Pritchett – In the mud on the side of Baca County Road WW, in one of the few bare spots in an otherwise snow-smothered prairie, lies the carcass of Steve McEndree’s wife’s favorite cow.
Jamie McEndree playfully named the auburn Hereford “Bad Horn Day,” for the curious way one of its horns curled up and one down. Steve wanted to sell the old cow a year ago, but Jamie asked him not to.
Last week, nearly two months after a blizzard dropped 4 feet of snow on the McEndree’s ranch, Bad Horn Day lay down in that spot along Road WW and died, worn out from fighting the snow, fighting the cold and fighting the hunger.
“It’s part of life,” says Steve McEndree, a third-generation rancher in Baca County. “But you don’t like it.”
Another dead cow.
One of at least 46 cows and calves that McEndree has lost since the December blizzard. One of an estimated 10,000 that have died in southeastern Colorado as a result of the storm.
Their carcasses are reminders that the blizzard’s wrath didn’t end when the storms faded months ago and likely won’t end even when the snow that still lies on the ground a foot deep finally melts away.
Agriculture is all about legacy. This winter’s weather affects this spring’s calves. This spring’s calves, in turn, pay next year’s bills. Next year’s bills determine whether ranchers will be able to fix the tractor or the pickup or the fence to keep the operation running. Whether ranchers will have money for their operation decides whether mechanics, contractors and numerous others in the community have jobs, too.
“It’s not just an inconvenience; our livelihoods are at stake,” said Stephanie Hund, superintendent of the 77-student Pritchett school district in the state’s southeastern corner. “When our ranchers suffer, we all suffer.”
McEndree’s story is typical.
Before the storm, he had about 1,000 cattle on his ranch. The survivors are living in small paths of pasture that McEndree, 49, and neighbors bulldozed through the snow. Many are underweight, some so much so that their ribs show and their hipbones poke high into their hide.
What McEndree doesn’t know, he said, is how this spring’s calves will turn out. Calving in the mud can be disastrous for the young animals, said Rick Birdsong, a veterinarian in Springfield. Winter stress can also force cows to abort their pregnancies or to simply absorb the fetus, he said.
“They’re not out there feeding off the grass they normally do,” Birdsong said. “It’s harder. They’re stressed.”
So are the people here.
At the school, Hund said teachers are seeing more students writing about blizzards, dying animals and hardship.
“We really have to take things day by day,” she said. “And we live in fear of snow. Please, God, make it stop.”
There is some help making its way to southeastern Colorado. A benefit concert is planned. Ten counties have received disaster funds to help with snow removal. But the Federal Emergency Management Administration on Monday denied extending extra funding to all but two of those counties, a decision the state is appealing.
“It’s not all doom and gloom,” McEndree said. “Once this all goes away, this really is pretty country out here. You have to look at the positives.”
Staff writer John Ingold can be reached at 720-929-0898 or jingold@denverpost.com.
