Passport to Texas

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Wildlife Restoration Program

Cattle and wildlife live in harmony on the Seven Cross Ranch in the High Plains. Texas Parks and Wildlife biologist, Gene Miller.

The things that they’re doing with this land, as I like to say, loving it with cattle—or keeping it in a state that is very friendly to native wildlife—and native prairie species that occur here, especially these iconic species of the prairie like the prairie chickens. [LH Webb] We have the Parks and Wildlife out here every year, about the first of April, middle of April, to count the prairie chickens.

LH Webb, with his wife Nama, are owners/operators of this 11-thousand acre ranch in eastern Gray County, where cattle graze and endangered prairie chickens roam.

That’s a species that’s rapidly disappearing on the High Plains. Maybe Parks and Wildlife can learn something where it will bring these species back.

White-tailed and mule deer, bobwhite and scaled quail, Rio Grande turkeys and black-tailed prairie dogs also share the land with the cattle at Seven Cross Ranch, and have for generations of the Webb family.

This is where my granddad grew up, and my great granddad bought a hundred years ago and started putting it together. And his sweat is on this land, and then now my sweat and my kid’s sweat will be on this land. And that’s going to help hold the soil down.

Seven Cross Ranch is the Lone Star Land Steward Award winner for the High Plains Eco-region.

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.

Lone Star Land Steward High Plains Eco-Region, 2 Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport 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.

Lone Star Land Steward High Plains Eco-Region, 1 Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Wildlife Restoration Program

Big Time Texas Hunts offers hunters the chance to win one of seven exclusive hunting trips.

Big Time Texas Hunts is a fundraising effort to generate money to provide additional public hunting opportunities and to fund wildlife research and conservation efforts throughout Texas.

Linda Campbell is Program Director of the Private Lands and Public Hunting Program. The entry fee is $10 or $9 when you purchase an entry online!

This will be our twelfth year. We’ve been very successful with this program—it has grown—and we’ve generated over two million dollars in revenue for wildlife conservation.

For your entry fee you’ll have a chance to win a hunt of a lifetime on some of the finest private ranches and prime wildlife management areas in Texas

And we offer some awesome packages here, with big game packages, upland bird hunting, waterfowl, gator. So, we’ve got a lot of different options here, and even if you don’t win your money goes to support the work of the wildlife division, both in research, management, restoration of bighorn sheep, for example, and enhancement of our public hunting opportunities throughout the state.

Find a link to Big Time Texas Hunts at passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show… with support from the Wildlife restoration program…For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Big Time Texas Hunts, 1 Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

Today, Texas is chiefly urban, which is a big shift from our rural roots and connection to the natural world.

I am concerned that we are seeing a public that is becoming more detached from the natural world.

Texas Parks and Wildlife Executive Director, Carter Smith, says making nature relevant to urbanites comes down to quality of life issues.

At the end of the day, what are those thing that we need, that we want to have emotionally, economically, spiritually, and the out of doors is the answer for that. It’s our clean air; it’s our clean water; it’s our scenery; it’s our abundant fish and wildlife; it’s the opportunity to get out and recreate, and to canoe and kayak and to hike and to hunt or fish.

I think fundamentally Texans want that, and we as an agency have an obligation to provide those opportunities for them. Our state’s land and water plan calls for a couple of things. The number one goal in that plan is to provide enhanced recreational opportunities for Texans. And part of that goal is working to ensure that we have a system of parks in and around our major metropolitan areas that can provide a point of entry into the out of doors, and that is something we take very seriously and are working on.

Find a link to the Land and Water plan at passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show… For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Remaining Relevant in a State of Change Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

Blackland Prairie once covered more than 20-million acres in Texas. Jason Spangler of the Native Prairies Assoc. of Texas says because of cropping and livestock overgrazing, less than one percent of this native habitat exists today.

It’s the most endangered large ecosystem in North America.

You can find a thriving 500-acre example of Blackland Prairie in Bell County thanks to the restoration efforts of Bob and Mickey Burleson.

I don’t think that any of our neighbors think of it as anything but Burleson’s folly. They all think that grass is for grazing to the ground.

Over four decades the Burleson’s visited remnant prairies collecting seeds they later used to restore their land.

Eventually it started working naturally to come back to a climax of what had been here. And, it’s still doing that. We haven’t gotten to the place where the Big Bluestem is the dominant—and that’s what would have been at one time—but we’re getting there.

The Burlesons won the Lone Star Land Steward Award for their dedication to land restoration and stewardship.

It’s what belongs here. This is where I live, This is my home, And this is what I love. (birds chirping)

Learn about land management at passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show… For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Lone Star land Stewards: Burleson's Prairie, 2 Play Now | Play in Popup | Download