Cow Factor - Science over Beliefs

Science over Beliefs

The matter of History

Cow Factor

By Stephen L. Wilmeth

            I have a particular interest in any piece of information relating to Charles Goodnight.

            The relationship is not simply the fact that my great-grandfather rode for Mr. Goodnight from 1880-1888 and Goodnight cattle formed the basis of his destiny, but the man himself is a profile of many things. Courage comes to mind. Acute observation is another. He was a trail blazer, an opportunist, a businessman, and a caretaker of his surroundings. Credit him in part to the salvation of the buffalo and original Texas cattle, the longhorns. He saw the value of both and he appointed himself guardian of their plight.

            As far as I can discern, there were few absolutes in his life. He was certainly human, and his powers of observation were superb. When he described matters such as buffalo and wolves, I found myself riveted to his words. He knew wolves were about not just by the buffalo herd dust on the horizons, but by the absence of rabbits and certain birds. The wolves, following the buffalo, would simply wipe the populations of those prey animals out.

            His comments about the grass in the wake of the great herds are important. There was no grass. The turf would be reduced to bare ground after the passage. The ground itself was trampled and turned. Defecation and urination was everywhere. Carcasses of natural deaths or predator kills littered the ground in varying forms of decay and or consumption. There was nothing resembling peace or pastoral harmony. It was a veritable riot of beastly presence.

That fact was noted without attachment of judgment. The aftermath was simply … the way it was.

Cow factor

Other than period sustenance and a particular buffalo hunt to sell his cattle ideas, Goodnight demonstrated little interest in the commercialization of buffalo. He knew there were enough risks in life not to go chasing buffalo needlessly across the plain. The sensible alternative was cattle. They converted sunlight to protein just as efficiently as buffalo and did it under much more controlled conditions. They took the swings out of natural and market cycles. Uncertainty was reduced, and the controlled process surrounding the enterprise stimulated every aspect of the human condition. Ranch to market trails became farm to market roads, byways, and railways. Texas became a state as did New Mexico, Colorado, Oklahoma, and Kansas. All were lands that benefited from the vision and the toil of Goodnight.

The public, fed bits and pieces of information from afar, tended to be fascinated by men like Charles Goodnight.

The public today, fed bits and pieces of false science, tend to assign guilt and environmental condemnation to Goodnight’s modern day counterparts. They also assign guilt to the cow.

Like the stewards, the cow has become a falsely accused environmental pariah, but nothing could be further from the truth. She is now the most important converter of sunlight to protein in this modern world. As science will reveal, her refined role as the major ungulate will also be the key to grassland health and robust reovery.

She is that important, and …she is that critical.

Allan Savory, once accused of being the ultimate hawker of wire and posts, has reappeared with a special report in the summer, 2015 edition of Range Magazine. Savory should have started the narrative with a later quote.

I used to detest domestic livestock because I was trained to believe they caused desertification and it was after all ‘so obvious’.

His hatred, however, was reversed in the ‘60s when he realized there was no option other than to use the cow to reverse the desertification process. His critical thinking had been altered. The science was clear. Cattle numbers didn’t cause overgrazing. Time and exposure and re-exposure to grazing resulted in overgrazing. In fact, like the cumulative affects of the historic great herds, large cattle numbers are necessary, beneficial, and crucial for maintaining turf health. Only in that course of action can desertification be reversed.

Proper and timely management had to become the new focus, and Savory was the flamboyant emissary to carry the message.

The guidelines to land health had to start with the halting of non-effective rainfall and the stepwise reduction of exposed soil surface. Partial rest was found to be non-effective and an agent of desertification. Not a single example in semiarid lands anywhere can found to halt desertification if the rest, unto itself, is the only tool applied. Herd action must accompany managed rest.

Savory correctly points out that the general public believes that western rangelands are deteriorating because of cattle, riparian areas are being demolished because of cattle, and cattle factories are inhumane, lead to excessive water and antibiotic use, pollute, and rob cereal grains from the human population. Those beliefs are not coming from science nor are they coming from local communities being negatively affected. They are coming from the universities, agencies, and NGOs that control the communication lines and provide policy recommendations to the governing bodies.

The outcome of current management will be a continuing assault on rural communities and further deterioration of the grasslands. It also promotes cultural cleansing. Savory summarized his view of the looming prospect:

The ultimate tragedy will occur when science prevails over beliefs and government agencies eventually have to run millions more cattle on these lands to reverse the desertification process. To prevent such tragedy we need to collaborate based on science and common desire now.

The suggestion that any agency is capable of running millions more cattle is ludicrous, but, like conservationist Aldo Leopold before him, we must be somewhat tolerant of Savory for his misguided belief in the practical capability of his institutional colleagues.

   We will accept and applaud his insight of the real science, and we will engage and seek real and substantive support from any unbiased colleagues, but we must turn to the agent that can make the real changes. From Leopold’s somewhat condescending words, we will identify that individual as the land steward “too poor to pay for his sport”.

That, of course, is the … American rancher and his cattle.

The path forward

As stewards, we must recognize and embrace the most simplistic of Savory’s observations. The matter of biological decay as opposed to material oxidation in sunlight leading to expanding bare soil exposure is a premise we can accept. We can also understand and herald the need to counter conditions that lead to noneffective rainfall. In parlance that makes sense to us, we can agree that the rain that falls on our lands must be managed on the basis of enhancing retention and eliminating runoff.

Concentrated emphasis must be placed on decreasing bare soil exposure and eliminating noneffective rainfall.

We must also have altered cooperative partnership thinking. The removal of grazers does not reverse desertification. The presence of the grazers is critical, and, in most cases, the reduction of grazers unto itself doesn’t correct problems. Grasslands evolved relying on grazers to remove dead and decaying overstory to expose sunlight to growth points, to trample for the purposes of reseeding and asexual propagation, for dunging with its natural fertilization, and for urinating which sets the natural fertility cycle for subsequent growth sequences. These actions cannot be sporadic or localized. Understocking can negate the entire process.

The complexity of grazing is another factor. When an engine is overhauled, an entire tool kit is necessary for the job. Managing grasslands is no different. The management of natural systems with only one grazer, the cow, that is expected to be grazer, browser, forbs and weed eater, noxious weed eliminator, brush removal agent and all-the-while absent from sight for day hike excursions is tomfoolery. Accusation of failure is unfair and it is contradictory to the greater model. If the cow exists alone, and, if there is disallowance for promoting and incorporating other specialized ungulates for system health, mechanical and or chemical alternatives must be added to accomplish the actions that complexity of grazing would manifest.

Finally, there is the matter of the land steward.

Current law sets forth that lands will be managed for multiple values including that of historic and, where appropriate, will protect lands in their natural condition and provide food habitat for wildlife and livestock. Those lands will also provide for human occupancy and use. When science does prevail over misinterpreted beliefs, it will not be the agencies that are capable or equipped to manage the facilitator of turf. It will be the rancher. The integrity of his existence including the vast array of infrastructure he has in place must be maintained inviolate. His water sources alone must be protected and enhanced in order to support the only grazer that is deployed in numbers adequate to deal with the more aggressive future management of our grasslands.

Stephen L. Wilmeth is a rancher from southern New Mexico. “This is the second essay mapping the importance of the History Value. The socio-political impacts will appear in the third installment.”

ICYMI, part one is here.