PITY THE POOR COWMAN. All his life he has been told to raise bigger and better cattle. More meat on the hoof meant more dollars in his pocket—which is why Texas ranchers have turned away from smaller British breeds like Angus and Hereford in favor of heftier continental breeds like
The Federal Express of the cattle business.
Celebrity land deals—not.
A final farewell to the Hill Country spread that for more than thirty years meant everything to me and my family.
Riding the rapids of Texas’ last major unpolluted river is dangerous enough. But trample the private property around it and you could really get hurt.
All across Texas, vandals are searching for ancient treasures by looting Indian campgrounds—including the one on my family’s ranch.
John L. Guldemann scorns claims that Longhorns damage the natural area.
A third-generation rancher rebuilds his spread by just saying no to cattle.
With bulldozers poised to plow through their family’s historic spread, three San Antonio sisters are waging war against the state department.
Trans-Pecos ranchers grapple with El Paso over the West’s most valuable resource.
Pipeline leaks, unplugged wells, toxic drilling materials, and a virtually unregulated oil industry are leaving a legacy of polluted groundwater.
A wet year followed by a dry one made for one hellacious brush with disaster in the ranchlands of West Texas.
Buster Welch’s success as a cutting horse trainer is based on a simple observation: when you insult a horse’s intelligence, you hurt his feelings.
Without these funky watering holes, where would we—much less our cattle and sheep—be today?
Tastes in livestock are as whimsical as tastes in fashion. This year petite is in.
The great Texas ranches and how they got that way.
“When the cowboys on the 06 ranch talked about losing a way of life, they often pointed to their neighbor, Clayton Williams, as an example of what they meant. He was a millionaire and an oilman, and he represented everything they hated.”
You may have played on one when you were a kid, but it’s no fun for cows.
These days it seems every five-acre ranchette flaunts a gate worthy of the XIT.
The stake is survival—for either the sheep and goat ranchers of West Texas or the smartest predator of all.
The biggest landholders in the state, acre by acre.
Beefing and chewing the fat about a rare pleasure that’s almost done for.
When this young man decided to go West, he made it as far as a dude ranch in Bandera.
The pioneers who came to tame the West met their match in the land of ‘Giant.’
Once you let a goat in your life, you can never get it out.
Living in the country is all you ever wanted—and probably more than you bargained for.
In today‘s tame, tame West, the cowboy seldom rides a horse and never carries a gun, but the cattle business is bigger than ever.
Old Glory is a long way from Madison Avenue, and Bigun Bradley probably knew it.
