SPONSORED CONTENT
Cows and What? 30 Years of Riparian Stewardship
BY AMY MCLEOD, PROVINCIAL RIPARIAN SPECIALIST AT C OWS AND FISH Timber Ridge Ranch tour
Hilton Pharis
“YOU WORK FOR WHO?” I often get asked when I say I work for Cows and Fish. People might guess I work at a steak and seafood restaurant. For me, our name is about understanding relationships; in this case, the relationship between cattle and their impact on the landscape, and how that impacts fish, and in general, water. Cows and Fish is a non-profit society that promotes sustainable management of riparian areas, the areas connecting land and water. Making up a small portion of the landscape, riparian areas are among the most productive and valuable places. When intact, these green threads along the water's edge help stitch together the shoreline. Diverse plant layers provide water storage, filtration, shade, and forage, which is invaluable for cows, fish, and people. 16
Cows and Fish took root in 1992, with the proactive involvement of several ranchers in southwestern Alberta, who understood it was possible to maintain water quality, sustain livestock, and simultaneously improve trout spawning habitat in the foothill streams of the Canadian Rockies with thoughtful grazing management. Our program has since branched out across Alberta. If you ask Lorne Fitch, a provincial fisheries biologist and one of Cows and Fish’s founding members, it was a walk across a pasture on the Elkhorn Ranch in Willow Valley with Hilton Pharis that started a journey of discovery. “Walking across the pasture with Hilton was the beginning of a new insight into how many ranchers and farmers feel about their land and what grows there,
walks across it, or swims through it,” Fitch said. Recorded in the Pharis family photos is the story of succession, growth, and prosperity. Also depicted in the background are the changes over time of Willow Valley. Over the years, Hilton noticed willows were disappearing and that Cutthroat trout populations had also declined. The trout used to spawn in the gravel riffles beneath the umbrella of Canadian Cowboy Country February/March 2022