Shopping on line can be easy, simple and save you lots of money. It can also take a lot of your time, frustrate you, and result in unwanted purchases. Now the same can be said for regular high street shopping, but with the vast opportunity presented by the Internet it will pay you to spend a few minutes reading this and understanding how to better optimize your Ranching shopping experience:
1. Compare - without doubt the biggest advantage that the Ranching offers shoppers today is the ability to compare thousands of Ranching at a time. This is a great thing, but not necessarily all the time! Too much can be daunting at times so take advantage of the great comparison sites and where possible let them do the hard work for you.
2. Research - if it has been said it will be on the internet. Ignorance is no longer a justifiable reason for buying the wrong thing. Take the time to research in detail everything that you could possible want to know about
3. Testimonials - don't know anybody that has bought a Ranching? Wrong! If the Ranching is good the internet will let you know. Use the Internet as a friend and get testimonials before you buy.
4. Questions - Got a question about Ranching then search the Forums, FAQ's, Blogs etc. Don't be afraid to ask .....
5. Reputation - Never heard of the company selling Ranching? Don't worry, no reason why you should know every company in the world, but you know someone that does! Use the internet to find out what people are saying about Ranching and build up a picture of their reputation for sales, returns, customer service, delivery etc.
6. Returns - still worried that even after all of the above your Ranching wont be what you want? Check out the returns policy. There is so much competition now that someone, somewhere is bound to offer the terms that you are comfortable with.
7. Feedback - happy with your Ranching then let people know, after all you are depending on others people input in your buying decision, so why not give a little back.
8. Security - check for the yellow padlock on the Ranching site before you buy, and the s after http:/ /i.e. https:// = a secure site
9. Contact - got a question about Ranching, or want to leave a comment then check out the sites contact page. Reputable companies have them and respond.
10. Payment - ready to pay for your Ranching, then use your credit card or PayPal! Be aware of companies that don't accept them, there may be genuine reasons but given the huge amount of choice you have when buying online there is no reason at all not to buy via credit card or PayPal.
A
ranch is an area of landscape, including various structures, given primarily to the practice of
ranching, the practice of raising grazing livestock such as cattle or
sheep for meat or wool. The word most often applies to livestock-raising operations in the western United States and
Canada, though there are ranches in other areas. People who own or operate a ranch are called stockgrowers or ranchers. Ranching is also a method used to raise less common
livestock such as elk, American Bison or even
ostrich and
emu.
Ranches generally consist of large areas, but may be of nearly any size. In the western United States, many ranches are a combination of privately owned land supplemented by grazing leases on land under the control of the federal
Bureau of Land Management. If the ranch includes arable or irrigated land, the ranch may also engage in a limited amount of farming, raising crops for feeding the animals, such as hay and feed grains.
Ranches that cater exclusively to tourists are called dude ranches. Most working ranches do not cater to guests, though they may allow private hunters or outfitters onto their property to hunt native wildlife. However, in recent years, a few struggling smaller operations have added some dude ranch features, such as horseback rides, cattle drives or guided hunting, in an attempt to bring in additional income. Ranching is part of the
iconography of the "Wild West" as seen in Western movies.
Origins of ranching
Ranching and the cowboy tradition originated in
Spain, out of the necessity to handle large herds of grazing animals on dry land from horseback. Beginning during the
Reconquista, members of the
Spanish nobility and various military orders received large land that the kingdom of Castile hadreconquista that they were to defend and could use for earning revenue. These individuals found that open-range breeding of sheep and cattle (under the
Mesta association) was the most suitable for the areas now known as
Castilla-La Mancha,
Extremadura and
Andalusia.
History in North America
Spanish North America
When the Conquistadors came to the Americas in the 16th century, followed by settlers, they brought their
cattle and cattle-raising techniques with them. Huge land grants by the Spanish (and later Mexican) government, part of the
hacienda system, allowed large numbers of animals to roam freely over vast areas. A number of different traditions developed, often related to the original location in Spain from which a settlement originated. For example, many of the traditions of the
Jalisco charros in southern Mexico come from the Salamanca (province)
charros of Castile. The
Vaquero tradition of Northern Mexico was more organic, developed to adapt to the characteristics of the region from Spanish sources by cultural interaction between the Spanish elites and the native and
mestizo peoples.http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/08/0814_030815_cowboys.html Haeber, Jonathan. "Vaqueros: The First Cowboys of the Open Range"
National Geographic News, August 15, 2003. Accessed online October 15, 2007.
United States
As settlers from the United States moved west, they brought cattle breeds developed on the east coast and in Europe along with them, and adapted their management to the drier lands of the west by borrowing key elements of the Spanish
vaquero culture. Deep Hollow Ranch, east of New York City in
Montauk, New York, claims to be the first ranch in the United States, having continuously operated since 1658.http://deephollowranch.com/history1.htm Deep Hollow Ranch History
The Open Range
The prairie and desert lands of what today is
Mexico and the western
United States were well-suited to "open range" grazing. For example,
American bison had been a mainstay of the diet for the
Indigenous peoples of the Americas in the Great Plains for centuries. Likewise, cattle and sheep, descended from animals bought over from Europe, were simply turned loose in the spring after their young were born and allowed to roam with little supervision and no fences, then rounded up in the fall, with the mature animals driven to market and the breeding stock brought close to the ranch headquarters for greater protection in the winter. The use of
livestock branding allowed the cattle owned by different ranchers to be identified and sorted. Beginning with the settlement of
Texas in the 1840s, and expansion both north and west from that time, through the
American Civil War and into the 1880s, ranching dominated western economic activity.
Along with ranchers came the need for agricultural crops to feed both humans and livestock, and hence many
farmers also came west along with ranchers. Many operations were "diversified," with both ranching and farming activities taking place. With the Homestead Act of 1862, more settlers came west to set up
farms. This created some conflict, as increasing numbers of farmers needed to fence off fields to prevent cattle and sheep from eating their crops.
Barbed wire, invented in 1874, gradually made inroads in fencing off privately owned land, especially for homesteads. There was some reduction of land on the Great Plains open to grazing.
End of the Open Range
.The end of the open range was not brought about by a reduction in land due to arable farming, but by overgrazing. Cattle stocked on the open range created a
tragedy of the commons as each rancher sought increased economic benefit by grazing too many animals on public lands that "nobody" owned. However, being a non-native species, the grazing patterns of ever-increasing numbers of cattle slowly reduced the quality of the rangeland, in spite of the simultaneous massive slaughter of
American bison that occurred. The winter of 1886-1887 was one of the most severe on record, and livestock that were already stressed by reduced grazing died by the thousands. Many large cattle operations went bankrupt, and others suffered severe financial losses. Thus, after this time, ranchers also began to fence off their land and negotiated individual grazing leases with the American government so that they could keep better control of the pasture land available to their own animals.
Ranching in Hawaii
Ranching in Hawaii developed independently of that in the continental United States. In colonial times, Capt. George Vancouver gave several head of cattle to the Hawaiian king, Pai`ea Kamehameha, monarch of the Hawaiian Kingdom, and by the early 1800s, they had multiplied considerably, to the point that they were wreaking havoc throughout the countryside. About 1812, John Parker, a sailor who had jumped ship and settled in the islands, received permission from Kamehameha to capture the wild cattle and develop a beef industry.
The Hawaiian style of ranching originally included capturing wild cattle by driving them into pits dug in the forest floor. Once tamed somewhat by hunger and thirst, they were hauled out up a steep ramp, and tied by their horns to the horns of a tame, older steer (or
ox) and taken to fenced-in areas. The industry grew slowly under the reign of Kamehameha's son Liholiho (
Kamehameha II). When Liholiho's son, Kauikeaouli (
Kamehameha III), visited California, then still a part of
Mexico, he was impressed with the skill of the Mexican
vaqueros. In 1832, he invited several to Hawai`i to teach the Hawaiian people how to work cattle.
The Native Hawaiians cowboy came to be called the
paniolo, a Hawaiianized pronunciation of
español. Even today, the traditional Hawaiian saddle and many other tools of the ranching trade have a distinctly Mexican look, and many Hawaiian ranching families still carry the surnames of vaqueros who made Hawai`i their home.
Ranching in South America
In Argentina, ranches are known as estancias, and in
Brazil, they are called
fazendas. In much of South America , including Ecuador and Colombia, the term
hacienda may be used.
Ranchero is also a generic term used throughout Latin America.
In the colonial period, Pampas regions of
South America, particularly the Semi-arid Pampas of
Argentina, were often well-suited to ranching and a tradition developed that largely paralleled that of Mexico and the United States. However, in the 20th century, cattle raising expanded into less-suitable areas. Particularly in Brazil, the 20th century marked the rapid growth of deforestation as
rain forest lands were cleared by
slash and burn methods that allowed grass to grow for livestock, but also led to the depletion of the land within only a few years. Many of Indigenous peoples of the rain forest opposed this form of cattle ranching and protested the forest being burnt down to set up grazing operations and farms. This conflict is still a concern in the region today.
Ranches outside the Americas
, SpainIn Spain, where the origins of ranching can be traced, there are
ganaderías operating on
dehesa-type land, where bullfightings are raised.
In Australia, ranches are known as '
Station (Australian agriculture)' usually in the context of what stock they carry - usually referred to as Cattle stations or
Sheep stations. They exist mainly on dry
rangeland in the
outback and many were originally administered as pastoral leases by state governments. Owners and employees are known as
Stockmen,
jackaroos, and drovers rather than ranchers or
cowboys. Australian sheep and cattle stations are larger than ranches in the
United States. For example, one of the largest is
Anna Creek station at 34,000 km².
New Zealanders use the term
runs.
The term "ranch" and the need for vast grazing area is not used in United Kingdom agriculture. The nation has far less land area, and sufficient rainfall to allow the raising of cattle on much smaller areas. From medieval times,
cattle were traditionally raised in the small-area bocage. For similar reasons, the concept of a "ranch" is also not seen to any significant degree in most of western Europe. The only stock-raising properties in the
British Isles that are anywhere close to the size of the smaller ranches in other nations are the largest hill farms in the upland areas of the
United Kingdom.
See also
References
External links
- The Handbook of Texas Online: Ranching
- Watersheds Project
- Cattle Ranges of the Southwest, published 1898, hosted by the Portal to Texas History
Further reading
- Judy Blunt. Breaking Clean Knopf: 2002, hardcover, ISBN 0-375-40131-8
- Campbell, Ida Foster and Alice Foster Hill. Triumph and Tragedy: A History of Thomas Lyons and the LCs, High-Lonesome Books, Silver City, New Mexico, 2002, softcover, ISBN: 0-944383-61-0
- George F. Ellis, The Bell Ranch As I Knew It, Lowell Press: 1973, hardcover, ISBN 0-913504-15-7
- Greenwood, Kathy L. Heart-Diamond, University of North Texas Press, 1989, hardback, ISBN 0-929398-08-4
- Paul, Virginia. This Was Cattle Ranching: Yesterday and Today, Superior Publishing Company, Seattle, Washington, 1973
- Ward, Delbert R. Great Ranches of the United States, Ganada Press, San Antonio, Texas, 1993, softcover, ISBN 7-880-510-25-1
A
ranch is an area of landscape, including various structures, given primarily to the practice of
ranching, the practice of raising grazing livestock such as cattle or
sheep for meat or wool. The word most often applies to livestock-raising operations in the western
United States and
Canada, though there are ranches in other areas. People who own or operate a ranch are called stockgrowers or ranchers. Ranching is also a method used to raise less common
livestock such as elk,
American Bison or even
ostrich and emu.
Ranches generally consist of large areas, but may be of nearly any size. In the western United States, many ranches are a combination of privately owned land supplemented by grazing leases on land under the control of the federal Bureau of Land Management. If the ranch includes arable or irrigated land, the ranch may also engage in a limited amount of
farming, raising crops for feeding the animals, such as
hay and feed grains.
Ranches that cater exclusively to tourists are called
dude ranches. Most working ranches do not cater to guests, though they may allow private hunters or outfitters onto their property to hunt native wildlife. However, in recent years, a few struggling smaller operations have added some dude ranch features, such as horseback rides, cattle drives or guided hunting, in an attempt to bring in additional income. Ranching is part of the iconography of the "Wild West" as seen in Western movies.
Origins of ranching
Ranching and the cowboy tradition originated in
Spain, out of the necessity to handle large herds of grazing animals on dry land from horseback. Beginning during the
Reconquista, members of the
Spanish nobility and various military orders received large land that the kingdom of
Castile hadreconquista that they were to defend and could use for earning revenue. These individuals found that open-range breeding of sheep and cattle (under the Mesta association) was the most suitable for the areas now known as
Castilla-La Mancha,
Extremadura and Andalusia.
History in North America
Spanish North America
When the Conquistadors came to the
Americas in the 16th century, followed by settlers, they brought their
cattle and cattle-raising techniques with them. Huge land grants by the Spanish (and later Mexican) government, part of the hacienda system, allowed large numbers of animals to roam freely over vast areas. A number of different traditions developed, often related to the original location in Spain from which a settlement originated. For example, many of the traditions of the Jalisco
charros in southern Mexico come from the
Salamanca (province) charros of Castile. The
Vaquero tradition of Northern Mexico was more organic, developed to adapt to the characteristics of the region from Spanish sources by cultural interaction between the Spanish elites and the native and
mestizo peoples.http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/08/0814_030815_cowboys.html Haeber, Jonathan. "Vaqueros: The First Cowboys of the Open Range"
National Geographic News, August 15, 2003. Accessed online October 15, 2007.
United States
As settlers from the United States moved west, they brought cattle breeds developed on the east coast and in Europe along with them, and adapted their management to the drier lands of the west by borrowing key elements of the Spanish
vaquero culture. Deep Hollow Ranch, east of
New York City in
Montauk, New York, claims to be the first ranch in the United States, having continuously operated since 1658.http://deephollowranch.com/history1.htm Deep Hollow Ranch History
The Open Range
The
prairie and desert lands of what today is Mexico and the western United States were well-suited to "open range" grazing. For example, American bison had been a mainstay of the diet for the
Indigenous peoples of the Americas in the Great Plains for centuries. Likewise, cattle and sheep, descended from animals bought over from Europe, were simply turned loose in the spring after their young were born and allowed to roam with little supervision and no fences, then rounded up in the fall, with the mature animals driven to market and the breeding stock brought close to the ranch headquarters for greater protection in the winter. The use of
livestock branding allowed the cattle owned by different ranchers to be identified and sorted. Beginning with the settlement of Texas in the 1840s, and expansion both north and west from that time, through the American Civil War and into the 1880s, ranching dominated western economic activity.
Along with ranchers came the need for agricultural crops to feed both humans and livestock, and hence many
farmers also came west along with ranchers. Many operations were "diversified," with both ranching and farming activities taking place. With the
Homestead Act of 1862, more settlers came west to set up
farms. This created some conflict, as increasing numbers of farmers needed to fence off fields to prevent cattle and sheep from eating their crops. Barbed wire, invented in
1874, gradually made inroads in fencing off privately owned land, especially for homesteads. There was some reduction of land on the
Great Plains open to grazing.
End of the Open Range
.The end of the open range was not brought about by a reduction in land due to
arable farming, but by
overgrazing. Cattle stocked on the open range created a tragedy of the commons as each rancher sought increased economic benefit by grazing too many animals on
public lands that "nobody" owned. However, being a non-native species, the grazing patterns of ever-increasing numbers of cattle slowly reduced the quality of the rangeland, in spite of the simultaneous massive slaughter of
American bison that occurred. The winter of 1886-1887 was one of the most severe on record, and livestock that were already stressed by reduced grazing died by the thousands. Many large cattle operations went bankrupt, and others suffered severe financial losses. Thus, after this time, ranchers also began to fence off their land and negotiated individual grazing leases with the American government so that they could keep better control of the pasture land available to their own animals.
Ranching in Hawaii
Ranching in Hawaii developed independently of that in the continental United States. In colonial times, Capt. George Vancouver gave several head of cattle to the Hawaiian king, Pai`ea Kamehameha, monarch of the Hawaiian Kingdom, and by the early 1800s, they had multiplied considerably, to the point that they were wreaking havoc throughout the countryside. About 1812, John Parker, a sailor who had jumped ship and settled in the islands, received permission from Kamehameha to capture the wild cattle and develop a beef industry.
The Hawaiian style of ranching originally included capturing wild cattle by driving them into pits dug in the forest floor. Once tamed somewhat by hunger and thirst, they were hauled out up a steep ramp, and tied by their horns to the horns of a tame, older steer (or ox) and taken to fenced-in areas. The industry grew slowly under the reign of Kamehameha's son Liholiho (
Kamehameha II). When Liholiho's son, Kauikeaouli (Kamehameha III), visited
California, then still a part of
Mexico, he was impressed with the skill of the Mexican vaqueros. In 1832, he invited several to Hawai`i to teach the Hawaiian people how to work cattle.
The Native Hawaiians cowboy came to be called the
paniolo, a Hawaiianized pronunciation of
español. Even today, the traditional Hawaiian saddle and many other tools of the ranching trade have a distinctly Mexican look, and many Hawaiian ranching families still carry the surnames of vaqueros who made Hawai`i their home.
Ranching in South America
In Argentina, ranches are known as estancias, and in Brazil, they are called
fazendas. In much of South America , including
Ecuador and
Colombia, the term hacienda may be used.
Ranchero is also a generic term used throughout
Latin America.
In the colonial period,
Pampas regions of South America, particularly the
Semi-arid Pampas of
Argentina, were often well-suited to ranching and a tradition developed that largely paralleled that of Mexico and the United States. However, in the 20th century, cattle raising expanded into less-suitable areas. Particularly in Brazil, the 20th century marked the rapid growth of deforestation as rain forest lands were cleared by slash and burn methods that allowed grass to grow for livestock, but also led to the depletion of the land within only a few years. Many of Indigenous peoples of the rain forest opposed this form of cattle ranching and protested the forest being burnt down to set up grazing operations and farms. This conflict is still a concern in the region today.
Ranches outside the Americas
, SpainIn Spain, where the origins of ranching can be traced, there are
ganaderías operating on
dehesa-type land, where
bullfightings are raised.
In
Australia, ranches are known as 'Station (Australian agriculture)' usually in the context of what stock they carry - usually referred to as
Cattle stations or
Sheep stations. They exist mainly on dry
rangeland in the
outback and many were originally administered as pastoral leases by state governments. Owners and employees are known as Stockmen,
jackaroos, and
drovers rather than ranchers or cowboys. Australian sheep and cattle stations are larger than ranches in the United States. For example, one of the largest is Anna Creek station at 34,000 km².
New Zealanders use the term
runs.
The term "ranch" and the need for vast grazing area is not used in
United Kingdom agriculture. The nation has far less land area, and sufficient rainfall to allow the raising of
cattle on much smaller areas. From
medieval times, cattle were traditionally raised in the small-area
bocage. For similar reasons, the concept of a "ranch" is also not seen to any significant degree in most of western
Europe. The only stock-raising properties in the British Isles that are anywhere close to the size of the smaller ranches in other nations are the largest hill farms in the upland areas of the
United Kingdom.
See also
- Pastoralism
- Farm
- Cowboy
- Horse
- Guest ranch (also known as a Dude Ranch)
- Rangeland
- Movie ranch
- Hunting
- Animal husbandry
- Transhumance
- List of Ranches and Stations
References
External links
- The Handbook of Texas Online: Ranching
- Watersheds Project
- Cattle Ranges of the Southwest, published 1898, hosted by the Portal to Texas History
Further reading
- Judy Blunt. Breaking Clean Knopf: 2002, hardcover, ISBN 0-375-40131-8
- Campbell, Ida Foster and Alice Foster Hill. Triumph and Tragedy: A History of Thomas Lyons and the LCs, High-Lonesome Books, Silver City, New Mexico, 2002, softcover, ISBN: 0-944383-61-0
- George F. Ellis, The Bell Ranch As I Knew It, Lowell Press: 1973, hardcover, ISBN 0-913504-15-7
- Greenwood, Kathy L. Heart-Diamond, University of North Texas Press, 1989, hardback, ISBN 0-929398-08-4
- Paul, Virginia. This Was Cattle Ranching: Yesterday and Today, Superior Publishing Company, Seattle, Washington, 1973
- Ward, Delbert R. Great Ranches of the United States, Ganada Press, San Antonio, Texas, 1993, softcover, ISBN 7-880-510-25-1
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A secondary school revision resource for GCSE History ... Cowboys and cattle ranchers were the first group of European settlers to move permanently onto the Great Plains.
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