Let's admit at the outset that harmony between man and land, like harmony between
neighbors, is an ideal-and one we shall never obtain. . . . But any man who
respects himself and his land can try..." -Aldo Leopold
This Iowan, the author of "A Sand County Almanac" and father of wildlife
conservation in the 1930s and 1940s, could not have foreseen how extensively
farms and ranches would be fragmented today. But that's what's happening in much
of the U.S. Agriculture often has become nonprofit, death taxes have taken their
toll and the big places have been sold off a piece at a time to alleviate both
trends.
Fragmentation has changed the land not only in its ag production, but also in its
wildlife. Of course, hunting keeps the kids coming home for Christmas, and
lease-hunting puts presents under the tree. But when big places are splintered
into shards, each with a deer blind on every fenceline, how do you keep the game
resource productive? That's where game-management cooperatives can help.
"Let's all work together toward an objective; that's one of our main tenets,"
says Al Brothers of Berclair, Texas, in Goliad County. This rancher and biologist
co-authored the groundbreaking book "Producing Quality Whitetails" in 1975 and
spent 30 years managing H.B. Zachry Ranches in south Texas and Utah.
"On the north and east sides of the county, smaller landowners were competing to
get the deer first," Brothers says. "Now they're cooperating to let the deer herd
build back."
That's mostly because of the Goliad County Wildlife Cooperative, which was
established in 1993 with eight members and 8,500 acres. Now the group of 160
members controls 102,606 acres, making it the biggest one in land mass in Texas.
The Lone Star State has over 60 wildlife associations in 33 counties. But
organizations such as the Quality Deer Management Association, headquartered in
Georgia, have gotten them started as far away as New York.
Brothers says management associations in Texas focus on everything from deer to
turkey and quail to bats, and there's even one whose members manage for the rare
Attwater's prairie chicken on the lower Gulf Coast. The groups sponsor field days
and have annual meetings to educate members on wildlife conservation.
Here in Goliad County, it's mostly for deer management. "In the northern part of
the county, we've had a tremendous impact because we've educated people on buck
harvest," says Larry Lange, president of the Goliad association. "Now eight of 10
people are following guidelines."