A fire on Point Reyes Friday morning razed a century-old barn on E Ranch at the mouth of Drake's Estero, destroying feed for the Nunes dairy herd near the Point Reyes Lighthouse.
Green alfalfa, which generates heat as it decomposes, may have been smoldering in the barn before it erupted in flames at 8 a.m. Friday morning, said Marin County Fire Captain Ed Mestre. Stiff winds then fanned the blaze.
Damages are estimated at more than $425,000.
About 50 calves were feeding in the redwood barn when it caught fire. Tim Nunes said a ranch worker had backed a truck in between stacked bales to pull a bale out for the calves.
"He was getting the hooks out to handle the alfalfa. He walked around to the rear of the pickup and saw that [the alfalfa] was on fire," the rancher said. "He jumped into the pickup and got out of there."
Another ranchworker rushed back into the barn and got the calves out, while outside the rest of the cattle were herded away.
"In a matter of minutes, in the time it took me to call 911 and get back out there, the barn was an inferno," said George Nunes, Tim's father. "If it weren't for the fire department, they [the outside stalls] would have went up too. They did a hell of a good job."
Some 20 firefighters and nine engines and water tenders from Marin County and the Park Service fought the blaze, Mestre said. The first engine showed up at the remote site in 21 minutes.
The Nunes family has been ranching on the point for five generations. The federal government bought E Ranch from the family in 1971 and added it to the Point Reyes National Seashore.
"We just put a new roof on part of [the barn] a few years ago, with all stainless steel nails from back East," said George Nunes. "You go up there now and the nails are all that's left."
"Our insurance carried [the barn] at a depreciated value," said son Tim. "We're going to have to come up with the money to build it back to what it was."
But the cost of redwood may make it difficult to recreate the barn exactly, said Don Neubacher, superintendent of the National Seashore. The barn was built in 1880s with redwood timbers and two tower-like cupolas, he explained.
"We're going to work with them in any way possible to help them rebuild," Neubacher said. The Park Service, he added, will meet with insurance agents and also offer the services of an engineer to help design a new barn that will "fit in with the historic scene."
At H Ranch, the Nuneses keep fewer than 100 beef cattle and calves, plus heifers not producing milk for the family's 300-head dairy herd five miles west at A Ranch.
The family has lost other barns over the years. While floods swept over much of West Marin in 1982, hurricane-force winds ripped apart two barns at A Ranch.
The fire at E Ranch came six weeks after a devastating fire at H Ranch near Abbotts Lagoon. Damages from the Oct. 12 fire - which destroyed two barns, feed, and equipment at the Grossi/Evans beef ranch - were estimated at $1.2 million.