The weather flipped to fall. Snow blanketed the high country over the last few nights, and the aspens and cottonwoods are gilded with gold. The air is thick and clear. I love this time of year. I fired up the wood stove for the first time this year with daughter Emily yesterday. She was the […]
Why Cheaters Rarely Prosper…in Organic
The sun tired of shining high and bright in the sky, and started its now deliberate descent to the horizon. It was springtime in Idaho, and as was often the case just before dusk, a breeze was picking up, evidenced from the left-drifting trail of dust emanating from the pickup on the road ahead. Mike […]
Why Dirty Hands Save Our Land
After parking my truck along the curb on a backstreet in Missoula, Montana, I sit and witness a pilgrimage of sorts. My wife had already left on her own personal journey through the tightly packed serpentine aisles of plants placed into a former front yard on Third Street. Yes, there was still a house there, […]
Why Lonesome Larry Can’t Get a Girl
I walk barefoot in the coarse granitic sand and turn back to see what is happening to my footprints. They have vanished, swept away by the incessant waves that pound the beach. I look across the lake. It is a fair-sized lake, 5 to 6 miles long, I think. It is long enough that the […]
Evacuating Snakebite
The 800 pound steer we call Snakebite charged and knocked Indiana intern Renae off of her feet, and proceeded to trample her. He had already had enough human interaction for a day, and it was payback time. The rope, freshly attached to his neck pushed him to his breaking point, and when he turned to […]
It’s a Long Walk Home
Horseback, I had just pushed through a long thicket of nearly impenetrable young Douglas-fir trees. They were twice the size of Christmas trees, but no less branched. I could hear the cattle I herded in front of me, but there were times I could see nothing except the soft branches that swept my face and […]