Saying things that need to be said.
big, Big, BIGGER
Amidst all the euphoria about cattle prices I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I think we may NOT have learned from our mistakes made 40 or 50 years ago. Old timers will remember that of the thousand known cattle breeds in the world it seems cattlemen in this country were experimenting with half of them in an effort to make our cattle longer and taller. In the process we made them bigger and badder. Actually, our little experiment involved about 35 breeds and, sure enough, instead of more efficient cattle that consistently graded choice, our primary concern was something called “frame score.” We were selecting cattle in the show ring and at bull sales that were longer, taller all right but they were also devoid of muscle mass and their meat was of poor eating quality. It took us decades to recover and to regain the customer’s trust and for beef to regain its reputation for eating quality tied to gradability.
we are making our finished cattle weigh from 1,700 to 2,000 pounds. It takes a much bigger cow to make an 1,800-pound steer and yet bigger cows are the last thing we need. What happens to maintenance costs when your range cows go from 1,000 to 1,400 pounds? And how many ranges in this country
Take care of yourself as well as you do your horse and you’ll both be healthy.
can support such a cow? I can show you places in the Southwest that will hardly support a 900-pound cow let alone one that weighs 1,300 pounds. And how many of those extra-large replacement heifers are going to get big round zeros painted on their rumps when preg checked. Even if they have a first calf good luck getting the monsters
rebred with their second calf. Sure, some of this is the cattle feeder’s fault, but who can blame them when they are making money for every extra pound they can add to a beef animal’s carcass now and that’s a much more favorable business model than to try and replace those cattle in the feedlot with new ones that cost $2,500 to $3,000. Especially when all it would take is one “Black Swan” event and those cattle could easily lose 25 to 33 percent of their value. Add in the cost of feeding the replacement animal for 200 days and we could see a wreck of epic proportions. And yes, I said 200 days on feed. And some Holstein and Holstein crosses are spending up to an entire year in the feedlot! This infatuation with bigger cattle and heavier carcasses is all due to one thing: because corn and other grains are dirt cheap right now. But what happens
Failed Illusions: Non-Lethal Wolf Management &
“Reimbursement”
We may be making a similar mistake now only this time
SOURCE: WESTERN JUSTICE
For years, pro-wolf activists have insisted that ranchers have nothing to complain about. When wolves kill cattle, “you get compensated.” When calves come up missing, “get range riders.” According to the urban fantasy version of wolf management, a handful of people riding around vast expanses of mountainous livestock range can prevent predation, and whatever they can’t prevent, the government will pay back.
But the people who actually work in wolf country know that both of these promises — range riding as prevention and compensation as cure — are nothing more than carefully crafted political illusions.
Wolf-conflict specialist Jeff Flood has spent more than a decade on the ground in Washington, and he is brutally clear: range riding does not stop wolf depredation, and compensation does not fix the damage. Together, they form a system that looks good on paper while quietly dismantling rural families, cattle herds, ranching legacies, and the agricultural economy of the region.
The Myth of Range Riding Is the First Lie Ranchers Are Told
The public imagines range riders galloping across the landscape, intercepting wolves just in time, heroically pushing predators away from cattle. In reality, Flood says, that never happens.
when hay and grain prices go back up, as they always have? Who is going to want to feed those cattle to extreme weights when feeders lose money on every extra pound they add? And if you remember anything from this story, remember this... CATTLE BECOME MORE INEFFICIENT THE BIGGER THEY GET.
The Grain Economy
In my part of the world farmers have a new word for what’s happening in the markets right now. They call it Farmageddon, a takeoff on the word “Armageddon” in which mankind disappears from the planet. Sure, it’s an exaggeration, unless you’re a farmer watching your world swirling down the drain. Faith Parum, a Ph.D. an economist for the Farm Bureau puts it all in perspective. “For most of the country, farmers face a difficult farm economy – as crop prices continue to decline and production expenses remain high. Strong yields provide little relief and imbalance
continued on page 2
Department of Energy Awards $9
Million
For National Research Project on Cactus
Pear’s Bioenergy Potential
As the quest to diversify and expand sustainable alternative energy products continues, the U.S. Department of Energy has awarded a $9 million grant to support research that will be led by researchers at the University of Nevada, Reno to expand the use of cactus pear as a low-water-use, climate-resilient biomass crop and potential biofuel feedstock.
During the five-year, multi-institution project, a national team will conduct cactus pear field trials at sites across the U.S. to identify varieties that produce the highest biomass with minimal water and other inputs.
If viable, cactus pear could join next-generation bioenergy crops such as switchgrass, sorghum, miscanthus and energy cane, contributing to national clean-fuel and bioproducts goals. The major appeal of cactus pear lies in its ability to produce biomass using only a fraction of the water required by conventional biofuel crops, without directly competing with food production. The versatile desert plant also produces fruit used in cosmetics, nutraceuticals and specialty foods.
“Cactus pear represents a real economic opportunity for farmers and landowners in the West and the South,” said John Cushman,
by LEE PITTS
Real Men
Areal man doesn’t moisturize. Nor does he go to a salon to get his haircut. He goes to a barber, not a stylist and would never wear hair gel like the Governor of California or some sissy poetry professor.
A real man is adventurous and likes to explore unchartered territory, like the kitchen. He can go to the hardware store without a support group.
He is knowledgeable and LOOKS at magazines like Bassmaster, Field and Stream and Playboy so he can discuss the content with other real men. Like, “Hey, did you catch the bazooms on Miss February?”
A real man is able to hit a certain white plumbing fixture while standing five feet away. He has also peed on his share of truck tires.
A real man’s four food groups are meat, anything fried, Mexican food and beer, He’s been known to kill his own food and likes to barbecue.
A real man has never had a pedicure in his life. He cuts his nails with a pocketknife and files them with a horseshoer’s rasp. And yes, he does carry a pocketknife which he uses to cut his meat at barbecues and brandings where plastic fork are provided, even if he used his knife the day before to castrate bulls.
He doesn’t use lip balm, gloss or scented Chap Stick. He knows the difference between a backhoe and a “ho.”
A real man does not wear an earring, tongue stud or lip jewelry. He’s never worn capri pants (whatever they are), a dress or leggings. None of his clothes are mauve, peach or pumpkin in color.
Real men listen to real music and that means country/western. He never heard of Bad Bunny until he performed at the Super Bowl, which he boycotted by going to the bathroom. Both stunk.
A real man knows the date of his anniversary, his wife’s birthday and that she likes See’s candy, which he gives her every year. But with a one-pound box costing over $27.00 she might have to start get to liking a Hershey candy bar from the Dollar Store instead.
He can’t tell you the difference between Cappuccino or espresso or arugula and radicchio.
LEE PITTS
News with a View...
in the market has driven profit margins to the point where BREAKING EVEN IS UNACHIEVABLE! Commodity prices have plummeted from their 2022 highs, creating a persistent imbalance in the farm economy that places real strain on the financial health of row crop farmers across the country.
“Corn that once topped $7 per bushel is closer to $4 today, down 54 percent. Soybeans have slipped below $10 per bushel and have seen a decrease in price of 58 percent. Wheat prices have decreased 51 percent.
“As crop revenues contin ue to decline, says Parum, “expenses remain stubbornly high, leaving farmers with very few options beyond drawing down equity, tap ping reserves or taking on more costly debt. Profitabil ity per acre is negative across most major crops.” Accord ing to Parum corn farmers lost $169.31 for every acre they planted last year, sor ghum farmers lost $159.95 per acre, soybean producers lost $114.15 per acre and wheat lost $111.64 per acre. As a consequence, the U.S. lost more than 140,000 farms from 2017 to 2022, and an additional 20,000 in the last two years.
and heifers after slaughter — was 615 pounds. By 2024, it had risen to 890 pounds, an increase of about 45 percent. And while the most recent USDA figures are from 2024, industry data suggests weights rose much faster in 2025 — prompting questions about how much more weight the animals can bear?”
Advances in genetics, growth-promoting hormones, beta agonists, and the utilization of four million beef-ondairy animals have largely led to the increased weight. Keep in mind, your average Holstein cow weighs 1,500 pounds and the drop calves they produce can be worth up to $1,500. Beef from dairy herds now accounts for 16 to 20 percent of the beef supply in this country and no one we know says this dairy-on-beef trend will end any time soon, but who in their right mind is going to want to feed one for a whole year when corn gets back to six or seven dollars?
Is Bigger Really Better?
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The National Corn Growers Association has sounded the alarm about “the economic crisis hitting rural America,” while the American Soybean Association warned in a letter to Trump that “U.S. soybean farmers are standing at a trade and financial precipice.”
According to Ty Kreitman, an associate economist at the Omaha Branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, “According to the National Survey of Terms of Lending to Farmers, the average size of loans for operating expenses during the year reached a record high and pushed up lending volumes. The volume of new farm operating loans increased nearly 40 percent from the previous year in the fourth quarter and grew by an average of more than 20 percent throughout the past year.”
Bursting At the Seams
We keep hearing that U.S. ranchers now produce more beef at a lower cost than they did 40 years ago, even though herds have shrunk by 13 million head. But ask yourselves, how did we accomplish this fete?
The answer is simple: we created giant cattle by ranchers continuing to select for abnormally high EPD’s for growth and then feeding the resulting calves on cheap corn until they looked like they’d burst if they ate one more kernel.
Last November the King Ranch Institute put on a program that zeroed in on the topic of BIGGER cattle. Glen Dolezal, a retired Cargill meat scientist said, “We’re really putting a lot more pounds on them than the 5-pound average per year that we’ve seen previously. In 2025 alone steer carcass weights were up 40 pounds.” According to Dolezal this led to a growing list of health concerns, including lameness, heat stress, congestive heart failure and late-term deaths in feedyards. “Those concerns are reflected in recent reports and data. Liver abscesses and congestive heart failure have become more common, and death-loss rates in feedlots have risen in recent years, particularly among steers.”
“We are not making their lungs and hearts bigger, and that’s a problem,” said Justin Gleghorn, former Director of Cattle Risk Manage ment with Cactus Feeders and now employed by Smith Cattle Company.
Dolezal continued, “Operations can fabricate a 1,000-pound carcass at the same chain speed or line speed as a 600-pound carcass. And a 1,000-pound carcass puts more meat in the box, or more lean trim to make ground beef. But transport trailer densities, pen sizes at the yards or at the packing plant, are often outdated and too small for the bigger cattle.”
Many older packing houses were simply not built to handle 1,700-pound cattle. There have been many instances where cattle were simply too big to fit in a trailer or too wide to fit down a chute.
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According to the USDA, the weight of the average beef cow hovered around 1,000 pounds nationwide until the mid-’70s. Since 1975, the weight of the average range cow at slaughter has increased by roughly nine pounds each year – from 996 pounds in 1975 to a whopping 1,363 pounds in 2016. And we feel confident in saying it’s only increased much higher in the past nine years.
“In 1975,” according to the USDA, “ the average cattle carcass weight — the combined average for steers
“We’re not the only protein that has gone this route,” said Dolezal. “Com paring 1957 to 2005, the chicken you’re eating today has increased 364 percent in size, and they’ve had issues like Woody Breast. Chickens got too big, too fast, couldn’t stand up, fell down in the finishing houses and devel op calluses on the breast. Pork industry did something like this with porcine stress syndrome. They selected too heavily for muscling and ended up with pale, soft, and watery lean. Many pigs
died from the stress syndrome because they got the shakes. As an industry, we have to be careful.”
Too Big for the Box?
Gleghorn’s presentation at the King Ranch Institute confab was a head-turner. His topic was titled “Feeder Perspective: Impacts of Longer Days on Feed and What are the Limitations.”
As a feedlot editor in the early 1970’s I was frequently told that the optimum number of days on feed was 90 to 120 days and this remained the industry standard for decades. We were told that anything bigger created beef that was “too big for the box.” But according to Gleghorn, “Today, 220 or more days on feed is not uncommon. Cattle are getting bigger because we are feeding them longer, plus the genetic capabilities of these cattle to grow.”
“When you purchase a set of cattle,” continued Gleghorn, “you’re making an investment, trying to de termine what kind of return to expect. Let’s say we paid $347.30—average price go ing through Oklahoma City on the USDA report for an animal that weighs 751 pounds. That animal had a first cost of over $2,608.”
“The next biggest cost is feed ration price, days on feed, etc. You’ll spend a lit tle less than $500 a head in feed to get that animal to finished weight in 205 days. Yardage is another component, paying for la bor, equipment, getting cat tle fed and watered every day. This will be 55 to 65 cents per day, adding $112 to your budget. Feed costs will be about 14 percent of
your budget, and yardage/ care about 3 percent. There’s also processing costs, ear tags, vaccinations, implants, medicine.”
“The second biggest thing that can screw up a budget is mortality,” said Gleghorn. “You have to account for the ones that aren’t going to make it to the end. Their costs must be shared by their buddies that lived. This doesn’t include the ones that die late in the feeding period. They racked up all the costs then decided to die right before we ship them,” said Gleghorn. “The one you bought for $2,600, if he dies the other 99
If you’ve dined at a steakhouse recently or grilled rib-eye for dinner, you may have noticed a curious trend: Steaks are getting thinner and there’s emerging evidence that Americans dislike the changes to their steaks. And that could hurt the beef sector in the long run.”
There is also the issue of larger steaks and roasts sold at retail. Bigger cuts mean more pounds of beef in each package which raises the final price. At a time when more and more people are talking about “affordability” consumers are looking for lower prices, not higher, even if they do get more poundage.
He thinks dogs can do no wrong but dislikes cats.
A real man NEVER cries during a movie not even when John Wayne’s character got terminal cancer in his last movie. He may have shed a tiny tear a couple years later when The Duke did die of cancer for real.
A real man retains full control of the remote control (when his wife is not present). HGTV puts him to sleep and The Housewives of Everywhere makes him puke.
A real man would NOT be caught dead in a tanning booth, a spa, Palm Beach or Palm Springs. He’s never been to Monte Carlo, Victoria’s Secret or a psychoanalyst.
also knows the recipe for ice cubes. He can open any jar his wife hands him.
A real man can live out of the contents of one backpack for a month.
His all-time favorite actors are Jason Statham, Clint Eastwood, Mel Gibson and Bruce Willis.
He doesn’t know what the letters LGBTQ-TA stand for and still thinks real men can’t have babies.
A real man has a toolbox full of tools and knows how to use everyone.
He’s the only animal that will fight for something other than food and sex.
out of the 100 have to bear his cost. A rule of thumb is that for every 1 percent mortality it will cost the ones that lived about $20 a head. So, if you think you’ll have a 3 percent death loss, and suddenly you’ve got 10 percent death loss, you’ve got a major problem. It will be very hard for those cattle to be profitable.”
“Another thing that can happen is carcass bruis ing,” said Gleghorn. “It might happen through ship ping, improper handling, or Mother Nature. Hailstorms can put bruises on the rib and loin. The packer will trim that out, so instead of selling 900 pounds of car cass weight, you might only be selling 875.”
Thinner Steaks
Dr.Dolezal, also addressed the all-important consumer. “Customers are generally not looking for larger cuts, especially not in food service, so there are some antagonistic relationships that you have to deal with.
Dolezal says, “Cattle have gotten so big that restaurants and grocery stores need new ways to cut steaks. Meat cutters have had to get very creative. Increasingly, that means thinner steaks – as well as more scrap meat and “alternative” cuts designed to make the most of a bigger animal.”
But in a survey of more than 1,000 U.S. beefeaters, dislike for the thinner steaks was nearly unanimous. Which raises the question, are we once again sabotaging the consumer’s craving for beef, like we once did back when beef consumption in this country eventually dropped 40 pounds per person? If so, one day we’ll cuss the days of cheap grain and the huge cattle it produced just like we do the European invasion of all those humongous cattle with their 100 percent totally undigestible frame scores. ▫
A real man NEVER stops and asks for directions. Period!
His daily driver can be a pickup, a Peterbilt, a tractor or a bucking bull but NEVER a Smart Car.
He doesn’t eat quiche, plant burgers, vegetarian lasagna, mashed sweet potatoes or zucchini and lentil casserole.
A real man knows his way around a microwave and
He’s worn Carhartt® to a funeral but wouldn’t be caught dead wearing a fanny pack. A real man wears a leather belt but he does not wear gloves unless he’s roping or welding. He’s never worn black socks and sandals together at the same time.
A real man likes football, baseball, basketball and NASCAR but hates soccer and cricket. He’d rather have three teeth pulled without the aid of anesthesia than watch the pairs skating at the Winter Olympics.
A real man doesn’t know the first thing about how a woman thinks.
Wolves kill at night, in timber, in ravines, in “some old dark hole.” Riders simply cannot be everywhere at once, and wolves know it.
Range riding is not predator deterrence — it is extra labor. Riders check cattle, find carcasses, document kills, and push scattered cows back together. These tasks matter, but they do nothing to prevent wolves from killing.
And even the one thing riders can do — find carcasses early — only feeds into the next failure in the system: the compensation maze.
The Second Lie: Compensation Will Make Ranchers Whole
When a rider or rancher finds a dead calf quickly enough and there is still sufficient evidence left to examine, the state may confirm a depredation. But even then, payment rarely matches the true economic loss.
Flood works with a producer who already has more than $30,000 in confirmed wolf kills — while Washington’s entire statewide compensation budget for 2025 is also $30,000. That’s for all ranchers, all depredations, all year. Meanwhile, the open (not pregnant) cows, missing calves, lightweight calves, and cows run to exhaustion are not compensable at all.
The program covers only what the rider finds soon enough to be documented — and wolves are incredibly good at eliminating the evidence.
Flood says what ranchers whisper to each other privately:
“When this gets bad, the dead ones are the least of your worries.”
Range Riders Can’t Stop Wolves — but They Do Help Wolves Learn
In states without public wolf hunting and trapping, wolves quickly habituate to human presence. Without lethal consequences, the highly intelligent wolf learns that range riders are just another predictable feature of the landscape. Wolves smell them, watch them, hide from them, and then go right back to killing cattle the moment the rider is over the ridge.
Flood warns that range riding often makes wolves bolder:
“All we’re doing is habituating wolves to humans.”
A wolf that repeatedly experiences human scent, sound, and presence without lethal consequences becomes more confident, not less. And a confident wolf is a killing wolf. But even worse, range riding — which is touted as a mandatory step before the state will authorize lethal removal — de-
lays decisive action, allowing wolf packs to become fully habituated to non-threatening human presence and to livestock as easy, plentiful prey.
That delay is catastrophic, because once one or two wolves learn to kill cattle, the entire pack quickly follows.
Flood has seen this pattern countless times.
And that is exactly where the compensation trap snaps shut.
Compensation Is Not a Safety Net — It Is a Shackle
Once the pack has learned to kill cattle, the rancher is losing calves, losing cows, losing condition, losing pregnancies, and losing money and morale every single day. Yet instead of removing the problem wolves early, the state requires more range riding, more documentation, more checking of meaningless bureaucratic boxes.
Meanwhile, the wolves continue killing.
And then the state says, “Don’t worry — you’ll be compensated.”
Except:
■ you won’t be compensated fully
■ you won’t be compensated for indirect losses
■ you won’t be compensated for stress-induced abortions
■ you won’t be compensated for weight loss
cisions. It kicks the can down the road until a pack becomes so deeply habituated to killing cattle that lethal removal—full pack removal—often becomes the only remaining option.
This isn’t coexistence. It’s irresponsible management that produces more conflict, more cattle killed, and ultimately more wolves killed.
Flood sees the tragedy clearly:
“This isn’t a wolf problem. It’s a management problem.”
Neither non-lethal deterrent programs or compensation programs prevent depredation.
Neither protects ranchers. Neither improves coexistence. In fact, Flood argues that they produce the opposite result:
• Wolves become habituated to non-lethal deterrents.
• Beyond the confirmed kills, cattle become stressed and unproductive.
• Ranch families become financially crippled.
• Entire wolf packs eventually must be removed because the problem escalated too far.
When ranchers finally reach their breaking point — emotionally, financially, or both — they sell off land that they have preserved as open rangeland for generations. And when that land becomes housing developments and ranchettes, it is wolves, deer, elk, and every other wild species that loses.
Y RANCH BULLS
■ you won’t be compensated for calves that simply disappear
■ you won’t be compensated for the long-term change in herd behavior and hardiness
And worst of all, Flood warns, compensation is a political muzzle:
“We can make you rich for a year or two, but you’ve got to keep your mouth shut.”
Once a rancher accepts compensation dollars, they become targets for harassment and outright threats from activist groups. Because of this, and the bureaucratic procedural quagmire, some ranchers with plenty of verifiable wolf depredations simply quit seeking compensation. And by seeking compensation, they effectively lose their public voice. They are viewed as “paid off.” And when compensation funds run dry — which they always do — the rancher is still left dealing with a wolf pack now fully trained to kill cattle.
Compensation doesn’t save ranching operations. It buys time for the state to avoid making decisions, while the situation on the ground grows unmanageable. The ultimate decision quite often ends up being lethal removal of entire packs. In contrast, states that allow the public to hunt and trap wolves have very little trouble with wolves killing livestock.
Together, Range Riding and Compensation Create the Perfect Storm
The public is told that nonlethal deterrent methods and compensation somehow create a utopian coexistence. Flood’s experience says otherwise. Without lethal management methods, the highly intelligent wolf quickly learns that there are no real consequences to preying on livestock. Compensation simply allows the state to postpone making hard de-
principal investigator on the project and professor in the University’s College of Ag riculture, Biotechnology & Natural Resources. “It of fers multiple revenue streams with minimal inputs, mean ing Western and Southern producers could tap into the bioenergy and bioprod ucts economy in a way that fits their climate and makes financial sense while also conserving precious water resources.”
Rural communities in arid regions, such as southern Nevada’s Logandale, where Cushman and his team conducted their first long-term field trials of spineless Opuntia cactus pear varieties, could likewise benefit from new agricultural and biobased industrial opportunities if the crop proves commercially feasible.
The very people who claim to be “protecting wilderness” by pushing wolves onto ranchers are the ones accelerating the destruction of open space.
The Truth No One in Power Wants to Admit
Range riding does not prevent wolf conflict. Compensation does not repair wolf conflict. Combined, they institutionalize wolf conflict.
They are not designed to solve the problem — they are designed to delay responsibility while ranch families absorb the cost in silence.
Flood’s warning cuts through the political fog:
“I’ll help you get compensation if you want it, but I’m telling you — it’ll be the end of you.”
Range riding won’t save a ranch. Compensation won’t save a ranch. Only honest, timely, decisive wolf management will. ▫
This Department of Energy-funded project builds on the Logandale trials and a threeyear study in Parlier, California, supported by the University’s Experiment Station and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. In the earlier research, Cushman, a foundation professor of biochemistry in the College’s Department of Biochemistry, Molecular Biology & Biotechnology, and his team compared biomass produced by 14 cactus pear varieties, finding that the top-performing variety yielded eight times more biomass than the lowest-producing variety.
The new project expands the work to 240 cactus pear varieties from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Germplasm Resources Laboratory, which facilitates the acquisition, exchange and documentation of crop genetic resources important to world food security. Using this larger set, Cushman and his team will examine how the plant’s use of crassulacean acid metabolism, or CAM, affects biomass production. CAM is a process in which cactus pear opens its stomata at night to take in carbon dioxide and keeps them closed during the day to conserve water. The researchers will also study soil microorganisms around the plant’s roots to see whether they influence its efficient use of nitrogen and phosphorus, both essential for plant development.
A national, multisite “natural experiment”
Cactus pear will be grown at four two-acre field sites.
Two U.S. Department of Agriculture sites, the Arid Land Agricultural Research Center in Maricopa, Arizona, and the National Arid Land Plant Genetic Resource Unit in Parlier, California, receive only 147 and 213 millimeters of annual rainfall, respectively. Both will use controlled irrigation to assess responses to different water levels. The other two sites, in Bremond, Texas, and Marianna, Florida, receive an average of 1,200 millimeters of rain annually, nearly eight times more than the desert locations, creating a natural precipitation gradient that allows the team to study cactus pear performance across both dry and moist conditions.
Black angus Bulls - Private Treaty
Multi-institution collaboration supports cactus pear biofuel and bioproduct study
Other members of the team from the University of Nevada, Reno include Associate Professor Robert Washington-Allen, a rangeland ecologist in the College’s Department of Agriculture, Veterinary & Rangeland Sciences; Associate Professor Won C. Yim, a computational biologist specializing in plant genomics in the College’s Department of Biochemistry, Molecular Biology & Biotechnology; and Tracy Shane, a state livestock specialist with the University’s Extension unit.
Yim will lead research exploring how cactus pear works with beneficial microbes to grow and thrive. His team will analyze the plant’s DNA to identify the helpful bacteria and fungi living in and around their roots. They will then test microbes that are especially good at adding nitrogen to the soil or unlocking phosphorus, key nutrients for plant growth, to see whether these natural partners help cactus pear grow faster and produce more biomass.
Washington-Allen will lead efforts to use cutting-edge remote sensing technology to measure above- and below-ground plant growth, 3D structure and biomass, contributing to measurements of nitrogen and water-use efficiency. Together with Shane, a licensed drone pilot, they will use drones equipped with specialized cameras and laser technology, along with ground-penetrating radar, to estimate how much cactus pear is growing above and below the soil, without having to dig up or cut down the plants.
“Traditionally, measur ing biomass requires har vesting, drying and weighing plants, a labor‑intensive and difficult procedure,” Wash ington Allen said. “Using remote sensing technology, we are able to create pre cise, high resolution models
from which we can estimate biomass across hundreds of varieties quickly and consis tently.”
The team, which also conducts research through the University’s Experiment Station, will be supported by postdoctoral researchers Monirul Islam and Uriel Cholula Rivera. Rivera, a graduate of the College’s Animal & Rangeland Sciences Program, works under Washington-Allen, while Islam is supervised by Cushman. The team will collaborate with the University of Florida Institute for Food and Agricultural Sciences; Loop Bioproducts, LLC; the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service at the Arid Land Agricultural Research Center and the National Arid Land Plant Genetic Resource Unit; as well as the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and the National Laboratory of the Rockies.
Looking ahead, the research team expects to deliver specific recommendations on top-performing cactus pear varieties, along with validated remote sensing and modeling methods that can be applied well beyond cactus pear.
“If we can show that cactus pear reliably delivers high biomass with a frac tion of the water other crops need, it changes the map of where and how we produce bioenergy in this country,” Cushman said. “It means the West and the South don’t just have to endure a hotter, drier future; they can help power the transition to cleaner fuels and bioprod ucts.”
Agrilife Research Brahman Program at Overton Named Breeder of the Year
American Brahman Breeders Association honors 50 years of research-driven leadership in herd performance
BY ADAM RUSSELL
The Texas A&M AgriLife Research Brahman program at the Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Extension Center in Overton has been named the American Brahman Breeders Association, ABBA, 2025 Performance Breeder of the Year.
The recognition underscores the center’s five decades of leadership in Brahman performance testing, research-driven innovation and service to the beef industry.
“It’s an enormous honor for the research herd and our team to be recognized,” said Charles Long, Ph.D., center director and professor of animal breeding and genetics in the Texas A&M Department of Animal Science. “This research has been a true team effort to advance the science in ways that directly impact cattle producers and the industry.”
The Texas A&M AgriLife center’s purebred Brahman program began in 1974, complementing a Brahman-Hereford F1 herd established in 1967. Today, the breeding program maintains a 200-head registered Brahman herd and is known for comprehensive, long-term data collection spanning reproduction, temperament, grazing management, feed efficiency and carcass merit. Data from the herd are routinely submitted to the Brahman Herd Improvement Registry and used widely by producers and researchers.
Research impacts ripple through beef industry
The research herd has become a foundational resource for understanding tropically adapted cattle.
The AgriLife Research program at Overton has been guided by Long, Ron Randel,
Ph.D., beef cattle physiologist and professor emeritus, and George Perry, Ph.D., beef cattle physiologist and professor, all in the Department of Animal Science; and Monte Rouquette, Ph.D., forage physiologist and professor, Department of Soil and Crop Sciences. Additional support staff involved include Don Neuendorf, M.J. Florence, Joel Kerby, Kyle Turner, Dustin Law, Sandra Welch and Kelli Norman.
Research conducted with the herd has helped refine breeding protocols, uncover physiological differences unique to Brahman females and improve strategies for managing temperament and transportation-related stress. Long-term carcass data collected over more than 30 years continues to strengthen industry knowledge of traits affecting yield, value, beef quality and palatability traits in Brahman and Brahman-influenced cattle.
The program has also ex-
celled in maternal performance. Since the inception of the ABBA Maternal Merit Program in 2009, the herd has produced 22 Elite Maternal Merit Females, four Supreme Maternal Merit Females and three Silver Maternal Performance Sires, demonstrating a sustained commitment to advancing reproductive efficiency and longevity — traits of critical economic importance to producers.
Beyond genetic and performance achievements, the Texas A&M AgriLife breeding program plays a vital role in innovation and talent development. The herd supports research in genetics, reproduction, forage systems and beef production modeling, aligning closely with AgriLife Research and Department of Animal Science strategic priorities of innovation, enhancing productivity and sustainability, and training future leaders.
To date, the Brahman program has contributed to the training of more than 225 graduate students, along with numerous interns and early-career scientists whose work continues to influence beef production systems nationwide.
Mexico Shows the Futility and Danger of Gun Control
BY SEAN DURNS / WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Mexico is awash in violence. And the country’s stringent gun control laws aren’t helping.
On February 22, the Mexican military carried out an operation that killed Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, nicknamed “El Mencho,” the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG). Mexican armed forces were reportedly trained by a small cadre of U.S. Navy SEALs who entered the country on a “training mission” approved by Mexico’s Senate.
CJNG responded to El Mencho’s death with wanton violence. The cartel murdered no fewer than 25 Mexican National Guard members and set up no fewer than 250 roadblocks. Schools were closed, and flights at airports were grounded. Dozens of buildings were burned. The savagery spanned multiple jurisdictions. By day’s end, at least 60 people had been slaughtered.
The U.S. and Mexican governments issued joint statements calling for their citizens
to “shelter in place.” Countless men, women, and children were forced to hide. Those unlucky to be caught found themselves at the cartel’s mercy.
For many Americans, it is a nearly unthinkable situation. But the United States has the Second Amendment and is filled with thousands of law-abiding gun owners.
Tragically, the same can’t be said for Mexico, where both the state and cartels have a monopoly on gun ownership. Your average citizen gets the short end of the stick.
Mexico’s government might not be able to thwart the cartels, but it sure can regulate firearms ownership.
Indeed, up until quite recently, there was only one place in the entire country to purchase firearms. And that place, the Directorate of Commercialization of Arms and Munitions, is on a secure military base.
The process to purchase these guns is arduous and requires extensive time and vetting. Citizens who qualify are restricted to certain calibers and designs and are forbidden from having guns that shoot common cartridges used by the military, such as 9mm. They are only allowed to have one handgun. And concealed carry is forbidden. “High-capacity magazines”–that is, magazines that carry what is a standard amount in most U.S. states–are also illegal.
Mexico’s firearms laws are
stricter than any in the U.S. In fact, much of what Mexico has on the books is precisely what some claim will “curb gun violence.” Their proposed solutions look like Mexico’s gun laws. But just as strict firearms laws haven’t curbed violence in Chicago, Washington, D.C., or Baltimore, they’ve done nothing to make Mexico and its citizens safer.
And just like those that govern those locales, Mexico’s government is always able to point the finger elsewhere and assign blame for the violence. Like them, Mexico blames gun manufacturers, filing lawsuits against Smith and Wesson, Glock, Colt, and others. As Brandon Darby and Ildelfonso Ortiz noted in 2022, the Mexican journalist Carlos Loret De Mola revealed that 30 percent of the weapons purchased by the Mexican military “went missing.” That is a large number of firearms to just up and disappear.
Mexico is a testament to what happens when the state, and not citizens, is given a monopoly on control and self-defense. Citizens become subjects, or worse. Criminals, by definition, break laws. Governments, history tells us, are frequently incompetent, corrupt, or both. Gun laws don’t protect innocents. Rather, they create victims. Sadly, Mexico has no shortage. ▫
Texas A&M-Kingsville Professor Innovates Cattle Collars to Combat Screwworm Threat Near Border
Still in the research stage, the virtual collars aimed at combating screwworm threats could potentially save ranchers and their herds.
BY LIDIA HERRERA
ATexas A&M University-Kingsville professor is working on a new kind of virtual technology to make it easier to move cattle quickly, especially with the threat of screwworms.
With screwworms still a threat near the Texas border, the collar could help isolate infected cattle. Dr. Robert Wells, a professor at the King Ranch Institute for Ranch Management, understands firsthand how serious the threat can be.
“So, growing up in the valley during the early ‘70s, that outbreak that happened then, it was decimating to see a cow that could be healthy one day and, within less than a week, be infested and have a horrible wound or just be dead,” Wells said.
Now he’s taking matters into his own hands with a proactive solution.
“So, the way the technology is going to work, it’s going to be able to substitute for the lack of cowboys and skilled manpower by delivering the cattle to a certain location at a certain time. We’re able to find those animals that might be in the early stages of being infested by the screwworm fly or the screwworm larvae, and then we’re able to go and proactively treat that animal quicker,” Wells said.
The cows will be directed using a collar.
“We collared 57 of our fall calving herd yesterday. Last month, we collared 108 of our spring calving cows. Within less than four days, the cows were trained to listen to the sound of the buzzer on the pendant that the cow wears,” Wells said.
Jeff Petter, operations manager at HR Smith Ranch, where the research is taking place, said the technology helps manage the cattle more efficiently.
“With the influx of a screwworm, if we end up having it, and we can see all the cattle, we can get them grouped up— ideally into an area to do a welfare check on everybody,” Petter said.
Although this technology has been used before, Wells said it is now being applied to save cattle lives.
“It can be a game changer for ranchers who are absentee, older, or just don’t have enough help,” Wells said. “Unfortunately, talking to some of the ranchers in the community, we hear repeatedly that when the fly gets here, that maybe it. We may just sell our cattle and quit ranching. This technology has the ability to help ranchers stay in business.”
Wells said the research should be finished by summer, and they hope to make the technology available to ranchers soon.
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