From Home Power #54, Post Courtesy of and with permission from Home Power Magazine, http://www.homepower.com

Solar Powered Cattle Saloon

L.A. Wallin )1996 L.A. Wallin

Cattle were first trailed to Montana from Texas in the late 1800s to help feed hungry miners working in the precious minerals boom then in full swing. On the vast open range the critters multiplied into huge herds. With the arrival of railroads from the eastern states and advent of transport refrigeration, both livestock and swinging meat grown in the Big Sky found their way to distant markets.

In the 1950s, REA lines made big inroads into the area bringing electric power to isolated ranches and farms. There are still many ranches with pastures which are as large as counties in many other parts of the nation. Often the cost of installing service at remote livestock water wells makes it uneconomical to consider. Sharp fluctuations in prices received from the sale of animals has continued to stab into the pocket books of ranchers.

Runoff from snow melt and rainfall gets channeled into dugouts on some spreads. There are some artesian wells which flow on their own, thus avoiding use of power for pumping. Very high winds can often turn water pumping windmills into heaps of scrap metal if not carefully maintained. On many ranches cattle are rotated from winter pasture to summer pasture. Alkaline water damages submersible pumps which stand unused for long periods of time. Jack pumps hooked to sucker rod-driven cylinders are viable options. Petrol-fueled engines are often unreliable and are a bigger pain than saddle sores.

Rancher Don Golder, whose place is northeast of Billings, put together a portable outfit to use year around for pumping fresh drinking water for his grass fed cattle. He erected a stationary module mounting rack onto the frame of an abandoned house trailer. Dons quiet generator uses Solarex modules wired in two series/parallel arrays. After passing through a controller the current powers a DC motor which turns a Solarjack pump jack. The unit is used at two separate locations during all kinds of weather. Heavy turnbuckles latch the trailer firmly in place. Each water well is fenced to keep cattle at a safe distance.

The controller on the DC system allows it to operate at reduced but viable water production even on cloudy days. The system is sized so that the cylinder should never have to run dry. Working with his local well driller, Don decided to leave a submersible pump previously powered by a gasoline generator in place below the new pump cylinder. Harnesses were build to keep sucker rods from tangling with pump wires. Since the trailer-mounted modules were put on line, only a few rare occasions have necessitated bringing back the gas belching monster.

Solar hardware was purchased through Tom Bishop at Sunelco in Hamilton, Montana. Don figures that the unit has more than paid for itself. At current prices it could be replicated for about $11,000, compared to over twice that for bringing in public power lines to each of the wells. Mighty fine looking on a balance sheet.

Water is brought up from about 400 feet through a pit less adaptor and stored in underground cisterns. Gravity carries the water to the cattle bar via a float valve. At his winter pastures on the windswept high plains, when temperatures are expected to drop below nothing, Don adjusts the float valve so that a small stream trickles all night, exiting through an overflow tube to the coulee below. No expensive stock tank heaters are used.

Its many miles of hard riding in unbelievable chill factors from the main ranch house to either well. The winter range normally has plenty of grazing and shelter for cattle. With ground heat stored in the massive concrete cisterns and trough, seldom does Don have to chop ice for livestock. Critters need water even in cold weather. They do much better when their drinking water is reasonably warm.

The quiet power station has held up very well under adverse conditions, including twice yearly commutes over rough stock trails.

Access/ Author: L.A. Wallin and her husband live in an earth bermed, rock and turf roofed, solar electric-powered log home. They lived in a tent for three years while building their present structure. Not fancy, but its theirs. Country hard-scrabble raised, during the past fifteen years they have developed many alternate methods of surviving tough times. Box 356 Roundup, MT 59072  406-575-4395

-- Don Kulha (dkulha@vom.com), August 04, 1999