Pancho07 Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 I'm sure it's been on the news but there are fires all ove Kansas oklahoma and I'm sure other places that I'm not aware of. My ranch was burned today along with most of Clark county in southwest Kansas. 30 homes at least have been lost, most have been my friends or family. I got lucky in that my house was spared but it was a close thing. The neighbors to the west of us have had to euthanize most of their cattle. For those willing please keep us in your thoughts. Also if anyone in the Tristate area would happen to have surplus hay they could part with it would be much appreciated, either in Clark county or other ares being affected. Pancho Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SLAG Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 Pancho, I am glad your house was spared. Sorry about your loss. Hang in there things are bound to get better. (I suppose your grass cannot burn twice, in the near future). Wish I could help. Marg & I are thinking about you two. Good luck going forward. Regards, SLAG. p.s. this is a serious business. Check out, http://www.msn.com/en-us/weather/topstories/wildfires-in-4-states-kill-6-force-thousands-from-homes/ar-AAnYeZB?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartanntp Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 You are on the list. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pancho07 Posted March 8, 2017 Author Share Posted March 8, 2017 Thanks Glenn and SLAG, this is how close it got to our house and this is the affected area as of 8:40am yesterday. We are pretty much the red dot there Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anachronist58 Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 In our thoughts and prayers, Robert and Sheila Taylor Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 You, your neighbors and friends are in our prayers. You must have some mixed emotions my friend. On one hand so glad not to have lost more but guilty when you think of those who lost so much more. Such conflicted emotions are normal don't let them get you down. The pics show as close a call as I've seen. Be well brother. Frosty The Lucky. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ausfire Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 Best wishes to you all in the affected area. We know all about bushfires here and the tragedy they bring to people's lives. You no doubt have a strong community and help one another in times like this. Thoughts are with you, family and friends. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkunkel Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 Take care! My thoughts and prayers are with you..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHCC Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 Gratitude that you are safe, prayers for recovery. Be well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pancho07 Posted March 8, 2017 Author Share Posted March 8, 2017 Last estimate I saw was over 60%of the county has burned Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 Stucco walls and steel roof on our house as brush fires are an issue out here too! Good Luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pancho07 Posted March 8, 2017 Author Share Posted March 8, 2017 New map, via Oklahoma forestry service,from 6am today Only about 342000 acres in oklahoma. If there is interest I will continue with updates as I get them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SLAG Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 Pancho, I AM interested. Thank you for the heads up. Is there any chance that President Trump will declare the area a disaster area? Hang in there. SLAG. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
C-1ToolSteel Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 Pancho, I hadn't heard about that yet. I'm praying for you, and everyone else who is involved. Very sorry about the ranch, but what a blessing that your home survived. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 How are your Fences? I have an acquaintance in the Texas panhandle and when they had a fire one of the biggest losses was the miles of fences that had had wooden fenceposts and so had to be re-done. (IIRC he told me they had 7 miles of fence to redo.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHCC Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 1 hour ago, ThomasPowers said: How are your Fences? I have an acquaintance in the Texas panhandle and when they had a fire one of the biggest losses was the miles of fences that had had wooden fenceposts and so had to be re-done. (IIRC he told me they had 7 miles of fence to redo.) And not replacing them is indefencible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pancho07 Posted March 9, 2017 Author Share Posted March 9, 2017 6 hours ago, SLAG said: Pancho, I AM interested. Thank you for the heads up. Is there any chance that President Trump will declare the area a disaster area? Hang in there. SLAG. Clark County Sheriffs Facebook post from 3 hours ago: Sadly, we have set a new record in Kansas. The one grassfire alone in Clark and Comanche Counties holds the record for most acres burned in Kansas from a single fire. So far, 351,000-400,000 acres have burned in Clark County (that's 85% of that county), and 151,000 in Comanche, making the total over 500,000 acres. The previous record was 312,427 acres in Comanche and Barber Counties in 2016. In addition to ground crews, there are two Black Hawk helicopters with 600 gallon buckets dropping water on the fire and two Chinook helicopters capable of dropping 2,000 gallons are joining the fight. There are five counties across Kansas fighting fires right now. In addition to Clark and Comanche, Reno, Ellis and Rooks Counties have fires not yet contained. Governor Brownback declared a State of Emergency at 7:21 PM March 5, 2017. I was contacted today by someone from ABC news earlier today asking for permission to use a live stream of mine from yesterday so some of you may see my place on tv. My ranch was luckier than most, we haven't located all of our cattle but as of now we have found no cattle carcasses and none injured enough to be euthanized, mostly minor respiratory. We have lost a lot of grass so we will be feeding a lot of hay which is being made available by some very charitable people. For other ranches in the area I won't say much until I hear from them, everyone knows what he said she said they say means. Our neighbors to the south lost all buildings at headquarters except for the bunkhouse. They had steers one wheat and heifers, that they bought from us actually, in a grow yard. All should be fine but the heifers were moved out of the danger area. Neighbors and cousins to the west of us, as I understand it, lost nearly all of their cows on the cimarron river and possibly in other pastures that they have. I heard from someone helping with a ranch north of town that they lost 2/3 of their herd and the 3 adult daughters and their families lost their homes. Im still alittle frazzled so I'm going to stop there for now. Bottom line there was very little loss of human life or limb, homes can be rebuilt, grass grows back, and cattle multiply. This is still a dangerous place to be but it is becoming less so every hour. Thank you all for your prayers, thoughts and kind words. Everything helps. pancho Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrew Martin Posted March 9, 2017 Share Posted March 9, 2017 Very sorry to here about your misfortune Pancho, everyone affected by the fires are on my knee-mail list. I had really hoped we wouldn't have a repeat of last year's fires but I guess it was wishful thinking. We haven't really had any major fires up this away , but I remember our house being right underneath the smoke plume from last years fire. That one was a hundred miles or so away I think and I could still smell it inside the house! Thomas, I heard lots of people had problems with their fences getting torched last year (almost as much of a problem as the shortage of hay). Sad to think the misfortune repeated itself this year, putting in new fences isn't fun. On a more cheerful note, maybe this one torched up another few hundred of those pesky cedar trees! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SLAG Posted March 9, 2017 Share Posted March 9, 2017 Pancho, Hang in there, things are bound to get better soon. Could rebar reinforced cement or concrete "columns" be substituted for wooden posts. Just a wild thought. SLAG. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted March 9, 2017 Share Posted March 9, 2017 Steel T posts probably cheaper than concrete. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pancho07 Posted March 9, 2017 Author Share Posted March 9, 2017 We do 5 steels and one wood post, some think that that's too many steels but there aren't many post trees in the area and when a fire does come through there aren't as many posts that need replaced. Current count on the north side of the river, we are along both sides of the Cimarron, is only about 40 line posts and 12 corners. We are not hurting as bad as some are. 1 hour ago, Andrew Martin said: everyone affected by the fires are on my knee-mail list. I hadn't heard that one before, brought a welcome laugh. There's not much laughter around here right now. I remember our house being right underneath the smoke plume from last years fire. That one was a hundred miles or so away I think and I could still smell it inside the house! where abouts are you? On a more cheerful note, maybe this one torched up another few hundred of those pesky cedar trees! Those and the tamarack which is worse on the cimarron than cedars are taken care of for a few years anyway. We have a big forestry HYDRO-AXE mower that will be seeing some use again soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrew Martin Posted March 9, 2017 Share Posted March 9, 2017 Pancho, I'm a bit east of Cheney, so kind of between Kingman and Wichita. Thankfully, my area consists more of wheat fields than cattle pasture, so we don't usually have too many flare ups. We did nearly have a tornado in our back yard a couple years ago, but that's another story. Oh, I can't take credit for coining the phrase "knee-mail", I saw that somewhere on here and thought it was hilarious Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pancho07 Posted March 9, 2017 Author Share Posted March 9, 2017 From Kansas division of emergency management. Here are the latest #kswildfires numbers: Total Kansas acres burned: approximately 631,950 Comanche and Clark Counties: approximately 502,000 (a new record for a single fire in Kansas) Total containment of active fires as of this morning: Clark County: 50% Comanche County: 70% Reno County: 85% Rooks County: 97% Ellis County: 98% Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pancho07 Posted March 11, 2017 Author Share Posted March 11, 2017 I want to thank everyone on here who has given prayers and anyone who has given donations. We are beginning to see a light at the end of the tunnel and it's not fire or a train. The last estimate I saw said that 81% of Clark county's landmass has been reduced to ash. We have had a tremendous outpouring of support from around the country though and it has made all the difference. In the last 2 days my ranch will have received 5 semi loads of hay and have another one coming tomorrow and I believe will be continuing to come until it is no longer needed. We already are starting too see a green cast to the pastures and I've been told we should be getting some rain over the weekend but I don't seem to see the same forecast everyone else has. Relative humidity has gone from the 5% it was on tuesday to 35% today which has made a huge difference as well. thats about all I can say for now as that 5th load is being brought in and needs unloaded. Things are going to start getting busier around here so updates probably won't be coming as often as I have been trying to and will probably be moreso about my ranch and less about the rest of the area but please continue to pray, things may be getting better but it's still going to be a long summer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pancho07 Posted March 20, 2017 Author Share Posted March 20, 2017 Grass is growing and charity is still coming in, there are a lot of better people than I who are helping us out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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