POTOMAC — This year, the Blackfoot River set multiple records for low flows, compounding another year of drought. The impacts rippled throughout the valley. Ranchers, like Denny Iverson, were short hay and sold off cattle to cope.
“It just didn't rain. It rained around us, you know, but Potomac and the Blackfoot in general was just under an umbrella all summer,” Iverson said.
Iverson is a self-described “retired rancher who still ranches.” For 50 years, he and his family have been running cattle in Potomac. For decades, they have been using Union Creek to irrigate their fields, always leaving water for fish and people downstream. This year, they had to stop before the end of June.
“About a month and a half after we quit irrigating, the creek actually dried up, and I hadn't seen that in 50 years. And I've talked to some older folks that have been here longer than we have, and they said yeah, they've never seen that either. So, it was pretty dramatic,” he said. ”As ranchers, we want to do a good job, we want to take care of the land, we want to be productive.”
The impacts of the drought stretch far beyond Iverson’s fields in Potomac, affecting the whole Blackfoot Valley. From Helmville down to Bonner and everywhere in between, the communities throughout the valley rely on the river.
“We're coming off of actually one of the worst droughts that's on record for the Blackfoot River and this comes off of a pretty severe drought that we had last year,” said Clancy Jandreau, water steward with Blackfoot Challenge. “Just to kind of put it into context, they've been measuring flows in the Blackfoot River for about 90, 92 years and this September we hit historic record lows for most of the month.”
Jandreau said this year was particularly tough for many, due to the drought’s intensity and longevity.
“The river is really the lifeblood of this community in this valley, speaking both from the wildlife and the animals that utilize the river, but also the economies that are based on it,” he said.
Like many across the valley, Iverson was short on hay. With years of drought, his family has changed their practices to deal with the changing conditions.
“We're grazing more, grazing some of our hay fields quite a bit, kind of rotating that around between grazing and haying,” he said. “That really got us through this year, because when the cows are grazing these meadows they trample a lot on top of the soil and it protects the soil from the sun and helps keep some some moisture in the soil.”
Iverson and others are also selling off some of their herd, because of the drought in the present and concerns about the future.
“Our forages just didn't grow back after we grazed them either. So, it was tough, but we destocked some last year. The boys are going to destock some more this fall, because it's gonna take a while to come out of this drought. One good hard winter isn't gonna fix it,” he said. “We’re trying to find the sweet spot of the number of cows we can run and not harm our land.”
Working with communities across the valley, Blackfoot Challenge has long helped coordinate a voluntary drought response plan. In the program’s 26 years, Jandreau said 17 have seen some form of drought. Dealing with it, he said, takes the whole valley.
“We have a good track record of doing that here in the watershed, but it's a struggle for sure when you get these really extreme events,” he said.
While the valley is used to drought, this year has shifted the focus on the future. Iverson is already planning to manage his herd on a much drier ranch and, with the help of his neighbors, live in a much drier valley.
“We've been through it before. We'll survive it,” he said. “There's a real understanding between the ranchers and those that aren't ranchers that we're all here because we love the landscape. We love the valley.”
