Greener pastures may not be better

When it comes to the particular challenges that nature places in the path of a not unsuccessful agricultural enterprise on the high desert, I’ve got a decent expertise. But there are places that aren’t the high desert, where people grow crops, harvest crops, run livestock, and do all the work that comes in between. A significant portion of those other places are what might be accurately called “greener pastures,” especially from the perspective of the dry High Plains.

But what must plague the agricultural endeavors on the other side of that fence?

Are there more bugs and beetles in their fields that are equitable in increase to the proportional increase of yield that having more water and less sand allows?

There are probably mudholes that stop the progress of vehicles and equipment at least as much as we get ours stuck in the sand.

Maybe it’s closer to the grain elevator, and less miles to the nearest good place to get parts, but it might also be through denser traffic and require a route that is more roundabout.

Fuel might not have so far to be delivered, and the fields might not be as big, so as not to use so much of it up; but that might not matter, because in some places they make up for it with a hike in what it costs.

I’m not sure what the varmints look like in greener pastures. They may not be coyotes, rattlesnakes, porcupines, and badgers.

What about trees? I know that there are more than the notably few and far between that we have in the pastures up here.

It’s hard to imagine what it would look like to gather cattle in between trees that are more than just bigger scrub that you have to navigate between.

There’s no telling what it’d be like where the pastures are greener. It might be the greenest, looking down from the sand, here on the high desert.

Audra Brown always comes home from visiting greener pastures. Contact her at: [email protected]