BLISS DINOSAUR RANCH
Welcome to the Wyoming and Montana Border
Where Dinosaurs Hide Under the Grass the Cattle Eat!
I created this web site to better educate you about the business and lifestyle of cattle ranching as well as teach you a bit about paleontology. Our ranch receives no funds from this site but we hope that it helps you understand where the beef that you eat comes from when you buy USDA prime grassfed beef. Please buy American!
The Bliss Dinosaur Ranch is located about 50 miles north of Gillette Wyoming. The ranch consists of 3000 deeded acres plus various leased property. That is over 5 square miles of property that spans the Wyoming/Montana border. Two families live and work on the ranch, the Bliss Family (owns the land and runs the dinosaur Bed and Breakfast) and the Williams Family (who owns the cattle). We work very hard together making the ranch a productive cattle operation and dinosaur dude ranch. We continue a long tradition on this land. The photo above shows a stretch of the old Texas Trail that passes through our ranch. Cattle have been trailing on this land for well over 100 years. Before cattle, dinosaurs were roaming the place long before us 65 million years ago (Check out our "Dinosaurs on the Ranch" page). We are just the current stewards of the land.
Please enjoy the following pages that have many images from our ranch. Feel free to contact me at the email address: frank@blissnet.com If you want to see the current weather conditions live from our Davis Pro weather station, go to http://www.findu.com/cgi-bin/wxpage.cgi?call=cw3987 |
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These two solar panel arrays are the only grid connected system in Northeastern Wyoming. We use them to totally power our new guest quarters (under construction until the summer of 2007). The months of September and August of 2006, the 2600 square foot building they feed cost me -20 cents of power and I airconditioned the structure during that time. We try different technologies up here and will eventually have wind energy generation as well. |
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A Little About the Area.
We are located in a broad valley between the Black Hills to the east and the Big Horn Mountains to the west. We do not get alot of tourism as we are 64 miles from the nearest stop light. The gravel is well maintained however and usually there are no travel limitations. Everyone has 4 wheel drive and at least one pickup truck. Traffic is light through the ranch with maybe a dozen car/trucks per day passing through. There is a very nice community of ranch families that live out here. We are all very self-sufficient and independant. You have to be to live so far from town. To get an idea of where we are, look north of Gillette Wyoming right on the Montana border and you are close.
We live in the Powder River Basin which is known for it's vast coal/oil/gas reserves. Our ranch happens to be directly located on top of the Dinosaur Fossil rich Hell Creek Formation (Montana side) and the equivalent Lance Formation (Wyoming side). Besides the amazing natural resources, we have natural beauty too. Devils Tower National Monument is close by to the east and Custer National Monument is just northwest. We can see the Big Horn Mountains off in the distance to the west on a clear day.
There are environmental advantages to living out here. The amount of background noise is minimal. Usually there is no noise and it is so quiet that you can hear your heart beat. It is also quite dark at night. The night sky has more stars visable than most places because we are so far away from urban light polution. The air is quite clean and pure. The weather is always interesting. But if you don't like it, stick around, it will change. You are safer out here with almost no crime. We have no drive by shootings but we do have a few drive by shoutings. :-)
Visit Devils Tower Web Site Visit Custer National Monument Find out about Coal Bed Methane