My first diary contains an image of the Shideler Ranch where I spent a lot of hours as a kid bucking bales of hay, herding cattle or just plain doing gruntwork on fencing or stockyard cleaning. I want to give you a fairer perception of the small farmer/rancher across America, one that is not in any way exemplified by the Bundys of recent notoriety. This diary contains my own experiences for the most part, along with paraphrasing those of my extended farming/ranching family.
The rancher in the picture is my old family friend, Barry Shideler (recently deceased) and his wife Marilyn. I have permission to use the photo from Ryan Hoffman, editor of the Citizen Telegram newspaper, Glenwood Springs, Colorado. I am so pleased and grateful to Ryan to have it for the memories.
My last visit to the ranch was saddening; I saw few cattle and even less activity. Oil and gas wells abound.
The average farm/ranch is not the wealthy operation we saw weekly on the TV series, Dallas. I never saw your average rancher in a $5,000 suit; I did see them occasionally wearing a Western tie, cowboy hat/boots and a jacket on special occasions.
Small farmers and ranchers are a severely endangered species with the rise of phenomenally huge Agra. My friend Barry pastured his own cattle and the ranch did lease BLM land for grazing. Barry’s great grandpa had a 99 year lease on the land so I would imagine that lease expired about the time Barry inherited the entire responsibility. I don’t know if it was renewed but my guess is it had to be or the ranch would not have survived. The lease cost used to be manageable, but I suspect it has grown right along with taxes, both of which cut into profits a rancher might make which are all too often not enough for expenses that continually rise.
The trouble with cattle is that you need a lot of ‘em to make a living, which means a lot of pasture space needed to successfully
feed us all. Land is cripplingly expensive these days so you won’t see many new family farms cropping up. Cattle graze-out pasture in remarkably little time, so pastures have to be rotated and maintained which is costly. There is the cost of grain feed to consider, along with fertilizers and maintenance for the pastures. Cattle have to be moved from pasture to pasture frequently to allow for regrowth — miles of pasture. And by the way — that beef that was pasture-raised buries commercial meats in quality and safety tests. I can picture a big, seared steak over the open fire now, sizzling, a little pink in the middle, juices dripping…. moan. paleoleap.com/...
A farmer or rancher cannot compete with Big Agra’s industrial farming. If nothing else concerns you, what goes into feed for most of the beef, chickens, pigs or other protein on hooves should. On the Shideler Ranch manure was plowed under in the fields where it is used as fertilizer. Added to it are a few other nutrients that have been tried, tested and in use for at least many decades and known to be safe for consumption. In fact, some are ingredients found in your vitamin tabs. And by the way, Barry paid hefty taxes just as you or I do, but his pay wasn’t given to him in a steady paycheck. They had running money but the income came when the cows were grown and sold. In a best-case scenario, one calf per cow a year is the ideal. Believe me, not the norm. www.nutritionsecrets.com/...
Once a pasture is grazed it might come back a couple of times in summer rotation then lies fallow for the next season. Ranchers have a lot of pride in their product, Big Agra doesn’t give a pile of manure. Big Agra is fond of antibiotics to keep cattle ‘healthy’ (enough to meet ever-slackening regulations) in sickening conditions of jam-packed enclosures a foot deep in waste where diseases breed. You cannot believe the odors of a factory farm unless you’ve experienced them: nausea, headaches, respiratory problems for workers and the SMELL! Not to forget the bacteria and parasites from animal waste. Those little bugs are chlorine resistant (read: dirty drinking water) and often cause human ailments.
Big Agra practices:
*overuse of antibiotics lead to antibiotic resistance
*odors can cause nausea, headaches, and respiratory problems especially to barn workers (and neighbors!!!)
*Oh, and bacteria and parasites oh my! Well, those we know from the explosive super-flu that can result .
These examples are the microscopic beginning to a gag-worthy lengthy list of downright nasty stuff.
www.beyondfactoryfarming.org/....
All that land — the Federal Government owns 28% of American land that mostly sits fallow. Given this, I am asking you why it seems ridiculous for a desperate farmer/rancher to try to bring some light to his problem? Granted, the Bundys’ do so in the most negatively public manner as possible, but I feel his frustration. How bad did it have to get for these normally reticent people that I have lived among to resort to these measures? How else could they reach the American public (whom they feed) for support? Desperate times/desperate measures…..
28% of American land is owned by the U.S. government in a country with a rapidly growing population. Much of this is fallow land which ranchers really could use. The land costs the government nothing to maintain other than fencing Americans out, maybe. I understand and believe strongly in preserving our heritage, but a lot of that very usable federal land is not extraordinary or historical or lovely, miles and miles of it just sit there unused. If you’re worried about endangered wildlife, let the experts handle those problems — but give the small ranchers a chance to provide you with quality, healthy food by leasing those acres, say — for nothing, given the lands are not bringing in any federal money NOW. Give organic farming a boost by providing land to encourage healthier growing practices. Imbalance of federal land ownership sheds light on Oregon Militia
And for those of you assuming the farmers and ranchers are going to get filthy rich off your tax dollars — Funny, I haven’t noticed any wildly wealthy small farmers. Big Ag, now….. To farmers and ranchers, that federal pasture is vital land, sitting completely useless because the farmer cannot afford to pay to use it. The whole idea is to allow the farmer/rancher to make use of the land with some stringent rules as to how the land is treated, to grow healthy food for your children, for us all.