dung flipping

A rancher from the green country around MaryNeal (south of Roscoe, northwest of Winters and southeast of Lenorah) dropped by to say howdy. I hope everybody has seen the film "Dancer, Texas, population 16", an independent movie filmed down around Alpine. One scene captures the essence of howdying.

I am not going to tell you more, except to tell you that it occurs between two ranchers leaning up against a water tank. The heat of summer creates a soporific, somnolent rhythm to rural life anywhere in the tropical and subtropical regions. Our insanely intense industrial-technical life sneers at the pacing, but the art of conversation takes on a wealth of subtlety when people take time to think of what they are about to say and take time to listen.

Howdying, like knowing what a "draw", or a "tank", or a "water gap" is, is an integral part of being a West Texan. Everybody should know the lingua franca and social protocols of their region. It is one of the ways to love our homeland.

I rejoice in participating in the style of "them that's seen the elephant." I celebrate the incredible endurance, honesty, and dignity of those who have weathered drought, blizzard, brushfire, screwworm fly doctoring and other adversities. Our modern society is mostly unaffected by such things as drought. Our tribulations are rarely those presented by acts of God and I think we lose a wealth of knowledge when we do not honor those whose lives are still overwhelmingly influenced by acts of nature.

I am prejudiced. Ranchers are my heroes. My granddad was one of the last cattle drovers grazing Texas cattle and fattening them in Indian Territory. Being a steward of livestock entails the blunt acceptance of doing a tough job while finding the intestinal fortitude to step into a situation that could end in death.

John Wayne movies are the only place most urban people even get a hint of the vicissitudes within one's own character that must be overcome when challenged by what can seem to be unbearable natural conditions. It is 10 below zero and the wind is howling 50 miles an hour? So what? -- you got to go out and break ice for the stock. And your truck dies 10 miles from the house and the cell phone does not work because you are down in a valley and out of range of the nearest tower. So what you going to do? What if you are working round-up and have a pile-up and break your leg, and your horse's leg breaks, too, and the country is too rough for an ORV, and nobody will even start looking for you until sundown, and you are a mile from the nearest jeeptrack? What you going to do?

Other professions are as tough -- being an ocean-going fisherman, or a lumberjack, or working on a rig, or mining for precious minerals. None of these hardworking folks are given the honor that is truly due them. I am just a mite radical, I suppose, because I think every teenager needs to spend a good bit of time in the company of folks that take the bit in their teeth and pull their weight without a whimper of complaint.

MaryNeal is in the 23 inches of annual rainfall belt. It is only 100 miles east of Midland, but drought conditions there are not near as bad as here. They are wishing for some deep soil moisture, but nigh on to every summer that is the story. But, by golly, they actually have grass growing. Here in Midland County, there is not even a dead blade of grass in most pastures. Me and the ol' boy were chatting outside. It was a tad toasty being 99 degrees in the shade, so we were hunkered down in the shade of the windmill tank.

"I wonder if the termites will get it." He pointed at wood on the ground with his chin. I shrugged and lifted my palms skyward. A Cactus Wren joined us in the shade and we watched it for a minute or two as it tore apart a big black witch moth. The tiny little mesquite cicadas lost their fear and started singing in the thorny bushes again. A pebble-skinned band-winged grasshopper arched over the fence, its wings crepitating. A Mississippi Kite soared over, somehow finding just enough wind to keep from falling out of the sky. All of this and more we watched, without words.

"I was beginning to wonder if the termites hadn't died. The mud-tube termites that process dead grass-roots need moisture to survive, so how could they?" Grassland termites are a major recycler of nutrients -- half of a grass clumps hair roots die annually, and termite droppings provide nutrients for the next year. I poked at an old mesquite stick with the vestiges of a mud-tube still draped over it.

The tube is but one sand grain thick, each grain stuck together with saliva and pushed into place by the insects' heads. Even though termites require oxygen, there is no hole in the mud tube. Termites do not like light, and their soft bodies cannot endure dry air for more than five minutes. The mud shell also provides protection from ants that relish termite tidbits. At night, the tube is breached and termite excrement ejected. I pushed at another tube, and after it fell apart we noticed it was completely empty. The rancher found a round ball of the same construction, and when he tapped it, a partially eaten jackrabbit pellet was revealed.

"I amuse myself turning over cow patties, sometimes. I still can find termites under and in the ones that retain a little bit of moisture, so somehow the termites are able to survive eight years of drought." I sneaked a peak to see if he gave any reaction concerning such suspect behavior.

The rancher scratched his head. "Have you noticed the tiny species of scorpion that lives under the cow-plops?" Well, well, another dung-flipper. I was in good company!