Savanna Blog
Heavy Fuel Loads, The Fires in Ventura County, and the Brave New Normal
With the fires in Ventura County, I think we can call it official; our heavy fuel loads have come home to roost. A week ago I could convince myself, while drinking a beer and listening to rain patter on the roof, that the fires that destroyed our home were an anomaly. No, they are the […]
Soil Science Can Save Civilization. Twice
Soil Science can save civilization and it can do it twice. The first is the usual way; civilization is built on agriculture which is based on soil, etc. If you are unfamiliar with how this might be possible, check out this link from WAMU whic is a good discussion of this problem for the uninitiated. […]
Savanna Ecosystems are Deteriorating and My House was Collateral Damage
Did I mention that our home burned down in the Nuns Fires in Sonoma County last month? Well, I’m casually bringing it up again for two reasons. First of all, given all that’s happened, we at Grounded Land and Livestock have a product that you might want to consider, reduce heavy fuel loads through livestock […]
Giving Thanks
Friends and Family, The three of us Chisholm-Harts are spending our Thanksgiving eve thinking about what we are grateful for. Obviously all of you are top of mind. We are settling into our temporary digs in Petaluma, Abel is busy practicing his walking and Hanna is busy practicing ordering boxes from Amazon. We are adding […]
When My Free Range Cattle Range So Far Away That They Stop Being Local, Should I Be Concerned?
As it has through the summer, the fog still rolls in every morning from the ocean, a sort of daily glacier. Only marooned mountain tops stick out. It reminds me of the view from our ranches on top of Sonoma Mountain five hundred miles to the south. But the fog is icy at this time […]
Bent Grass
Abel is something of a grass connoisseur. When we go for our daily walk out in the pasture, our one year old son wants to get out and play. When we are in Oregon he prefers to play in a nice patch of bent grass (in the genus Agrostis). He finds this to be good […]