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Monday, November 10, 2003, By Cory Golden
ESPARTO -- Then: In 1849, George D. and John D. Stephens came west from Missouri, out to make their fortune. Panning for gold along the American River, however, turned into a humbling experience. "They said, 'There had to be a better way to make a living. We don't know how to do this,' " said their great-grandson and great-grandnephew, John Stephens, last week. From Sacramento to Woodland, it all looked like swampland to the pair. But just outside Esparto, the men found what they were looking for: good ground with tall, waving grass and scores of oaks close to Cache Creek and Willow Slough. They raised livestock first -- oxen, horses and cattle bought from arriving wagon trains. Later, they traveled home to Missouri, collected their families and more cattle and brought them all here -- to a place they called Oakdale Ranch. The family switched from raising cattle to raising sheep. In the 1940s, with creek water flowing through a series of canals, the Stephens family raised barley and wheat, then sugar beats. Two decades later, corn, wheat and tomatoes became their principal crops. Now sunflowers and alfalfa have replaced wheat, and walnuts are gathered from a stand of trees planted in the 1970s. Thousands of acres worked by a large family have, over time, been whittled away to 500. Most of those old oaks ended up as firewood, the trees dead not long after irrigation systems were put in or from disease or time. The slough became more of a trench than anything, clogged with cattails, its steep banks thick with tangled cockleburs. The farm, planed flat as a billiards table, dumped sediment there with each rain. This ground produces more efficiently than ever, but the rough beauty of the place those first settlers saw is all but gone. Now: When 65-year-old John Stephens and his wife Meredith remodeled their red farmhouse, with its tall, white pillars and trim and its dozen small bedrooms, they left a window to the past of what is believed to be the second-oldest family farm in California. Inside one room, through a piece of glass, John Stephens can see inside the thick wall. Inside: the dirt and lines of dry grass of the original 18-by-40-foot adobe structure -- a granary first, then a home -- built by his family, side by side with American Indians. Outside, he has decided, he must bring back some of what they found here, along what is now Highway 16 -- and he's undertaken an ambitious conservation effort to make it happen. "My son Brent came to me and said, 'Dad, do you realize there's hardly any wildlife on our farm anymore?' " John Stephens said. "He really pushed me to do something." So the family worked with the Yolo County Resource Conservation District, designing a pond alongside the slough to replace a one-acre boneyard of rusting cultivators and irrigators. When a grant wasn't funded, the Stephens went ahead and hired a local a contractor to do the work anyway. In April, working for a donation to a class trip, students from Esparto High School planted red willows, blue oaks and cottonwoods, sedges and rushes, and shrubs like mule's fat. The ducks and rabbits came back first; raccoon tracks appeared. "We've seen pheasant," John Stephens said. "I didn't think there was hardly a pheasant on the ranch anymore." Now the family is taking another, bolder step to increase habitat and reduce flooding -- a $35,000 to $40,000 project to widen the slough's banks over a quarter-mile stretch, replacing weeds with native perennial trees and grasses. A new pond nearby will trap sediment, which will then be spread back over adjacent fields. Last week, workers from a Woodland contractor, Diamond D General Engineering, hauled off some 20,000 cubic yards of dirt, starting the work. The project is made possible through cost-sharing and grant funds from Audubon California and the RCD. Design expertise came from hydrologist Mark Cocke of the state Natural Resource Conservation Service and RCD engineer Ha Truong, with Audubon heading up the plant planning. Esparto High students will make five trips to the farm with the Winters-based FARMS Inc.'s Student and Landowner Education and Watershed Stewards, or SLEWS, program. They will begin planting deer grass, purple needle grass, coyote bush and other grasses and shrubs in the next few weeks. Sedges and rushes will follow in January or February, an irrigation system they help design early next spring. Once established, the native plants will fend off weedy invaders that have clogged the slough and will dramatically reduce the amount of costly spraying, said Vance Russell of Audubon. They will also anchor the slough's wider banks, which will, in turn, allow the slough to convey more flood water. John Stephens estimates he will lose about two acres of valuable rowcrop land, but he believes the results will be worth it. "It's hard to give up even a couple of acres," he said. "But I guess I saw the slough as a weed patch that needed a lot of work to take care of." Russell said he hoped the project could be one piece in a wildlife corridor stretching to the hills, increasing habitat while remaining compatible with farming. Stephens said that like his ancestors from Missouri, farmers subscribe to the motto of the show-me state. If they learn about the programs available, about the funding help possible with collaborative efforts, and see the benefits of conservation, then they might follow suit. "I hope it will be a model and that other neighbors will join in," he said. When it comes time to plant trees, Stephens will put in a special request for one variety. In his lifetime he's seen the number of oaks dwindle from maybe 150 to maybe 15 on the farm he plans to pass on to his children, Brent, 34, and Marcy, 31. "It's called Oakdale Ranch and there are hardly any oaks left," he said. "So maybe an oak grove, that'd be my dream." For information on local conservation efforts, see Audubon, yolorcd.org or farmsleaders.org. Cory Golden can be reached at |
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