A collection of essays about the important role of ranchers in the landscapes of the west.

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Product Description

Recommended by The Nature Conservancy magazine.

Ranching West of the 100th Meridian offers a literary and thought-provoking look at ranching and its role in the changing West. The book's lyrical and deeply felt narratives, combined with fresh information and analysis, offer a poignant and enlightening consideration of ranchers' ecological commitments to the land, their cultural commitments to American society, and the economic role ranching plays in sustainable food production and the protection of biodiversity.

The book begins with writings that bring to life the culture of ranching, including the fading reality of families living and working together on their land generation after generation. The middle section offers an understanding of the ecology of ranching, from issues of overgrazing and watershed damage to the concept that grazing animals can actually help restore degraded land. The final section addresses the economics of ranching in the face of declining commodity prices and rising land values brought by the increasing suburbanization of the West. Among the contributors are Paul Starrs, Linda Hasselstrom, Bob Budd, Drummond Hadley, Mark Brunson, Wayne Elmore, Allan Savory, Luther Propst, and Bill Weeks.

Livestock ranching in the West has been attacked from all sides - by environmentalists who see cattle as a scourge upon the land, by fiscal conservatives who consider the leasing of grazing rights to be a massive federal handout program, and by developers who covet intact ranches for subdivisions and shopping centers. The authors acknowledge that, if done wrong, ranching clearly has the capacity to hurt the land. But if done right, it has the power to restore ecological integrity to Western lands that have been too-long neglected. Ranching West of the 100th Meridian makes a unique and impassioned contribution to the ongoing debate on the future of the New West.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #887054 in Books
• Published on: 2002-01-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 280 pages

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Customer Reviews

Assorted aspects of the ranch life in western America
Collaborative edited by Richard Knight, Wendell Gilgert, and Ed Martson, Ranching West Of The 100th Meridian: Culture, Ecology And Economics is an impressive and informative anthology of articulate essays by a wide variety of learned and experienced authors, focusing on assorted aspects of the ranch life in western America, and how ranching affects surrounding communities and the nation as a whole. Charts, graphs and a handful of black/white photographs illustrate this serious-minded and intriguing study. From Ranching: An Old Way Of Life In The New West (Paul F. Starrs); to Perceptions Of Ranching: Public Views, Personal Reflections (Mark Brunson & George Wallace); to Re-Creating The West One Decision At A Time (Allan Savory); to Saving The Family Ranch: New Directions (Ben Alexander & Luther Propst), the seventeen essays comprising Ranching West Of The 100th Meridian are compelling, challenging, superbly presented, highly recommended reading.