Time to look at ranching the way it used to be

August and dry brown spots are gathering in the pastures. But the cattle are fat and doing fine. The first week of August we'd just returned from vacation. I was literally trying to get all the sand out of my suitcase, thinking over our vacation, when the phone rang bringing me back to Carson Valley. We had been in Australia diving the Great Barrier Reef and now needed to dig through laundry to look for something to wear for a Dangberg Home Ranch tour the caller invited me to.

I highly recommend the home ranch tour. It is a deal at $3/adult, free for children 12 and under. Mark Jensen, the Dangberg Home Ranch interpretive guide, has done a lot of family and historical research and presented an intriguing picture of the Dangberg family and the fortune they made and lost. I won't give away any information presented on the tour but to say the history of one young family member could make you cry. Take a camera and a notebook along if you like. Tours are by reservation Wednesday through Sunday and can be arranged by calling 783-9417. The park needs our support, and we need to remember our history. Go, learn and enjoy.

Australia on the other hand may do better without visitors. The country is interesting, young and growing. On the coast we had no phone, no TV, no radio, no newspapers just books, ocean water, Jurassic park like rainforests complete with a very rare large cassowary bird appearing to be a link between an ostrich and a peacock walking the swamp water. In the interior we drove hundreds of kilometers of savanna grass lined, one-lane oiled highway dotted with termite mounds across the Northern Peninsula. Some of the termite mounds looked as big as an elephant only red or gray depending upon the soil they were burrowing in.

Driving in the Outback was like driving through an African safari movie and something akin to driving across the middle of Nevada complete with cattle roaming the highway. There were few people, and scant cars traveling along the one-lane roads. We could drive our Maui Adventure Spirit motor-home for kilometers before crossing one cattleguard to another, which marked a Cattle Station's boundaries. Ranching in Australia is similar to Central Nevada's. They have thousand-hectare stations without a settlement, town or village around for kilometers. And the cattle are big and mean. Brahma crosses all the cattle we saw. An animal meant to bear the heat with an ornery disposition to deal with dingoes, wild pigs and the 3- to 8-meter crocodiles lurking in water holes. Gathering cattle in Australia must be a harrowing experience. There are more types of deadly poisonous, stinging plants, trees, insects and animals in Australia than on any other continent.

Unfortunately Australia is now in the middle of a terrible drought. Some caravan park signs asked to keep showers to 3 minutes. Even the pilots on the Qantas flight reminded visitors to remember to conserve water. But that wasn't the issue that concerned me; I live in a desert state. It was the condition of the Reef. It is bleached. Some reports say from the slight temperature change in the ocean, or from general pollution collecting in the ocean, or I believe the volume of excited tourists inadvertently damaging the reef by their presents. Whatever the cause it was very depressing to see 10 meter coral bommies with only a light brushing of small blue or green patches of growing coral. So maybe as a tourist in Australia I hurt the thing I came to admire.

It is good to be home with slightly longer showers, fat happy cattle and go to the Historical Park where I know my attendance helped rather than hurt.

n Marie Johnson is a Carson Valley Rancher