Monday, February 5, 2024

Empire Ranch 8

 This may be our last warm sunny day for a while.  Warm anyway.  72 this afternoon.  Might be rain showers tomorrow and even snow showers the next day.  AHHH!!!

We made a quick run to town for propane and found out their pump was not working.  We had that issue at HVR last week too.  But here the gas company was coming around every day at 3 to fill small tanks.  So we left it there and went for prairie dog hunting, with the cameras.  Black Tail Prairie Dogs were reintroduced here a few years ago and have a good colony established.  I think we saw them last year too.  Quite a noisy neighborhood with all their  whistling.  We saw many of them running around from hole to hole as they considered the extent of their need to hide from us.  They have a protective fence to keep us out.  Skye was on leash.
After watching them for a while we walked out the road for a few miles.  It was warm  and Skye was hot so she cooled off in a small mud puddle.  What a mess!  So we had to detour on the way back so she could have a swim in a cow pond.  It wasn’t really a cow pond, it was fenced off so the cows couldn’t get to it.  They had their own pond.  This pond was labeled as being for endangered species protection and there were some ducks in it.  they did look endangered so Skye went in for a swim and came out pretty clean.  On the walk back she found a different and somewhat cleaner puddle and we kept her out of the really muddy puddle.
After all of that we had to go back for our propane tank.  On the way out we met a couple horse trailers.  We’ve seen those in here a few times and didn’t think much of it.  When we got home they were in the campsite getting ready to ride out.  One rider came over and said she had noticed out VT plate on the road and that she had lived in Brattleboro for 8 years.  When they came back 1 1/2 hours later we talked some more, checked out the horses & met the owner.
While we were talking to them, Skye was in the camper alone.  When we got back she was limping.  No idea what she did while we were out but she was probably looking out he windows to see where we were.  But now her left front leg is sore.  I guess she’ll have some time off from hiking, and that won’t make her very happy either.


There is a hazard to camping on the open range.  You may wake up to having cattle nearby 

Nice artwork at the entry to town

There really is a prairie dog in this photo.  Somewhere.
I have much better pix in the other camera, but I have to get the laptop out to access them.
I’ll post them later




The mystery critter

the duck pond

The riders



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