Dixon Water Foundation

Promoting healthy watersheds through sustainable land management

Soil Health Conference in Fort Worth on Jan. 13 & 14

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soilhealthconference_web

Green Cover Seed will be hosting the Southern Soil Health Conference, an Educational Opportunity for Producers and Land Owners, in Fort Worth on January 13 and 14, 2015.

The Dixon Water Foundation is one of several organizations sponsoring the conference: Samuel Roberts Noble Foundation, Texas Grazing Land Conservation Initiative, No-Till on the Plains, Sand County Foundation, Out On The Land, and Natural Resources Defense Council.

This unique conference will focus solely on the Five Keys to Soil Health: Keep the Soil Covered; Minimize Soil Disturbance; Crop Diversity; Living Roots in Soil at all times; and Integration of Livestock with the Land. This conference is for producers and land owners, 75% of the registration slots will be reserved for people directly involved with the land: production agriculture (crops and/or livestock) and land owners. This conference will also be producer driven with almost all the speakers and presenters being farmers. Keynote speakers will include; Gabe Brown, Scott Ravenkamp, Robin and Kelly Griffeth, and Paul Jasa. In addition, we will have 8-10 Texas and Oklahoma producers sharing about their individual experiences with Soil Health and how it has affected their farming operations. Some of these speakers are Todd Kimbrell, Terry McAllister, Jonathan Cobb,and Lisa Bellows. And this conference is about knowledge and learning and not selling products. We will not be having a commercial trade show to promote individual companies or products.

To register or learn more, visit Green Cover Seed’s conference website.

Location:
Best Western Plus South
100 Altamesa Boulevard E
Fort Worth, Texas, 76134
Phone: 817.293.3088

Date: January 13th & 14th, 2015

Cost: $100 Per Person – Your Spouse can register for $50**

*NOTICE – The cost of registration DOES NOT reserve your hotel room. You must book and cover the cost of your hotel room on your own. To reserve your room at the Best Western Plus, contact the hotel (information listed above) and be sure and mention Southern Soil Health Conference when you are booking your room to get the discounted rate of $69 per night.

 

A thoughtful defense of holistic management

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Last week in The Guardian, L. Hunter Lovins offered a thoughtful defense of holistic management: “Why George Monbiot is wrong: grazing livestock can save the world.” Lovins was responding to George Monbiot’s previously published critique of Allan Savory’s 2013 TED Talk (“How to fight desertification and reverse climate change“).

“In his recent interview with Allan Savory, the high profile biologist and farmer who argues that properly managing grazing animals can counter climate chaos, George Monbiot reasonably asks for proof. Where I believe he strays into the unreasonable, is in asserting that there is none.

Savory’s argument, which counters popular conceptions, is that more livestock rather than fewer can help save the planet through a concept he calls “holistic management.” In brief, he contends that grazing livestock can reverse desertification and restore carbon to the soil, enhancing its biodiversity and countering climate change. Monbiot claims that this approach doesn’t work and in fact does more harm than good. But his assertions skip over the science and on the ground evidence that say otherwise.”

He cites research by Richard Teague, a Dixon Water Foundation advisory board member, “finding significant soil carbon sequestration from holistic range management practices.” He also mentions several examples of successful holistic management practitioners, as well as studies by soil microbiologist Dr. Elaine Ingham:

“Peer-reviewed research from Rodale [Institute] has shown how regenerative agriculture can sequester more carbon than humans are now emitting. Scientists, as well as dozens of farmers, ranchers and pastoralists from around the world, describe how they are increasing the health of their land, the carrying capacity of it, its biodiversity, and its profitability, all while preserving their culture and traditions…

…I’d invite [Monbiot] to come out on the land, see with his own eyes and learn from those who are healing grasslands while producing food, fibre and community prosperity.”

 

Dixon sponsors Playa Country radio series on grazing management

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The Dixon Water Foundation is sponsoring an upcoming series of Playa Country radio programs on sustainable grazing management. Playa Country is produced by the Playa Lakes Joint Venture.

Desert rodents rebound after summer rains

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MARFA – Rodent researcher Bobby Allcorn had a busy September. Each week the Sul Ross State University graduate student trapped hundreds of small rodents—from petite silky pocket mice to husky wood rats—on the Dixon Ranches Mimms Unit. That’s great news for a host of other wild animals.

“The effects of the Rock House Fire, combined with the drought, devastated the small rodent population,” said Allcorn, whose research is funded by the Dixon Water Foundation, a non-profit that promotes healthy watersheds through sustainable land management. “These animals do rebound with precipitation though. And they’re coming back in force.”

While the drought persists, recent rains have been a boon to small rodents, like this silky pocket mouse found on the Dixon Ranches Mimms Unit near Marfa. (By Bobby Allcorn/Borderlands Research Institute)

While the drought persists, recent rains have been a boon to small rodents, like this silky pocket mouse found on the Dixon Ranches Mimms Unit near Marfa. (By Bobby Allcorn/Borderlands Research Institute)

In 2011, the Dixon Water Foundation partnered with Dr. Bonnie Warnock of Sul Ross’s Borderlands Research Institute to monitor the small-rodent population on the Mimms Unit. Then the historic Rock House Fire burned most of the ranch on Marfa’s northwest edge.

Without vegetation to eat or hide in, the number of mice and rats crashed, to the point that researchers rarely caught a rodent. The effects ricocheted throughout the food web, from bobcats to quail.

“Predators eat small rodents, so if there aren’t any small rodents, larger animals become prey more often,” Allcorn said. “For example, pronghorn really suffered after the fire. Not only was there no forage for them, but predators went after them more.”

Small rodents play other roles in maintaining healthy grasslands. They disperse seeds and can even alter the plant composition of an area.

“They’re a representation of overall ecological health,” Allcorn said.

Allcorn will finish his small-rodent research next year, at which point he’ll be able to draw more conclusions.

“But for now I can say the population and diversity have certainly increased since last year, due to the rainfall,” Allcorn said. “That’s a great thing for all the other animals and the environment.”

Dixon-funded research on soil microbes featured in Texas Wildlife magazine and Big Bend Sentinel

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How did the Rock House Fire and 2011 drought affect soil microbes at Mimms Unit? That was the subject of a recent research project by Masahiro Ohnishi, a Natural Resource Management graduate student at Sul Ross State University in Alpine. The Dixon Water Foundation funded Ohnishi’s research, which was featured in “The Road to Recovery” in the July 2013 issue of Texas Wildlife, republished here with permission of the Texas Wildlife Association. Ohnishi’s research was featured previously in the May 16, 2013 issue of the Big Bend Sentinel.

Weatherford Democrat spotlights holistic management at Bear Creek

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In Earth Day news, the Weatherford Democrat reports that our work at Bear Creek Unit “sets the standard” for environmentally sustainable ranching.

In “Managing land to protect water,” our Vice President and Board Chairman Clinton Josey describes holistic management as “treating the soil, the plants on the surface, the animals and the ranchers as a whole.”

“It’s a balance, Josey said, and when ranchers consider all the elements, it results in a healthy watershed — the area that drains to a common waterway — and a healthier life for everyone who lives in it.”

Vice President and Board Chairman Clinton Josey described as “treating the soil, the plants on the surface, the animals and the ranchers as a whole.”

It’s a balance, Josey said, and when ranchers consider all the elements, it results in a healthy watershed — the area that drains to a common waterway — and a healthier life for everyone who lives in it.

– See more at: http://www.weatherforddemocrat.com/top-news/x296817186/Managing-land-to-protect-water/#sthash.BuYR3UIe.dpuf

It’s a balance, Josey said, and when ranchers consider all the elements, it results in a healthy watershed — the area that drains to a common waterway — and a healthier life for everyone who lives in it. – See more at: http://www.weatherforddemocrat.com/top-news/x296817186/Managing-land-to-protect-water/#sthash.BuYR3UIe.dpuf

Dixon pledge to pronghorn recovery benefit featured in Alpine Avalanche

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From the Alpine Avalanche:

The Dixon Water Foundation of Marfa and the Horizon Foundation of Dallas have pledged up to $50,000 for this weekend’s Pronghorn Restoration Benefit Dinner and Dance.

The Pronghorn Restoration Benefit is scheduled for 6 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 29, at the Granada Theater in downtown Alpine. Local landowners will serving locally grown ribeye steaks with all the fixings; a cash bar will also be available.

The program also includes a silent auction, a brief presentation on pronghorn in West Texas and an outline of the restoration plan. The evening will culminate with a dance featuring Craig Carter and the Spur of the Moment Band.

The pledge comes in the form of a challenge grant where the foundations have committed a dollar to dollar match for up to $50,000 raised during the benefit.

The benefit is spearheaded by the Trans-Pecos Pronghorn Working Group made up of local ranchers, conservationists and researchers with the Borderlands Research Institute at Sul Ross State University who are concerned with the recent demise of pronghorn in the region. Figures put the population at an all-time low of 4,800. The Pronghorn Working Group has helped implement a series of investigations into the pronghorn decline.

Read more…

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