{"id":133069,"date":"2026-06-13T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-13T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/as-drought-deepens-a-colorado-ranching-family-prays-for-rain\/"},"modified":"2026-06-13T10:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-06-13T16:00:00","slug":"as-drought-deepens-a-colorado-ranching-family-prays-for-rain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/as-drought-deepens-a-colorado-ranching-family-prays-for-rain\/","title":{"rendered":"As drought deepens, a Colorado ranching family prays for rain"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Dwight
Dwight Mondragon pulls up some dry grass on his ranch south of San Luis on May 22. (Dan Boyce\/CPR News)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

There was barely a trace of snow left on the towering gray peaks across the road from Dwight Mondragon\u2019s weathered ranch house. It\u2019s a home Mondragon inherited from his father; a house that was built the year he was born on this now century-old family ranch near Colorado\u2019s border with New Mexico.<\/p>\n

Most years, on a typical late-May day like this, Mondragon said beautiful green grass a foot and a half high typically covers his 120 acres.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow it\u2019s barely a couple inches,\u201d he said. \u201cYellow. Doesn\u2019t look good.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last week, Gov. Jared Polis declared a statewide drought emergency. After record-low snowpack and persistent above average temperatures, every county in Colorado is dryer than average. Mondragon\u2019s ranch in southern Costilla County is facing some of the worst conditions, but there is plenty of very bad drought to go around.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are tracking stress around the state,\u201d said Colorado\u2019s Agriculture Commissioner Kate Greenberg during a meeting of Colorado\u2019s Drought Task Force in early June. \u201cStress on crops, stress on livestock, stress on people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mondragon\u2019s small herd of 20 cows and their calves picked through the bone dry grass, looking for whatever green they could find.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t see much pasture left in this field,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m going to have to move them here pretty soon.\u201d<\/p>\n

The emergency declaration coincides with moving to phase 3 of the state\u2019s drought response plan. It allows the governor to access and appropriate money available in Colorado\u2019s disaster emergency fund and sets up stronger state coordination on dispersing those resources. In addition, it opens the possibility of asking the White House to issue a federal emergency declaration.<\/p>\n

As it currently stands, farmers and ranchers can apply for a suite of relief options ranging from emergency loans, to grants for crop loss, to reimbursements for the travel costs of hauling extra feed or water for livestock.<\/p>\n

The Colorado Department of Agriculture said it cannot yet quantify how many people have applied for these various resources, but that many ag producers have been inquiring about their aid options.<\/p>\n

About 160 round hay bails were stacked near Mondragon\u2019s corral. It\u2019s all he has to get him through this upcoming winter, he said, and he\u2019s not at all sure it will be enough.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I have to start buying hay to feed my animals, then it\u2019s not worth it,\u201d Mondragon said. \u201cSo, then I\u2019ll have to get rid of some of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Summer 2002 was the last time he went through a dry spell like this. Conditions were bad enough that year the ranch was forced to downsize the herd by half. More than two decades later, Mondragon\u2019s herd is still half the size it was before the 2002 drought. If this year\u2019s drought forces him to downsize again, he worries the business will no longer be viable.<\/p>\n

Many of his neighbors are in a similar position, he noted.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a heartbreaking situation,\u201d Mondragon said. \u201cI don\u2019t want to let this farm go to waste. Once the cows are off of here, there\u2019s nothing left.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Mondragon said he\u2019s reluctant to apply for government assistance, he\u2019s ready to consider it. At 57, he hopes to pass the ranch down to his two adult sons at some point. One son and Mondragon\u2019s granddaughter are already living back on the property.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re going to have a hard time here,\u201d Mondragon said. \u201cI\u2019ve been trying to get it set up for them. We\u2019ve got new tractors, a new baler. But, everything depends on moisture right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Seasonal forecasts from the National Weather Service possibly indicate a strong monsoon season for Colorado. That could mean a rainier-than-average late summer.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ll get water eventually,\u201d he said. \u201cSomething my Dad always told me, \u2018Have lots of faith and patience.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

To read more stories from Colorado Public Radio, visit www.cpr.org<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Gov. Jared Polis declared a statewide emergency last week<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":133070,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[281,1820,402,28,1263,6419,294],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-133069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-agriculture","tag-dh-trueanthem","tag-drought","tag-headlines","tag-ranching","tag-tj-trueanthem","tag-water-supply"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133069"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133069\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133070"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133069"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=133069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}