Sandhills Fires

This Hope Story is about the fires that stole through the Sandhills, and its sandy dunes, forests, and cliffs that have forever stolen my heart …

Who am I to write about the fires that stole through the Sandhills? These aren’t my hills, but they did bring me to tears with their beauty when I was just a child and rested my eyes upon them the first time.

Seeing land, fences, structures, cattle, and more scorched away in the winds of forever, is something we cannot fathom unless we have also stood on the burned shores of our own lives. 

But people are still stirring strong in the Sandhills, cattle too, kicking up and picking up what is left, where cowboy and cowgirl hats are worn by real ones. 

No, these are not run of the mill neighbors, they are Sandhillers. Somewhere in their DNA they know the burn of hard times lived through before. I think this quote by author Mari Sandoz states the early challenges that presented themselves in the Sandhills well, “Forty miles to water, thirty miles to wood, twenty miles to hell, and I've gone there for good.” 

The great expanse of ongoing difficulty that arose from these fires, we cannot quite fathom. We simply do not know what this really means for this unmatched ecosystem worldwide. 

The Sandhills Task Force tells us more about this unique landscape on planet earth:

“The Sandhills is a contiguous 19,600 square-mile sand dune formation covered by grasses and located in northcentral Nebraska. Approximately 1.3 million acres of wetlands, formed by groundwater discharge, are scattered throughout. To some, the Sandhills appear to be a continual expanse of rolling hills with wetlands in the valleys. However, a closer examination shows diverse habitats. Dunes vary from high, steep hills in the western region to small mounds in the east.”

“The groundwater recharge and discharge associated with various dune types and geographic locations influence the type and quality of wetlands. Wetlands range from shallow, extremely alkaline basins to deeper, freshwater lakes to spring-fed streams. Plant communities range from isolated deciduous and coniferous forests to extensive short and tall-grass prairies. Plants associated with arid conditions inhabit the top of dunes, while lush stands of aquatic plants are found in the valleys a few hundred yards away. It is this broad diversity which provides homes and resting places for countless numbers of resident and migratory wildlife. This same ecosystem supports a strong ranching economy.”

“The landscape and economics of the Sandhills are closely tied to the sands and gravels that have formed the area over the past 38 million years. Ancient meandering streams deposited hundreds of feet of sand, gravel, and clay to create the Ogallala formation. Wind-blown dunes eventually covered the water-saturated deposits. The dunes became stabilized by vegetation. Within the last 100 years, the control of wildfires and managed grazing has reduced the amount of exposed sand.”

 “The dunes remain fragile and depend on the grasses to keep the sands in place. Many of the grasses, in turn, are dependent on the groundwater accumulated under the sands.  In the early 1900s, landowners ditched across the wetter meadows and open-water marshes to increase grass production. The rapid movement of groundwater creates an underground continuum between the lakes, wetlands, and streams. Therefore, an alteration in one area can easily impact vegetation and wetlands across a larger landscape.”

“Another alteration in the Sandhills is the conversion of grassland to cropland. Two attempts, one at the turn of the century (the Kincaid Act) and another in the 1970s, led to financial and environmental problems. In the late 1970s, cultivation in the eastern portion was encouraged by tax laws, center-pivot technology, low land values, and high grain prices. Nebraska Natural Resource Commission (1992) reports that from 1972 to 1981, irrigated land tripled (70,550 to 215,000 acres). Crop production dropped as organic material was leached or eroded. The loss of investment tax credits and low-profit margins led many of the fields to become idle. By 1990, irrigation had ceased on 50,000 acres; much of the land was placed in the Conservation Reserve Program. Conversion back to grassland, however, has been difficult and slow. Lands broken eighty years ago have not regained the natural plant diversity or production.”

“The land’s brief time as irrigated cropland had a significant impact on the local area. Water tables were lowered in some areas while other areas experienced flooding. Groundwater contamination by agricultural chemicals began to show up in domestic wells (Natural Resource Commission, 1992). Wind erosion (10 times the rate of grassland) damaged young corn and covered neighboring pastures.”

An uncertain summer ahead for the Sandhills that suffered ceaseless flames, seems to parallel the uncertainty of a nation asking itself what we need to do next too. 

If you made it for generations in Sandhill country, you really made it. Visit there and you will begin to understand, the fragile yet fervent land. The people as resilient as bending, not breaking, acres of grass. Grass that will one day return. But man, beast, and the idling sea of green beneath the scorched surface needs rains to make it burst forth to life again. 

A few showers here and there doesn’t take Nebraska out of the drought and while the fires have come to a sort of rest, the hills are not sleeping. 

I can feel the grass seed deep in that sand crying for restoring rains … 

Nearly the entire state is in a drought, with parts of west, central and northeast Nebraska categorized in extreme drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor’s March 26 update.

The Nebraska Sandhills may have been forgotten by some, or simply passed through by others, but what has happened there is now burned into the soul of our state. 

Perhaps this rolling country that brought me to tears with its beauty as a child, has something to tell us more than ever now. I am crying for you again Sandhills. You’re still so beautiful, but you have suffered something unfathomable. Something I believe we are all suffering together, whether we realize it yet or not. 

The fire that cannot be quenched is the one that burns within us all to survive. We have something profound to learn from the Sandhills fires. Sometimes nature gives us warnings to notice her or she will give us a burning, stern reminder we won’t forget. 

Willa Cather wrote in her novel “My Antonia” this about the Sandhills, “It must have been the scarcity of detail in that tawny landscape that made detail so precious.”

Whatever state you’re in, you’re precious Sandhills. Those that know the land isn’t really their land, know it best in the Sandhills. I think that’s why I am so confident they will survive this story too, right along with the injured hills they love. Time, nature, and care will tell. May tears become the rains so needed to bring these fragile dunes to life again.

There’s so much uncertainty in the world, but there are other timeless truths that carry us through. The soul of Nebraska is somewhere in the Sandhills. I know it with all my heart.