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General concepts
- Principle components of our state's, our country's old-time ranching heritage, culture, and pastoral way of life are:
- mid- and large-size working ranches
- vast undivided areas of agriculturally and ecologically important rangeland -- either desert, prairie, savanna, or forest type
- old-time ranching skills and traditions
- full-time working ranchers and cowboys
- special breeds, strains, and bloodlines of ranch horses, stock dogs, and range-adapted livestock -- including cattle, sheep, and goats
- highly nutritious range-aged beef
- climax species of native range grasses and forbs
- healthy populations of range-dependent wildlife
- Examples of old-time ranching skills and traditions include both ranch-house and chuck-wagon cooking, bunkhouse living, cowboy poetry and song, training cutting and roping horses, training stock dogs, managing where livestock graze, annual fall and spring round-ups, penning and working cattle, trail drives, and loading cattle for shipping.
- The greatest threat to our country's old-time ranching heritage, culture, and pastoral way of life is loss of mid- and large-size working ranches, and loss of spacious areas of agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands.
- Preserving our state's, our country's remaining mid- and large-size working ranches is important because after they are gone, the cultural lifestyle and wildlife they support, the agricultural products they produce, as well as the ecological services their grazing land provide will be gone too.
- Livestock ranching in harmony with native rangelands requires ranchers, cowboys, livestock, and rangelands to coexist over time without degrading the range's soil, water, vegetation, and wildlife resources.
- Any serious approach towards minimizing the negative effects of man-induced greenhouse gas emissions on the environment must include offering private ranch owners in Texas and other range states and regions a financial incentive to manage native rangelands for carbon sequestration and other ecological purposes, as well as for low stocking rate livestock grazing.
- Offering full-time working ranchers a financial incentive to practice light stocking and other sound range management practices would be an effective way to
- improve the financial, ecological, and social viability of rangeland ranching
- improve the agricultural and ecological health of our country's rangelands for the benefit of society
- mitigate long-term climate change, and minimize the negative effects of man-made global warming.
- Other ways to demonstrate responsible use of taxpayer money would be to
- employ qualified full-time working ranchers to manage the conservation of our country's agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands
- employ unemployed people in towns and cities to help remove invading brush, and do other types of rangeland conservation and restoration work.
- Trends in loss of mid- and large-size working ranches, and vast areas of agriculturally and ecologically important rangeland tend to parallel trends in population growth, and trends in public demand for small tracks of rangeland for residential and commercial development purposes.
Rangeland ranching concepts
- The hardest thing about rangeland ranching, as a vocational way of life, is achieving financial and social prosperity and happiness without degrading and fragmenting our country's agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands in the process.
- Most rangeland ranches in Texas have been degraded and fragmented to the point where they no longer have enough animal unit carrying capacity to make rangeland ranching financially viable on an one-operation (independent) basis.
- If Texas continues losing mid- and large-size working ranches in the same amounts as was lost during the past fifty years, it won't be long before there's nothing left to preserve or restore, especially in the southern, central, and coastal regions of our state.
- In order for small- and mid-size operations to achieve long-term prosperity in the range cattle business, they must be willing to do the following three things: (1) work in association with local or regional ranchers; (2) opt for a common ranching philosophy; and (3) opt for a common method of ranching.
- Three principle requirements for preserving rangeland ranching in Texas and other range states and regions are:
- recognizing past and present rangeland ranching problems and mistakes
- replacing past and present rangeland ranching problems and mistakes with viable solutions
- opting for a method of rangeland ranching that is financially viable, ecologically responsible, and socially acceptable, and can be maintained over an indefinite period of time without degrading the ranges soil, water, vegetation, and wildlife resources.
- The cornerstone of long-term (sustainable) rangeland ranching is practicing sound range management on a year-in and year-out basic.
Rangeland concepts
- It's a simple fact that further degradation and fragmentation of our state's, our country's agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands, in conjunction with further emissions of "greenhouse" gases in the atmosphere will end-up intensifying the damaging effects of man-induced climate change and man-induced global warming.
- It is way past time for people around the world to begin appreciating the ecosystem goods and services that healthy rangelands provide for the long-term welfare of society.
- Examples of ecosystem goods and services that healthy rangelands provide for societal benefit include:
- healthy food, natural fiber, and valuable by-products for human consumption
- natural habitat for grazing cultures, livestock, wildlife, and fish
- recharge of below- and above-ground aquifers
- purification of water going into aquifers, streams, and rivers
- watershed protection and natural flood control
- maintains soil and ecological buffering capacity
- regenerates soil and water fertility
- creates new soil, thus improves carbon storage capacity
- creates and maintains vascular structures for delivering soil and water nutrients to plants
- removes carbon dioxide and other "greenhouse" emissions out of the atmosphere
- transmits life-supporting oxygen in the air
- sequesters carbon in below and above-ground biomass
- detoxifies and degrades waste materials and pollution
- climate change mitigation
- maintains diversity in native flora and fauna
- natural control of pathogenic and parasitic organisms
- habitat for pollinators of cultivated and wild plants
- opportunities for hunting, fishing, and other types of recreation
- natural setting for cultural, social, and spiritual enrichment.
- Reality tells us that a high percent of our state's, our country's agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands have been severely degraded, fragmented, and polluted by human activities and development, and they no longer provide high levels of plant and animal life.
- Further degradation and fragmentation of our state's, our country's agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands will lead to
- further increase in man-induced climate change and an intensified rate of man-induced global warming
- further decrease in ecosystem goods and services that rangelands provide for human survival
- further decrease in natural habitat for ranchers, cowboys, livestock, wildlife, and fish
- further demise of our state's, our country's rangeland ranching heritage, culture, and pastoral way of life.
- Sorry to say that very few people in the U.S. and around the world recognize the importance for preserving native rangeland types and areas with high agricultural and ecological value to society.
- Based on past and current trends in loss of agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands around the world, the only rangeland types that will be left for the benefit of future generations will be the least productive types, or in other words, the rangelands with the lowest agricultural and ecological value to society.
- Under natural condition, desert and short-grass rangelands are extremely stingy when it comes to passing out ecosystem goods and services for supporting life.
Comment - Also stingy are mid-grass and tall-grass types that have been ruined by range degradation and fragmentation. Or, in other words, rangeland types that are no longer agriculturally and ecologically valuable.
- Man-induced degradation, fragmentation, and pollution of vast areas of prairie and savanna rangeland leads to permanent loss of healthy populations of white-tail deer, pronghorn antelope, mule deer, bob-white quail, and other species of range-dependent wildlife.
- Large wildlife numbers on degraded and fragmented rangelands, coupled with a reduction in natural predators (cougars, wolves, etc.), results in reducing the growth rate, body size, and body condition of range-dependent wildlife.
Comment - It also results in causing more disease and high death rates.
- Sad to say that past and present ruin of our state's, our country's agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands (mostly mid-grass and tall-grass prairie and savanna types) by human activities and development has has been and continues to be done one small piece at a time, and presently there are no signs of stopping the destruction.
Comment - Hopefully this land-use trend can be changed before all hope is lost.
- Trying to regenerate native rangelands destroyed by human-induced degradation, fragmentation, and pollution is a slow and time-consuming process, and may required hundreds or thousands of years to accomplish. In fact, native rangelands destroyed by human activities and development may be lost forever, no matter what people say, think, or do.
- There are no man-made (artificial) substitutes for the ecosystem goods and services that our country's, our planet's rangelands provide for the benefit of societies around the world.
Comment - Once they are gone, they are gone forever, and our country's, our planet's per animal unit carrying capacity is reduced to what our country's, our planet's remaining rangelands are able to support.
- Accumulative loss of agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands around the world, in conjunction with an always growing population, leads to world-wide poverty, malnutrition, famine, disease, anarchy, immigration, and fighting for existence.
Comment - Or, in other words, will lead to reducing the quality of life for present and future generations around the world.
- Humans are the only animal species that destroy the life-support system that Nature has provided for their survival, and describe their destruction as "making progress".
- Civilizations throughout human history have demonstrated the ability to plant seeds, grow crops, and build cities and empires, but zero have demonstrated the ability to recreate the agriculturally and ecologically important rangelands that civilized man has destroyed by his farming agriculture, resource mining, energy extraction, urbanization, and other types of man-induced activities and development.
Comment - It seems like civilized man is destined to plant, grow, build, explore, and technologically advance himself right out of existence.
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