Guest Blog

Calving is in full swing in many parts of the country. Here in north-central Montana, we are a bit behind the rest of the country – many of our cows don’t start calving until after mid-February.

There I was, armed to the teeth and ready for a fight. He had done it for the last time. I wasn’t backing down, and one of us was leaving that barn dead. You guessed it – a pack rat.

There is a tombstone that lies just off the edge of a small hayfield on the creek bottom of my parents’ ranch. It doesn’t mark the grave of the man whose name is engraved on its face, and grass and weeds show it little mercy.

“And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.” (Genesis 1:25)

Every producer meeting I attend and every time I go to the local sale barn, I can’t help but notice the gray hair everywhere. It speaks to the wisdom accumulating in the cattle industry, but it also poses some scary questions: “Where are the kids?” and “Who will lead this industry into the future?”

Four generations. As I sit here writing this, it dawns on me that I represent the fourth generation in my family to raise my own cattle and participate in agriculture. It is more than a lifestyle – being a rancher is who we are, not what we do.