Women In Agriculture - A Growing Force in Ranching

Burt Rutherford | Contributing Editor, CALF and Working Ranch

More than half of farms and ranches in the U.S. are owned or operated by women. are trained in Beef Quality Assurance (BQA) and can become BQA certified.

If USDA statistics don’t tell the story of the changing demographics in ranching, a glance into a ranch office, calving pasture or cattle industry meeting surely will Indeed, women are becoming more and more prominen in ranching and farming from chuteside to board room That’s the emphasis behind an innovative and unique rancher education series called WIRED Women Involve in Ranching Education and Development. The brainchild of the American National CattleWomen (ANCW) and sponsored by Merck Animal Health and its Allflex portfo the events offer women hands-on training including vaccination, implanting, ear tagging and proper animal handling and chute procedures. In addition, participants

“We see that women in agriculture are getting more involved in leadership roles on ranches and farms, and we give them the tools they need in a comfortable situation to learn and go back to their farms and ranches and be the leaders in those positions,” said Reba Mazak, a fifth-generation ranch owner in Bushnell, Florida, and past ANCW president

“It’s important for us, as cattle women, to be knowledgeable and go into our communities as leaders,” Mazak said “And some of us have the responsibility for our cattle ranches, and not only do we want it to be safe for ourselves, but I have two daughters and they have sons So we represent the fifth, sixth and seventh generations of cattle producers and we want to continue that in our family And there’s no way to do that if we don’t continue to educate ourselves and have the tools to make the right decisions ”

That’s where WIRED events, in their fourth year in 2023, are unique “Having an opportunity to do hands-on training is limited,” said Tammi Didlot, a ranch owner in southwest Oklahoma, past ANCW president and WIRED co-chair “Hands-on training gives us a comfort level to gain the confidence and experience to do things that we can go home and put into practice ”

Networking and mentoring also are priceless. “It gives us an opportunity to share experiences had a lot of young collegiate cattle women here. They can e who they can gain knowledge from as they grow, ” Didlot between generations is remarkable. Hodgen, senior account k Animal Health, grew up on a ranch and is involved in a t’s amazing to watch people who have been involved in the industry helping those who are just getting started,” she said “And those getting started have asked questions and presented ideas that some of us who have been in it forever have not even thought about The back and forth at these events is unparalleled ”

Kate Asmus, a master’s candidate at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, was one of the collegiate women who attended a recent WIRED meeting “I came to this event to learn how to improve my family’s ranching operation, specifically with our animal handling,” Asmus said. “We can always continue to improve animal welfare and health. I’m always interested in learning how I can improve myself."

Pictured Far Left: WIRED Sponsor, Moly Manufacturing provided a Silencer Chute for the WIRED event in NE

Pictured Left: Merck Animal Health led hands-on trainings for cattle health including vaccine handling Pictured Below: Animal behaviorist and CSU Professor, Temple Grandin, leads a demonstration on how to properly handle cattle when utilizing a chute system

That’s Austin Woltermath’s takeaway from the event He’s the Allflex sales representative for Nebraska and other states and demonstrated ear tags and EIDs, or electronic animal identification devices.

“This put meat on the bones,” he said. As he interacted with the participants, he was gratified to see smiles as inexperienced participants learned how to correctly place a plastic ear tag and an EID, as well as collect an Allflex Tissue Sampling Unit (TSU) used in DNA analysis.

“Even though they may not have known one another, when we were conversing back and forth or somebody would ask a question, either someone would help me answer it or they would bounce ideas off each other.” And, for the most part, the women weren’t shy about jumping in and trying out the various production practices themselves, he says.

Women Rising

According to data from the 2017 Census of Agriculture (the latest data available; 2022 census data has not been released as of this writing), there were 1 1 million farms with one or more female producers responsible for making decisions about the farm’s operation That’s 56 percent of total U S farms

While the 2017 census data didn’t differentiate between crop farms and ranches, it did indicate that of the $148 billion in ag products sold by female-operated farms, 51 percent or around $75 billi f l f li t k d li t k d t