Cattle Can Be Effective Grazing Tools

Last week, I attended a Riparian Area Grazing Seminar. One of the speakers University of California Davis Extension Rangeland Watershed Specialist Dr. Ken Tate has spent the last two decades researching livestock grazing and its affects on Watersheds throughout California.
Tate: “You know there are misconceptions out there that livestock grazing is ubiquitously bad for the environment and that is a misconception. I think that we need to base our decisions about livestock grazing on site-specific local conditions. We need to keep in mind that there are benefits to livestock grazing to the environment and rural communities, there is sustainability and those are all very important. And we have to keep in mind that there is a large tool box available of practical old time practices like herding and salting in key locations that allow us to address problems where they really exist. I’ve had ranchers tell me and others in California when we are talking about potential water quality or environmental problems with grazing. They say, ‘Show us where the problem is and give us a chance to fix it.”
One example he shared was the issue of erosion and sediment in the water ways and livestock grazing had been blamed; however, once they did the research they realized that nearly 77 percent of the issue was ranch roads and too small of culverts rather grazing which ended up attributing about 1 percent of the problem.