Following the footsteps of livestock and pioneers in Montana’s central foothills
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EmailExtension offers opportunities to learn, so that we can share with others. MSU Extension senior educator Phil Durst travelled to Montana for the annual conference of the National Association of County Agricultural Agents.
Travelling through the rolling hills of central Montana, with majestic mountains framing the wide-open fields of wheat ready to cut, we visited livestock enterprises and the people who run them. Montana hosted the National Association of County Agricultural Agents annual meeting and professional improvement conference, during which time we took the opportunity to attend their Animal Science pre-tour June 27-28.
Sheep used to be the major livestock in south-central Montana where they would go with a shepherd up into the mountain pastures to graze. They still do, with the shepherd living in a shepherd’s wagon, until about October when they come down out of the mountain for the winter.
We visited a museum of the life and accumulations of the Charles Bair family who at one time owned more than 300,000 sheep. He clothed the troops with wool during WWI, and the family foundation continues to produce fine wool, although prices are low. Graduate students from Montana State University (another MSU) talked about their research with wool fiber analysis, livestock tracking units and virtual fencing. The Bair Ranch Foundation works closely with the university, providing resources and cooperating on research.
Beef cow-calf operations are now the predominant livestock in Montana, with a heavy emphasis on Angus, mostly black ones. Grazing in the west can be very extensive, requiring 20-60 acres per cow or cow-calf pair. They calve in spring and the calves are sold in the fall, many to be backgrounded before going to a feedlot for finishing. We visited the Judith Bain Feedyard, a backgrounder that this year will raise 35,000 calves to around 1,000 lbs., gaining 2.25 to 2.5 lbs./day, before they are sent north to Calgary to be finished as a “Product of Canada.”
Each day, the cattle pens are monitored by cowboys riding the pens on horseback, checking the cattle and moving animals as needed. When we visited Lewiston Livestock. Auction, Kyle Shobe, the owner, told us that “true cowboys” who ride horses are increasingly few. On large ranches, he said, ranch hands ride “horses with four wheels” to check cattle.
Horse prices have increased steadily, further reducing the opportunity for developing those who work cattle. One stop we made was to Birdtail Ranch, a horse breeder, where it was such a beautiful sight to see young colts with their mothers, moving with them in a synchronized gallop.
While Montana was one of the original range areas of American bison, they are now pretty well confined to national parks such as Yellowstone and Theodore Roosevelt and private ranches that specialize in raising bison. Some of those are owned by the rich and famous, such as David Letterman and Ted Turner. We visited one ranch, Big Sky Bison, owned not so famously, and were intrigued to learn about the business of raising bison for hunting, meat and tours. We got a glimpse of the entrepreneurship of this individual as he kept looking for ways to add income to the overall business model.
Montana is not just the place where cattle roam, and we saw a number of pronghorn antelope as well as deer. It is also the home of some of the intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) that form the basis of this country’s nuclear deterrence. After the bus driver pointed out a couple of sites, it was easier to spot others as we covered (undisclosed) territory.
A long time ago, a couple of guys named Lewis and Clark also covered this countryside, along with their party of 29 others. They were traveled up the Missouri River, knowing that falls awaited them at Great Falls, Montana, only to learn there were five falls and the portage around them would be more than 18 miles, mostly uphill, with their large dugout canoes and supplies. We visited the Interpretive Center at Great Falls and learned about their perseverance despite the difficulties as they explored this new land clear through to the Pacific Ocean.
Water is supreme in the West. The melting of the winter snowpack in the mountains provides water for irrigation downhill for miles. One ranch owner teamed up with two partners, one of whom has small hydroelectric projects around the world, to make use of a 126-foot drop to power a turbine and generate electricity. If water flowed all year, he said it would be a gold mine, but as it only lasts 3-5 months, it is paying back the investment in 12 years.
Attending this national conference, seeing colleagues that I’ve come to know over the years and the ones I meet each year, is a special time. It is a time of learning much, experiencing and seeing things that challenge my assumptions or the way I’ve thought they were to be done. Knowledge is an investment for the future, to use and to share freely.
