Ross Fire 7

 Today the Ross Fire is at 88% containment across 90,400 acres. We had a little bit of rain this week, which was a nice break.

We had some fence work completed this week, and the burned Mesquite trees were rooted up and piled together. It's best to uproot them after a fire using heavy equipment.  These were removed with a skidsteer to ensure the roots came out.  Mechanical uprooting is best for now, otherwise it could take two years for chemical/herbicide removal after a wildfire.  

Ross Fire 6

 Today the Ross Fire is still at 57% containment.

Moon and Mimi are happy and well fed.  They have had a lot of visitors since the fire came through, but they seem to be just fine.  We have noticed that Mimi has been scratching her back left side more, so we are keeping an eye on it. They have some scratching brushes that they love to use.  

We could really use some rain!

The fire jumped around a lot. It was strange to see just the middle of this cactus burned.

We find something new every time we visit these days!

Ross Fire 5 / Fence

Today the Ross Fire is at 57% containment. But in other news...

A trailer driving by Little Frog Ranch lost control and wiped out a long section of the front fence and a gate connecting two pastures.  All we could do was laugh, seriously!  We actually did laugh, because it is so crazy the challenges that Little Frog Ranch is dealing with at one time.  But this one turned out ok! The people were so nice and put a temporary fix on the fence so the cows didn't escape. They will come back later and repair it permanently.  We are grateful that they stopped, and fixed it!  

This was a large roll of hay. The trailer hit it and pushed it forward to the second pile in the background.

The rest of the roll of hay.

The view back from where it stopped to where it came in.  The front fence was fixed the same day, and they will come back during the week to fix the fence between the pastures.  

The worst part of this is that the trailer belonged to another member of our community who lost his business in the Ross Fire.  Even in the midst of their own tragedy, they still fixed the fence right away so our cows couldn't escape.  

Check out their story and news video and their GoFundMe.

Ross Fire 4

The Ross Fire is still burning, sitting at about 44% containment today.  The firefighters came by today to go through our property and the property behind us to do a "mop up". Mop-up is the process of extinguishing hidden hot spots, smoldering logs, and underground roots near a wildfire's edge to ensure the fire cannot flare back up. We are grateful that they are checking!

To keep up with the Ross Fire, we check the WatchDuty Website. We also get good information from Inciweb.

This week we had to provide hay for the cows, since there is almost nothing left for them to graze on. We were able to get 5 six-foot round coastal hay rolls delivered and will monitor how much they eat over the next month. They were very happy!

Here is a quick view of Little Frog Ranch from the front left gate.

Ross Fire 3

 Day 6 of the Ross Fire

We checked on Little Frog Ranch and the cows this morning and found some pleasant surprises.   Yesterday people had dropped off some hay into the pastures, and even left a bag of cattle cubes by the gate!

Moon and Mimi have hay on the other side of their cow shed in a small section of unscorched land, but since it is not visible from the road we wondered if people were worried about them being abandoned. So we moved some hay around to the other side and put a note on the gate they are being taken care of, and also thanking people for the donations.  We will need to get a lot more hay brought in this week, and will continue to provide extra hay for the next few months.  They will eat a large round bale of coastal hay each week without much else to graze on.   Typically we don't need to supplement much until the winter months, but with so little left for grazing, it is important that we monitor the hay levels.  

There is a lot more hay on the other side as well.  They really love the cattle cubes though!

Mimi

Moon

 

We walked around a bit looking at the fire damage. 

Firefighter boot print

The smoke smell still lingers, and the ground has a strange crunch sound when you walk on it.  We could really use some rain to refresh the land.  The Ross Fire is still only at 31% containment.  Still we are thankful for the hard work of so many battling this fire, and for those who saw the cows and stopped to make sure they had food.  

Ross Fire 2

Today is Day 5 of the Ross Fire in Texas, affecting 89,127 acres at 31% containment.  We have been using Watchduty.org to get updated information on the fire.  Here is an updated fire map as of today, including Little Frog Ranch.

Little Frog Ranch is 11.4 acres, and we estimate that about 11.2 were burned.

It is a very small fraction of the total fire to date. 

We are still very thankful that our buildings, cows, and tractor were spared.  We will keep a closer eye on the cows to make sure they have adequate hay since they can no longer graze anywhere they want. There is a small patch of land near their cowshed where they have access to hay and water.  We had been wanting to plant a field of coastal hay, so this is something we will plan for in the future as we reset things at Little Frog Ranch. 

Moon

We are so grateful for all of the firefighters still out there every day battling the Ross Fire!  

Link to Ross Fire Part 1

Ross Fire

This has been a wild and worrisome time at Little Frog Ranch!  The Ross Fire started in Palo Pinto County and spread north into Jack County.  As of today, it has covered 83,000 acres and is only at 12% containment.  We watched every update we could find online overnight, hoping it would miss Little Frog Ranch.  Our wonderful neighbor contacted us during the night to let us know that the fire was spreading and the forestry service was there working, as evacuations were being made.

Ross Fire Map from Watch Duty.com

Overview of Little Frog Ranch before and after the fire came through from Google Maps

The road to LFR was closed during the night, so Chris was able to go this morning.

It was still smoldering in the back.

The tractor was spared!

My favorite tree was spared!  

And most importantly, the cows were spared.

We have some cleanup and work to do, but for now we are just grateful.  

Link to Ross Fire Part 2