I recently attended the 150th anniversary meeting of the Wyoming Stockgrowers Association. I have made some good friends in Wyoming over the years. I was glad to see them, reacquaint myself with others and meet some new folks whom I am sure will become friends as time goes on.
I was struck by the optimism I encountered and the enthusiasm for the industry. Wyoming has had its share of drought and other severe weather lately. Market conditions are possibly better than in recent years but with inflation increasing the cost inputs in any business plus fuel and commodity prices on the uptick, the livestock business is ripe for pessimism and anxiousness. However, as I said, these Wyoming ranchers were in a generally positive mood. I am sure this anniversary of such longevity had something to do with their attitude. Why wouldn’t it?
What was the cattle “business like 150 years ago? In 1872 the civil war had been over for only seven years. The great cattle drives from Texas to Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana had just begun. Many veterans of the newly fought war participated in those drives to rail heads and greener pastures. The beginnings of a national market for beef were being felt in the growing markets in big cities like Chicago, Saint Louis, and New York City. The cattle that had been trailed to rail heads then traveled to these midwestern and eastern cities by rail where there were processing plants to accommodate the increased demand for beef by a war-weary nation.
In the upper Midwest and mountain west there were millions of acres of some of the finest grasslands in the world. Bison were being hunted almost to extinction and pushed into smaller and smaller areas while sheep and cattle raisers moved livestock onto the old wildlife ranges. Of course, this also meant Native Americans who relied on the wildlife for their survival were also pushed further and further to less desirable smaller areas and government established reservations.
The transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869. Barbed wire was first commercially produced in Wisconsin in 1874. Wyoming became a state in 1890. Contemporaneous with some of these events, the Wyoming Stockgrowers Association was founded in 1872, 150 years ago.
The Wyoming Association was the second of its kind to be formed just a couple of years after Colorado. The reason the Association was created was for ranchers to become more organized against cattle rustling on the wide-open grass ranges of Eastern Wyoming. The Association established a brand registration and hired inspectors to make sure the big roundups they organized attributed ownership of cattle and sheep to the correct ranch. These inspectors were also deputized to arrest thieves and cattle rustlers.
Over the last 150 years the Wyoming Stockgrowers Association has been recognized as an integral part of the history of the territory and state of Wyoming.
Over the three decades after the Association was founded brand inspections, barbed wire and rail roads built into every isolated area of the west changed the livestock business remarkably. No longer were the ranges open for everyone with a saddle horse and a cow. The great cattle drives to railheads hundreds of miles away became a thing of the distant past while it is true that cattle were driven, and sheep were herded smaller distances. And, thankfully for those in the business, organized law enforcement became routine and there was less rustling of cattle. However, we all know theft of livestock is still a problem because the vast open spaces have not been reduced and are still needed to raise livestock in the west.
As the above paragraphs convey, the 1872 livestock industry looked nothing like the 1900 industry because of the barbed wire, railroads, and a more organized enforcement of brand laws and range use. That changed look back can most assuredly apply to today. What about the cattle industry today is similar to yesterday?
Cattle in Wyoming, Nevada and other places on big range ranches are still worked using horses but with variations on the past practices such as trailering to work rather than long trots. The use of four-wheel drive trucks and ATVs have sped up activities. I remember changing water or fixing fence by horseback. Nowadays ATVs are extensively used for these chores.
Marketing by satellite auction and incorporating value-added practices like Certified Angus Beef, Vac 45, feedlots, and all-natural beef are just part of the bigger cattle industry picture. And, it almost goes without saying little of the industry today looks like the industry of a hundred or 150 years ago.
Change is always a part of the livestock industry. It is how we meet the challenges of that change that ensures we have a sustainable, productive, and profitable future. There is no doubt, as evidenced by the Wyoming Stockgrowers Association experience, that ranchers are hardwired to meet change head on and adapt. What we may have facing us around the corner remains to be seen. But there will be an industry different than that which we see today.
Thanks to the optimism and enthusiasm I experienced in Cheyenne a couple of weeks ago, I feel better about where we are going even though I cannot quite see how to get there yet. Keep up the great work of feeding a nation and the world and raising the finest, safest, and most nutritious protein on the planet.
I’ll see you soon.
By Joseph Guild