Lone Star Land Steward High Plains Eco-Region, 1
Monday, October 27th, 2008Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Wildlife Restoration Program
The Seven Cross Ranch, a stocker cattle operation, grazes its animals on restored native prairie. The ranch is the Lone Star Land Steward Award winner for the High Plains eco-region.
This is crème de la crème of the high plains ecological region.
Gene Miller is a wildlife biologist based in Canyon, Texas.
What you see, when you see this Seven Cross Ranch, is a microcosm—a natural prairie ecosystem.
Seven Cross Ranch didn’t achieve rarified status by accident. Owners/operators, LH and Nama Webb, utilize a rapid rotation grazing system that simulates a bygone era when vast herds of bison roamed the high plains.
They’d come through, graze it down, and then move on in their trek. So, it’s more like the way it evolved over centuries. The more cattle you can get on one spot, you have the animal impact, the hoof action, and you get a more uniform graze, because you have more cattle in a smaller area, but you have to move them faster. And you know, my goal is possible a hundred pastures, and you know, you’re hitting one pasture a day—and then you’re off of it. And if you have a hundred pastures, you know, you’re hitting one pasture a day, and then you’re off of it. And if you’ve got a hundred pastures, then you’re off it for ninety-nine days before you get back to it. You don’t want to severely graze it, you just want to kind of top it off and move them on.
Learn more about the Lone Star Land Steward Program at: passporttotexas.org
That’s our show… with support from the Wildlife Restoration Program…providing funding for the Private Lands and Public Hunting Program. For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.
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