APR on NPR

[SAJ-99]

Here is the summary of the reality the region faces
1) we live in an age of "blame someone else for your problems" because adaptation/change is hard.
2) most ranchers live by "we have always done it this way" and hate change.
3) family ranches can't consolidate enough to dictate price and take more share of the supply-chain profit.
4) there is a general (almost unhealthy, IMO) fear of the any type of organization, especially the government, in this region. Note the paradox of note being able to organize and hating anything that resembles an organization.
5) younger family members typically choose a different career path.

Let me know if I missed anything. For now, as a hunter, I would rather be on the side of the APR than against it, while reserving my right to change my mind.

 

[mtmuley]

So tell me Eric, if the Wilkes were buying this land would you also put up a fuss?

At least with the Wilke's you know their intention up front. mtmuley

 

[antlerradar]

Cattle price and input price trends dictate that ranchers need scale to be successful. To gain scale ranchers need to acquire more land/feed. The land prices have gone up more than cattle prices, so when a rancher wants to buy more land the math tends to look bad (because it is) so they can't get a loan from the bank. The APR buys the land at fair market value, which isn't viewed as "fair" to the rancher, hence the claim of driving up land prices. Of course, this isn't true in isolation, but could be justified as true depending on your narrative.
Back to the claim in the first sentence, in my view, the real problem is consolidation in the processing industry. Beef producers/ranchers remain largely a small to mid sized collective of entrepreneurs selling a commoditized product. Even in a co-op, they have little pricing power given the size and power of processors. Consequently, we see that retail prices have gone up adequately, but wholesale prices haven't. The processors set the price and the profits tend to stay at that level rather than flowing through the supply chain. I have often wondered why more ranchers don't try to raise bison, or the bison/cattle hybrid, because they can get 3x the $pp. It is happening slowly, though.

Having never hunted the APR, likely I never will. It's the broader conservation, open space, wildlife habitat, preservation of grasslands that garners my support.

Why so much negativity is directed at a landowner who is now allowing public access, with the gloomy prediction of some far off future day not allowing public hunting maybe (whos knows; I don't, you don't) baffles me ... when there are so many many ranches bought and never open to the public. Those kind of expressions and attitudes seem a strong whiff of self-entitled ingratitude.

There is a difference between no hunting and not open to the public. Our place is far form open to the public yet every year we have between 200 to 300 nonpaying hunter days a year. Our neighbors is leased to an outfitter. His property is hunted harder now than it ever was when people didn't pay to hunt there. To the south of me is essentially closed to all hunting. I don't know how may payed to hunt it a few years ago but I suspect it was close to 50 paying hunters and some management youth hunters. Now those paying hunters are hunting with other outfitters who will need to lease additional properties or are bypassing the outfitter and leasing land on their own. I don't know what APR's plans are but I suspect that Eric is right and that hunting is not in the long term plan. If APR pulls the plug on hunting, sportsmen will be worse off than when those propertied were just not open to the public.

 

[Straight Arrow]

If APR pulls the plug on hunting sportsmen will be worse off than when those propertied were just not open to the public.

I don't understand that statement.

 

[antlerradar]

I don't understand that statement.

Before APR own those properties the the level of hunting on those ranches was not zero. Those ranches were hunted before APR bought them and the amount of hunting was likely not insignificant. If APR goes to zero hunters all of the hunting that those ranch absorbed before APR bought them will be displaced to other ranches and public land making the hunters that hunt those place worse off.
Having a comma between hunting and sportsman also would have made my statement clearer.

 

[Straight Arrow]

Before APR own those properties the the level of hunting on those ranches was not zero. Those ranches were hunted before APR bought them and the amount of hunting was likely not insignificant. If APR goes to zero hunters all of the hunting that those ranch absorbed before APR bought them will be displaced to other ranches and public land making the hunters that hunt those place worse off.
Having a comma between hunting and sportsman also would have made my statement clearer.

Thanks for the clarification. Having no knowledge of the public access for hunting or other recreation on the properties prior to APR purchase, I can't respond to that. However, having camped at an APR campground, checked the area out, and subsequently researched and gathered information about what to this point is the publicized APR mission, especially with respect to public recreational access, I can tell you that for a place you suspect will curtail public access at some point ... they have invested one helluva lot into infrastructure, programs, and public access opportunities.

No disrespect meant, but I think that this doom and gloom prediction for hunting access on APR is another red herring which is grasped at in the absence of no other real valid substantiated criticisms of this apparently scary change for the folks of NE Montana. But who knows ... perhaps Senator John Brenden's fearful prediction of bison bulls running rampant across the NE Montana farms and ranches raping hereford purebred cows and trampling what sparse grain fields remain will be the case. His rationale makes as much sense as the hunting access doom and gloom.

 

[npaden]

If they do restrict hunting at some point in the future I can see some pretty amazing spots where someone could helicopter in onto some BLM land that would be some awesome hunting.

At least they wouldn't make a lame attempt to fence the elk off of the public land.

 

[406dn]

I have only been a fairly regular visitor to the region, haven't ever actually been on APR land. It is impossible to fully know what it would feel like if my home was there and my family's way of life was hanging in the balance.

APR has bought land from ranchers/farmers who wanted to sell. Anyone else could have bought the land if they had made an acceptable offer before APR. The reason no one else bought the land is a combination of other ranchers/farmers knowing they can't make it work and banks knowing a borrower can't make it work.

A harsh reality across much of the west is that if you borrow money to buy rangeland, you'll have a tough time growing enough beef to make it work. It is certainly a factor in how many landowners lease out the hunting rights. A bull elk is worth numerous head of cattle.

 

[mtmuley]

Straight Arrow, you think the trails and yurt communities are for hunters? mtmuley

 

[mtmuley]

If they do restrict hunting at some point in the future I can see some pretty amazing spots where someone could helicopter in onto some BLM land that would be some awesome hunting.

Great. mtmuley

 

[Straight Arrow]

Straight Arrow, you think the trails and yurt communities are for hunters? mtmuley

Only if hunters want to use them. BTW, if you are attempting to use the phrase "yurt communities" to infer cult or something, you are misinformed. To call the isolated yurt accommodations "communities" is a misnomer.

 

[mtmuley]

Only if hunters want to use them. BTW, if you are attempting to use the phrase "yurt communities" to infer cult or something, you are misinformed. To call the isolated yurt accommodations "communities" is a misnomer.

Don't know why you went the "cult" direction. Your words, not mine. I'm betting APR figures out folks will pay money to look at critters instead of kill them and make the same or more compensation. Wanna bet? Oh wait, unless they start selling hunts. Another good bet. mtmuley

 

[Deleted member 20812]

Don't know why you went the "cult" direction. Your words, not mine. I'm betting APR figures out folks will pay money to look at critters instead of kill them and make the same or more compensation. Wanna bet? Oh wait, unless they start selling hunts. Another good bet. mtmuley

What specifically is the bet and the timeline?

 

[Straight Arrow]

Don't know why you went the "cult" direction. Your words, not mine. I'm betting APR figures out folks will pay money to look at critters instead of kill them and make the same or more compensation. Wanna bet? mtmuley

Don't know why anyone would refer to a "yurt community" unless trying to infer something. I tend to agree with what APR might eventually figure out with respect to wildlife watching, but at least now the program appears to be more in line with viable wildlife management, with hunting being a useful tool.

 

[406dn]

Don't know why you went the "cult" direction. Your words, not mine. I'm betting APR figures out folks will pay money to look at critters instead of kill them and make the same or more compensation. Wanna bet? mtmuley

What time frame are we talking about?? I might take a wager.

Hunting and just looking at animals are not mutually exclusive per se. Who knows ,maybe they let people look at them nine to ten months a year for some sort of fee and let others hunt during the fall for some sort of fee. More power to them if they can pull that off.

 

[Deleted member 20812]

What time frame are we talking about?? I might take a wager.

Wait your turn, Dale and I need a good beer wager. Unlike the last clown I made one with, I know he won’t flake out on me.

 

[mtmuley]

SA, quit grasping at why I said "yurt community". I meant nothing. Some yurts, a few yurts, a number of yurts, yurt city. Better? JLS, timeline to come, beverage of your choice. Wish I had the same rosy outlook about the future as some seem to, but I don't. mtmuley

 

[npaden]

Great. mtmuley

Actually if you look at the maps there will still be plenty of BLM land that is accessible from county roads so you wouldn't have to helicopter in. If APR quits allowing hunting it would just go back to exactly how it was before, a VERY low percentage of the places they have purchased allowed public hunting before they were purchased by the APR. Right now the average hunter is in a win situation with quite a bit of property that was closed to public hunting now open to public hunting.

There are a couple big ranches to the east of them that have big block management contracts that I think would be in the long term plan of the APR but we should know by the time they get there how they are dealing with hunting on a long term basis.

I think this is a lot like the Nature Conservancy. A lot of folks freak out when they buy land, and there are a few exceptions, but for the most part they seem to line up pretty well with public hunting.

 

[SAJ-99]

I think a certain amount of skepticism is health in any topic. But be careful, because at a point you just become Al Bundy or Archie Bunker with a computer. Ragging on what the APR "might" do is not going to help the "Save the Cowboy", no matter what the signs say.

 

[BigHornRam]

SA, quit grasping at why I said "yurt community". I meant nothing. Some yurts, a few yurts, a number of yurts, yurt city. Better? JLS, timeline to come, beverage of your choice. Wish I had the same rosy outlook about the future as some seem to, but I don't. mtmuley

Come on muley. The high roller crowd likes better accommodations than yurts on the prairie.

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