creek flows, soil moisture, and other conditions). Sometimes this data helps the drought map authors include an area that they didn't know was experiencing drought – or supports a more severe drought designation. But now that I'm living and working in a new set of counties, I'm finding that I need to recalibrate my definition of “normal.” So today, when I checked out the most recent drought map, I was somewhat surprised to see that all ofTuolumne,Calaveras, andAmador counties, and most of ElDorado County, are classified as “Abnormally Dry.”
When I moved to Calaveras County last August, I maintained my commitment to keeping a daily weather journal. In the 20-plus years I lived in Auburn, I have continued to record the high and low temperatures on most days, as well as daily precipitation. I've also recorded the date of germinating rain, as well as the first frost date (I'll record the last frost date sometime in April or May, I expect). My new place, situated at about 2400 feet above sea level east of San Andreas, saw its first frost on October 18, 2024. We didn't get a germinating rain until November 11, and the combination of cooler morning temperatures and shorter days has meant that I have seen much grass growth yet – so maybe we are “abnormally dry!” On the other hand, maybe the Drought Monitor hasn't caught up with the more than two inches of rain we received in the last week of December!
All of this is a long lead-in to my actual topic – the importance of flexibility when it comes to managing rangeland livestock (cattle, sheep, or goats). Anyone who's ranched for any period of time knows that “normal” simply means half the years are wetter and half of the years are drier. Building flexibility into our management calendars allows us to take advantage of the better years and (hopefully) survive the tougher ones.
In the more than two decades I've raised sheep commercially, I've come to appreciate their flexibility when it comes to my management calendar. Much of this flexibility revolves around their shorter gestation period when compared with cattle (5 months instead of 9 months). A shorter pregnancy corresponds to a longer dry period (when a ewe's nutritional needs are at a minimum). A shorter pregnancy also means we can adjust our lambing season from one year to the next without sacrificing a lamb crop. Changing a fall calving herd of cows to spring calving is a much more complicated process!
But cattle provide flexibility in other ways. Since every large predator in our foothill environment (and even some mid-sized predators) will dine on sheep if given the opportunity, I use livestock guardian dogs to protect them. Which means I need to feed the dogs every day (or find someone to feed for me if I'm traveling). Cattle typically don't experience as much predator pressure – which means they don't necessarily need to be checked 365 days a year.
Several years ago, I worked with colleagues at UC Cooperative Extension and theUSDA Agricultural Research Service to flesh out what we called an “Ecological Calendar” for describing the way that most ranchers try to fit their production systems into the ecology and climate of their operations. I started with putting my own sheep operation in Auburn into this framework. In my mind, the core of my operation was annualrangeland, which I supplemented with irrigated pasture in the late spring, summer, and early fall. On top of this annual cycle of forage growth, I overlaid my operation calendar (shearing, breeding, lambing, marketing), all based on the recognition that I wanted to match my lambing season with the onset of rapid forage growth in the early spring. Finally, this calendar also allowed me to project when I'd receive most of my income from the sheep, as well as periods where we could use the ewes to graze down weeds and fine fuels.
Ranching, in my experience, seems cyclical rather than linear – while no two years are ever the same, there is a cycle to what we do as ranchers. Decisions that I make about this year impact what I am able do next year. In laying out this cycle in a circular calendar, I started to think about where I could tweak my management system to take advantage a grass season that seemed to be trending earlier in my part of the foothills. In 2023, I experimented with turning the rams in with the ewes three weeks earlier – with the hope that I'd have heaver lambs when I weaned them in early June. And it worked – the ewes handled the earlier lambing season just fine, and the lambs I hauled to Escalon were bigger than my previous average! One data point isn't enough to know if this strategy will work every year, but now I can track it!
I've since talked to other producers who have made micro-adjustments to their management systems based on ecology and climate. A sheep rancher who I've collaborated with on predator research decided to sheep three bands of sheep to the mountains a week early this year, due to a predicted heat wave in mid July. Other ranchers have moved their breeding dates based on changing forage conditions or loss of fall feed. And the reverse is true, too – I've talked to ranchers who are trying to meet a specific market window who count backwards from their project weaning date to see if changing their breeding window is feasible.
I suppose this approach isn't as simple as I've made it sound! In order to change my production calendar, I needed to have tracked precipitation and forage growth over a number of years. I needed to know what my lambs typically weighed at weaning. Even the micro-adjustments I described can be complicated – if your Forest Service on-date isn't flexible, can you ship animals early to avoid a heat wave? But I do like the ability to describe the entire picture of a ranch – how forage growth, livestock needs, and markets fit together. I've even used my ecological calendar to identify slower times of year when I might be able to sneak away for a quick camping trip!
