The Smokehouse Creek fire tore through more than 1 million acres of Texas panhandle grasslands. It killed two people. The animal casualties are much worse. Officially, the state says 7,350 animals were killed, mostly livestock, but officials in the counties hit hardest by the fire believe the death toll could be much higher.

Canadian

The Smokehouse Creek fire devastated a vast area of the Texas panhandle, consuming over one million acres of grassland. This catastrophic blaze not only claimed the lives of two individuals but also decimated the local livestock population. Official figures from the state report that approximately 7,350 animals perished in the inferno. The majority of these were livestock critical to the region's agricultural economy.

Local authorities in the areas most severely affected by the Smokehouse Creek fire, however, suggest that the actual number of animal casualties could significantly surpass the official estimate. The discrepancy points to a potentially greater impact on the ranching community, which is already grappling with the immediate loss of animals and the subsequent challenges of sourcing feed for the survivors. This situation underscores the extensive damage inflicted on the agricultural landscape and the steep recovery path that lies ahead for local ranchers.



Texas ranchers struggle with burned cattle, lack of feed

Donald Hill has unexpected visitors but they're perfectly welcome on his 4,000 acre Canadian Texas ranch. They've come actually from across the river when the fire they come across then the fire jumped in and they got caught in the river. About two dozen red angus cattle from a neighboring property joined his herd, mother cows and calves fleeing the flames of one of the most destructive fires ever to hit the Texas panhandle. They're here and I mean they're they're getting treated just like they were my own. Local officials say the flames from this month's panhandle wildfires not only claim thousands of cattle but severely injured cattle across the hardest hit counties. We've got some baby calves that their ear tags are just wadded up and then they're just they're singed and stuff and the mother cows there's a lot of them they're udders and things just burnt and just black crusty and so they kicked the calves off and we've lost a lot of calves that way. So that calf and mother pair are the lucky ones because her udder isn't burned. The other cows here have burned udders meaning they can't suckle their calves their calves can't eat. Hemphill County where Hill keeps his cattle may have been up to 90 percent burned. In all the Texas A&M Forest Service says more than one million acres of grassland vital to Texas cattle raising has been torched. Normally the food that these guys get is on your acreage here and you told just told me how much of it has it burned? It's well over half. So that affects how they can eat? It affects big time how they can eat. So in the meantime Penn Handle ranchers need hay and lots of it. We've handled almost 20,000 bales of hay here in three weeks. Andy Holloway is the county's Texas AgriLife Extension agent. If y'all could use it come get it. His normal job connects ranchers and farmers with helpful resources. Lately he's commanding local aid and recovery. Donations of animal supplies and money have poured in from around the country. All this feed and hay it's just really like a grain of sand on a beach. It's just a little bit. It's going to take years of time to get over this and millions and millions of dollars in reinvestment of things to get us back to where we were. It could take grasslands a year or more to heal. The same could be said for legions of burned livestock. This one over here that got burned is in pretty good spirits. It's a little crippled but not bad. Veterinarian Doug Crouch is caring for some like these calves now suckling on a surrogate mother cow as well as a quarter horse which suffered bad burns. He has one hoof affected that's all. The danger for hooved animals if their legs burn badly their hooves fall off and don't grow. Crouch spoke of many hard decisions ranchers have had to make. Most things were euthanized on site or burned to death and just succumbed to the fire. There was nothing to do. In this part of Texas cattle are more populous than people. Roughly 10.2 million in the panhandle alone in 2023. Beef isn't just what's for dinner it's a culture. For some families it stopped their way of life. They've lost it all and they won't be back. For those that stay they pray the grass grows green and soon. John Moen, Scripps News, Canadian, Texas.

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