#178, In Practice, March/April 2018

Healthy Land. Healthy Food. Healthy Lives.

MARCH / APRIL 2018

In Practice a publication of Holistic Management International

NUMBER 178

W W W. H O L I S T I C M A N A G E M E N T. O R G

Animal Agriculture is Regenerative Agriculture

BY ANN ADAMS

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t was disappointing to read in a recent web article at Civil Eats that Marin County, California supervisors are getting resistance from some factions of the local food advocate groups for allowing local animal processing facilities. Marin County is known as a hotbed of local and organic foods, so I was pleased to learn that the supervisors took that ethos seriously and granted permission for locally-run, small animal processing facilities to operate in the county (less than 20,000 birds for poultry and mobile slaughter facilities for larger animals).

Those of us working in the regenerative agriculture movement know that the lack of processing facilities is a major sticking point for many communities working toward a local sustainable food system.

But there are people who believe that animal agriculture is not as sustainable as plants and thus meat is not a sustainable food source. While they recognize there is a difference between confined animal systems and grass-based livestock systems, they still believe that you get more plants than animals per acre. Thus, as we worry about feeding 9 billion people, these individuals fall into the reductionist crop versus livestock trap. They do not consider the crop and livestock opportunity that regenerative agriculture offers.

Consider the research done by USDA Agricultural Research Service on the Brown Ranch in North Dakota where they have been using no-till and polyseeded cover crops for many years to improve soil health from a less than two percent organic matter to over six percent in many places. They grow grain crops as well as forage crops for their livestock. Of particular import is the fact that when they began integrating their livestock into their crop fields to increase the fertility (naturally and sustainably rather than importing inputs on the farm), they were able to increase soil fertility and nutrients an almost additional 50 percent

from an already highly regenerative cropping system.

Cropping alone (even done locally and organically) relies heavily on inputs (often from animals not owned by that farmer). Cropping can create the illusion of great production on small amounts of space, but the soil must be fed to produce at high nurture resilience, build diversity volumes and there is a question of how and where those inputs are created. Holistic Management is about moving past reductionist thinking Oct 31 - Nov 2, 2018 of agriculture as either cropping or Albuquerque, NM livestock to focusing on agriculture as a whole system in which living soil is the key to all life and all tools are considered in the regenerative management of that system.

We hope that our readers will join us for the 2018 Regenerate Conference that HMI is hosting with the Quivira Coalition and the American Grassfed Association to learn more about these critical issues and how we can all help regenerate our lands and communities.

save the date ___________________________________________

REGENERATE

2018

INSIDE THIS ISSUE At the foundation, Regenerative Agriculture is about investing in soil health. Whether that investment is land management practices like holistic planned grazing or planting cover crops, the goal is to feed the life under the soil so that a diversity of life above the soil can be fed as well, with businesses and communities prospering sustainably.

Learn more about the No Regrets Initiative’s efforts to invest in soil health on page 2.

INVESTING IN SOIL HEALTH

To Create a Thriving Society, We Must Invest in Soil Health

Healthy Land. Healthy Food. Healthy Lives.

In Practice a publication of Hollistic Management International

HMI educates people in regenerative agriculture for healthy land and thriving communities.

STAFF Ann Adams. . . . . . . . . . . . Executive Director Kathy Harris. . . . . . . . . . . Program Director Mary Girsch-Bock. . . . . . Development Manager Carrie Stearns . . . . . . . . . Communications &

Outreach Manager Valerie Grubbs. . . . . . . . . Accounting Manager Julie Fierro. . . . . . . . . . . . Education Manager Stephanie Von Ancken . . Program Manager Kimberly Barnett. . . . . . . Administrative Assistant

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Daniel Nuckols, Chair Walter Lynn, Vice-Chair Kelly Sidoryk, Past Board Chair Gerardo Bezanilla Avery Anderson-Sponholtz Kirrily Blomfield Kevin Boyer Jonathan Cobb Guy Glosson Wayne Knight Robert Potts Jim Shelton Sarah Williford

HOLISTIC MANAGEMENT In Practice (ISSN: 1098-8157) is published six times a year by: Holistic Management International 5941 Jefferson St. NE, Suite B Albuquerque, NM 87109 505/842-5252, fax: 505/843-7900; email: hmi@holisticmanagement.org.; website: www.holisticmanagement.org

BY SALLIE CALHOUN

A

s a young woman growing up in Knoxville, Tennessee, I showed passions many considered “uncharacteristic” of a Southern lady. I was a tomboy who enjoyed sports, science, and math. I wanted to be an engineer like (L to R) Kelly Mulville, Holistic Management educator and my dad. viticulturist Paicines Ranch; Esther Park, CEO of Cienga Capital; I left for college in Texas and Sallie Calhoun, philanthropist and social financier. at 16 and then headed to Silicon Valley in its early A couple of years later, we received an days. As my dad returned to the family farm unexpected offer for our software company and in South Carolina, I started my tech career, agreed to sell. Days before we had closed the thinking that gardening was as close as I would deal, the county rejected the developer’s plan. ever come to farming.

Three weeks later, we made our first offer on the Paicines Ranch, and six months later, it was Growing Grass ours. We didn’t have a plan or know anything In the late 90s, my husband, Matt, and I about ranching, but it seemed like something bought a small ranch in rural San Benito County, we should do. where we planned to build a weekend home I thought I would be a landlord rather away from the booming Silicon Valley. At that than a rancher, but a few months after we time, Matt had become fascinated by a 7,600had bought the ranch, I was introduced to acre ranch on the way to our “starter ranch.”

Holistic Management. I had been fascinated Developers owned the property and planned

by California native perennial grasses for to build 4,500 houses, which made the idea of years. They had virtually disappeared from purchasing it look pretty crazy. I didn’t give it our grasslands, but I had been growing them much thought. in my garden. When I read about Holistic Management, I got hooked on the idea of bringing these grasses back by changing the management of livestock, so I decided to get into ranching to see if it might be possible, and I have been on an amazing journey since then.

Copyright © 2018

The Ranch

Holistic Management® is a registered trademark of Holistic Management International

Education and innovation sharing at Paicines Ranch.

Over the last seventeen years, we have improved the way we

FEATURE STORIES

LAND & LIVESTOCK

NEWS & NETWORK

To Create a Thriving Society, We Must Invest in Soil Health

Parker Pastures — Developing a Profitable Product Mix

Grapevine................................................................ 15

Finding NEW Ground — Making the Impossible Possible

Lazy A Ranch — From Feedlot to Grassfed, From the Classroom to the Field

SALLIE CALHOUN........................................................................ 2

JEFF GOEBEL ............................................................................. 4

Using Remote Sensing to Compare Ground Cover — Comparing the Effectiveness of Grazing Strategies

RICK DANVIR, GREGG SIMONDS, AND ERIC SANT ................ 5

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HEATHER SMITH THOMAS......................................................... 9

HEATHER SMITH THOMAS.......................................................12

Board Chair............................................................. 16 Program Round Up.................................................. 17 Book Review............................................................ 19 Certified Educators.................................................. 20 Marketplace............................................................. 21 Development Corner............................................... 24

manage cattle, produced and marketed grassfed beef and lamb, started an event center, installed a vineyard designed to be managed by sheep, restored 25 buildings, and transitioned the ranch to organic. There have been many mistakes and an extraordinary amount of learning. Through our educational events and research partnerships, we unearth new knowledge with our colleagues and share what we are doing on the ground.

If you want to change what happens to that system, why on earth do you care what kind of capital it takes to do what you need.

Most recently, we began farming—something I swore that I would never do, even after getting into ranching. Though our crop ground is certified organic, it is still cultivated in a way that is extractive, destroying soil health and releasing carbon into the atmosphere. A couple of years ago, one block at a time, we started the hard work of restoring the soil by creating a profitable production system for the long term.

Our goal is to figure out how we can produce food, fuel, and fiber and not just sustain but regenerate ecosystems. It is the most fascinating system I have ever worked on and one of the most challenging problems I can imagine. I have never had so much fun!

Big Ag Falsehood

There are a lot of current agricultural practices that destroy soil health, including tilling, bare ground, monocultures, and the application of synthetic fertilizers or pesticides.

All of these practices diminish life in the soil, release carbon into the atmosphere, and reduce long-term productivity. We need to manage our soils by working with nature and using the tools that have evolved over 5 billion years.

Everything we’re doing for soil health looks to the future and incorporates all of the growing scientific evidence available along with enormous amounts of human creativity.

Naysayers and critics question our ability to “feed the world” while working with nature. They view reducing our dependence on technology as a step backward. My response is that nobody’s talking about going back! Everything we’re doing

for soil health looks to the future and incorporates all of the growing scientific evidence available along with enormous amounts of human creativity.

I believe that the fundamental change we need to make in agriculture is to realize that we are part of nature and must work with nature if we plan to be around as a Ranchland managed by Sallie and farm team. species in the long term. We cannot continue on our disconnected path, attempting marketer. To me, talking about my journey to to dominate, control, and simplify. Besides, it’s a restore the health of soils sometimes seems like lot more fun to partner with Mother Nature than an interruption of my “real work.” It was not until with the chemical companies.

I met Nikki Silvestri, whom I’ve since hired as a strategic communications consultant, that I was Capital Is Energy convinced otherwise. She helped me recognize When I was in the high-tech industry, I built the value of sharing with my peers in social robotic systems for a while. Whenever there finance and philanthropy the importance of soil was a problem, we would sit down as a team health and the possibilities of integrated capital and evaluate the entire system: the hardware, for their respective causes. the software, and the human interface. We were With Nikki’s expertise, we launched the looking to find what change we could make that #NoRegrets initiative. Part integrated capital would allow the whole system to function. resource, part education campaign, we seek to In my mind, I frequently take this systems inform and inspire philanthropists and investors approach and apply it to the food system. If you about the remarkable, interconnected life of the want to change what happens to that system, soil. No matter what you care about, I can show why on earth do you care what kind of capital it you why soil health is vital to your mission, be it takes to do what you need? Capital is energy. human health, ecosystem vibrancy, or climate This systems approach is essentially what change mitigation. Soil health is an important RSF’s integrated capital approach is all about. consideration for all people who want to make My relationship with RSF started 12 years the world a better place. ago when I met Don Shaffer. Through Don, I The name #NoRegrets has a double connected with an entire ecosystem of people meaning. Carbon sequestration in soil is called who were working to change the way economies a “no regrets negative emissions technology.” and money work. One of the people I met was The process takes CO2 out of the air and puts Esther Park, who was then RSF’s director of carbon (and life) into the soil. Improving soil social enterprise lending. health would be the most important work of In 2015, Esther became the CEO of Cienega the 21st century, even without climate change Capital, an investment firm I founded for soil because of the current degraded state of the health, regenerative agricultural practices, planet’s agricultural soils. If we build expensive and local food systems. I am thrilled to work technology to scrub CO2 from the air, all of that alongside one of the framers of integrated money will be spent on just mitigating climate capital. She is not only a talented and creative change. Why not address our many problems deal-maker but a thoughtful leader in the field. by creating many more solutions all Even though she calls herself a banker with a at once? heart, I see her as a heart who has banking skills.

The second reason I call this initiative Soil health is an important consideration for #NoRegrets is more obvious: my grandchildren. all people who want to make the When they ask how we failed to address climate world a better place. change, I want to be able to tell them I did In addition to investment capital, everything I could think of. we also work as a team to deploy Connect with the #NoRegrets Initiative at philanthropic capital. The key is first noregretsinitiative.com. to figure out where capital is needed and then what type of capital best This article was first published on the supports the change-makers.

RSF Social Finance website at: http://

#NoRegrets 2.0 Sallie feels the soil and roots of Paicines Ranch.

I am an engineer, not a

rsfsocialfinance.org/2017/10/26/noregrets/.

Learn more about Paicines Ranch at www.paicinesranch.com.

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Finding NEW Ground—

another fished.

I was hired as a subcontractor to teach conflict resolution through consensus building. I did five workshops over four years. There

BY JEFF GOEBEL were many wonderful outcomes y friend, Bob Chadwick, wrote a throughout this time. One issue book, Finding New Ground, about of note was an opportunity to his conflict resolution through challenge these ethnic groups, consensus building work before who faced an 85% food insecurity By coming together to create new ground, warring ethnic he passed on two years ago. One may wonder situation, to figure out what could groups used the cattle of one group to fertilize the crop what “finding new ground” means exactly? Here be done to significantly increase fields of another group and grow more food. are some of my insights. food production.

Most people approach conflict resolution During my second trip, I decided by finding “common” ground. I have worked to introduce the villagers to the conflict process Asking these two questions are important with numerous processes over the years and associated with scarcity. Once I do some initial for our mind to cope with the fact that we have have had conversations with dozens of people groundwork in the workshop, I help the group beliefs that limit our potential, and because they about other processes for resolving conflict. explore the notion of “impossibility.” To achieve are our beliefs, they need to be acknowledged.

What I have seen is that most people use the impossible, people need new information, The brain will not “let go” of those limiting beliefs some mechanism to reach “compromise” when and new core beliefs. They need to find “new” unless allowed the opportunity to articulate resolving conflict. One can do this by finding ground to do the impossible. the limited beliefs. Once they are articulated, what people have in common.

I asked the villagers if they could grow the brain is much more willing and able to look The consensus building approach, instead, 5–10% more food. They said probably. beyond being pragmatic to entertaining the focuses on finding “new” ground by working Internally, I wondered why they didn’t do this. notion of doing the impossible. not with just what we have in common, I asked if they could grow 20% more food.

When I work with groups, I stop my inquiry but also looking for solutions based on our They said possibly. I was looking for a solid at that point, with ideas floating around. I don’t differences. These types of solutions require statement of impossible, so I asked could you bring them to conclusion because the brain will an understanding, occurring through respectful grow 50% more food. In unison, they said that stop thinking about the puzzle. If I leave the listening to others who have different points of was impossible! I said “Good! I will help you puzzle open, they keep thinking, until they have views and together co-creating solutions that explore the impossible task of increasing food results. This requires action. optimize the unique qualities presented by production by 50% without western technology.”

When I came back to them fifteen months this difference.

At this point in the workshop, I asked them later, I was being driven to the community about For example, several years ago I was to list all the reasons that it was impossible eight hours from the capital by a driver. Before working with seven ethnic groups in Western for them to increase food production by 50% our pickup even stopped, the excited villagers Africa who had a pattern of resolving conflict by just by using their own resources? They had grabbed to open my door. They were excited to hurting each other physically, including by death. an exhaustive list, very similar in nature as the show me something significant. They grabbed The situation among members of these ten best PhDs from Harvard would develop. Once my hand and took me out to the fields. What villages was so challenged that two years before they had the list, I asked them to notice the list they showed me totally shocked me. In fifteen my work began 29 villagers got killed because and see that everything on there was a “belief months, they had not increased food production some cattle drifted onto cropland. These ethnic system” about why they couldn’t grow more by 50%. They had increased food production groups had different roles in the community. food. Given the strong beliefs, they were right, it by 78%, using their own resources, by finding The Bambara were farmers. The Fulani were was impossible! new ground. herders. Another ethnic group hunted, while Next, I asked the group of villagers to The solution was to put cattle on the answer this question “Given cropland for ten days before planting. This was that it is impossible to grow the very action that had led to the killing of 29 50% more food without western people two years earlier. What they had learned technology, if it were possible, from each other was that the cattle are important what would you do?” Well, at for increasing cropland fertility. The uniqueness first, it was quiet and no one that each ethnic group brought forward was part answered. Being patient, I of a solution that was greater than any of us, waited. I know the power of me included, could imagine. This is the way of the human mind. Within a finding new ground. minute, an answer came, then Finding “common” ground requires that we another, then another, until usually give up perspectives that matter to us there was a whole list of ideas. to satisfy the agreement of all. This is called I have learned that when the compromise. Compromise is about losing.

Fulani herders were part of a number of ethnic groups first idea comes out as an People don’t like to lose. Consensus building that came together in West Africa to grow 78% more food answer to this question, it is goes further. It is about “gaining” the richness than they had in the past when they were in conflict with CONTINUED ON PAGE 11 no longer impossible. each other.

Making the Impossible Possible

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Using Remote Sensing to Compare Ground Cover—

Comparing the Effectiveness of Grazing Strategies

BY RICK DANVIR, GREGG SIMONDS, AND ERIC SANT

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ractitioners of grazing management strategies that provide relatively long periods of plant recovery between shorter grazing periods generally do so because they’ve found this approach useful to improve range and riparian cover, soil health, watershed function, financial return

and strategic grazing management practices and rested areas? The short answer was—yes, are actually due to the associated intensive management appears to makes a difference planning, attention and monitoring. There may and it can be measured. The following is a brief be some truth in this statement, planning, overview of the project, cited from the scientific experience and execution definitely effect publication in the journal Rangelands 8. outcomes on the land. However, this doesn’t mean that the practices themselves, applied The Study by experienced In 2015 Western Landowners Alliance managers, may (WLA) and the Thornburg Foundation partnered not also create with Open Range Consulting (ORC), applying ecological changes.

ORC’s remote sensing technology to compare We decided ground cover attributes under different to investigate the management styles. ORC’s Gregg Simonds effects of grazing and Eric Sant developed and have used their management remote sensing technology to measure land practices, at a cover characteristics like bare ground, litter, landscape scale herbaceous and woody cover on western on upland bare riparian and upland range sites for years. ground and riparian Gregg developed this technology because of vegetative cover. We his belief that “You can’t manage what you compared cover on can’t measure”.

Julia Davis Stafford and CS Ranch riparian area. four eastern New We focused on upland bare ground and (Photo credit Rick Danvir) Mexico ranches riparian vegetative cover as the metrics of and quality of life. Others remain unconvinced managed for ten or more years by Holistic comparison. We decided to compare SGM that the added planning, infrastructure and Management-trained ranchers using ‘Strategic ranches with nearby CS pastures of similar site management complexity of this approach is Grazing Management’ (SGM) with neighboring potential (similar soils and weather). With help worth the extra cost, time and energy. They pastures seasonally or continuous stocked from WLA’s Executive Director Lesli Allison, prefer a more traditional approach of moderate, (CS) or multi-year rest (3 or more years of Quivira’s Courtney White and consultants continuous stocking, with minimal fence and rest). Our question was, does management Charlie Orchard and Kirk Gadzia, we identified water development. Perhaps the most widely make a difference? Are there quantifiable, several ranches to visit as possible candidates held view is that the best way to improve the significant differences in cover between for this study. On these initial visits we toured ecological condition of western rangelands is intensively managed, traditionally managed the ranches, discussed their management to simply remove livestock and let rest heal CONTINUED ON PAGE 6 the land.

Many personal experiences, casestudies and scientific investigations through the years suggest more strategic planning and management can help managers to better achieve their landscape goals. Over the years many Holistic Management practitioners have collected monitoring data and photos, developed presentations and lead tours of their own operations, explaining their management practices and sharing the changes they’ve experienced. Several scientific papers have reported decreased bare ground and increased cover on both upland1,2 and riparian sites3,4 in recent years.

Others have noted benefits of rotational grazing in managing wildlife habitat5,6 and soil health7.

It has also been suggested that apparent Thorpe family at the JT Ranch homestead. improvements in ecological and economic (Photo Credit R. Danvir) conditions attributed to Holistic Management Num ber 178

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history and reviewed Landsat satellite imagery of each candidate ranch with the ranchers.

Dedication, creativity, hard work and love of the land was obvious and apparent as we toured each ranch. Every ranch had a unique story to tell, one reflecting their continual journey of experimentation, learning and adapting, and their commitment to land stewardship, ranching, and community.

eastern New Mexico. Prior to implementing SGM, all four ranches had been continuously stocked, similar to other ranches in the area.

Changing to SGM required planning, management, experimentation and monitoring, and periodically adding additional livestock Figure 1 showing paired soil polygons.

The Ranches watering capacity and With the help of a Science Advisory team fencing as the ranch plan (a team of experienced range professors) we evolved. Most important was planning and stocked a bit higher, having increased from 58 settled on four selection criteria to narrow our implementing periods of effective plant recovery ac/AU in the late 1990’s to about 35 ac/AU. between grazing periods.

The ORC field work consisted of collecting As Kirk Gadzia remarked 70–130 ground-based vertical photographs “We really should call (GBVP) on each subject ranch. These images it Strategic Rest, rather were obtained from a high-resolution camera than strategic grazing”. on a boom, linked to a laptop, mounted on The subject ranches a four-wheeler. Photo sites were selected to provide 3–12-month capture the full range of variability in cover recovery periods, running variation on each ranch. Back in the lab, ORC’s 1–3 herds through Eric Sant used the GBVP’s and self-learning 10–30 pastures per herd software to ‘train’ the computer to interpret cover each year. They plan characteristics on 0.5-m2 Pleaides satellite relatively short (< 15 day) imagery in sync with the GBVP’s. Once the grazing periods during GBVP images and Pleiades imagery were in the growing season, and agreement, ORC used image classification vary pasture season of software to develop continuous cover maps use through Tom Sidwell, Gregg Simonds, Eric Sant and the time. As a “Camera on a stick”.taking GBVP’s at the JX Ranch. result, pastures Ranch 3 Fence Line Comparison are grazed ≤ focus. First, both the subject ranches must be 10% and recovering from grazing for in the livestock grazing business. Second, we ≥ 90% of the calendar year. selected only ranches managed with Holistic Since effective precipitation varies Management principles (like SGM) for ten or significantly from year to year, and more years. Third, we chose ranches who drought is always a possibility, subject began using Holistic Management grazing ranches base next year’s stocking principles after 1972 (when Landsat satellite rate on this year’s estimated fall imagery first became available). Finally, forage resources. Stocking rates of we excluded any ranches that had dense, the subject ranches and neighboring widespread juniper cover, often a tough ranches vary from year to year with competitor with herbaceous plants and a precipitation and forage availability. potentially confounding effect on cover values.

In years of poor precipitation and Four of the ranches met the criteria (the forage production subject ranches AM, CS, JX and JT ranches). Field work was and neighboring ranches may reduce More Bare Ground conducted by ORC in September of 2015, stocking rate—sometimes to zero Equal Bare Ground 3–8% Less Bare Ground following a very wet growing season (150% in pastures dependent on rainfall 9–13% Less Bare Ground of average precipitation). Due to the good for stock water. Information gained > 14% Bare Ground Pastures moisture, forage production on the subject from ranch records, interviews and ranches and adjacent lands was also above consultants suggests maximum average and sorely needed—this country stocking rates of the subject ranches Fig. 2 showing differences in bare ground around had just experienced several years of severe and neighboring ranches over the JX Ranch8. drought. The ranches ranged in size from past decade were in the 40–60 acres/ (Figures adapted from Danvir et al. 2018) 7,000–70,000 acres, and were scattered across AU range. The JX Ranch is currently 6 IN PRACTICE

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for the entirety of each subject ranch and immediately adjacent lands using the Pleiades imagery. Eric insures the accuracy of the model, calculating coefficients of determination (R2) “by withholding 20% of the GBVP images from the model and then testing the prediction of the 0.5m imagery on the withheld images8”.

Correlations were improved by combining herbaceous and litter into a single cover attribute, providing estimates of bare ground, herbaceous/litter and shrub/tree cover for each entire ranch.

Since two of the ranches also had streams and riparian habitat, ORC used satellite imagery to determine the amount of each potential riparian area (PRA) along the streams containing riparian vegetation. In addition, they correlated the Pleaides imagery with Landsat satellite imagery (which are available every year since 1972) to compare riparian cover through time, on both the subject ranches and on neighboring stream ‘reaches’.

Comparing Upland Bare Ground

We focused on percent bare ground to compare upland range condition, as bare ground is believed to reflect management over many years9. Gregg and Eric then devised a way to compare grazing management effects on upland bare ground values. Using the continuous cover maps, they compared bare ground on 100-meter-wide strips on either side of the ranch boundary fence, completely around each ranch. Within these strips, they compared bare ground values on soil polygons of the same

Figure 4 shows Cimarron NM precipitation for the same years8.

(Figures adapted from Danvir et al. 2018)

soil types, on each side of the fence (Fig. 1).

Since these adjacent polygons were of identical soil types, and received virtually identical weather, any difference in bare ground was attributed to management.

As might be expected, bare ground values varied with soil type and ranch geographic location. Sometimes bare ground was less on the SGM side of the fence and sometimes less on the paired CS or rested polygons across the fence. However, the data indicated that on each ranch bare ground averaged less on the SGM subject ranches than on adjacent, neighboring pastures (Fig. 2).

The data from all four ranches was then

pooled together, and assessed using a statistical test that accounted for soil type and ranch.

This analysis indicated the SGM polygons had significantly less bare ground (13% less) than the paired CS or rested polygons across the fence, supporting the idea the differences were due to management. Since we knew the grazing history of JX Ranch and its adjoining pastures, we were able to separately compare the JX Ranch SGM polygons with polygons in neighboring pastures 1) grazed continuously or season-long, or 2) rested three or more years.

The JX had significantly less bare ground (27% less) than the adjoining grazed pastures.

Surprisingly, bare ground was also less (9%) than on the adjoining pastures rested three or more years8.

Riparian Comparison

Figure 3 comparing SGM and CS riparian vegetative cover, 1984–2015.

We also compared the difference in riparian vegetation on adjacent stream reaches onand-off the AM and CS ranches. Using Landsat data, we went back in time, comparing riparian vegetation differences on SGM ‘reaches’ (a length of stream) with paired CS reaches 1984–2015. Over this time period, riparian vegetation averaged significantly greater (19% greater) on SGM stream reaches than on paired CS reaches. Riparian vegetation was similar on both SGM and CS reaches in 1984 (before SGM began). However, after 1990 (after SGM began) riparian vegetation is consistently greater on SGM than CS reaches8.

The riparian trend data highlights the driving influence of weather on riparian condition (compare Figures 3 and 4). Although riparian cover is consistently higher on the SGM ranches, 1990–2015, vegetative cover (on CONTINUED ON PAGE 8

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SGM and CS) increases in wet years and decreases in dry years. Riparian vegetation doubled in wet years compared to dry years.

Interestingly, riparian cover values are similar on SGM and CS in the wettest and driest years, suggesting it’s tough to maintain riparian vegetation in drought under any management, and that riparian areas can rapidly revegetate given enough moisture under various management styles.

Soil Carbon and Water Infiltration Data from an unpublished, on-going pilot study on the JX Ranch by ORC suggests that soil carbon levels on paired soil polygons mirror the bare ground differences observed under SGM, CS and rest. Soil carbon in the upper 8 inches of the soil under SGM was significantly greater than on paired CS grazed plots across the fence, and was slightly greater than on paired plots rested for 3 or more years. Initial trials suggest water infiltration rates are also greater under SGM than under either CS or multi-year rest.

What We Learned

First, the results support the belief that SGM practices can improve a land manager’s ability to reduce upland bare ground and increase riparian herbaceous cover on rangelands. The SGM ranches had less bare ground and higher riparian cover than more traditionally managed lands. Of equal importance, we found little difference in bare ground between pastures receiving multi-year rest and SGM pastures, suggesting that periodic grazing, alternated with appropriate and effective recovery periods (strategic rest), is comparable to multi-year rest.

Our data suggests ranchers can achieve bare ground values as good or better than multi-year rest, while generating livestock grazing revenue to fund themselves and their stewardship.

This is not the first study suggesting land cover values can be improved using rotational grazing and ‘strategic rest’ 1,2,3,4. The flexibility offered by rotational grazing can also be used to defer pastures to build fuel for controlled burns1 and to achieve wildlife habitat goals5,6 such as spring nesting cover in key areas for grassland birds.

What about experience and planning? The influence of planning, experience and wisdom are difficult to quantify. Certainly, knowing when and how to apply rest and grazing practices, gained from years of experience, undoubtedly impacts the economic and ecological conditions 8 IN PRACTICE

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at the end of the day. Management success (regardless of management style) likely depends as much on learning, practice and skillful application as on the practices employed.

Riparian cover in both SGM and CS reaches (1984–2015) changed significantly with precipitation, and were similar at precipitation extremes (Fig. 3). Managers must consider how precipitation affects cover values, and the length of time over which these fluctuations occur, to properly judge the effectiveness of management activities on range and habitat condition. For example, our comparison of riparian vegetation between management systems would tell a different story at different points in time. If compared during a period of average rainfall, SGM ranches had much more riparian cover than paired CS reaches. In wet or drought cycles, there was less difference in cover between management types. This illustrates a limitation of shorter-term research projects— depending on which two-five-year period was studied could result in very different conclusions.

Cost Benefit Analysis

Are the benefits of SGM worth additional management complexity and infrastructure?

The ranchers we worked with believe it was.

Sure, the change was hard, requiring water development, additional fencing, in some cases brush control, and a lot of planning. The upside is that bare ground declined while cover, forage, beef production and habitat improved. Tom Sidwell explained that the resultant higher forage production, higher average stocking rate and more calves to sell—plus planning for drought and innovative marketing—means ranch revenue is better and more dependable than ever. Equally important, the increased cover and soil carbon initiated a positive cascade—capturing more water, reducing runoff, increasing forage production and lengthening the ‘green’ period—good for livestock, wildlife and the bottom line.

Rick Danvir is a Wildlife and Range advisor to the Western Landowners Alliance and can be reached at basinwlc@gmail.com.

Gregg Simonds (greggesimonds@gmail.com) and Eric Sant (eric@openrangeconsulting. com) work at Open Range Consulting.

References

1. Teague W.R., S.L. Dowhower, R.J. Ansley, W.E. Pinchak, J.A. Waggoner. 2010.

Integrated grazing and prescribed fire

restoration strategies in a mesquite savanna: I. vegetation responses. Rangeland Ecology & Management, 63:275-285.

2. Jacobo E.J., A.M. Rodríguez, N. Bartoloni, V.A. Deregibus. 2006. Rotational grazing effects on rangeland vegetation at a farm scale. Rangeland Ecology & Management, 59:249-257.

3. Sant, E.D., G.E. Simonds, D. R. Ramsey and R. T. Larsen. 2014. Assessment of sagebrush cover using remote sensing at multiple spatial and temporal scales. Ecological Indicators 43:297-305.

4. Swenson, S., S. Wyman and C. Evans. 2015.

Practical grazing management to maintain or restore riparian functions and values on rangelands. J. Rangelands Applications, Vol. 2.

5. Krausman, P. R., D. E. Naugle, M. R. Frisina, R. Northrup, V. C. Bleich, W. M. Block, M. C. Wallace and J. D. Wright. 2009. Livestock grazing, wildlife habitat, and rangeland values. Rangelands 31:15-19.

6. Hagen, C.A., D.C. Pavlacky, Jr., K. Adachi, F.E. Hornsby, T. J. Rintz, and L.L. McDonald. 2016. Multiscale occupancy modeling provides insights into range-wide conservation needs of Lesser Prairie-Chicken (Tympanuchus pallidicinctus). The Condor 118:597–612.

7. Natural Resource Conservation Service.

2016. Grazing Management and Soil Health - NRCS - USDA. https://www.nrcs. usda.gov/wps/PA_NRCSConsumption/ download?cid=nrcseprd621806&ext=pdf.

Accessed Dec 28, 2017.

8. Danvir, R., G. Simonds, E. Sant, E. Thacker, R. Larsen, T. Svejcar, D. Ramsey, F. Provenza and C. Boyd. 2018. Upland bare ground and riparian vegetative cover under strategic grazing management, continuous stocking and multi-year rest in New Mexico mid-grass prairie. Rangelands. Vol. 40: in press.

9. Weber, K.T., Alados, C.L., Bueno, C.G., Gokhale, B., Komac, B. and Pueyo, Y. 2009.

Modeling bare ground with classification trees in Northern Spain. Rangeland Ecol. Manage.

62:452–459.

LIVESTOCK Parker Pastures—

&

Developing a Profitable Product Mix

BY HEATHER SMITH THOMAS

K

customers and just tried to keep them and build our internet business. We now sell most of our meat on line through our website Parkerpastures.com and this has become an important part of our marketing.”

With a combination of doing the farmers’ markets early on, getting their name out there, and the internet site and word of mouth references, they sell all the meat they produce each year. “We are trying to produce a well-marbled, nicely finished grass-fed beef. We have Devon genetics in all of our calves; we’ve been using Devon bulls for the past 4 years. We really like their marbling ability and the product that comes from them just off grass,” says Parker.

They also offer some Devon seedstock to cattle producers. “We sold some heifers last year, as our first sale of seedstock, and that’s something we are looking toward in the future.” These cattle are very efficient for finishing on grass.

elli and Bill Parker both grew up in Gunnison, Colorado and went away for school, then worked at different places. “The last place we worked was for Duke Phillips on the Chico Basin Ranch. We managed that for a few years and then decided we were ready to move back to the place we both loved, to raise our family. We started leasing land near Gunnison.

Everything we run cattle on is all leased land,” says Bill. This focus on running a grass-based business on leased land has proven to be the right focus for Bill and Kelli.

“We have been running our own business now for 10 years. We have Grazing Irrigated Land a small herd of 100 cows, plus we do While all of their grazing is on a lot of custom grazing in the summer. private leased land they also lease We became certified organic last year a large tract owned by the city. “Our with all of our pastures. This year we headquarters operation we lease from ran some certified organic steers all the city of Gunnison. The city bought The Parkers’ children each have a role in the business summer and were paid to put gain on this property because they wanted operation as they learn how to be good business operators them. We also custom graze some to preserve the town’s aquifer, and and land stewards. commodity cows during the summer,” flood irrigation was instrumental in he says. that. This ranch borders the town on one side and the Gunnison River is “Our other main business is selling grass-fed beef and lamb. We do our other border. Since water is the top priority of the city, they wanted to mostly direct marketing and sell quarters, halves and wholes, selling see it irrigated. When we initially leased it, they wanted it to be a haying locally in Gunnison and across the Western Slope. We also take a growing operation, with no livestock. We were able to convince them that cattle amount of meat over to the front range to Denver and Colorado Springs. were beneficial for this program. We have been grazing it, and there’s a Locally we also do a meat CSA and have a lot of customers who get recreational trail through the middle of the ranch,” says Parker. monthly bags of meat,” he says.

Many people go through the ranch on this trail, and see what a ranch In the early stages of their meat business they mainly did farmers’ is like. “Sometimes having a lot of people go through can be a balancing markets and their products were very diverse. “We were doing a raw act, but it’s worked fairly well and I think the city is happy with what we are dairy herd share program, pastured chickens, pastured eggs, pastured doing. We really like this ranch and it’s our one public land lease,” he says. pork, grass-fed lamb and grass-fed beef. We eventually realized it was “We mostly operate on irrigated land, though we have a few range very difficult to keep all of that going. We recognized that a lot of those pastures. On the irrigated pastures we get multiple grazings per season, enterprises weren’t very profitable so we focused on the things we loved whereas most of our neighbors have hay ground and might graze it a little that were profitable—narrowing it down to beef and lamb. We focused on in early spring and then grow it up for hay and only graze the aftermath the grass-based enterprises instead of the ones we needed to buy grain again in the fall. By contrast we are getting 3 or 4 good grazings during the for. This made it much simpler, and that’s been a big help,” Parker says. growing season, and we are increasing production at the same time. This “We did quite a few years of farmers’ markets, selling all those is quite contrary to the paradigm here because most irrigated fields are products. When we simplified our operation we simplified the marketing hayfields; people think that the only profitable thing you can do is make as well. Through all the years of farmers’ markets we gained a lot of local CONTINUED ON PAGE 10 N um ber 178

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hay on that kind of land.” Most people don’t feel it can be profitable to graze irrigated fields.

Yet if grazed properly, a person can make more money grazing irrigated land than haying it. “This is what we are finding. We feel we are getting much more production by grazing it, letting the pasture recover and then graze it again. For us it’s much more economical,” he says. The soil health and plant productivity can be improved with cattle, and there’s no expense for haying equipment, fuel, etc. and you don’t have to worry about being dependent on the weather for harvest conditions.

The grazing returns nutrients to the soil, rather than removing them with the hay. “For instance, with this city ranch, we have definitely increased the organic matter and production has almost doubled. On another lease that we’ve had the whole time since we started, we have tripled the production,” he explains.

“We feel like we are moving in the right direction. We would eventually like to buy something, but we also find that leasing is most feasible for this higher-valued land. We are happy leasing it, though we don’t have many long-term lease contracts. We’ve been on the same lands for 7 to 9 years, however, so it’s been pretty stable.” The results from the grazing have probably been beneficial enough to encourage landlords to keep renewing the leases. Sometimes the owners can see and understand the benefits, while others don’t seem to care.

Selling Landscape Services

The Parker family’s mission is to manage landscapes to improve habitat and beauty while creating an agricultural return on the land. Their purpose is to offer landowners an experienced turn-key land management service that promotes beautiful, thriving landscapes and a profitable business through improved land productivity. “We are trained to use livestock to increase soil fertility, cycle nutrients, build organic matter in the soil, and increase the water holding capacity of the soil,” says Bill.

Values in this enterprise include striving for absolute honesty and integrity in all of relationships. “We offer flexibility to match each landowners’ needs in the management of their land and resources. We are experienced in creating thriving ecosystems that support diverse and abundant wildlife and plant populations. We produce healthy meats while being a model for sustainable agriculture and effective land and resource management,” he explains.

Lease and partnership opportunities through their sister business Parker Land Management is another enterprise. As they note on their website: “Parker Land Management provides experienced and excellent care, maintenance and improvement of your land as an agricultural resource as well as a diverse and vibrant ecosystem for people, plants, and wildlife. A partnership with PLM creates an Cloe is in charge of the sheep operation. economic, ecological 10

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and personal benefit for landowners and their properties.”

Benefits of their pasture management include: decreased fire danger, improved water cycle and storing more water in the soil, reduced bare ground, reduced erosion, efficient use of water rights, improved The Parker family (left to right): Oliver, tax status (an agricultural Cloe, Bill, John, and Kelli. exemption that lowers the property taxes), increased wildlife and plant diversity, generate economic return on property, increased soil and plant fertility and decreased weeds without resorting to pesticides and chemical fertilizer.

Services they offer include planned grazing, custom haying, biological monitoring, maintenance of current infrastructure, and improvement of existing infrastructure. They design a flexible Grazing Plan that is specific to each property including areas of sensitivity and specific use or non-use.

They match the needs of each property by determining stocking rates that fit that property.

The grazing plan is implemented using healthy, gentle cattle trained in low-stress livestock handling and temporary electric fence. Cattle grazing utilizes short duration, high stock density to assure that healthy plants are never overgrazed and that dead standing plants are recycled into the soil.

Having the reduced property taxes (based on agricultural use of the land rather than recreational values) is one of the biggest driving forces for many landlords to lease out their land for grazing. “Those owners want the agricultural status, and their land is being improved in the process,” says Parker.

Working with Water Politics

With water being such a critical issue in the West, the Parkers find themselves in the middle of some interesting conundrums. “We are a high mountain valley on the Western Slope with a lot of water running through, but our river basin has major shortages. A lot of work is being done by various organizations to increase irrigation efficiency, such as Trout Unlimited and city water boards. The biggest message that we are trying to get out there and prove, and actually document, is that if we improve the health of the land, the organic matter in the soil and its water-holding capacity we can actually produce more with less water. This seems counter-intuitive to most people, but we’ve been demonstrating it,” Bill says.

“This is also a touchy thing with the land owners, due to water rights.

For example our headquarters ranch’s primary purpose is to recharge the town’s aquifer, so they want us to run as much water over the land as we can. We could potentially do as much or more with less water, but sometimes they don’t want us to use less water. Generally we would like to be on a trend of using less water and producing more, but in this instance we have certain constraints,” he explains.

Healthy land, with not as much run-off, can hold back and store more water. It doesn’t all run off in the spring or during heavy rain to run off downstream. The moisture can last much longer in the soil. “Today there are more programs for ranchers who have extra water that they are not using; they can lease out that water. I am excited about the water market that is developing. I think we will see a lot of innovation on storing/saving/

producing water in the coming years. I think more people are learning that through good grazing management we can use less water and send more downstream,” says Bill.

Educating Other People

When Bill was growing up, he learned about Holistic Management from his uncle. “My uncle Jim Parker was on the board of HMI for a long time and just retired recently. He was my inspiration. My dad had a ranch when I was very young, but lost it in the 1980s during those hard times, so I went to work for my Uncle Jim. He was an early starter in Holistic Management and I worked for him when I was 16 to 18 years old, and I was able to see Holistic Management and how it transformed his land.

This was a good early education and inspired me to want to do this for my livelihood,” says Bill. “My uncle is still a big part of our family as my advisor and a part of our operation. I give a lot of credit to him as my mentor. I hope I can do that for other people, as well.”

That education begins at home with the Parkers’ children. Bill and Kelli have a 13-year-old daughter Cloe, and two sons. John is 10 and Oliver is 9 years old. “Cloe owns half of the sheep so that’s her enterprise.

She and I work together on the sheep,” says Bill.

John raises chickens for eggs and meat. At this point he raises them just for the family, but he may eventually expand that enterprise. He really enjoys the chickens and wants to get bigger and start selling some. Oliver has ducks and geese for eggs and meat. Right now he raises them just for the family, but in the future he may want to expand. All three children enjoy being part of the business.

But Bill and Kelli are also involved in educating other young people interested in working landscapes. “We are becoming more involved with Western State Colorado University here in Gunnison,” says Bill. “They offer a master’s degree in environmental management as one of their programs. There are many students today who want to do something in environmental management. More and more of these students seem to be discovering Holistic Management and the fact that animals can improve the environment.” This is a step forward, since many young people entering environmental careers have gotten the wrong message and feel that grazing animals are harmful for the environment.

“It is important for us to do what we can locally, to show these students that managing animals correctly can improve the landscape. They are interested and want to get involved, so I see a trend of more young people wanting to become involved in agriculture. This is a very positive thing,” he says. “We show them what we are doing. We offered an internship a while ago and gave it up, but this coming summer we are looking to start that up again. We are beginning to connect with students who are really interested.”

Finding NEW Ground

The Parkers are able to earn more money from grazing their irrigated pastures than haying them.

Bill does some land and grazing consulting as part of the Parkers’ educational goals. “Our valley has high-end land prices so a lot of the people who buy the land want to preserve it and do the right thing. We try to be available to help them choose Holistic Management to manage their ranch,” he says “Along with taking the intensive HMI Ranch and Rangeland Manager program offered in the past, we have gone through the Ranching for Profit school and are part of their Executive Link (EL) program,” says Bill. “We find these two programs extremely complimentary, and both of them have been crucial to our success. Through the EL we have met a lot of people, and recently have gotten some consulting jobs through that avenue, as well. Sometimes landowners get into ranching as a way to preserve money, and then after they own the land they learn about things like managing holistically. We try to help implement that, if we can.”

Holistic Management has made all the difference for their own family operation. “Learning more, and knowing what is significant has been a big asset for us. Being able to approach things in a holistic perspective has given us the ability to raise a family in agriculture even though we don’t own any land. It always gives us hope, because we know that we can improve the land, and that we can provide more opportunity for everyone.

It helps us know that we are going in the right direction, and enables us to see all the different angles and options to manage. It has been the cornerstone for doing what we are doing.” With a passion for healthy working landscapes, the Parkers have developed a profitable enterprise mix that allows them to make a living doing work that they love while helping others create healthy land and abundant water in the West.

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offered by the “other.” Consensus is a 100% agreement to do the “right thing,” which is defined by the parties involved.

The work that I have learned to do allows humans to explore the notion of “AND Logic,” rather than “EITHER/OR.” “AND Logic” is exploring what we can do to do what I want AND what you want. “EITHER/OR” only focuses on the capability of doing this or that, because we only have so many resources, or are limited in our thinking, or don’t have enough information, or… But, “AND Logic” is very much what a holistic context or goal creates, the ability to engage social/cultural, economic, and ecologic values simultaneously.

This is the work of finding new ground. When people achieve this level

of outcome, they are ecstatic. And to do this, they will have developed much deeper connections as humans, a much deeper sense of friendship, safety and respect. These outcomes are some of what drives me to do this work. I often meet people at their worst, in conflict, and leave them living their best outcomes and being at their best. We are all capable of doing this transformation change in life. To do this is also relatively simple, though often not easy.

To learn about the Consensus Institute visit www. consensusinstitute.com or contact Jeff at: goebel@aboutlistening.com.

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Lazy A Ranch—

From Feedlot to Grassfed, From the Classroom to the Field

BY HEATHER SMITH THOMAS

T

he Heard family raises grassfed beef and hosts outdoor grassfed. They are English cattle and their history appealed to us because education on their Lazy A Ranch, located in Austin County, they were the original wild cattle of the forests in England. They were at Texas between Bellville and Hempstead. Their journey into one time reserved for the English royalty and aristocracy, and enclosed in grassfed beef and direct marketing has been in stark contrast parks,” says Margot. to the way Margot Heard’s father raised and sold beef, and the outdoor “I did a lot of reading about their history and didn’t find a education they offer provides a missing component to many standard comprehensive history that included all the things that I thought were education curriculums. interesting about these cattle, so I worked on that and wrote a history of Margot grew up in Laredo, Texas where her father had a farm and the breed, which can be found on our website, which is www.lazyatexas. became involved in ranching. “He designed the first commercial feedlot in com. After doing this research I bought an eight-month-old British White Texas, in the 1950s. Finishing cattle in a feedlot is the opposite of what we bull to breed to my Santa Gertrudis cows. I bought a couple of British are doing today. Feedlots were the innovation then. Finishing cattle more White cows and a young heifer that first year, then the next year I had little quickly on formulated feed was innovative at British White babies all over the place. This was that time, and his feedlot was written up in The a good cross, and this is how we got started in Cattleman magazine,” she says.

British White cattle,” she explains.

“As a child, I was always interested in the The ranch began marketing the beef as outdoors, but after I grew up my life took other grassfed, Texas inspected, with the Lazy A directions. I loved animals, however, though Ranch label. “We don’t have a USDA inspector my career has been education—as a teacher, here, but my husband talked with someone who principal and school founder. Then my husband was a USDA inspector who taught at Texas Bill and I reached a point in our lives where we A&M (at Corpus Christi). He had a circuit he could get a place in the country, and by then the traveled and would be available to look at our school we had founded had developed to the meat from time to time. We were told we had stage that I didn’t have to be there every day.” basically Choice grade quality meat. I wanted it This gave her more time to pursue her desire to to be even better, however, and had read about work with the land and livestock. the various Wagyu cattle breeds,” says Margot.

“We bought this ranch and moved out She decided to add some of these genetics here—with our three rescue cats and a golden to the herd, and chose the red Akaushi breed— retriever—nine years ago. We’d been living the only Wagyu that is red. “The color is not the at Lamar Tower, a high-rise condominium in most important thing, but this one just seemed Houston, so this was a big change. We wanted to be the breed of Wagyu that had the most to have a place in the country for our family and balanced traits. Some of the Wagyu lines don’t for the school children to enjoy,” says Margot. have much milk, for example. I thought the Margot Heard went back to her true love of Bill was a retired Episcopal priest and active in Akaushi was the best choice for us, so I got my ranching after a career as an educator. the school and ranch operations. In June 2017 first Akaushi bull purchased from the Chisholm he passed away.

Cattle Company” she says.

The Lazy A was originally owned and developed by Allen (Buddy) “When my first F1 Akaushi crossbreds were ready to breed, I bought and Ethel Carruth and their family, beginning in the 1950’s. The former another Akaushi bull from the Heartbrand Ranch. In 2017 our first F2s owners raised registered Santa Gertrudis show cattle—an American were born. I am still developing our various herds. We have two herds of breed developed by the King Ranch, utilizing a blend of Shorthorn and British White, two herds of Akaushi, and we now have a second ranch, Brahman cattle. the Brazos River Ranch, located in Waller County. That ranch is where we keep the steers in the beef program and two herds of Brangus cattle (a Developing Grassfed Genetics breed combining Angus and Brahman) that I am breeding to British White “I didn’t envision getting into the cattle business so quickly when we bulls. We don’t want meat that is more than 20% Brahman,” she explains. moved out here, but there were still twenty-two Santa Gertrudis cattle on The British White adds meat quality and the cattle have a lot of hybrid the ranch. They were pretty, but they were older cows, leftovers from the vigor with this cross. ranch herd. I bought them just because they were here, and I wanted them “This has been my project, in my plan to raise excellent beef. From the to keep their home. These cattle are very protective of their calves, and a Santa Gertrudis we were getting a lot of crossbred British White calves. I little aggressive; so we had to learn how to handle them,” says Margot. took the 50% and 75% British White females to create the herd to breed to She realized she wanted to raise a different type of cattle and began the Akaushi bulls, and also have my pedigreed British Whites in a different researching cattle breeds. “At that point I knew that we wanted grassfed herd,” she says. The genetic plan has been working out very well. cattle, managed and handled in a caring way. That was the only way we “The Santa Gertrudis crosses show the color dominance of the British would raise cattle. I looked at various grassfed breeds and decided that White. The first year, I didn’t know what to expect. The first 12 calves the British White would be the best breed for us. They are found all over that arrived (out of the Santa Gertrudis cows that were bred to the British the world and adapt very well to different climates and are traditionally White) you would have thought were purebred British White, but number

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13 was a red-faced baby. My Brangus-British White cross babies are black and white marked in different patterns, which is quite different. The different influence is Shorthorn (in the Santa Gertrudis) versus Angus (in the Brangus cattle),” she says.

“Our animals are very tame, moved gently, and live on grassy pasture their entire lives. In addition to pasture grass, our cows eat baled hay grown on our ranch, alfalfa from Nebraska, and an IGR mineral molasses tub. They are also given a free-choice supplement with vitamins, minerals, kelp, alfalfa meal, and diatomaceous earth. They get a sea salt block with minerals.”

The ranch is a member of the British White Cattle Association of America, the American Wagyu Association, The Texas Wagyu Association, and the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association. The ranch is certified by American Grassfed Association and the Animal Welfare Approved organization. “This means our standards have been verified by an independent auditor.” says Margot.

Growing Productive Rangeland

Early on in their cattle venture, the ranch became certified American Grassfed and Animal Welfare Approved. “We wanted to learn how to take care of the land in a better way, and support grassfed production.

Creating Differentiated Products I’ve been to a number of conferences and found someone who is in the “Our main interest and business is selling grassfed beef, though we business of making soil amendments and organic fertilizer, compost tea, also sell some breeding stock, mainly British White. There is a growing etc. For several years she came here to test our soils, mix up what it interest in this breed in our area. These cattle are tame, and safe to needed, and come apply it to the land.” The ranch pastures have been work with,” says Margot. The finishing process for the beef is begun treated by Sustainable Growth Texas, LLC (Betsy Ross), with liquid after weaning, when alfalfa and hay bales are placed in the pastures. compost extract and natural organic liquid fertilizer that stimulates soil The weaned calves are weighed monthly, and after 28 months they are biological activity and adds nutrients as needed to build the soil, plants, weighed weekly. and animals.

“Typically, our beef will be 30-32 months old and weigh 1,300-1,400 The cattle are grassfed and naturally grown without hormones, pounds for a heavier, more marbled and flavorful beef carcass. As long as antibiotics, or grain. “We give the cattle a supplement that we mix up, and the animals are gaining they are allowed to keep developing. Then they it gets back to the soil that way,” says Margot. This supplement includes are individually selected as they reach full growth and desired heaviness, kelp, diatomaceous earth, vitamins, minerals, probiotics, and enzymes. and processed by Smithville Food Lockers, which is Animal Welfare “We understand the value of planned grazing and letting the cattle Approved. The beef is dry aged for 21 days and shrink-wrapped for the improve the pasture and the soil. We move the cattle on an average of freezer. We take custom orders,” says Margot. every two weeks. As we become more able to do it, we want to divide our The Lazy A Ranch is located about one hour from Houston. Beef may pastures more. We’ve been doing some of that, and want to keep working be picked up at the ranch, or at the school in Houston, or shipped frozen on that—using more pastures and moving them more frequently. We’ve overnight in Texas. “We have our website set up so customers can buy been here nine years and are seeing improvements,” she says. beef on our website. It tells how we price it. They can order the British Most people use herbicides and chemicals to try to improve their White beef, or the Akaushi beef. It tells what we have in stock, and what pastures, but it’s healthier to do it in a more natural way. “It’s better for the price is. A lot of the beef is sold online but some is sold to restaurants. the ecosystem, but you have to keep cutting the weeds down and adding After a person orders their beef and pays for it, they can pick it up. The price what is needed in the soil. I’m not an expert by any means but this is a for our British White beef is based on $4 per pound hanging weight, plus work in progress and we have very happy cows. I just call them and they processing expenses. The Akaushi beef costs a little more,” she explains. come. They are very easy to handle and move. When they think it’s time to move, they go line up at the gate!”

Margot and Bill learned about Holistic Management from going to conferences to learn and implement what they could. “Our family communicates and has common goals and a succession plan. We share decisions, and work together at the Farmer’s Market in Bellville and in filling orders. Our daughter Elizabeth is Head Teacher of our school but comes out to the ranch some weekends to help us. Our son Tom is more involved with the ranch; he designed and manages the website, helps with the meat inventory and packing. He is also involved in taking our products to the local farmer’s market, and wants to start giving out sample meat balls,” says Margot.

“Our children are involved in new ideas, and it is a team effort. It has to be, because I can’t do it all. Our daughter Terry, and son-in-law Jeffery, live here on the ranch, so they are involved with the ranch on a daily basis with daily chores of care and feeding. Jeffery packs the meat into the freezer for the Farmer’s Market, and works on keeping the The Lazy A Ranch crosses their British White cows with red Akaushi (Waygu) bulls for freezer organized. Our other daughter Anne, and their grassfed beef program.

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husband Jeff, who have three boys and live in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, love the ranch and come whenever they can be out of school. We have been influenced by Holistic Management and want our kids to buy into this ranch so that it will continue. All of our business planning and succession planning has been based on having the children take this over,” Margot says. The ranch has become the hub for the family, and if there is a hurricane, they all come here. It’s the family gathering place.

A permaculture design plan for the Lazy A Ranch was completed by Holistic Management Certified Educator Owen Hablutzel in 2012. This is an integration of permaculture design, Keyline design, and Holistic Management Planning frameworks. Principles from Resilience Science are included, addressing things like climate and context, land shape, water, access, trees, structures, land components, fencing, and soils.

Continuing improvements follow this plan. Native grasses and wildflowers are being re-established in the pastures and meadows. Quail and doves have been introduced into the improving natural habitat.

The pasture grazing plan is developed using the Holistic Grazing Planning process, and the Keyline plow is used for pasture improvement and retention of water. The cattle are raised according to American Grassfed Association standards. Round bale hay is offered in feeding racks in the pastures if needed, but the cows prefer grasses and browse.

“The calves receive vaccinations recommended by our veterinarian.

The male calves not kept as bulls are castrated by the veterinarian with local anesthetic at an early age,” says Margot. Parasites are controlled

chicken house. The compost is produced in three large concrete bins and used in the gardens. Recycled and salvaged materials are used when available and green construction practices are followed. Bio-digester sewage systems are used and plastic, glass, and paper are recycled. On the ranch no herbicides, pesticides, or chemical fertilizers are used and cattle and wildlife are managed to be mutually beneficial.

Kids and Community

Lazy A Ranch also tries to benefit local people and the ecosystem. The ranch employs local people and supports local businesses. A protected environment is provided for extensive wildlife including birds, deer, bobcats, and cougar.

Alternative energy use includes some solar and wind technology. There is a backup generator at the main house and five wood burning fireplaces that can be used for heating. The ranch is wired for electricity, propane is stored in tanks at each house, and water is pumped from five water wells.

The ranch garden (fertilized by compost) grows organic vegetables, herbs, and flowers in raised beds along with grain and greens for the poultry. The raised beds have greenhouse tenting for year-round production and drip irrigation. Fruit trees and bushes are also being developed. Bees are kept for pollination, honey is bottled raw, and the beeswax produces candles, soap, and other products. Hummingbird and butterfly gardens provide special necessary pollinator plants. Grassfed beef and vegetables as available are also sent to the Saint Nicholas School kitchen in Houston.

The Outdoor Education company operates the ranch. “We named it this because we wanted children to come out here to learn.

Children from our own school come with their teacher. We talk to the children about whatever is happening on the ranch that day with the land and animals. We discuss how we benefit the land, plants and animals.” Through this curriculum the children learn about interaction between the animals and the land, the cycles of nature, wildlife habitat, etc.

“They see the animals, and babies being born. We also have hens as well as cattle, so they see the eggs and chicks. This is a great resource for our school.” Groups of any age may come to the ranch to participate in the day’s activities. Teachers can plan the ranch tour according to their curriculum needs.

Some of the activities may include learning more about ponds, floating island wetlands, fishing, plants, animals, wildlife, forest, creek, Outdoor education is one of the offerings on hand at the Lazy A Ranch. gardening, and composting. Building shelter, with diatomaceous earth and with tiny fly predator wasps that hatch and woodworking, art, outdoor cooking, hiking, visiting the blacksmith, archery eat fly larvae in manure. The cattle are sprayed with an organic insect and games are other activities available. deterrent with natural oils, and have access to an all-natural molasses tub For the Lazy A Ranch education is a key value. Whether providing supplement containing insect growth regulator that breaks the life cycle of outdoor education for children and adults or educating the consumer on the horn fly. the benefits of grassfed beef or educating themselves on how to improve Rain collection and well water in water troughs provide drinking water the land and their product, the Heard family has brought education into for the cattle. Ranch conservation practices include carbon farming, each aspect of their ranch. With that focus, they have adapted the ranch to which is supported with planned grazing, trees and pasture development. encourage the next generation to become involved in the family business Composting utilizes material from the gardens, houses, stable, and and take it to the next level.

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people programs projects

N E W S F R O M H O L I S T I C M A N AG E M E N T I N T E R N AT I O N A L

New BOD Members HMI is excited to announce the addition of two new board members for HMI’s Board of Directors.

Avery C. Anderson Sponholtz

Avery is the Director of Community Impact Initiatives and Vice President of Soil Health for the Globetrotter Foundation, based in Paicines, California. She has a BA from Hamilton College (2003) and a Master’s degree from the Yale University School of Forestry and Environmental Studies (2008).

Prior to joining Globetrotter’s team, she was the president of Impairative LLC, a consulting company dedicated to activating authentic relationships between the people, land and animals in our emergent food system by strategically pairing philanthropy with regenerative opportunities. Prior to Avery C. Anderson that, Avery worked for the Quivira Coalition, a non-profit in New Mexico dedicated to building resilience on Western working landscapes, as a program director from 2008 to 2012, and then as the executive director from 2012 to 2015. She has a successful history of building partnerships between diverse constituencies comprised of other non-profit leaders, businesses, philanthropists, ranchers/farmers, scientists, federal and state land management agencies, youth, and tribes. In addition, Avery has experience in fundraising, human resource management, financial planning, risk management, strategic decision-making, and facilitation.

She is a Wyss Conservation Scholar, an Audubon TogetherGreen Fellow and a recipient of the 2011 New Mexico Business Weekly’s “40 Under 40” Award. She was a founding board member of the National Young Farmers’ Coalition, and currently serves on the boards of Holistic Management International and the New Mexico Farmers’ Marketing Association, as well as the Advisory Council of the Western Landowners Alliance.

Avery is deeply honored to join the Board of HMI. With a decade of experience in working with several of HMI’s “sister” organizations, joining the Board feels like “coming home.” HMI is the undisputed leader in regenerative problem-solving and Avery feels fortunate for the opportunity to work in service to this remarkable team.

Jonathan Cobb

Jonathan is a fourth generation farmer in the Blackland Prairie near Rogers, TX. He went off to “a better future away from the farm” as the prevailing culture had taught him, where he earned a degree in business. The best part of college to Jonathan was meeting his wife, Kaylyn, with whom he moved to Fort Worth to begin their respective careers in

Jonathan Cobb

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business. However, several years later, the instinct to farm was stronger in his blood than he realized. The two decided in 2007 to move back to the family farm where Jonathan would work with his father until a future transition of ownership could occur.

The family farm had taken the shape of most in the industrial era.

It had become an efficient machine, void of diversity and at risk to many forces beyond the reach of the family. In addition to a growing unrest and disconnect between their farming methods and their belief that God created the earth for them to steward well, the combination of increasing input costs, low product prices, and increasingly extreme weather-related crop failures had taken the shine off the dreams to continue the family farm. Despite the difficultly of the realization that the family farm would end with his father, Jonathan made the decision to leave the farm in mid-2011.

It was a last minute decision to attend a meeting about soil health that changed the trajectory of Jonathan’s life and would lead to an introduction to many of the leading practitioners of regenerative farming. The common thread among the leaders Jonathan met was Holistic Management.

The decision to stay on the farm and learn to manage it holistically was made in late 2011. Since then, Jonathan and his family have been on an amazing journey of learning and discovery. The farm is now home to Jonathan’s parents, his sister’s family, Kaylyn’s parents along with Kaylyn and Jonathan. The family manages multiple enterprises of grass-finished beef, a cow/calf herd, grass-finished lamb, breeding ewes, pastured pork, and pastured eggs.

Jonathan also works as a soil health consultant and works with Green Cover Seed as a cover crop consultant for Texas and the southeastern U.S. He currently serves on the board of directors for The Grassfed Exchange.

“HMI played a very important role in the direction of my life personally and also our family farm. Because of the gratitude I have for the organization’s role in our lives and the global impact HMI has and has potential to have in the future, I felt a deep sense of honor and duty to accept the invitation to serve HMI as a member of the Board of Directors,” says Jonathan.

Welcome, Avery and Jonathan!

Proposed Changes to the Holistic Management Framework

HMI aims to be a practitioner-focused organization. Within and outside the organization there are clearly many opinions on what the framework can and should be. There is also the temptation to follow affiliated organizations to remove differences and reduce confusion in the messages that are being distributed by educators, trainers and academics. With these different ideas in mind, the HMI Framework Review committee embarked on obtaining feedback from our practitioner and Certified Educator community. HMI’s staff have also contributed to the proposed changes and have been very supportive of the process of discussing and collating the feedback into the final product.

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Overwhelmingly, there is great support for the existing Holistic Management Framework. At this point, the only change proposed is under Tools. Here “Animals and Living Organisms” have been sub-divided into “Grazing” and “Animal Impact”. The reason for this is to highlight the importance of grazing as a process, distinct from other organisms’ (large and small) impact on our environments.

We are now soliciting feedback on this proposed change with a deadline for all comments by April 15, 2018. You may provide your feedback to any member of the Framework Review Committee (listed below).

We look forward to hearing your inputs as we strive to refine the practice, and share the learning of this unique practice of Holistic Management.

HMI’s Framework Review Committee Ann Adams, Executive Director and Certified Educator, anna@holisticmanagement.org Kathy Harris, Program Director and Certified Educator, kathyh@holisticmanagement.org Julie Fierro, Education Manager julief@holisticmanagement.org Guy Glosson, HMI Board Member and Certified Educator, glosson@caprock-spur.com Sarah Williford, HMI Board Member and Educator, sarahmwilliford@gmail.com

Wayne Knight HMI Board Member and Certified Educator Chair, HMI’s Framework Review Committee wayne@theknights.za.net

Holistic Systems— Manage for Interactions

BY DANNY NUCKOLS, PhD

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s argued by the eminent systems thinker, Russel Ackoff, a system is a grouping of component parts that individually establish relationships with each other and that interact with their environment both as individuals and as a collective. A system is a whole that can be taken apart, with each part satisfying certain conditions. Each part of a system can affect its behavior or its properties.

A farm is an agricultural/biological system. No part has an independent effect on the whole; the parts interact. Furthermore, each part has the same or similar essential function, behavior, or properties of that of the whole, but none of the system’s parts have the essential (defining) function, behavior, or property of a system taken as whole.

Moreover, Ackoff goes on to claim that the way each part affects the whole depends on at least what one other part is doing. When a system is dismantled, taken apart, it loses its essential function. A system’s characteristics depends on how the parts interact, not the functioning of the individual parts. In other words, the performance of a system is not the sum of its part’s performance, but the product of their interactions. “Stop Managing Action and Start Managing Interactions,” screams Ackoff.

The problem with western science, states Ackoff, is its faith in Analysis 1) take apart 2) explain how the part works 3) reaggregate and watch the parts work together But, this does not shed light on how the parts interact/relate to each other. “Analysis” cannot yield understanding of a system because when the system is taken apart both the whole and its parts lose their essential properties. Analysis of a system tells us how the system works and how

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it is structured. The product of this sort of analysis is knowledge, not understanding. Explanations of a system lie outside of the system.

Ackoff maintains the human mind holds five kinds of content: Data = properties of objects & events Information = description (who, where, what, how many) Knowledge = instruction and “how to” Understanding = explanation or “why” Wisdom = understanding and evaluation—doing the right thing.

It is the lack of understanding of systems that is responsible for failures in land management. Wisdom helps us realize that too many times we are doing things right, but doing the wrong thing.

I recently had the privilege of reviewing Professor Estabrook’s work on Wendell Berry. Estabrook writes that Berry’s criticism of much scientific thinking is its tendency to isolate the knowledge of people, plants, places and ideas as parts rather than wholes. Standing in the tradition of John Muir, Berry reminds us that the distinctive essence of any particular thing has meaning through its connections with everything else.

Isolation is distortion. Estabrooks wisely cites Berry belief in the importance of context—the basic truth found in dictionaries: every word in our language is defined by its context; its use in that context determines which of its many definitions apply. In Berry’s view, Estabrook pens, our failure to recognize the importance of context in this way has led to many of our worst ecological disasters, to say nothing of deformations in our economic and social lives. For this reason, Holistic Management continually encourages us to understand the system and context within which we work and gain wisdom on how to interact more effectively within that system.

PROGRAM ROUNDUP 2017 Open Gate Update Lowry Range (Colorado)

HMI had a busy 2017 fall with numerous Open Gates around the country. We thank all our supporters for their support of these introductory educational programs that help people new to Holistic Management learn more the Holistic Management community.

Fifty-five participants and land trust managers gathered on October 26th at the Arapahoe County Fairgrounds Event Center in Aurora, Colorado in anticipation of a tour of Lowry Range. These participants currently influence a total of 223,810 acres of land.

The Lowry Range property is held by the School Trust and managed on behalf of the trust by the Colorado State Land Board (CSLB).

The CSLB is working with The Nature Conservancy (TNC) to meet certain conservation goals such as improved wildlife habitat for birds and balancing prairie dog conservation with a viable agricultural operation. Because of its size, location, and complexity, Nick Trainor leads tour at Lowry Range both the CSLB and Open Gate TNC believe that the operation at Lowry offers a great opportunity to show that Holistic Management can be a powerful tool for advancing a successful ranching operation that meets the requirements of ownership and that supports ecosystem and rangeland health and the conservation of many species of plants and animals.

Participants were bussed to the Lowry Range property, where participants were treated to the scenic view of the the 28,000-acre Lowry Ranch, which borders a neighborhood of upscale homes. This jumpstarted the first discussion of the day, such as how to manage a property so close to a populated area.

The group then left the windy ridge to hike to the bottom of the riparian zone where there were discussions of the changing creek bed, the past planned grazing regime, and a great view of the results. Nick Trainor, from Trainor Cattle Company emphasized how, when properly managed, cattle in a riparian area can bring big benefits.

Prior to Trainor Cattle Company being awarded the grazing lease, the land had been rested for eight years, with little to no recovery visible. But the results of the past four seasons of planned grazing are showing great improvements in the diversity of forage and ground cover.

Next, the group made a short hike to the fence line between two grazing regimes. Big bluestem patches were highly visible in both, with one having been grazed and still in need of time for full recovery, and the adjacent pasture that had not been grazed yet. A discussion followed about monitoring both and seeing which grazing regime produces better results, with participants also discussing the different monitoring methods used on the Lowry Range.

Soon, bitter cold winds forced everyone back into the buses for a return to the indoor comfort at Araphoe County Fairgrounds Event Center for lunch and afternoon presentations from William Burnidge, William Woolston, Mindy Gottsegen from the State Land Board Stewardship Trust, and Program Director and HMI Certified Educator Kathy Harris. Next HMI Certified Educator Kirk Gadzia and Nick Trainor led a lively discussion and answered questions from Land Trust managers and ranchers alike. The day ended with a Q & A session, with snow flurries in the air as participants left the event center.

Ortensi Farm (New York)

The Ortensi Farm Open Gate event took place in Richfield Springs, NY on November 11th. Participant experience ranged from beginner to experienced practitioner. A panel discussion began the day, with farm owner Berni Ortensi, farmer Elizabeth Collins, and HMI Certified Educator Sarah Williford participating. The panel participants spoke about their experience with Holistic Management, and how it’s been used on their farms and in their lives.

The panel discussion was followed by two brainstorming activities; brainstorming a list of values and a list of enterprises that interested the participants. After lunch, participants were introduced to Farm Service Agency (FSA), with an emphasis on FSA loans. Two program participants shared their experiences with the loans, and why they were beneficial for their farms.

The panel then presented enterprise budgets from their personal farmers, later doing a group enterprise budget. Afterwards, the group headed over to Ortensi Farm for a hayride tour of the farm. Owner Berni Ortensi shared her practices with the group, including that a monitoring system is built in, so they are always paying attention to what is working and what is not. Because of Holistic Management, they have a goal for their lives and their farm, and make decisions based on both quality of life and financial success. A special thanks goes out to FSA for providing funding for this program.

SpeakEasy Farm Day (New Mexico)

Thirty-five people influencing 221,506 acres, gathered at the SpeakEasy Garden in Albuquerque’s South Valley on November 14th to learn about Holistic Management and sustainable food systems.

The day began with an overview of Holistic Management by HMI Program Director Kathy Harris, followed by a brief history of the area and of SpeakEasy Gardens by owner/operator, Berenika Byszewski.

Kathy then presented on Holistic Decision Making and how it leads to building soil health and growing local community. Next, Susann Mikkelson talked about her work with the Rocky Mountain Farmers Union and the Southwest Grassfed Livestock Alliance, then introduced Nancy Ranney, of Ranney Grassfed, who spoke about their ranch NRCS agent Dan Bloedel demonstrates in Corona, NM and how tilled versus no-till/pasture soil how grassfed beef responds to moisture.

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production is helping to address climate change.

After lunch Dan Bloedel from the NRCS gave an informative presentation on water infiltration and soil types, then Kathy and Berenika led the group on a short farm tour. Anzia Bennett presented on her Three Sisters Kitchen project, James Esqueda presented on his experiences working with La Montanita Coop and how they go about engaging with local producers, Tiana Baca presented on the Desert Oasis Teaching Garden at the Albuquerque Academy, Penny Davis gave an overview of the Seed2Need program, and Tina Garcia-Shams presented on the Street Food Institute. The day ended with a brief Q & A session. Thanks to the Thornburg Foundation for their support of this program.

New Agrarian Online Program

HMI’s Online Learning Series Getting Started Introduction to Holistic Management course ran from August to October 2017 with 43 participants from the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, China and Japan. This course focused on key Holistic Management planning concepts and principles to help participants manage their farm/ranch for the triple bottom line (social, environmental, and financial sustainability) and more effectively manage resources.

Participants were excited to learn how to improve their ability to observe, understand, and make decisions based on what they can control. Through these new skills participants now have the knowledge and tools to improve their ability to work with nature and to increase productivity. Based on the survey responses, here are some of the results from the course: Knowledge/Behavior and Confidence Increase

% Increase

Your ability to develop a whole farm goal after session

100%

Your ability to identify needed systems and protocols to create a successful farm after session

98%

Ability to integrate social, economic, and environmental factors into your decisions after session

94%

Your ability to make complex on-farm or ranch decisions after session

93%

Your ability to assess ecosystem health after session

92%

Overall satisfaction with the instructor’s effectiveness

100%

Getting Started Introduction to Holistic Management Whole Farm/ Ranch Planning Course Survey Results Here’s the best things participants learned/experienced: “Overall the course was great; I loved the online nature of it because I don’t have access to this kind of training in my area. Sometimes online can feel like you’re not really part of a community—not so with this course. There was great discussion and interaction, both during the webinars and on the discussion pages and I really loved that. The instructor was also great at responding to questions.”

“The course was excellent! The instructor is extremely helpful, interesting, and knowledgeable. The material was excellent and extremely useful. I’m really looking forward to learning more from H.M.I. Thank you very, very much for this course.”

“The tools learned for making decisions was very helpful and

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something I had not been exposed to. Each week had its own benefit.”

“Learning how to set a goal and define the holistic context was extremely valuable and the act of actually going through it with my management team I feel really strengthened our team.”

“I think just being forced to stop and think about why we do things and how we do/should make decisions was really useful.”

“This is excellent material, I think the testing questions were the “aha” for us.”

“The most significant thing for us is the systematic way we learned to John and Sandy address change and expansion of VanDerWalker the business. Looking at the entire enterprise of a farm and shifting that thinking to be applicable to the retreat center we manage has been an enlightening experience for us and has helped us make decisions as well as present possibilities to the board of directors more clearly and persuasively.” John and Sandy VanDerWalker, Scott Point Poultry/Managers Samish Island Campground–Community of Christ. —John and Sandy VanDerWalker

Financial Planning

HMI’s Online Learning Series Getting Started Holistic Financial Planning course ran from October to November 2017 with 31 participants from The United States, Iceland, Canada, Mexico, and Portugal. This course focused on key financial principles that helped participants learn how to work on their business, not just in their business. This simple approach to financial planning assisted participants to understand the big picture view as well as make critical production decisions based on a clear sense of cost of production for different enterprises. Participants were able to develop a financial plan and identify ways to implement and monitor that plan. The participants were very excited to learn the key economic analysis tools for improved financial decisions for both annual budgets and for longterm investment.

Knowledge/Behavior and Confidence Increase

% Increase

Determining the weak link in your farm’s/ranch’s enterprises

100%

Identifying log jam and adverse factors

100%

Determining viable profitable enterprises for your farm/ranch after the course

100%

Your skills in developing a whole farm/ranch financial plan after the course

97%

How to increase your farm’s/ranch’s net worth after the course

96%

Assessing the cash flow of your plan after the course

94%

Prioritizing and cutting farm/ranch expenses to guide reinvestment in your farm/ranch after the course

93%

Determining your farm’s/ranch’s projected revenue

93%

Getting Started Holistic Financial Planning Course Survey Results

Book Review—

Growing a Revolution: Bringing Our Soil Back to Life

BY ANN ADAMS

Growing a Revolution: Bringing Our Soil Back to Life is the latest book by author David Montgomery who has also written The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health and Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations. If you are interested in soil and regenerative agriculture, this book is well worth the read.

Montgomery is a professor of geomorphology at the University of Washington and is now on the lecture circuit promoting this new book and helping more people understand the power of soil life to not only address our human health issues but also many of our environmental issues as well.

Montgomery has clearly been focused on the soil for a long time, but his evolution from “dirt” to “microbes” to “soil” mirrors many people’s journey in understanding how soil functions and how we have mismanaged our agricultural lands to the tune of billions of dollars and countless environmental ills. In this book he moves quickly past the problems of conventional agriculture and the myths that surround it to the innovative, cutting edge work of researchers like Dwayne Beck and farmers like Holistic Management practitioners Gabe Brown and Neil Dennis—two of the stars from the movie “Carbon Cowboys.”

In the chapter “Green Manure” Montgomery interviews Dwayne Beck who is the Director of the Dakota Lakes Research Farm and someone who has completed a great deal of research on cover crops, no-till, and the incredible power of weeds to become resistant to herbicide. If you aren’t sure that there is good research being done in this country, this chapter alone will restore your faith in good agricultural research and education. Key takeaway for that chapter: “Do your own cooking… don’t be afraid to ask for advice, but accept no recipes from others,” says Beck.

All the key components of diversity, keeping soil covered, and minimal disturbance are discussed in this chapter. The goal of creating an environment where the crop can out compete the weeds is the name of the game and a challenging concept for farmers who have been told that killing the weeds with herbicides and tillage are the most effective means to profitable farming. Beck does use some herbicide, but is working to educate farmers on the options beyond that tool and all the challenges that go along with using it. That’s why Beck notes we need more demonstration farms to encourage farmers to try new, but proven, methods of farming.

In the chapter “Carbon Cowboys” Montgomery tells about his time visiting with Gabe Brown on his ranch in North Dakota. He captures Gabe’s ability to explain the importance of livestock integration to not

only improve soil health but also increase farm profitability. As Gabe notes: “On the two key arguments of net production and price, I can blow conventional farmers out of the water. And, in doing it, I have a positive environmental impact.” His commodity yields are 25% higher than the county average at a much lower cost.

Montgomery also shares Neil Dennis’ story of going to a Holistic Management training and then going home to try to prove the instructor wrong, but failing to do so. In the process of that experiment, Neil became one of the leading ranchers on improving stock density and using it as a tool to “massage” the land and increase soil fertility and water infiltration on his ranch in Saskatchewan, Canada. In turn, he has also quadrupled his stocking rate. The big picture about using livestock to improve soil health is that over the past 40 million years, grasslands and grazing animals co-evolved to cover 40% of the Earth and contributed to our last Ice Age. Montgomery also notes that currently livestock manure could meet as much as a third of global fertilizer needs.

At the end of his book, Montgomery makes the point that “humus” and “human” share the same Latin root meaning of the earth or ground, making the connection between the soil and humans. Indeed, it will ultimately be a community of determined individuals and organizations that will shift agriculture from a heavily-subsidized industry that increases the profits for agribusiness more than it does for the individual producer to a regenerative agriculture that can improve the environment, provide a financial return for the farmer, and produce healthy food.

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Certified

Educators

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COLORADO Cindy Dvergsten 17702 County Rd. 23, Dolores, CO 81323 970/882-4222 • 970/739-2445 (c) wnc@gobrainstorm.net Katie Miller 22755 E Garrett Rd, Calhan, CO 80808 970/310-0852 • heritagebellefarms@gmail.com

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KANSAS Bill Casey 13835 Udall Road, Erie, KS 66733 620/423-2842 • bill.caseyag@gmail.com MICHIGAN Larry Dyer 1113 Klondike Ave, Petoskey, MI 49770 231/347-7162 (h) • 231/881-2784 (c) ldyer3913@gmail.com MISSISSIPPI Preston Sullivan 610 Ed Sullivan Lane NE, Meadville, MS 39653 prestons@telepak.net 601/384-5310 (h) • 601/835-6124 (c)

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MONTANA Amy Driggs 1551 Burma Road, Eureka, MT 59917 208/310-6664 • adriggs@ldagmachinery.com Roland Kroos 4926 Itana Circle, Bozeman, MT 59715 406/522-3862 • 406/581-3038 (c) kroosing@msn.com Cliff Montagne Montana State University 1105 S. Tracy, Bozeman, MT 59715 406/599-7755 (c) • montagne@montana.edu

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NEBRASKA Paul Swanson 5155 West 12th St., Hastings, NE 68901 402/463-8507 • 402/705-1241 (c) pswanson3@unl.edu

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NORTH DAKOTA Joshua Dukart 2539 Clover Place, Bismarck, ND 58503 701/870-1184 • Joshua_dukart@yahoo.com

WISCONSIN Heather Flashinski 16294 250th Street, Cadott, WI 54727 715/289-4896 (w) • 715/379-3742 (c) grassheather@hotmail.com Larry Johnson 453 Woodside Terrace, Madison, WI 53711 608/957-2935 • larrystillpointfarm@gmail.com Laura Paine N893 Kranz Rd., Columbus, WI 53925 920/623-4407 (h) • 608/338-9039 (c) lkpaine@gmail.com

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U N I T E D S TAT E S Tim McGaffic P.O. Box 1903, Cave Creek, AZ 85327 808/936-5749 • tim@timmcgaffic.com CALIFORNIA Lee Altier College of Agriculture, CSU 400 West First St., Chico, CA 95929-0310 laltier@csuchico.edu • 530/636-2525 Owen Hablutzel 4235 W. 63rd St., Los Angeles, CA 90043 310/567-6862 • go2owen@gmail.com Richard King 1675 Adobe Rd., Petaluma, CA 94954 rking1675@gmail.com • 707/217-2308 (c) 707/769-1490 (h) Kelly Mulville P.O. Box 23, Paicines, CA 95043 707/431-8060 • kmulville@gmail.com Donald D. Nelson 11728 Shafer Ave., Red Bluff, CA 96080-8994 208/301-5066 • nelson-don1@hotmail.com Rob Rutherford 4757 Bridgecreek Rd., San Luis Obispo, CA 93401 805/544-5781 (h) • 805/550-4858 (c) robtrutherford@gmail.com

806/237-2554 • glosson@caprock-spur.com Tracy Litle 1277 S CR 305, Orange Grove, TX 78372 361/537-3417 (c) • tjlitle@hotmail.com Peggy Maddox 9460 East FM 1606, Hermleigh, TX 79526 325/226-3042 (c) • westgift@hughes.net Katherine Napper Ottmers 313 Lytle Street, Kerrville, TX 78028 830/896-1474 • katherineottmers@icloud.com CD Pounds 753 VZ CR 1114, Fruitvale, TX 75127 214/568-3377 • cdpounds@live.com Peggy Sechrist 106 Thunderbird Ranch Road Fredericksburg, TX 78624 830/456-5587 (c) • peggysechrist@gmail.com

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The following Certified Educators listed have been trained to teach and coach individuals in Holistic Management. On a yearly basis, Certified Educators renew their agreement to be affiliated with HMI. This agreement requires their commitment to practice Holistic Management in their own lives and to seek out opportunities for staying current with the latest developments in Holistic Management.

ARIZONA

NEW YORK Craig Leggett 6143 SR 9, Chestertown, NY 12817 518/494-2324 (h) • 970/946-1771 (c) craigrleggett@gmail.com Erica Frenay Shelterbelt Farm 200 Creamery Rd., Brooktondale, NY 14817 607/539-6512 (h) • 607/342-3771 (c) info@shelterbeltfarm.com Elizabeth Marks 1024 State Rt. 66, Ghent, NY 12075 518/828-4385 x107 (w) • 518/567-9476 (c) Elizabeth.marks@ny.usda.gov Phillip Metzger 120 Thompson Creek Rd., Norwich, NY 13815 607/334-2407 (h) • pmetzger17@gmail.com

Ralph Tate 1109 Timber Dr., Papillion, NE 68046 402/932-3405 • 402/250-8981 (c) Tater2d2@cox.net NEW HAMPSHIRE Seth Wilner 24 Main Street, Newport, NH 03773 603/863-4497 (h) • 603/863-9200 (w) 603/543-7169 (c) • seth.wilner@unh.edu NEW MEXICO Ann Adams Holistic Management International 5941 Jefferson St. NE, Suite B Albuquerque, NM 87109 505/842-5252 • anna@holisticmanagement.org Kelly Boney 4865 Quay Road L, San Jon, NM 88434 575/268-1162 • kellyboney_79@yahoo.com Kirk Gadzia P.O. Box 1100, Bernalillo, NM 87004 505/263-8677 (c) • kirk@rmsgadzia.com Jeff Goebel 1033 N. Gabaldon Rd., Belen, NM 87002 541/610-7084 • goebel@aboutlistening.com Kathy Harris Holistic Management International 5941 Jefferson St. NE, Suite B Albuquerque, NM 87109 505/842-5252 • kathyh@holisticmanagement.org

OREGON Angela Boudro PO Box 3444, Central Point, OR 97502 541/ 890-4014 • angelaboudro@gmail.com SOUTH DAKOTA Randal Holmquist 4870 Cliff Drive, Rapid City, SD 57702 605/730-0550, randy@zhvalley.com

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TEXAS

Bellows *NorthLisaCentral Texas College

1525 W. California St., Gainesville, TX 76240-4636 940/736-3996 (c) • 940/668-7731 ext. 4346 (o) lbellows@nctc.edu Deborah Clark PO Box 90, Henrietta, TX 76365-0090 940/328-5542 • deborahclark90@sbcglobal.net Guy Glosson 6717 Hwy. 380, Snyder, TX 79549

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For more information about or application forms for the HMI’s Certified Educator Training Programs, contact Ann Adams or visit our website: www.holisticmanagement.org. associate educators provide * These educational services to their communities and peer groups.

I N T E R N AT I O N A L AUSTRALIA Judi Earl “Glen Orton” 3843 Warialda Rd. Coolatai, NSW 2402 61-409-151-969 (c) • judi_earl@bigpond.com Paul Griffiths PO Box 186, Mudgee, NSW 2850 612-6373-3078 paul@holisticmudgee.com Graeme Hand 150 Caroona Lane, Branxholme, VIC 3302 61-3-5578-6272 (h) • 61-4-1853-2130 (c) graemehand9@gmail.com Dick Richardson PO Box 341 Balhannah SA 5242 61-0-42906900 (c) dick@dickrichardson.com.au Jason Virtue P.O. Box 75 Cooran QLD 4569 61-0-754851997 • jason@spiderweb.com.au Brian Wehlburg Pine Scrub Creek, Kindee, NSW 2446 61-2-6587-4353 (h) • 61 04087 404 431 (c) brian@insideoutsidemgt.com.au

Blain Hjertaas Box 760, Redvers, Saskatchewan SOC 2HO 306/452-3882 • bhjer@sasktel.net Brian Luce RR #4, Ponoka, AB T4J 1R4 403/783-6518 • lucends@cciwireless.ca Noel McNaughton 5704-144 St NW, Edmonton, AB T6H 4H4 780/432-5492; noel@mcnaughton.ca Tony McQuail 86016 Creek Line, RR#1, Lucknow, ON N0G 2H0 519/528-2493 • mcqufarm@hurontel.on.ca Len Pigott Box 222, Dysart, SK, SOH 1HO 306/432-4583 • JLPigott@sasktel.net Kelly Sidoryk Box 72, Blackroot, A B TOB OLO 780/872-9761 (h) • 780/875-4418 (w) 780/872-2585 (c) • sidorykk@yahoo.ca

CANADA Don Campbell Box 817 Meadow Lake, SK S0X 1Y6 306/236-6088 • 320/240-7660 (c) doncampbell@sasktel.net Ralph Corcoran Box 36, Langbank, SK S0G 2X0 306/532-4778 rlcorcoran@sasktel.net

NAMIBIA Usiel Seuakouje Kandjii P O Box 24102, Windhoek 9000 264-812840426 (c) • 264-61-244028 (h) kandjiiu@gmail.com Colin Nott PO Box 11977, Windhoek 9000 264-81-2418778 (c) • 264-61-225085 (h) canott@iafrica.com.na

March / April 2018

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KENYA Christine C. Jost Box 30677, Nairobi 00100 773/706-2705 (c) • 703/981-1224 (w) cjost@usaid.gov

Wiebke Volkmann P. O . Box 9285, Windhoek 264-61-225183 or 264-81-127-0081 wiebke@afol.com.na NEW ZEALAND John King P. O. Box 12011, Beckenha Christchurch 8242 64-276-737-885 john@succession.co.nz

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SOUTH AFRICA Wayne Knight Solar Addicts, P.O. Box 537, Mokopane, 0600 South Africa 27-0-15-491-5286 +27-87-550-0255 (h) +27-82-805-3274 (c) wayne@theknights.za.net Jozua Lambrechts PO Box 5070, Helderberg, Somerset West, 7135 +27-0-21 -851 5669 +27-0-08-310-1940 Ian Mitchell-Innes 14 Chevril Road, Ladysmith, 3370 +27-83-262-9030 ian@mitchell-innes.co.za UNITED KINGDOM Philip Bubb 32 Dart Close, St. Ives, Cambridge, PE27 3JB 44-1480-496-2925 (h) +44 7837 405483 (w) pjbubb99@gmail.com

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Num ber 178

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Nonprofit U.S POSTAGE

PAID Jefferson City, MO PERMIT 210

Healthy Land. Healthy Food. Healthy Lives.

a publication of Holistic Management International 5941 Jefferson St. NE, Suite B Albuquerque, NM 87109 USA

RETURN SERVICE REQUESTED

please send address corrections before moving so that we do not incur unnecessary postal fees

DEVELOPMENT CORNER HMI Beginning Farmer Program Makes a Difference—

85% Increase in Net Profit

BY C.D. POUNDS

T

he 2013–14 Beginning Women Farmer program in Texas was the beginning of an empowering journey for myself and my family. I was excited to find that HMI was a community of likeminded folks from all over the world. When we attend Open Gates or conferences, we meet friendly people who are blazing new trails and expanding their horizons. The HMI training was intense and gave me appropriate tools to produce goals, focus on land, grazing and financial planning and test decisions. I am so grateful for the instructors (Peggy Sechrist, Peggy Cole and Peggy Maddox) and staff (Ann Adams and the crew in Albuquerque) for this immense opportunity.

Bobby, my husband, partnered right along with me from the beginning. Together, we are witnessing significant improvements at Triple Cross Farm: Soil health has increased with multi-species in our pastures allowing us to winter graze our cattle with little or no supplemental hay. Prior to this, we purchased 100 –150 bales each winter.

We do soil tests every 6–12 months. Through the process of planned grazing and the knowledge I gained from Betsy Ross on the application of compost teas and minerals, we improved aggregation in our sandy loam soil—preventing leaching of nutrients and promoting the biological function of the soil ecosystem. When we get heavy rainfall here in East Texas our neighbors suffer from flooding and run off while we retain our water. It makes you want to go out and do a happy dance! Soil organic matter increased from 2.5% to 3.5%. Mother Nature wants to feed everyone and, because of our practices, we are seeing deer, bats and a host of other birds I have not yet identified.

The decision to make our farm an event venue would have never occurred without the marketing and business planning I learned, and the encouragement from Pam Mitchell and Peggy Cole. Businesses, in general, focus on their bottom line. However, what I appreciate about HMI is the triple bottom line; Environmental, Financial and Social. We

have become so aware of the impact of our regenerative practices and the practices of those around us on the environment. Socially, we are C.D. Pounds able to share our experiences and teach new ideas to our neighbors and community. Let’s face it, there is opposition to our beliefs, but they are watching what you are doing; actions speak louder than words. Some of our neighbors have quit using Roundup® on their fence lines and are using apple cider vinegar instead. We experienced an increase in net profit each year since the implementation of planning for profit. This fast- paced year, the increase is over 85% on the farm and even more in our construction business.

As a Certified Educator, I am now a part of training up the next generation of farmers and ranchers. It’s exciting to see a larger percentage of young ladies and gentlemen in HMI’s Beginning Farmer classes. It makes me think of Proverbs 22:6: “Train up a child in the way that he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it.”

Teaching deepens my understanding every year. Part of my Holistic Goal in 2013 included using our farm as a teaching facility and conference center. Little did I know when I signed up for the first class in 2013 that I would become a Certified Educator. This has been one of the most satisfying things I have ever done. Several weeks ago we were proud to host the second Beginning Farmer class at our farm!!

The beauty of HMI is that it is a program that gives you the tools to use to create “what works for you.” The feedback loop, ensures you are on the right track pointing you toward your Holistic Goal.

Supporting HMI with our time and finances is giving back to a worthy organization. I know there is so much that goes on behind the scenes to run an organization like this that we never see. Together donating some of our finances and volunteering our time, we can get the job done.

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