What do you do when area livestock is threatened by wildfires? Well, in the olden days, you might round up a posse and get the critters to safety.
And that’s exactly what happened last Thursday, Aug. 8, as the Lee Falls Fire in southwest Washington County prompted evacuations of residents from the fast-moving fire. While no lives or structures were lost — as of the last report from the Oregon Department of Forestry on Sunday, Aug. 11 — many forget that there are a lot of farm animals in the area that could have been in harm’s way.
Enter the 17-member Washington County Sheriff’s Posse.
Having recently wrapped up participating in the Washington County Fair at Westside Commons, Gil MacGregor, a retired Washington County Sheriff’s Office commander who is the posse’s captain, thought his organization might get a little rest.
Such didn’t prove to be the case as the organization that’s been around since 1945 was called in to aid in making sure animals who needed help were evacuated. The posse started by staging several animal trailers near the fire. That proved a wise decision since the sheriff’s posse ended up transporting 55 animals to two barns at Westside Commons, the fair’s home, off of Northeast 34th Avenue in Hillsboro.
A tour by MacGregor on Friday, Aug. 9, revealed one corral containing 10 mini Hereford cows, who despite their shorter stature, are irritable critters, he explained.
Although the fairgrounds were set up to have animals’ owners transport them to the fairgrounds, MacGregor estimated “pretty much 90% of these animals, we went and got.”
MacGregor, who retired from the Washington County’s Sheriff’s Office about three years ago after working there for 33 years, said after the fire began spreading Thursday, the posse staged several trailers at different points near the fire.
“And then so, for the first little bit yesterday afternoon and into the evening, we were shuttling back, unload, go back, get more, that type of thing,” said MacGregor on Friday, adding that rounding up those 10 cattle was no small feat. “That took a while.”
While several horses were transported as well, the largest number of animals present were goats.
“There’s 37 goats in here, and we brought in 30,” MacGregor said. “The owners have been really good about coming in, caring for their animals, checking on (them).”
In the end, the only animal that didn’t have a companion was a lone llama who seem to stoically take in its situation and new surroundings.
Despite having enough space for other animals, MacGregor said the goal is to not place similar animals from different owners together in the same corral not only to prevent any diseases that might be passed on but also to make sure the animals’ owners leave with the same number of animals they came with.
He said plans were to keep the animals as long as there’s an evacuation order in place and after that’s lifted it will be up to the fair director to determine how long the animals can remain. They also want the owners to bring the animals back by their own means.
McGregor said to his knowledge, no animals perished during the fire.
At the same time, he said he’s please with all the help the folks in the posse have provided, noting that each and every one of them is a volunteer.
Philip Bransford, Washington County communications officer, said both the Washington County Sheriff’s Posse and Westside Commons staff quickly came up with a plan when they discovered animals might need to be evacuated from the Lee Falls Fire.
“It took them like 30 minutes to have this activated,” said Bransford.
It was something that had been done once before, most recently in 2020 when wildfires devastated portions of both Washington and Clackamas counties, with Westside Commons agreeing to take animals from both counties.
Bransford said last week’s effort was all the more impressive because the Washington County Fair only wrapped up on July 28, and officials had to come up quickly with a plan that included the possibility of evacuating livestock.
“Low and behold, we needed it,” he said.
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