AMARILLO, Texas (KFDA) – Recovery efforts are underway with volunteers from all over hauling hay to the region for ranchers and farmers impacted.<\/p>\n
Texas rancher Lee Wells says the first 60 bales of hay donations have reached the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandle and have been dropped off to ranchers who have lost land, cattle, and barns in the most recent fires.<\/p>\n
Volunteers are offering their time, money, and resources to continue these efforts while the need is there.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s refreshing to see the help from people that they don\u2019t even know. They\u2019ll never meet and they\u2019ll never see them,\u201d says Wells. \u201cBut they understand the need and good people understand when it\u2019s their time to step up and it\u2019s their turn to step up, and if they can see a place where they can help. Maybe they got a few extra bucks. They\u2019re grateful they\u2019re not scraping through ashes themselves. So, it hits them and they give or they participate. It\u2019s always refreshing to see the help from other people come in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wells provided recovery efforts two years ago and says due to the similarity of this year\u2019s fires, they will start with hay drop-offs.<\/p>\n
This is because it is the direst need with some ranchers needing an immediate way to feed their livestock after losing large portions of their grazing land.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe similarities are that we have cattle that have to be fed because they are standing on charred ground with nothing to eat in their entire pastures,\u201d says Wells. \u201cThe ranchers are completely burned off, so our goal now, just as it was two years ago, is to get hay to them as quick as possible. So that we are able to contain those cattle up around the barn in certain areas, so they don\u2019t wander and of course feed them as well.\u201d<\/p>\n