Gene’s very kind wife, Alecia, snapped this just before I hit the road for up north; their son Jett to my right. Horses, the prairie, buttes, my ‘electric Bike, one of their dogs, perfect light… says it all.
I appreciate the kind reaction to my Badlands Cattle Roundup imagery and that so many of you realize the serious situation the ranchers find themselves in. I’m very fond of the people I met and fear for their future. They have a lot more to lose than someone like me, and even most of you. A unique and productive American culture…
A few nights after the roundup and a couple days on the Fortune ranch ‘back forty’ niche I moved back to the Badlands National Park boundary where Gus and I were hit with the thunderstorm that broke my windows and tore my surfboard from the roof. And sure enough we got hit again.
A couple days ago, Alecia, Jett, and I spent hours scouring the range for newborns, to make sure all was well. This one, still wet with afterbirth, just now arrived… The ranchers care deeply about their animals.
But before that Gus pulled one of her stunts that drives me nuts. It’s late afternoon and the western sky is looking ominous, like it did that time I already told you about, so I take Gus for a walk before we get stuck in the rig hunkering down all night, right? She’s not on a leash — I hate leashes — and I didn’t see the bighorn sheep just below the rim of the steep drop from the plateau to the prairie way way below. But Gus sees them and just as I (uselessly) yell ‘No!’ she launches herself over the rim edge and near free falls towards them.
This is the slope Gus somehow transversed, almost from the next camper to past my camera position. She was gaining on the bighorns when I last saw them.
She’s a goner, I’m thinking, gonna fall to a splattered death at the bottom of the ravine, but before the thought even jells I witness what I can only call a cartoon moment: Three bighorns are racing across the impossible slope as bighorns can somehow do, but as dogs cannot do, but somehow Gus is right behind them, not looking down at the bottomless drop and yes Wily Coyote comes to mind when he’s hotfooting over thin air but doesn’t know it yet so no problem, right?
Next thing I recall is the bighorns, Gus somehow still right behind, scrambling up from the near vertical onto the escarpment a hundred yards at least to the west, then the mob of hoofed and pawed critters racing off across the grassland between scattered campsites, a wild scene all right, and somehow my dog has survived certain death, through sheer stupidity and ignorance both, given the laws of physics and so forth.
Another Badlands danger: At deep dusk this huge coyote tried to lure Gus out onto the prairie. The sumbitch is as big as a wolf…
In Cosmic Banditos I describe a dog as having ‘the longest tongue of any known mammal’ and this description comes to mind, when I finally caught up with Gus way down the way almost to the Park entrance, with astounded RV folks watching as I drag her back, her ridiculous pink tongue all but dragging in the dirt.
An hour later Gus is stretched out exhausted by the rig and the western sky is looking very nasty now, yes like last time, but I’m thinking to get some photo imagery before the pandemonium so I break out the Canon and tripod and set it up.
Feels like a storm coming, huh?
First I’m visually attracted to some campers on the next rise to the south so I fire off a few bursts with a long lens. They look interesting with the strong shape of the cloud behind them so I’ll embed one here. If I were pretentious enough to title photographs I’d call this ‘The Storm Approaches’ or some such, especially with that weird motion blur like a high wind.
Same car campers as the previous image, plus the car that went by, fleeing the tempest, I suspect.
Then I switch to a wider lens as a car approaches from the north, which will pass right by my position then skirt by the campers I’m shooting, and given my 20 second exposure I’m figuring he will either ruin the shot or improve it, one or the other, nothing in between. Here it is embedded just to the right, and it’s the version I cropped so you can see the car on the hill better.
But the shot I’m thinking will be a good one is of the western horizon, which is looking downright surreal now, almost beyond menacing, but I need something in the foreground. Yes, my goddamn dog will do, the bitch, scaring me like that, but with the long exposure, a full 30 seconds now, she will ruin the image by moving so I keep shooting and shooting, hoping there’s one wherein she keeps her dumb ass head still while that wild ass horizon does its insane, explosive color thing. Meanwhile, since it’s all but dark now and I have time during the 30 second exposures, I light Gus and the grassland behind her with a flashlight.
I think I willed her to not move for this shot, the only one that worked. Click to enlarge. It’s worth a close look.
Since I’m writing this at least one of the 40 or so frames must have worked, meaning Gus held still. (It’s now one of my favorites from the last few weeks, actually). If I were pretentious enough to title photographs, this one would be ‘Gus Awaits Armageddon.’
Has a ring to it.
Later in the rig I put the Canon on the dash and let it fire away on auto with more 30 second exposures while Gus and I held on as the rig rocked and rolled. Oh, and I guess there ARE lightning bolts these days…
Allan
Farmers are the salt of the earth people, and are vital for growing our food. I know without them, my great & varied food diet would turn into bullshit scrappy stuff.
If big corps monopolize and control our food supply, the cost of our food will go sky high – if it is available at all.
Here is an amusing video about one of the greatest animals to keep on a farm to help look after it and guard it – Donkeys! > https://youtu.be/3lFG1ps3wak
Here is me thinking all this time Gus was a boy dog, but she’s a girl dog! lol!.
Thanks for more great photo’s Allan – love the top picture!.
Gus looked frightened in the lower pic.
It is amazing those farmers aren’t having problems with coyote’s, from what I have heard they are a hell on earth problem for many ranchers.
When I think about the criminal gangs running and controlling us, I sometimes watch this to de – stress (the family that hunts together stays together) > https://youtu.be/S_1CS8P7_BI
Thanks for including that topmost photo, though it s not one of yrs.
Forgive me, but –hey– it does kind of beg the question :
Can’t you Social Distance with Anyone ?
Great imagery! That coyote looks like a bad arse! Most I see look half starved. That one looks well fed, testament to his bar arsery. Love the pic of you, the family, and the perfect light. Sorry Gus was stressing you out chasing big horns. Pets, we love them, but it always costs us dearly. But we gladly pay the price for their company. Worth it every time.
I’ve been reading up on this Colorado bill. Evil clever bastards. The wording is nefarious, meant to tug at the heart strings, while concealing the true motive, doing away with a proud tradition and worthwhile way of life. I am researching the two sponsors of the bill.
Yes, thank you. This is the sort of thing I hoped would happen. People getting involved and helping out. Please keep us informed and I will pass on any info to the ranchers. I fear they are not taking this seriously enough. In some ways they are naive re the PTB and its real motives and M.O.
And that coyote, yes, he or more likely she was incredibly fit. It’s hard to tell from the photo (which was at deep dusk) but it was nearly twice as big as Gus, meaning it was 100 pounds or more. And Alecia told me they rarely have problems with them, which was a surprise to me. She said the momma cows get crazed protecting the newborns, etc… I learned a lot driving around with her scouting the newborns.
ranchers last vestiges of a horrible history , not that the future looks any better but they will have a museum
There is truth to your ‘horrible history’ comment but that’s like blaming current white residents of the USA for slavery.
Allan…lightning bolts not touching the ground, this was my observation and the one of Claire Séverac. Your photos show a lightning bolt not touching the ground, mostly traveling cloud to cloud…I guess. Personnaly I almost live all my life in one city wich is Quebec. So my observation on weaker thunderstorm is not a fabrication of my imagination. FYI it is not normal here we did’nt have our first thunderstorm of the year before today the 11th of june (we had a dozen of days over 88F and high relative humidity). In the past i recall fist thunderstorm in April. And when rare thunderstorm occur the sound of the thunder is not as loud, it is like the sound is suppresed, also the number of lighting bolt is greatly reduce…but this is my point of view from Quebec city like Claire Séverac observation were from Paris….you are in the Badland, away from any electromagnetic device wich can mess the weather…if they can mess with the weather from above I think it is also possible from below…I guess
I’d like to see some formal data on the thunderstorm issue. It should not be hard to find given how meticulous the various weather services are….