CALF_News_June_July_2019

15 CALF News • June | July 2019 • www.calfnews.net How the fire began Early March is the middle of calving season at Giles Ranch. Molly Beckford says the day started out like any other – checking heifers. She describes the weather as warm and nice, but an omi- nous wind picked up around noon. It was a Monday, the day when the Giles crew always eats lunch together and lines out a plan for the week. She depicted the meeting at the ranch office, where extended family was alarmed to hear of a fire that had broken out in Oklahoma. It was getting out of hand. Plans were immediately made to haul water south and help out in any way they could. Beckford’s mother and several of Molly’s nieces went into sandwich-mak- ing mode, packing badly needed lunches for exhausted firefighters. With a water truck loaded, C.J. was ready to head south. At that time they discovered that an independent fire had popped up west of the Giles Ranch. Survival mode The first decision at that critical point was to stay put. C.J. remained home and the family devised a plan to move their cattle to safer areas. They combined yearlings together on one wheat pasture and moved cow-calf pairs onto those same fields. Beckford describes the ensu- ing hours as chaotic – the ranch is large and the pairs were scattered. All the family members were on board, gather- ing cattle from several pastures, cutting fences, attempting to catch horses. “To be honest, for most of this time I was thinking there is no way a fire could take out the entire ranch,” she recalls.“We are mixing all of these cattle up and going to have such a mess tomorrow!” Beckford says moving the pairs was the slowest and most difficult endeavor. “If you know anything about baby calves, you know they don’t want to move very far or very fast,” she says. At this point, she began to pray. Shifting winds The family kept at it until the wind shifted.“I still remember the exact spot I was at, the cows I was trying to move …my heifer pairs I had spent so many hours taking care of all winter, when my dad called and said we gotta get out of here. Go to the highway right now,” Beckford recalls. “In a matter of seconds, the sky turned from blue to black as ash sur- rounded us. On my way to the highway, my husband called and told me he wasn’t going to make it off the ranch and that he loved me. Looking back at that call now, I know what it was for, but at the time I was still so naïve to what was happening all around me. I made it to the highway with my dad and one sister behind me.” Beckford’s mother had all the four young grandchildren in her vehicle, pick- ing up a son-in-law along the way. He had hit a cow and wrecked his pickup attempting to get off the ranch. They made it out. That left Molly Beckford’s husband, C.J., one sister and an intern in the inferno. C.J. and the intern rode out the fire in a metal hay shed. SD-671944-1 Spring Quantity Discounts Available! Call Now! Continued on page 16 