As I walked out this morning I saw two pigeons fly off the top of the barn. They must have survived the hunt. After morning chores, JC and I walked the land and the creek was at full run. There are two beaver dams with a willow island in the middle. The west dam was holding against the snow melt but the longer, weaker east dam was 80% breached. Fast moving water.
We spent most of the remaining day clearing scrub willow from a corner of the pasture in preparation of heavy equipment coming next week to install a new dam/gate in the irrigation system. JC and Rebecca’s acequia (irrigation ditch) that flows through their land starts from a river one mile up valley. Many different acequias run through his property and throughout the bottom land of Taos. These ancient acequias are maintained by the landowners along the system. No person can keep an individual off of his land if he is tending the acequia. The need to keep the water flowing has produced a cooperative attitude among the farms in the basin. Now that development is creeping into the farm land, non farmers are disputing this long established right.
Tomorrow I leave this perfect place, this place of my sister and her gentle husband.
No comments:
Post a Comment