In the 70's and 80's,I had a 550ac. ranch in Western Colorado near the town of Crawford. Pop.100 the majority of which were ranch families. Primarily cow/calf operations, I ran sheep. Elevation of the area was 7000ft. so hay was the primary crop.15" of annual prec. made it a semi arid high mesa environment. We were on a ditch system that collected snow runoff. My ranch was a long canyon with many connecting fields that gave me 100+ acs of alfalfa/grass and 20acs of oats or barley. I would get 2 cutting on most fields and a well that gave 3 cuttings on 1 long field. The well saved my bacon on dry years when we would have a 3 day run of ditch water. The well was good for 300GPM. The long fields allowed me to wear the water out, runoff from one field to the next.
I started out with 1200hd of old Wyoming Columbia ewes that I paid $10.00 per/hd. I would keep replacement ewe lambs to build a younger bunch. Coyotes were a nightmare. One night coyotes got into a bunch of replacement ewe lambs on alfalfa and killed over 30, Man, that was hard to take. Mine was a one man show, I did have a sheepherder. There was a 20,000ac BLM allotment adjacent to my ranch that I had use of. It was good spring and fall grazing. I also owned 430 acs of high mtn pasture below the Ragged Mtns near McClures Pass. I lambed in March and sold fat lambs around Labor Day.
Life was good. Divorce ended it. I'm almost 74 now living in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia running a small bunch of sheep. Life is good again!
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Colorado Ranch
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