Summers here in Northern New Mexico are sweet but short - it’s not unusual for us to have slow flurries in September (as we did last week)!
While the sheep spend the summer up in the mountain, we stay busy here on the ranch. One of the biggest summer responsibilities we have is keeping our hay pastures irrigated.
The main work of irrigating with the ditch system (acequia) that we use is in the monitoring and moving a series of water-diverting tarps. Water from the main ditch flows into a series of smaller ditches dug throughout the hay fields. We place tarps into these smaller ditches which, when held in place with stones or clods of earth, cause the water in the ditch to back up and overflow onto the hay pastures. This type of irrigation is called flood irrigation.
These pastures are contoured so that the water from one ditch runs over the ground and empties into the next ditch in the system. We check the tarps twice a day to ensure that the fields are watered evenly - we want a good hay crop in the fall!
When the hay is ready, we cross our fingers for a dry week when the haying crew can come to cut the fields. Once the hay has been cut and baled, it will be stacked and stored for winter feeding.
The work of summer may not be glamorous, but it’s an essential part of the ranching year. The quiet effort we put into our pastures and hay crop now will be returned to us over the winter while we wait for spring to come again.
