It takes all weekend to mow my lawn. I either need a smaller lawn or a bigger mower. When we don’t get much rain, I don’t have to mow more than once or twice a month during the spring, but on wetter years, like this one, by the time I get to the end of the lawn, the part I started on already looks like it needs to be mowed again.
That seriously cuts into my spring fishing time. I’d much rather be out on a creek bank somewhere, practicing my dead drift and hoping to hook a lunker of a brookie or cutthroat, but instead, I’ve been spending all my spare weekend hours driving my lawn tractor in mind-numbingly boring rows back and forth across my yard.
I can’t complain too much about the rapid growth of my grass, though. It’s essentially native prairie grass, which is exactly what’s growing on the prairies all across the state. If it’s growing this well here at my house, as long as there is a similar amount of rain falling elsewhere in Wyoming, it bodes well for the prairie species that live in the state’s wilder places. I’m betting this will be a good year for sharp-tailed grouse, sage grouse, pronghorns, deer, and a bunch of other species. In turn, it should be good for the critters that eat those herbivores, as well.
For now, I won’t have as much time as I’d like to get out and see those animals, and maybe even get some photos of some of them. But the rains will peter out as summer approaches, and the grass won’t grow as quickly. Hopefully there will be enough still out there on the plains for those animals to eat and hide in. When fall comes along, there should be plenty of game for all of us to have a great hunting season. At least, that’s what I’m hoping for as I repeatedly mow my lawn.
