"To pull back the curtain on the federal public-lands grazing system, ProPublica and High Country News pored over government documents and data gleaned from more than 100 public records requests filed with the Bureau of Land Management, Forest Service and state agencies across the West. We interviewed ranchers, conservationists, researchers and federal rangeland managers. We also toured grazing allotments in Arizona, Colorado, Montana and Nevada."
"To identify the largest public-lands ranchers - and the share of public-lands ranching controlled by the top 10% of permittees - we relied on BLM and Forest Service datasets, which included roughly 50,000 bills the agencies had sent to operators. We sued the BLM to obtain its data. Our analysis covered the most recent grazing fee year - effectively a fiscal year for cows -"
"To calculate how much ranchers save using federal allotments instead of grazing their herds on private property, we multiplied the annual open market grazing price in that state by the number of AUMs for which the permittee was billed, before subtracting what the federal government had billed the permittee for those AUMs. We ascertained each state's average free market rate by using U.S. Department of Agriculture research for grazing fee year 2024, which the BLM publishes annually."
Extensive government datasets, public records requests, interviews, and field visits were used to analyze federal public-lands grazing. The analysis relied on BLM and Forest Service billing records, including roughly 50,000 bills, and covered the grazing fee year from March 2024 through February 2025. Ranching operation size was measured by billed animal unit months (AUMs), and related entities were grouped together. Savings from federal allotments were calculated by comparing state open-market grazing prices to federal bills using USDA state rates. Forest Service acreage lists were obtained via FOIA and permittees were contacted for confirmation.
Read at High Country News
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]