Nebraska Sandhills native Glenna Sherfey has always loved the beauty of the area’s rolling hills. But this year, the vibrant splendor is one of somber reflection. The Morrill Fire tore through parts of Rush Creek Ranch, which spans 150,000 acres across eight counties, in March, leaving behind charred ground that’s now parched due to drought.
On March 12, Glenna and her husband, Lyle, who is a ranch manager for the north camp, were in Scottsbluff when they got word a fire had started about 15 to 20 miles west of their place. When they tried to get home, roads were blocked by fire crews and an overturned semi, and the fire was already spreading in multiple directions.
Lyle says one ranch hand described the front of the fire like “lightning flashing across the top of the ground” as it moved over a hill. By Thursday night, the fire had burned south of their camp. The flames, however, did not pass with the first wave.
“I will never forget how helpless I was,” Glenna says of the next few days. “I couldn’t do anything. It’s still fresh, and it’s still pretty painful.”
On Friday, the wind shifted, and the fire turned back toward them.
“Everywhere you looked, we had fire,” Lyle says.
Limited Cell Service Slowed Family Updates
The situation was made more difficult by the Sandhills’ limited cell service. The family often had to rely on a small hilltop spot they call the “phone booth” to get enough signal to check on one another and relay updates.
“Getting a hold of my husband was pretty difficult,” Glenna says. “It was kind of just wait until he got to a hilltop and could call and let me know he was OK and that everything was all right.”
Burned Pasture Forces Cattle Moves
With pasture burned and little grass left to graze, the ranch has had to make difficult decisions. Lyle says the crew sold yearlings and moved more than 700 cattle from his ranch camp and about 900 from another pasture to other grazing ground.
“We’ve had to do it before, maybe not to this extent,” he says. “All of us are trying to make decisions. You don’t know because we’ve never been through something like this.”
The drought has only deepened the challenge. Since the end of May, the area has received much-needed rain. Prior to that, the ranch had received less than three-fourths of an inch of moisture since the fire, leaving little recovery in the burned hills.
After the fire, Lyle says the immediate issue was feed. With no grass to support cattle, ranchers had to make quick decisions about whether to move cows, buy hay or sell livestock.
“Sandhills will come back,” he says. “But when there isn’t any grass, you can’t put cattle there.”
That reality has hit smaller operations especially hard, he adds, because they may not have the flexibility to shift cattle or absorb lost grazing.
“If this was his whole ranch, he would have lost everything,” Lyle says of smaller operations. “He still has the buildings and the cows, but he has no feed, and you can’t raise cattle without feed.”
Agriculture Community Steps Up With Hay and Supplies
The response from neighbors and the agricultural community across the country has helped soften the blow. Lyle says hay, mineral, tubs, cake and fence supplies started arriving in truckloads soon after the fire.
“One gentleman came up to us, had a notebook and showed us a page of people who donated hay,” Lyle says. “There was just truckload after truckload after truckload coming in.”
The Sherfeys say they are focused on moving forward; however, Glenna says some of the country that burned includes land that families have worked for generations, and the impact reaches beyond pasture loss.
“I’ve got so many comments on my Facebook that fire’s good and fire’s cleansing, and you’re dang right it is,” she says. “We all know the benefit in a fire and cleaning up your brush and cleaning up your dead grass, but this is so much more ... It is miles and miles and miles of nothing but sand, and it is really struggling right now.”
For Glenna, the recovery has been as much about faith as it has been about grazing plans. She has never seen anything like the fire or the dry conditions that followed.
“I don’t think you can be a farmer or rancher or anything in ag and not have faith,” she says. “But there’s days where it’s really hard to look at these hills that I’ve loved all my life and see them like this. It hurts.”
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