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We hope you and your family had a wonderful Christmas. And Happy New year to you all!

Here is what we’ve been reading, watching and writing about this week…

Articles

Grouse Guns of the Old Guard

Here is a great article about old-time hunters and their shotguns.

Quoting the article, “What makes an ideal grouse gun? The Old Guard clearly preferred doubles, but their preferences about make, model, barrel length, gauge and choke cut a wide swath.”

More here →

Wild Horses Coevolved with Wildfire on The North American Landscape

Here is a good article with many valuable ideas on  managing wild horses. These are controversial to say the least.

Let us think about this issue holistically: Horses are COMPLEMENTARY to — not COMPETITIVE with — the wildlife, plants, and water of North America because these coevolved over the last 40 million years and became interdependent (symbiotic). Obviously, animals that evolved in North America over the last 40 million years, and which may have been hunted out by early Native Americans only 5,000-years ago—or never completely hunted out at all—are still native. (This topic is examined and discussed frequently on this blog.)

As ranchers stewarding resources in overgrown and fire-prone Idaho forests and the high-desert mountains of far-West Texas, we know first-hand that a lack of animal impact is the root cause of forest and rangeland decline. Like cows and goats, wild horses will open forests and stimulate ranges to increase food for wildlife PROVIDED THE HORSES ARE PROPERLY MANAGED. There’s room – and a need –  for horses AND cattle. Generally, the “stocking problem” is too few animals, not too many animals.

Cattlemen, hunters, and horse advocates want the same outcomes. Wild horse advocates must stand on common ground with ranchers. Attacking ranchers and ranching in an effort to replace cattle with wild horses makes enemies of natural allies, zeroing out the influence of both. This harms wild horses.

Excess horses must be removed by humans as they have been for all the millennia that our species have co-existed, by including human use of horses for work, food, and fiber as fundamental to good management. Horse “advocates” who interfere with this ancient relationship unintentionally harm wild horses in the name of protecting them.

More here →

Videos

Cows Christmas Party

Merry Christmas!!!

Scottish Highland Cattle: Aren’t they wonderful?

Highland Cattle are the most cold-tolerant of the English breeds. In Finland, Highlanders are the ONLY cattle that may legally be pastured outdoors through brutal Finnish winters.

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Drought Busters 101 : A 21-Minute Video on Desert Grassland Restoration

Drought Busters” is an inexpensive, quick, physiologically and economically sustainable method of habitat and wildlife restoration. We call it Drought Busters because it increases effective rainfall by rebuilding soil fertility and the soil’s ability to absorb and store water. This 21-minute video explains Drought Busters, and our experience on how wild and domestic animals, Keyline sub-soiling, and water harvesting can restore desertified grasslands.

More here →

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And that’s it - as always thank you..

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