The Nebraska Sandhills are made for cattle grazing, and that is, in large part, what keeps the area thriving and supports the small communities throughout western Nebraska. In Arthur County, most operations are cow-calf producers with a few operators who run yearlings on grass during the summer. On a good year, the grass is dense with nutrition and the cows and calves grazing it are fat and shiny.

The Sandhills, like much of Colorado, western Kansas and Wyoming, haven’t received any measurable moisture since last fall with little snow over the winter months. Snow or not, calving season arrived and most producers move the bred cows closer to their headquarters to allow for constant calf checks. That was where many of the cows and calves were when the Morrill Fire began.

I spoke to a rancher named Ainslie Wilson about the fire. She came here from a cattle station in Australia in 1996 and worked as a freelance writer and photographer. She eventually met and married an Arthur County rancher and they’re raising kids, cattle and horses today. Arthur’s sign claims the population at 120, with the county around 450 people, she said. The school has an enrollment of about 120 from kindergarten through 12th grade, so sparsely populated is accurate, even by Sandhills standards.

The wind was punishing the Sandhills the day the fires began, and in dry, windy conditions, people in cattle country keep their eyes open, constantly scanning the horizon. She said it was dusty and hazy and then they smelled the smoke. Neighbors to the west were doling out progress reports, one telling Wilson, “this fire is big and it’s headed your way.”

Pickups and trailers were hooked up, fire rigs were readied, horses were loaded, and the most important items were thrown into vehicles while daylight was still on their sides. She and her boys loaded until a neighbor called to tell her she needed to get to safety immediately. One neighbor loaded horses and belongings into pickups and trailers and parked them on a circle of winter wheat under a pivot sprinkler that could be turned on if necessary.

Green wheat saves cattle and wildlife in fires across the plains each spring. Pasture and road ditches and fallowed ground can all burn, but green wheat stands like circles of sanctuary. From the air, it creates circles within the patchwork of flyover country, but on the ground, it’s lifesaving.

That night, Wilson said, was chaos. The wind punished everything and everyone all night, driving the flames toward homes. One fire rig crew was working near a ranch headquarters when their exit was closed by flames and they were forced to hunker down on bare dirt next to a water tank and wait for the fire to burn all around them. Wilson said they finally returned home around 4 in the morning. The next morning, the wind blew from a different direction, reigniting flames and sending them back to get what they had missed the night before.

Her brother-in-law lost 23 sections of grass in the fire and with it, the fences that make grazing management possible. A section is 640 acres. Other neighbors estimate that they’ve lost 80% to 90% of their pastures. It costs about $10,000 per mile of four strand barbed-wire fence and it is hard work.

In some cases, fire can burn away dead grass and expose new growth, acting as a rebirth of sorts. That’s not going to be the case in Wilson’s beloved Sandhills. The area is comprised of grass-stabilized sand dunes that frame the Niobrara River that winds through the area. On the tops of the hills, the fire was ferocious enough to destroy every bit of plant material, leaving the sand to blow and drift. Ditches have filled with sand and hills have shifted lower. Some soapweeds remain, giving the sand something to pile around. In the draws, she said there is some grass remaining and some twinge of green may reappear.

The bulk of the area, though, will take years to recover, leaving ranchers to either feed hay, sell cows, or ship cows elsewhere. The problem is the dry conditions are so widespread, there is little good grass for hours.
This will have a tremendous effect on the feeder cattle markets in the fall, the cow markets and the ranchers who still need to operate and make a living. Ranchers live closer to the land than most. Nearly all have experienced some sort of loss and the loads of donated hay, feed, veterinary supplies, fencing supplies and other items have rolled into Arthur County by the semi convoy, the loss of grass and fences is central to everything in the area. They will manage through this, and cattle will eventually graze the Sandhills again, but it will forever be changed and so will the ranchers.

Rachel Gabel writes about agriculture and rural issues. She is assistant editor of The Fence Post Magazine, the region’s preeminent agriculture publication.