Grazing contracts and fleeces over the years
The steel blue of Iris the sheep’s hip is revealed as shears pass across her, peeling the matted dull iron tinged gray of her fleece away, a process uncannily like taking a grinder to rusted metal and leaving ridged circles of brightness behind with each swipe. I’m shearing her while we are out on a […]
Lions in the Barnyard
I think this is Myrtle’s last winter. She is hacking, which is tempting to think is a bronchial issue from the damp cold weather. As it’s not responding to treatment, however, I suspect it’s a sign she’s having difficulty clearing her cud because her teeth are going. She is, at minimum, a ten year old […]
Wild Hope
My plan for the spring was drawn out in digital lines. These blocky cells linked to create dated blocks superimposed over the most recent satellite imagery of the field, which happened to be taken the spring that we burned it. The field hissed and rushed with grass fire that destroyed the dense invasive grasses but […]
In the Night Corral
Insomnia has been with me all my life, a relic of lying awake keeping wary vigil over my alcoholic father. I have developed strategies and drawn myself maps to navigate sleep, and some of them work sometimes. Like most adaptations within a living system they have to be adjusted constantly. They can’t be set once […]
Lions in Mendocino
I was awake at 5am, feeding thin sticks into my newly kindled fire, when my phone pinged. My neighbor was asking for help. A mountain lion had attacked their goats, and they wanted to know if I could bring my medical bag. I headed out the door and walked through the blue predawn to their […]
Community Flock
Slender tendrils of grass thread their way between the trampled thatch of dead grey matter formed from generations of oxidizing plants, left standing until we arrived. The electric green cotyledons of wild radish speckled the cool fall ground. The sinking sun gave shining edges to the clouds, moving swiftly through a sky like a dusky […]