The Agrarian's Lament: Agrarian of the Week. Emiliano Zapata.

The Agrarian's Lament: Agrarian of the Week. Emiliano Zapata.:   

Agrarian of the Week. Emiliano Zapata.

 

The land belongs to those who work it with their hands.

Emiliano Zapata.

Going Feral: Blog Mirror: Eric Movar from the Tribune: Rock Springs plan proposal brings commonsense conservation to the Red Desert

Going Feral: Blog Mirror: Eric Movar from the Tribune: Rock Sp...: 

Blog Mirror: Eric Movar from the Tribune: Rock Springs plan proposal brings commonsense conservation to the Red Desert

The Rock Springs Field Office proposed Resource Management  Plan includes a wise balance of  land uses for 3.6 million acres of public land, but it’s apparently much too rational for Wyoming’s  elected leaders. We have seen a pathetic outpouring of outright  lies from Wyoming politicians,  hot-headed hyperbolic rants from unhinged exploiters and  shameless industry lapdogs. 

Their slanted view of public land uses — extract every use from every acre regardless of the damage to the land, its wildlife populations, and public recreation — has held sway for far too long already.

Rep. John Winter, R-Thermopolis, says the proposed plan would  lock out hunters, and he’s lying.  Fact check: Not only will the plan  protect Little Mountain and many  other hunting hotspots from decimation by heavy industry, but it will improve habitats and boost big game populations, improving hunting opportunities.

Rep. John Bear, R-Gillette, says the plan would “take away the livelihood of hundreds of ranchers,” and he’s lying. The reality is that 99.8% of the planning area would remain rented to ranchers for livestock forage, and the few areas slated for closure haven’t been grazed for years. Sure, there are new designations for areas where enough forage would have to be left behind for elk and mule deer, but that should have been required all along.

U.S. Rep. Harriet Hageman, R-Wyo., says, “This RMP will exclude, prohibit and bar all access, management, and use of vast swaths, vast swaths, of public land,” and she’s lying. In truth, the entire planning area will remain open to public access, every acre of land will continue to be managed, and every acre of land will remain open to multiple types of uses. (Many public uses and benefits have nothing to do with lining some corporation’s pocket, by the way).

Much more in the article. 

The author, Eric Movar, is a Western Watersheds Project’s Executive Director and frankly, I'm not a big fan of the Western Watershed Project, which I think tends to be anti agriculture.  Here, however, I think they're right on the mark.

Wild and Backyard Food Use During COVID-19 in Upstate New York

 

Wild and Backyard Food Use During COVID-19 in Upstate New York

The Agrarian's Lament: Somehow unsettling.

The Agrarian's Lament: Somehow unsettling.: 

Somehow unsettling.

Okay, I regard myself as an agrarian, and I am a Catholic, but I've worked sheep (many yeas ago), and I've worked cattle a lot.

Catholic Land Movement

@CatholicLand

4:24 PM · Sep 21, 2023

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And I don't ever recall anyone working sheep or cattle dressed like this and looking so darned clean.

Images like this, while beautiful in their own way (and the female subject doesn't look too bad either), really distort agriculture.  

It's a minor matter, but a little creepy somehow.

Friday Farming. All agriculture is local, the danger of taking agricultural advice from Reddit, and Meeting Marcus Aurelius on the prairie.

Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together,but do so with all your heart.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

Longhorn in mixed herd, central Wyoming.  This is from this year. . . a high water year.

From the r/ranching Subreddit on, of course, Reddit:

I just inherited 1200 acres of ranch land. WTF do I do?

My father in law wants to pass on his ranch to me before he passes. He’s in bad health and for some reason decided that I would be the best of everyone to take on his property. I don’t know a god damn thing about cows or hay, having lived in a big city my whole life; but I’m a pretty good mechanic and would fix all of his equipment whenever I visited him, so I guess he likes me and he thinks I’m the best to take things over. The ranch, located in southern Wyoming, hasn’t done anything productive in the past 5 years due to FIL declining health and I have no idea what to do with it. Like the title says, it’s 1200 acres of mostly hilly sagebrush with grassy bottom land surrounded by forest land. I promised him I wouldn’t break up the land or develop it; but how does a city slicker move out to the middle of Wyoming and generate a living income off of the land without knowing a thing about ranching? Can I lease the grazing property out; lease the grass land out? Just looking for any advice or recommendations. Any advice is appreciated.

Let's answer the question first, that being, "how does a city slicker move out to the middle of Wyoming and generate a living income off of the land without knowing a thing about ranching?"

The answer is simple.  You don't.

Here's the reason why:

level 1

DyersvilleStLambert

·1 day ago

With only two sections, in Wyoming, I’m assuming that he wasn't a full time rancher, or that he leased a lot of land to get by. Most working Wyoming ranches are large for a reason.

So, as a starting point, what did he do with it? 1,200 acres sounds like a lot unless you've actually ranched in Wyoming, in which case, it really isn't.

19

level 2

overeducatedhick

·22 hr. ago

And to be fair, two sections in Carbon or Sweetwater Counties is different than the same area in Laramie or Albany Counties. Your mention of sagebrush suggests that you are somewhere west of Laramie. That also suggests that there are some state or federal leases that are connected to the privately owned land. How many adult cattle does (or did) he run on his place?

The truth of the matter is that, in today's operations, your mechanical abilities are among the most important skills to make a farm or ranch work.

15

level 3

DyersvilleStLambert

·18 hr. ago

True. If you are east of Cheyenne, which is really more farm country, it's one thing. Once you start heading west of Cheyenne and into Albany County, it's another. The sagebrush country of Carbon County, something else entirely. Wyoming has quite a bit of varied terrain and conditions.

None of it will support really dense stocking, however, like some other regions of the country will allow. I'd have to assume, like you, that if he was really ranching, he must have had Federal and perhaps state leases, or maybe some private leases.

As a total aside, the line "Somewhere west of Laramie" is part of one of the greatest advertising campaigns of all time, which some credit with starting modern advertising. The 1923 ad for the Jordan Playboy car, which starts off with “Somewhere west of Laramie there's a broncho busting, steer roping girl who knows what I'm talking about".

Replies, from me, and some other guy.

Now, the same thread is full of advice on how this person can just move out and, yee haw, be a rancher.

Bull.

All agriculture is local.  All of it.  A grain farmer in Kansas can't walk right into a bandanna plantation in Africa and expect to make a go of it instantly.  Gardeners all over the country, if they suddenly inherited a wheat farm, would go broke.

And with animal agriculture, this is particularly true.  Ranching in Wyoming may be like ranching in Montana, but it's not like cattle farming in Arkansas.  Frankly, a Northern Plains rancher used to low grass and cold winters would have a lot better chance of being successful in Arkansas, than an Arkansas cattle farmer would of being a rancher here.

And somebody from a city, stepping into land on advice from people who don't realize that 1,200 acres doesn't cut it here as a ranch, and who have never endured our winters.

Forget it.

This property will be leased to a neighbor, or sold.

And let us discuss the injustice of things.

From when I was small, I've always wanted to ranch.  It's hard to explain these things, but I always wanted to.  It's probably one of the two "I want to be when I grow up" things in my personality.  The other one was being a soldier, which I've done.  Regarding that, by the time I was approaching graduating from high school (I graduated when I was 17 years old, not all that uncommon at the time) that was waning, but that desire was expressed by six years I spent in the National Guard.

And I have been a stockman as an adult, but I was never able to make it my full time occupation.

I came pretty close twice, once before being married, and once after, but events transpired and. . . off to the office I go.

There's a difference between being in the Regular Army (which I was for training) and being in the reserves. And there's a difference between being a part-time stockman and a full time one.  Moreover, as I'm in one of the professions, I've entered that weird part of my life, which seems to be the case for at least people in my profession, when the kids have grown up and have their own lives, and your spouse has her own job, and most of the people you meet on a daily basis are in your profession, where your private aspirations just die as other people murder them.

You don't need a stock working horse. . . you can borrow one.  Wouldn't you like to sell that old one ton stick shift and buy a nice 1/2 ton sport auto, or maybe a Jeep pickup?  You don't need to work cattle this weekend, you can get that big project done at work.

Which is why, I think, that I see so many old members of my profession carrying on into their 70s and 80s. Their actual personality died thirty years ago.  Just the shell is left.  

And in the weird way of the world, here we are.  Some urban dude who has little interest in ranching inherits a small (and it is) parcel, but one that has entertaining possibilities, and isn't really that interested, whereas some rural dude spends his whole life, more or less, in suit and tie.

M'eh.

My wife always says things work the way they do for a reason.  We're placed in one place, under one set of circumstances, because God wants us there for some reason.  We should accordingly accept it, and be happy with it and that we can do what we do, even if we don't realize whatever the good is that we're supposed to be doing by our placement. I try to accept that, but I'll confess, stuff like this frustrates me.