Drought threatens way of life for Texas ranchers

[Pastor Dale Morgan]

Perilous Times and Climate Change

Drought threatens way of life for Texas ranchers

By Rick Jervis, USA TODAY

SAN ANGELO, Texas – The rolling pastures surrounding this West Texas city usually are green and verdant, chock-full of roving herds of sheep and cattle grazing on a seemingly endless supply of grass.

With the lack of rainfall and a wildfire in April that consumed grazing land, Texas rancher Jim Hughes has been forced to sell more than 750 head of cattle, shutting down his ranching operation.

These days, acre after acre is yellowed and inedible from a withering lack of rain. Wide patches are scorched black from where wildfires mauled them, and highway bridges span dry, empty riverbeds. There are few visible sheep or cattle, many having been sent to slaughter rather than left to starve in the barren fields.

"It's just burnt up," says Jim Hughes, 68, a local cattle rancher who has lost 7,000 acres of his property to wildfires and sold off most of his herd. "It's the worst I've ever seen it."

As parts of the northeastern United States recover from historic flooding, Texas is suffering the worst one-year drought in its history. The state has received just 7.33 inches of rain this year through August, the lowest amount in four decades, state climatologist John Nielsen-Gammon says.

Temperatures, meanwhile, have hit record highs: Texas' June-through-August average of 86.8 degrees was the hottest summer for any state in U.S. history, beating out a record set by Oklahoma (85.2) in 1934, according to the National Weather Service.

The dearth of rain has wilted fields and led to destructive wildfires across the state.

In the Bastrop area, 25 miles east of Austin, recent wildfires killed two residents and destroyed 1,500 homes in less than a week — far surpassing the statewide record of 436 in 2009. Across Texas, wildfires this year have burned a record 3.7 million acres — an area about the size of Connecticut, according to the Texas Forest Service.

Most affected by the drought have been cattle and sheep ranchers, whose grazing fields have been scorched into arid brown parchment and who have sent their herds to slaughter in record numbers.

The drought so far has cost the state a record $5.2 billion in livestock and crop losses, according to the Texas AgriLife Extension Service at Texas A&M University.

Statewide water restrictions now prevent waitresses from pouring glasses of water for guests at restaurants unless requested, and force some residents to drive 10 miles or more to wash their cars in neighboring counties that have fewer restrictions on water use. Lawns haven't had a drink in months. Throughout Texas, residents pray for rain at church, at the dinner table, at nightly vigils and at funeral eulogies.

Still, no rain comes.

"Everything about this is historic and comparable to the Dust Bowl years," says Robert Dull, an assistant professor of geography and the environment at the University of Texas at Austin, referring to the severe drought and dust storms of the 1930s that forced mass migrations from Oklahoma and other states. "People made major life-changing decisions based on that event, just as they will with this."

Droughts and wildfires usually are phenomena that occur in faraway, rural corners of West Texas, Dull says.

But last week, some of his students said their families had lost homes to the wildfires in nearby Bastrop, marking a disaster that has been felt as much in urban centers as in rural areas.

"There's a psychological effect that will linger for years," he says.

Claiming homes, not just prairie

The stunned residents of Bastrop gathered at the city's convention center last week, checking maps to see whether their homes had survived the fires.

The fires near Bastrop destroyed the lumber business belonging to Deborah Shelton and her husband, Bo. She left her home after smelling smoke, carrying only her camera, her laptop and a suitcase full of clothes. She says she's not sure what they'll do next.

"We just don't know if it's worth rebuilding at this point," Shelton says.

The drought is a result of La Niña, a weather phenomenon that cools surface temperatures in the eastern Pacific Ocean and creates drier-than-normal conditions in the southern United States, Nielsen-Gammon says.

The drought stretches across swaths of New Mexico, Oklahoma and Kansas but is most acute in Texas. Here, 80% of the state is experiencing "exceptional" drought, the most severe ranking, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, produced by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and other agencies.

More bad news: NOAA scientists recently predicted that La Niña will return this winter, extending the drought through at least next summer.

"People will remember this for a long time," says David Anderson, an economist with the Texas AgriLife Extension Service.

No refuge for ranchers

In San Angelo— considered the epicenter of the drought — the dry conditions have hit ranchers the hardest.

Benny Cox, who owns the area's largest livestock auction, says he has sold record numbers of cattle and sheep, including calves and young cows that ranchers typically would keep for breeding. On a recent afternoon, his bins bustled with 4,500 cattle — more than four times the norm. Although good for business in the short term, the selling of the younger cows will mean a lack of cattle production in coming years, Cox says.

"A lot of these people have completely destocked," he says. "I've never seen that before."

Bill Tullos, 88, has been culling cattle and sheep on his property west of San Angelo for seven decades. He took over the family ranch when he was 16, after his father's sudden death. He has worked the livestock every year since, except for four years spent flying B-17 bombers over Europe during World War II, he says.

Today, the ranch's 4,500 acres are burnt yellow and parched. He has had to sell all 80 of his cows, all 900 sheep and 500 of his 700 goats. If it doesn't rain by spring, the business started by his grandpa in 1919 will end, he says.

"There's nothing here," Tullos says of his ranch's parched conditions. "This is the driest I've ever seen it."

Water supply threatened

Twenty minutes up the road in Robert Lee, Texas — population 1,049 — city leaders are facing an even greater problem: how to get enough water to residents.

Nearby Lake E.V. Spence, where the city gets its water, has dropped to dangerously low levels, Mayor John Jacobs says. At last reading, the reservoir was at less than 0.5% of its total capacity, he says.

The city brought in bigger pumps to pull the last drops from the lake, but the quality of the water has plummeted as the pumps reach nearer the bottom, Jacobs says. The city has applied for federal and state funds to pipe in water from a nearby town. But even that would be a temporary fix, he says. Robert Lee is running out of water.

"We're just hanging on, praying for rain," Jacobs says.

So are townsfolk elsewhere.

Every Thursday night, a few residents of Llano, 75 miles west of Austin, gather in the gazebo in the town square and pray. It's a routine started by Ervin Light, pastor of the Llano Church of God of Prophecy, during the 2009 drought and ramped up again this year.

On a recent Thursday, 15 of the faithful met at the gazebo and split into two circles. They joined hands, squeezed their eyes shut and prayed. They prayed for an end to the wildfires, for the thinning deer and cattle, for neighbors who have lost homes. And they prayed for rain.

The problem plaguing Texas is not so much shifting weather patterns as a lack of fervent faith from its residents, says Light, 67. More prayer could open up the skies, he says.

"When enough people get serious and do whatever it takes to get God's attention," Light says, "that's when we'll have our rain."