Your area +s & -s

[HDRider]

Jed gave me the idea for a thread with his off farm job thread, and we all seem to like threads that let us tell us story, or at least I do. I like to travel and see different areas and love it when some local saddles up next to me at my nightly watering session and tells me about the area.

Tell us about your area, the county where you live and whatever.

I live in Clay County Arkansas. We have two county seats because a million years ago the waters of Black and Cache river would rise once a year making travel difficult. This proves that once government creates something it last forever, way past its intended purpose.

Anyway - It is a poor county. Mostly agri, rice, cotton, soy beans, wheat, some milo. I live on Crowley's Ridge, a little hill range that runs diagonally from SW to NE Arkansas on up into Missouri. Missouri borders my county. Flat land borders both sides of the ridge. That is the good farm land. The ridge is prone to erosion. There is a lot of idle land on the ridge.

Duck hunting is a big deal here, hunting flooded timber and fields. Hunting state and federal land is very contentious now, with the out of state hunters not really considering local customs. We have dove hunting, turkey and deer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clay_County,_Arkansas

http://www.cctimesdemocrat.com/

The people are good neighbors, but we do have a bad meth problem. We have very little in the way of employment, and the population has declined for decades.

It is a dry county, which really aggravates me. The downtowns are dead, empty husks of what they once were when farms were small and it took more people to farm.

Not a pretty picture I guess, but its home, and I missed it a lot for the 30 plus years I was gone. These are my people.

 

[greybeard]

The + here is it has a lot of National Forest which keeps more of the city people from moving in.
The - is that it has a lot of dang trees and way too much water 99% of the years.

I miss West Texas, where I could see into the next county.

 

[Bigfoot]

Jed gave me the idea for a thread with his off farm job thread, and we all seem to like threads that let us tell us story, or at least I do. I like to travel and see different areas and love it when some local saddles up next to me at my nightly watering session and tells me about the area.

Tell us about your area, the county where you live and whatever.

I live in Clay County Arkansas. We have two county seats because a million years ago the waters of Black and Cache river would rise once a year making travel difficult. This proves that once government creates something it last forever, way past its intended purpose.

Anyway - It is a poor county. Mostly agri, rice, cotton, soy beans, wheat, some milo. I live on Crowley's Ridge, a little hill range that runs diagonally from SW to NE Arkansas on up into Missouri. Missouri borders my county. Flat land borders both sides of the ridge. That is the good farm land. The ridge is prone to erosion. There is a lot of idle land on the ridge.

Duck hunting is a big deal here, hunting flooded timber and fields. Hunting state and federal land is very contentious now, with the out of state hunters not really considering local customs. We have dove hunting, turkey and deer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clay_County,_Arkansas

http://www.cctimesdemocrat.com/

The people are good neighbors, but we do have a bad meth problem. We have very little in the way of employment, and the population has declined for decades.

It is a dry county, which really aggravates me. The downtowns are dead, empty husks of what they once were when farms were small and it took more people to farm.

Not a pretty picture I guess, but its home, and I missed it a lot for the 30 plus years I was gone. These are my people.

You may not know the answer to this rather obscure question, but isn't that the home of Kirsten Tuff Scott?

 

[Caustic Burno]

Let see rolling red clay hills 60 inches rainfall a year we have lots of little and big sketters. Ninety six percent of the county is forest.
Big thicket some consider it a blessing others a curse with high humidity,temp and every kind of bug imaginable.

http://texasalmanac.com/topics/government/tyler-county

https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/gkb03

 

[jedstivers]

HD you live on the ridge and I live on it at the only gap it has in it. It playes out north of Marianna and starts back at Marianna and goes to Helena. I live at the very edge of the gap. The backwater from the st Francis and the l'angullie can get to within a few hundred yards of my house but I'm above them. I'm at 230' and the water will get to 205' in years like 2011.

 

[Nesikep]

Well.. this is an interesting one..

Plusses to my area? Dry, but has creeks with water, 1 day drying time for hay for each ton/acre (4T/ac = 4 days), 2 cuts and good grazing, or 3 cuts if you get the timing right and Alfalfa LOVES it here with warm night, producing exceptional protein content, decently long growing season, beautiful country to look at, neighbors aren't too close. You can be close enough to people and still have privacy.. and if you want to, you can really go get lost out in the sticks. Compared to many places, we still have pretty mild winters.. we hardly ever have over 4" of snow.. We hardly have any bad bugs.. a few skeeters in the spring but they get burnt to a crisp, Snakes are all non-venomous... I've seen a couple lizards and a couple salamanders as well.. Elevation here is 1100ft, total precipitation is 8-12"/yr

drawbacks? Economy is dead, town lives off handouts.. hardly possible to make a living doing anything as there's not a sufficient population base, and there's probably already 2 other people who'll start up as soon as you do. There's hardly a ranch big enough to really be viable through times of bad prices, the size of the benchland is non-negotiable! It can also make irrigation a hand-move-only kind of deal with odd shapes. Agriculture is only a small part of the economy, so there's no supporting infrastructure.. slaughter houses, sale barns, cold storage, markets, etc. Nearest sale barn is 3 hours away, nearest vet is 2 hours.... They roll up the sidewalks at 7pm. Cliquey politics in town with lots of rumor mills

http://lillooetbc.ca

 

[HDRider]

You may not know the answer to this rather obscure question, but isn't that the home of Kirsten Tuff Scott?

I had never heard of her, but according to this, yes it is..

http://www.cctimesdemocrat.com/story/2276523.html

 

[M-5]

We are situated in the panhandle , we border 2 states Alabama and Georgia. We have the Chattahoochee and Apalachicola rivers so our area had the some ancient civilizations dating back thousands of yrs . The Indians had many villages and after they were all gathered and shipped out west , turpentine, cotton and tobacco became the export goods on the steam boats. Several small civil war battles were fought here but a major one was fought 153 yrs ago this year in Marianna Fl. Our diverse ecosystem and proximity to the gulf make this county one of the best places to live with no major city in our county and being predominantly rural. T Thomas Fortune was born here.

 

[HDRider]

We are situated in the panhandle , we border 2 states Alabama and Georgia. We have the Chattahoochee and Apalachicola rivers so our area had the some ancient civilizations dating back thousands of yrs . The Indians had many villages and after they were all gathered and shipped out west , turpentine, cotton and tobacco became the export goods on the steam boats. Several small civil war battles were fought here but a major one was fought 153 yrs ago this year in Marianna Fl. Our diverse ecosystem and proximity to the gulf make this county one of the best places to live with no major city in our county and being predominantly rural. T Thomas Fortune was born here.

I grew up in a small community called Mounds because of all the Indian mounds. We had a big collections of arrow and spear heads, grinding stones & stone axes. The best time to find artifacts was after a rain in fresh turned dirt.

One of the little stores in Mounds had mounted hundreds of the artifacts on display. One was a stone tomahawk my uncle redid. People would ask if it was found in that condition. :roll: :roll:

Growing up around all that Indian stuff created a connection to the Indians in me.

 

[HDRider]

HD you live on the ridge and I live on it at the only gap it has in it. It playes out north of Marianna and starts back at Marianna and goes to Helena. I live at the very edge of the gap. The backwater from the st Francis and the l'angullie can get to within a few hundred yards of my house but I'm above them. I'm at 230' and the water will get to 205' in years like 2011.

Jed you made me go take a look at the ridge. I misstated its origination as SW Arkansas.

A NRCS guy told me the ridge's soil type exists in two places, here and somewhere in China. He said the top soil here blew in ages ago.

 

[M-5]

We are situated in the panhandle , we border 2 states Alabama and Georgia. We have the Chattahoochee and Apalachicola rivers so our area had the some ancient civilizations dating back thousands of yrs . The Indians had many villages and after they were all gathered and shipped out west , turpentine, cotton and tobacco became the export goods on the steam boats. Several small civil war battles were fought here but a major one was fought 153 yrs ago this year in Marianna Fl. Our diverse ecosystem and proximity to the gulf make this county one of the best places to live with no major city in our county and being predominantly rural. T Thomas Fortune was born here.

I grew up in a small community called Mounds because of all the Indian mounds. We had a big collections of arrow and spear heads, grinding stones & stone axes. The best time to find artifacts was after a rain in fresh turned dirt.

One of the little stores in Mounds had mounted hundreds of the artifacts on display. One was a stone tomahawk my uncle redid. People would ask if it was found in that condition. :roll: :roll:

Growing up around all that Indian stuff created a connection to the Indians in me.

My 5 great grand father is on the roles in and brought Christianity to the reservation. His is mentioned in a Methodist doctrine .

 

[TexasBred]

Let see rolling red clay hills 60 inches rainfall a year we have lots of little and big sketters. Ninety six percent of the county is forest.
Big thicket some consider it a blessing others a curse with high humidity,temp and every kind of bug imaginable.

http://texasalmanac.com/topics/government/tyler-county

https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/gkb03

CB I tell folks they can still find wild indian tribes in the Big Thicket. Maybe not as wild as they once were but they are still there. Folks catch glimpses of them occasionally at the liquor store. :lol: :lol:

 

[TexasBred]

I live almost in the Center of Texas just West of I-35 and a bit north of Waco, Texas and about 80 miles SW of the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex. Mainly pasture land with rolling hills, a lot of cedar, post oak, pecan, hack berry and live oak trees. The Brazos River is about 25 miles from me as well as a number of large man made recreational and flood control lakes. Much of the area was once under a great sea so marine fossils can be found almost anywhere and limestone must be 50 ft. deep in some areas. Fossilized dinosaur bones and tracks are also a common discovery. Most of the farming in this part of the state is along I-35 in the blackland and consists of corn, milo and cotton with an occasional field of soybeans. Weather is mild year round with maybe a half dozen days a year below freezing 10-12 days a year above 100 but those are rare. Most cattle operations are small with the average herd probably not being over 30-40 head of cattle and most cattle are sold at auction sales. Dairy was a huge business for a long time but a combination of low milk prices, high humidity weather in summer and opportunities to relocate and start up in other places is slowly reducing dairy farm numbers greatly. All in all a great place to live.

 

[Nesikep]

Lillooet used to be the biggest western town north of San Fransico during the gold rush days.. Well known for the "hangman's tree" Judge Begbie was known for using.

Also, there was a REAL character of a lady, Margaret "Ma" Murray who started the local newspaper (among others) and was very vocal.. she was known for saying "That's for damsure"

 

[Dave]

I live just about exactly half way in between Seattle and Portland. Just a few miles west of I-5. I remember my Dad saying that one day it would be one big city from Seattle to Portland, well it isn't far from that now. The state capital is in the north end of my county and my little town in the Southwest corner of the county has turned into a bedroom community for state workers and a fair number of people who commute to Seattle and Tacoma. There is getting to be way too many people. The traffic is terrible. In the last two weeks I have literally less than a minute behind three different traffic accidents on the freeway. We get 60 inches of rain which mostly falls between November and April when It does no good. It generally doesn't rain hard just grey and dreary for weeks on end this time of year.
Plus side I can be on the ocean beach in a little over an hour. Or to a ski slope in the mountains in about two hours. Mt. Rainier and St. Helen are about 80-100 miles away as the crow flies and I see them nearly everyday that the sky is clear. There are huge areas of National Parks and forest service open to hike, camp, hunt (forest service), and generally recreate in. I can walk out my back door and fish for Steelhead or salmon when they are running. We don't have hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, very many bugs or poison snakes. Any flooding is pretty localized. In my entire life I can count on the finger of one hand the days above 100 degrees and the days below zero on the other hand. We don't have high humidity.

 

[SIMMGAL]

The local college wants to add 20,000 more students to it's already overcrowded campus, so that's a big negative as far as I'm concerned!

The positive part is I live about 5 miles out of town, where cows outnumber people! :lol2: :lol2:

Another good thing is that we have 4 seasons here. Having them all in the span of less than a week is the not so good part.

 

[Ky hills]

For me the +'s are that there is still a decent sized agricultural area. We have a few farm supply stores, including one within a couple miles of where I live. The stockyards that I sell at is about 20 miles away in Montgomery County, and there are also several other markets within 25-50 or so miles.
-'s would be that there is a high rate of drug use in the area, and generational dependence on government assistance.

 

[Caustic Burno]

I live almost in the Center of Texas just West of I-35 and a bit north of Waco, Texas and about 80 miles SW of the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex. Mainly pasture land with rolling hills, a lot of cedar, post oak, pecan, hack berry and live oak trees. The Brazos River is about 25 miles from me as well as a number of large man made recreational and flood control lakes. Much of the area was once under a great sea so marine fossils can be found almost anywhere and limestone must be 50 ft. deep in some areas. Fossilized dinosaur bones and tracks are also a common discovery. Most of the farming in this part of the state is along I-35 in the blackland and consists of corn, milo and cotton with an occasional field of soybeans. Weather is mild year round with maybe a half dozen days a year below freezing 10-12 days a year above 100 but those are rare. Most cattle operations are small with the average herd probably not being over 30-40 head of cattle and most cattle are sold at auction sales. Dairy was a huge business for a long time but a combination of low milk prices, high humidity weather in summer and opportunities to relocate and start up in other places is slowly reducing dairy farm numbers greatly. All in all a great place to live.

The second prettiest place in the state is between Buffalo and Waco.

 

[Bigfoot]

You may not know the answer to this rather obscure question, but isn't that the home of Kirsten Tuff Scott?

I had never heard of her, but according to this, yes it is..

http://www.cctimesdemocrat.com/story/2276523.html

A song you may enjoy:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=V5gDJdbtI1g

 

[TexasBred]

I live almost in the Center of Texas just West of I-35 and a bit north of Waco, Texas and about 80 miles SW of the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex. Mainly pasture land with rolling hills, a lot of cedar, post oak, pecan, hack berry and live oak trees. The Brazos River is about 25 miles from me as well as a number of large man made recreational and flood control lakes. Much of the area was once under a great sea so marine fossils can be found almost anywhere and limestone must be 50 ft. deep in some areas. Fossilized dinosaur bones and tracks are also a common discovery. Most of the farming in this part of the state is along I-35 in the blackland and consists of corn, milo and cotton with an occasional field of soybeans. Weather is mild year round with maybe a half dozen days a year below freezing 10-12 days a year above 100 but those are rare. Most cattle operations are small with the average herd probably not being over 30-40 head of cattle and most cattle are sold at auction sales. Dairy was a huge business for a long time but a combination of low milk prices, high humidity weather in summer and opportunities to relocate and start up in other places is slowly reducing dairy farm numbers greatly. All in all a great place to live.

The second prettiest place in the state is between Buffalo and Waco.

Where is that CB??