Western Larch, © George Wuerthner
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Andy Kerr's Grazing Index Page As sheep advance, flowers, vegetation, grass, soil, plenty, and poetry vanish. John Muir, John of the Mountains (1938) |
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See also Sagebrush
Sea. I think my best rant against livestock can be found in Oregon Desert Guide: 70 Hikes. Removing Hooved Locusts From the Public is an abbreviated version of why livestock are inappropriate on the public lands. The Western Range Revisited: Removing Livestock from Public Lands to Conserve Biological Diversity, by Deborah L. Donahue. Mark Salvo of American Lands and I have penned a review which has appeared in Wild Earth. It is a fine scholarly analysis of the historical, legal, ecological implications of public land grazing. Pillaged Preserves: Livestock in National Parks and Wilderness Areas, coauthored with Mark Salvo, appeared in Welfare Ranching: The Subsidized Destruction of the American West. Congress Designates First Livestock-Free Wilderness (on Steens Mountain) appeared in Wild Earth. Evolving Presidential Policy toward Livestock Grazing in National Monuments, co-authored with Mark Salvo, was initially published in and is copyrighted by the Penn State Environmental Law Review. The Voluntary Retirement Option for Federal Public Lands Grazing Permittees was simultaneously published in Rangelands and Wild Earth. An adapted version appeared in Cascade Cattleman. A different adaptation appeared in Different Drummer. Permits For Cash: A Fair and Equitable Resolution to the Public Land Range War by Mark Salvo of American Lands) and myself has appeared in Rangelands and may appear in Wild Earth. A more expansive version is also available which documents that federal compensation for grazing permits has been the policy for military takeovers of public lands since the middle of the 20th Century. Voluntary v. Mandatory Buyout analyzes the pro's and con's of the voluntary versus mandatory approach to the retirement of public land grazing permits. Politics isn't geometry; the shortest distance between two points is never a straight line. Cow Cops suggests that volunteer monitors can scare the hell out of federal grazing permittees. It was conceived by folks at Oregon Natural Resources Council, but funding limitations have prevented its implementation. Don't try to improve grazing; abolish it! appeared in High Country News. 'Home on the Range' an Environmental Folk Song is actually a song about the wilderness and has been misappropriated by cowboys. I took more shit for this column in the Wallowa County Chieftain than for any other. While this popular folk song is associated with cowboys, it does not contain a single reference to domestic livestock. Instead, it extols the natural richness of the Western range, mentioning a number of species now in decline. Perhaps conservationists will reclaim this folk song, sing it in camp and teach it to their children. It includes a new last verse penned by myself and have granted to the public domain. Hear Home on the Range performed by Eva-Marie Ascensio and Marc Viznick. (Needs Real Player.) Extra bonus! You can also get a rendition of Don't Fence Me In written by Cole Porter and performed by Eva-Marie Ascensio The National Public Lands Grazing Campaign seeks to end abusive livestock grazing on public lands, primarily through enactment of a congressional program to acquire grazing permits from willing federal permittees and then retiring the allotment permanently from commercial livestock grazing. Mark Salvo and I did an article in Wild Earth describing the campaign. American Lands is a leading player in the effort to end abusive livestock grazing on the public lands. Great Old Broads for Wilderness is what it says and more.Oregon Natural Desert Association is leading similar effort in Oregon. Western Watersheds Project is the lead organization in Idaho and is expanding throughout the arid West. Center for Biological Diversity is very effective in both listing and protecting species under the Endangered Species Act. Forest Guardians have an excellent anti-grazing program and are to be commended for figuring out how to use the federally listed Mexican spotted owl to go after the livestock. National Public Lands Grazing Campaign is a consortium of groups seeking a government buyout program. (I'm the director of it.) Oh give me a home...
On public lands in the great Western ecosystem, livestock will not have priority. The grazing of livestock will and must be subordinated to the natural order of the bison and the predator. The needs of the bison are first.
Livestock can be used as a management tool, like an AK-47 assault rifle can be used as a hunting tool. Perhaps theoretically possible, but only with very careful control of the tool. With either the cow or the assault rifle on fully automatic, bad things happen. At least the gun cannot walk around and do what a gun does by itself.
As sheep advance, flowers, vegetation, grass, soil, plenty, and poetry vanish.
Africa: Different antelope and other game consume different mixes of food plants, so the whole assemblage is used, but cows eat only certain plants and displace the rest, hence much food is wasted.
Although cattle-grazing in the West has polluted more water, eroded more topsoil, killed more fish, displaced more wildlife, and destroyed more vegetation than any other kind of land use, the American public pays ranchers to do it.
Resolved, that none of us know, or care to know, anything about grasses, native or otherwise, outside the fact that for the present there are lots of them, the best on record, and we are after getting the most out of them while they last.
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