arizona – nevada utah · department of agriculture, cooperative extension, college of agriculture...

29th Annual

Arizona – Nevada - Utah

Fairgrounds, St. George – April 10, 2007 Red Hills Best Western, Kanab – April 11, 2007

Tour, Kaibab/House Rock Valley, Arizona – April 12, 2007

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2007 AZ/NV/UT RANGE LIVESTOCK SPONSORS WORKSHOP SPONSORS AZ Department of Agriculture Boehringer-Ingelheim Cal Ranch Dow AgroSciences Fort Dodge Animal Health Intermountain Farmers Association Kane County Farm Bureau Young Farmers Manna Pro Products Novartis Animal Health Pfizer Ridley Block Scholzen Products UAP Timberlan Utah Beef Council Utah Beef Improvement Association Utah Grazingland Network Vitalix Inc Wheatland West Seed SPONSORING AGENCIES Bureau of Land Management Natural Resources Conservation Service University of Arizona University of Nevada-Reno Utah State University USDA Forest Service

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PLANNING COMMITTEE Joy Atkin, Rancher Roger Banner, Utah State University, Cooperative Extension, Range Specialist Jim Bowns, Utah State University, Cooperative Extension, Southern Utah University, Professor Dustin Burger, USDA Forest Service, N. Kaibab District C. Kim Chapman, Utah State University, Cooperative Extension, Area Beef Specialist Raymon Christenson, Arizona Department of Agriculture, Animal Science Del Despain, University of Arizona, Range Research Specialist Rob Grumbles, University of Arizona, Mohave County Extension Director, Extension Agent, Agriculture/Natural Resources Holly Gatzke, University of Arizona-Reno, Cooperative Extension, Lincoln County Douglas Hansen, USDA Farm Service Agency, Cedar City Kip Hansen, Manna Pro Kevin Heaton, Utah State University, Cooperative Extension, Kane & Garfield Counties Christy Mackelprang, Natural Resource Conservation Service, Fredonia Ken Montgomery, USDA, APHIS Tyce Palmer, Utah Association of Conservation Districts Vernon Parent, Utah State University, Cooperative Extension, Washington County Chad Reid, Utah State University, Cooperative Extension, Iron County Maria Ryan, University of Nevada-Reno, Cooperative Extension, Southern Area Bob Sandberg, Bureau of Land Management, Arizona Strip District, St. George Don Smith, USDA Forest Service, Kaibab Ranger District Kyle Spencer, USDA NRCS, Fredonia LD Walker, Bureau of Land Management, Arizona Strip District, St. George Dale ZoBell, Utah State University, Cooperative Extension, Beef Specialist We would like to express our sincere appreciation to those who have helped make this program possible.

Proceedings edited by Dale ZoBell, USU Animal Scientist Manuscript preparation by Karma K. Wood, USU Staff Assistant II

Issued in furtherance of Cooperative Extension work, acts of May 8 and June 30, 1914, in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Cooperative Extension, College of Agriculture & Live Sciences, University of Arizona, Utah State University. The University of Arizona, Utah State University are equal opportunity, affirmative action institutions. They do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, or sexual orientation in its programs and activities.

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ARIZONA/NEVADA/UTAH RANGE LIVESTOCK WORKSHOP

Program: St. George, Fairgrounds, April 10, 2007 Kanab, Red Hills Best Western, April 11, 2007 Demonstration Day: Arizona, Kaibab/House Rock Valley, April 12, 2007 7:45 a.m. Registration (no fee) 8:15 a.m. Welcome and Introduction 8:30 a.m. Records For Ranchers – Kim Chapman, Utah State University, Extension

Animal Scientist 9:00 a.m. Tying Animal Production to the Range: Grazing Management, Stocking

Rate, Foraging Behavior and Range Condition – Dr. George Ruyle, University of Arizona, Range Extension Scientist

9:45 a.m. Sponsor Introductions 10:15 a.m. Break – Sponsored by listed sponsors 10:45 a.m. Southern Region Utah Partners for Conservation and Development: Past,

Present & Future – Tyler Thompson, Utah Department of Wildlife Resources, Wildlife Biologist

11:30 a.m. Drought – Range Condition Across the Strip – Del Despain, University of Arizona, Range Monitoring Extension Specialist

12:00 p.m. Lunch Sponsor – Equine Nutrition – Steve Doty, Director of Nutrition and Formulation, Manna Pro Products. Sponsored by Manna Pro

12:30 p.m. Lunch 1:30 p.m. Lunch Sponsor – Heifer Development on Rangeland – Dean Fish, University

of Arizona, Area Extension Agent, Santa Cruz, Pima, Cochise Counties, Sponsored by Fort Dodge Animal Health

2:00 p.m. Predation: Myths, Lies & Scientific Fraud – Dr. Charles Kay, Utah State University, Wildlife Ecologist

2:45 p.m. Break 3:15 p.m. Management of Genetics to Maximize Profits – Shane Mathews, Business

Manager of Mathew Farmers 3:45 p.m. Calf Markets: Fuel & Corn Effects – Dr. Dillon Feuz, University of Nebraska-

Lincoln, Extension Ag Economist 4:30 p.m. Wrap Up and Evaluation 4:45 p.m. Adjourn Demonstration/Tour Day Program:

Kaibab/Warm Fire/House Rock Valley Meet at Kaibab NFS Office 430 S Main St., Fredonia, Arizona Talk to Grand Canyon Trust: Review Management Practices, Inventory, Fire, Etc. Stop at Point to See 5 Steps of the “Grand Staircase” Other Stops Will Be Given Out Morning of Field Tour Tour Lunch Sponsored by: Utah Grazingland Network, Bill Hopkins

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

TOPIC PAGE # Range Records for Management (Kim Chapman)……………………………………….6-9 Tying Animal Production to the Range: Grazing Management, Stocking Rate, Foraging Behavior, and Range Condition (Dr. George Ryle)………………………...10-18 Southern Region Utah Partners for Conservation and Development - Past, Present, and Future (Tyler Thompson)…………………………………………....19 Drought and Range Conditions on the Arizona Strip (Del Despain)………………....20-28 Equine Nutrition (Steve Doty)………………………………………………………...29-31 Heifer Development on Rangeland (Dean Fish)……………………………………...32-39 False Gods, Ecological Myths, and Biological Reality (Dr. Charles Kay)…………...40-57 Lewis and Clark, Aboriginal Overkill, and the Myth of Once Abundant Wildlife (Dr. Charles Kay)……………………………………………………………………..58-72 The Value of Genetic Improvement in Beef Cattle (Shane Mathews)…………………..73 Ethanol Expansion, Corn Prices, & the Cattle Industry (Dr. Dillon Feuz)…………..74-79

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Ranch Records for Ranch Records for ManagementManagement

C. Kim ChapmanC. Kim ChapmanExtension Animal ScientistExtension Animal Scientist

What types of records do I need?What types of records do I need?

ProductionProduction PurebredPurebred CommercialCommercial

FinancialFinancial ManagementManagement TaxesTaxes FinancingFinancing

Animal Health (BQA)Animal Health (BQA)

What types of records do I need?What types of records do I need?

MarketingMarketing Age & Source VerificationAge & Source Verification

National Animal Identification SystemNational Animal Identification System

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Financial RecordsFinancial Records

Paper vs. ComputerPaper vs. Computer What do I need from my financial records?What do I need from my financial records? ComputerComputer

Quicken Quicken -- $49.95$49.95--$79.95$79.95 QuickBooks QuickBooks -- $199.95$199.95--$399.95$399.95

Production RecordsProduction Records

Purebred/RegisteredPurebred/Registered Track individual performanceTrack individual performance Track pedigreesTrack pedigrees Track health/vaccination records (BQA)Track health/vaccination records (BQA) Determine which animals to cullDetermine which animals to cull Assist in marketing bulls and heifersAssist in marketing bulls and heifers

Production RecordsProduction Records

CommercialCommercial Keep BQA recordsKeep BQA records Track herd performanceTrack herd performance Track individual performanceTrack individual performance Make management decisions (culling)Make management decisions (culling)

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Production RecordProduction Record--KeepingKeeping

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Questions???Questions???

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Tying Animal Production to the Range: Tying Animal Production to the Range: Grazing Management, Stocking Rate, Grazing Management, Stocking Rate, Foraging Behavior, & Range ConditionForaging Behavior, & Range Condition

George B. George B. RuyleRuyle, Larry D. , Larry D. HoweryHoweryRangeland ResourcesRangeland Resources

School of Natural ResourcesSchool of Natural ResourcesThe University of ArizonaThe University of Arizona

Road MapRoad Map••Grazing managementGrazing management

••Stocking rateStocking rate

••Foraging behaviorForaging behavior

••Range conditionRange condition

••SummarySummary

Road MapRoad Map

••Grazing managementGrazing management





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Grazing ManagementGrazing Management

Grazing management Grazing management ---- the manipulation of livestock to accomplish desired results.

Desired results on public lands Desired results on public lands generally include consideration of generally include consideration of ecological, social and economic ecological, social and economic values.values.

Basic Tools of Grazing ManagementBasic Tools of Grazing Management

•Grazing intensity

•Frequency of grazing

•Season of grazing

•Animal distribution

•Kind/classes of animal

Road MapRoad Map






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Stocking RateStocking Rate

Stocking rate -- the number of animals (or animal units) actually grazing on a given unit of land for a specific period of time.

Animal Unit (AU)Animal Unit (AU)

• 1000 pound ruminant animal or equivalent in terms of forage consumption.

• Usually considered 1 cow or 1 cow with calf.

• Ruminants eat about 2% of their body weight per day (varies from 1-3%).

As stocking rate increases the productivity of As stocking rate increases the productivity of individual animals (weight gain, reproduction, etc) individual animals (weight gain, reproduction, etc) will start to decline at some point and continue to will start to decline at some point and continue to decline as stocking rate is further increased. This is decline as stocking rate is further increased. This is due to a reduction in either the quantity of forage the due to a reduction in either the quantity of forage the animal can eat, the quality of the forage, or both, as animal can eat, the quality of the forage, or both, as

stocking rate increases.stocking rate increases.

Stocking Rate vs. Gain/Head

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Stocking Rate vs. Gain/HeadStocking Rate vs. Gain/Head

An

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Stocking RateLight Mod Heavy

Gain per Head

As stocking rate increases the total production of As stocking rate increases the total production of livestock products (meat, wool, etc) will increase livestock products (meat, wool, etc) will increase because there are more animals producing. This because there are more animals producing. This increase can continue even after gain/head starts to increase can continue even after gain/head starts to decline. At some point, however, gain/acre will also decline. At some point, however, gain/acre will also decline with further increases in stocking rate decline with further increases in stocking rate because the production gained by adding another because the production gained by adding another animal is less than the combined reduction in gain animal is less than the combined reduction in gain from all the animals already present. from all the animals already present.

Stocking Rate vs. Gain/Acre

Gain/Head vs. Gain/AcreGain/Head vs. Gain/Acre

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Gain/Acre

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Stocking Rate vs. ProfitStocking Rate vs. Profit

An

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Max. Gain/Head

Max. Gain/AcreB

A

Most profitable SR

• Carrying costs/animal vs. return?• Overall range condition?• Risk of LT range deterioration?

Wild Bill Range (Ponderosa Pine-bunchgrass)Northern AZ (Ogden 1981)

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Road MapRoad Map






Stocking Rate vs. Stocking Rate vs. Foraging BehaviorForaging Behavior

•• Animals spend more time looking and less time foragingAnimals spend more time looking and less time foraging

•• Decreased intake (less digestible diets, lower nutrient Decreased intake (less digestible diets, lower nutrient levels, etc.)levels, etc.)

•• Increased poisonous/undesirable plant problemsIncreased poisonous/undesirable plant problems

•• Offset by supplemental feeding but this increases operating Offset by supplemental feeding but this increases operating costscosts

•• Continued heavy grazing can result in LT range Continued heavy grazing can result in LT range deterioration, reduced animal productivity, and reduced deterioration, reduced animal productivity, and reduced profitabilityprofitability

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lbs. Heavy (62%)

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Cattle production in relation to stocking rate in OK (Shoop & McIlvain 1971)

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Sheep production in relation to stocking rate in UT (Hutchings and Stewart 1953)

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$ Heavy (68%)

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Road MapRoad Map






Range Condition (Health)Range Condition (Health)••Classical definition Classical definition ---- The present state of the The present state of the vegetation on a range or ecological site, vegetation on a range or ecological site, compared to the kind and amount of native compared to the kind and amount of native vegetation the site is capable of producing.vegetation the site is capable of producing.

•Functional definition -- The current productivity of key forage species on a grazed range or ecological site compared to the current productivity of key forage species on a comparable ungrazed range or ecological site, or ecological site guide. As the amount and As the amount and vigor of desirable forage species increases so vigor of desirable forage species increases so does the range condition.does the range condition.

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Range or Ecological SitesRange or Ecological Sites

A range or ecological site is a distinctive kind of land with A range or ecological site is a distinctive kind of land with specific specific physical characteristicsphysical characteristics (climate, geology, topography, water, and (climate, geology, topography, water, and soilsoil)) that differs from other kinds of land in its that differs from other kinds of land in its ability to produce a ability to produce a distinctive kind and amount of vegetationdistinctive kind and amount of vegetation..

Why be concerned about range or Why be concerned about range or ecological condition?ecological condition?

••There is a direct relation between grazing There is a direct relation between grazing capacity and range condition. Ranges in poor capacity and range condition. Ranges in poor condition typically carry fewer cattle and produce condition typically carry fewer cattle and produce lower calf crops and calf weights.lower calf crops and calf weights.

••LongLong--term losses in animal production on arid and term losses in animal production on arid and semisemi--arid rangelands are observed only arid rangelands are observed only afteraftersignificant declines in range condition are detected.significant declines in range condition are detected.

••This is why it is critical to maintain range condition This is why it is critical to maintain range condition in the shortin the short--term to prevent a significant and term to prevent a significant and sometimes permanent loss in the sustainability of sometimes permanent loss in the sustainability of forage resources in the longforage resources in the long--term.term.

Main points from a SRER StudyMain points from a SRER Study••88--year study conducted by Cable and Martin (1964)year study conducted by Cable and Martin (1964)

••Initially found that a SR of Initially found that a SR of 30hd/section/year was too high30hd/section/year was too high

••Reduced SR to 15hd/section/year to achieve 60% useReduced SR to 15hd/section/year to achieve 60% use

••Reduced SR again to achieve 40% useReduced SR again to achieve 40% use

••After SR reductions, precipitation fluctuated widely, but, After SR reductions, precipitation fluctuated widely, but, forage production trended upwardforage production trended upward

••As range condition improved, they were able to increase SR As range condition improved, they were able to increase SR to achieve 40% useto achieve 40% use

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Why be concerned about range or Why be concerned about range or ecological condition?ecological condition?

Road MapRoad Map••Grazing managementGrazing management





SummarySummary

• Range manager’s goal of attaining or maintaining good range or ecological condition, and the livestock producer’s goal to maximize profit are compatible.

• Sustainability of the ranching operation depends on sustainability of the grazing resource.

• Good grazing management requires a long-term view along with flexibility to adjust management practices to react to variable forage production.

• Moderation in the long-term, flexibility in the short-term.

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Southern Region Utah Partners for Conservation and Development - Past, Present, and Future

Tyler Thompson

Southern Region Utah Division of Wildlife Resources Terrestrial Habitat Development Coordinator

Each year in conjunction with the Utah Partners for Conservation and Development

(UPCD) the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources participates in numerous projects that enhance or restores thousands of acres in the southern region. Starting in 2003 Utah Habitat Initiative funding became available to work on projects to benefit Utah’s at-risk wildlife habitats. This effort began with the improvement of shrub-steppe habitat types used by mule deer and sage-grouse this effort has now grown into what is known as Utah’s Watershed Initiative. The current program focuses on improving conditions in all of the key habitats for species of greatest conservation need listed in Utah’s newly completed Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Strategy a.k.a. Utah’s Wildlife Action Plan. These habitats include: lowland riparian, wetland, mountain riparian, shrub-steppe, mountain shrub, lotic (flowing) water, wet meadow, grassland, lentic (standing) water, and aspen. In 2004 the Southern Region UPCD developed a GIS coverage outlining the areas in our region that were in greatest need of both active and passive restoration. Funding, planning, and habitat development efforts have been and will continue to be directed as much as possible to these areas. This “focus area” coverage is updated each year to reflect completed projects as well as updated goals and objectives. Since 2004 the Southern Region Utah Partners for Conservation and Development group has completed over 100,000 acres of habitat improvement projects at a total cost of approximately 8 million dollars. Funding for these completed projects comes from 20 different sources including: Utah’s Watershed Initiative, NRCS Farm Bill, BLM fuels reduction and Cooperative Conservation Initiative, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, Mule Deer Foundation, Sportsman for Habitat, Wild Turkey Federation, DWR Habitat Council, Blue Ribbon Fisheries, Utah Forestry, Fire and State Lands, SITLA, Utah Department of Natural Resources Endangered Species Mitigation Fund, USFS, and many others. Methods used in these projects include: Dixie harrow, anchor chaining, lop and scatter, bullhog, skidsteer mounted tree saws, aerial seeding, prescribed fire, drill seeding, aerial herbicide application, etc. Hundreds of thousands of pounds of seed are purchased, stored, and applied by this group every year. The Southern Region UPCD has over 71 projects planned for the 2007-2008 season totaling over 4.2 million dollars in requested funding.

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Drought and Range Conditions on the Arizona Strip Del W. Despain

Research Specialist – University of Arizona

With the exception of the winter of 2005, the Arizona Strip and Southern Utah have experienced severe to moderate drought conditions during this first decade of the new century. Questions commonly raised about this drought to be addressed in this presentation include how does this drought compare with those of the past and what has been the impact on range conditions in the area. How does the current drought compare with those of the past?

Precipitation records for this area are relatively recent extending only back to the 1890s at St. George, Utah. On the Arizona Strip records have been kept since 1932 at Fredonia. Additional stations and rain gauges have since been established by the BLM and the National Weather Service and precipitation is now recorded at nearly 60 locations across the Strip. Figure 1 shows average annual precipitation for all rain gauges monitored on the Arizona Strip since 1932.

Average Annual Precipitation Across the Arizona Strip

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Figure 1: Average annual precipitation for all precipitation monitoring stations across the Arizona Strip.

In figure 1, the decadal average (a running 10 year average) highlights precipitation patterns over time. Precipitation was relatively high from the late 1930s into the mid-1940s, followed by an extensive dry period commonly referred to as the “1950s drought”. Throughout the Southwest, the 1950s drought extended from the mid-1940s into the early 1960s. However,

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the data in figure 1 indicate that dry conditions continued well into the 1970s on the Arizona Strip. The 80’s and 90’s were comparatively wet followed by the current drought.

Comparing the current drought with that of the 1950s within our region (Figure 2) it is evident that recent rainfall has been comparable to rainfall during the 1950s drought (with the exception of 2005 not shown). However, average temperatures have been much warmer this time around which has likely resulted in more severe drought conditions. How long the current drought will last remains to be seen.

Figure 2: Average annual precipitation and temperature across the four-corners states since 1940. Figure courtesy of Steve Archer.

The best indicator we have of historical weather patterns prior to human records comes from the history recorded in tree growth rings. In general, woody plants add a layer of cambial growth each year to the outside of trunks and limbs just inside the bark. The thickness of these layers and their extent throughout the tree vary depending on how much growth the tree is able to sustain under conditions at the time (see Figure 3).

Figure 3: Variation in tree growth rings (courtesy of University of Arizona - Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research).

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Variation in the width of tree growth rings depends on both temperature and moisture conditions, but is most closely correlated with moisture. For example, figure 4 shows the relationship between winter plus spring precipitation and the relative width of tree-rings in northwest New Mexico.

Figure 4: Relationship between width of tree growth rings and precipitation in northwest New Mexico. From Grissino-Mayer, 1996.

While the relationship is not necessarily perfect for any given year, overall growth patterns follow very closely with precipitation patterns. By measuring the historical growth of trees and extrapolating correlations between growth and precipitation, we can get a fair picture of historical weather patterns, especially cool-season moisture (because woody plants in temperate climates put on most of their growth in the spring).

By applying the correlation between tree-ring growth and precipitation in figure 4 to past growth of trees in the same area in New Mexico, a reconstruction of past precipitation patterns was created as shown in figure 5. Short-term patterns are shown by the jagged lines, while the thick black line in the bottom graph (like the decadal average in figure 1) indicates longer term patterns. While some drought periods lasted longer, the current drought and the 1950s drought are among the driest in the past 1.5 millennia, perhaps exceeded only 3 or 4 times since 600 A.D. It is also interesting to note that, overall, the past century was among the wettest since the 5th and 6th centuries. While the example in figure 5 comes from northwest New Mexico, other studies have revealed similar patterns throughout the American Southwest including northern Arizona.

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Figure 5: Reconstruction of precipitation for Northwest New Mexico based on tree rings. From Grissino-Mayer, 1996. What has been the impact of the drought on the Arizona Strip?

Perhaps the most visible impact of the drought has been the death of many pinyon trees in Northern Arizona, including the Arizona Strip. The following two pictures taken northeast of the San Francisco Peaks (north of Flagstaff along highway 89) show the dramatic die-off that occurred during the drought (photos courtesy of Steve Archer). As evident in these photos, the trees died primarily in 2003 following the driest year of the drought (2002). It has been established that the trees were actually killed by bark beetles, but it is generally held that the drought was responsible for weakening the trees to the point they succumbed to attack by the indigenous insect.

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Pinyon trees similarly died across the Arizona Strip. For example, many dead trees can be seen on south facing slopes along highway 89A between House Rock Valley and Jacob Lake. The photo below shows pinyons that died during the drought on a southwest slope on Wolfhole Mountain, south of St. George, Utah.

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The Bureau of Land Management has established study areas across the Arizona Strip for monitoring long-term changes in rangeland conditions. Of the more than 700 study areas established, over 351 areas have been re-sampled since the beginning of 2003, by which time effects of the drought were already in evidence. The results of these studies were compared with results from the last time the same areas were sampled prior to 1999. A few examples are presented below.

Frequency data, which is the percent chance of encountering a plant within a sample frame repeatedly placed on the ground within the study area, was collected at each location both before and after the drought. In the graphs below, the change in frequency at each location was plotted starting with the site on which frequency increased the most and continuing to the site on which frequency declined the most. This allows us to see overall trends in how a species reacted to drought across the Arizona Strip.

The results presented below are preliminary and will be refined in the future to account for other known issues on some of the study sites which might skew the results. However, overall trends related to the drought are still apparent.

One of the grasses most impacted by the drought was Blue Grama. Figure 6 shows that blue grama declined on a majority of the sites sampled on which it occurs. In a few cases, the loss of this native grass was quite dramatic.

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Blue Grama

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Figure 6: Percent changes in frequency of blue grama.

On the other hand, globemallow increased more often than it declined on sites on which it occurs (figure 7). Globemallow has been particularly showy when flowering during the spring in recent years and the data indicate that this perennial forb has indeed generally increased across the Arizona Strip.

Globemallow

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Figure 7: Percent changes in frequency of globemallow.

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Crested wheatgrass, which only occurs on treatment areas where it has been seeded, was particularly sensitive to the drought on the 42 study areas where it occurs (figure 8). While this species tends to slowly decline over time following establishment regardless of conditions, there is no question that the drought dramatically hastened the process.

Crested Wheatgrass

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Figure 8: Percent changes in frequency of crested wheatgrass.

Snakeweed, or matchbrush, is one of the most ubiquitous perennial species on the Arizona strip, occurring on most of the sites compared in this analysis. Snakeweed is a dynamic species that is not well understood and which comes and goes in plant communities in relatively brief periods of time, seemingly regardless of conditions. The graph below shows that frequency of occurrence of snakeweed increased, remained static, or declined on a nearly equal number of sites.

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Snakeweed

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Figure 9: Percent changes in frequency of snakeweed.

While the data presented above indicate overall changes in abundance of certain plant species, they do not provide a direct estimate of the loss of species productivity or changes in the total forage base as a result of the drought. However, across the Arizona Strip, most forage species declined in abundance, which for grasses and forbs reflects an actual loss of numbers of plants and not just a reduction in productivity of existing plants.

It is evident from long-term monitoring data collected on the Arizona Strip that few of the dominant species remain static for long periods of time across the area. Plant communities are dynamic and respond to the many influences in which they exist in ways that are not yet well understood. It is clear, however, that under current moderate levels of grazing and with current management strategies, weather is the driving force behind community change and it is very difficult to separate out the impacts of other influences such as grazing. References:

Breshears, et.al. 2005. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Vol. 102, No. 42.

Grissino-Mayer, H. D. 1996. A 2129 year annual reconstruction of precipitation for northwestern New Mexico, USA. Pages 191–204 in J. S. Dean, D. M. Meko, and T. W. Swetnam, editors. Tree rings, environment and humanity.

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Equine Nutrition

Steve Doty, M.S., PAS Manna Pro Products, LLC

Horses, like other animals and humans, need five essential nutrients included in their

diets to live, grow, reproduce and thrive. Essential nutrients are not produced by the body and thus must be consumed regularly. These nutrients, of equal importance, include water, protein, energy, minerals and vitamins. First, water provides several important bodily functions including transport of nutrients, lubrication, cushion and temperature regulation. Second, protein contributes ten essential amino acids for muscle development and growth. Third, energy is the fuel that drives the engine. Body movement and consistent body temperature are two important functions of energy. Fourth, minerals help produce the body structure and frame needed for soundness as well as being involved with metabolism. Bones, teeth, hooves and cell walls are a few of the body tissues requiring minerals for strength. Finally, nutrient metabolism and body functions are performed by a series of chemical reactions. Vitamins are catalysts for these chemical reactions and without vitamins other nutrients would be wasted.

The main purpose of a digestive system is to reduce feed ingredients to a size, small enough, to allow nutrient absorption through the intestinal wall into the bloodstream. Chewing begins the digestive process by crushing the feed into small sized particles. Next the feed is swallowed and mixed with acid in the stomach, further breaking down nutrients chemically. The digestive process continues as the feed solution moves into the small intestine. Here nutrient-specific enzymes (lipase, protease, amylase and hemicellulase) react with the feed ingredients to make the final particle size reduction, so that the nutrients can be absorbed into the bloodstream. In most non-ruminant animals, there is little digestion and nutrient absorption, except for water, after the feed leaves the small intestine and enters the large intestine. However, the horse has the advantage of having an enlarged cecum which is the first section of the large intestine. This enlarged cecum allows horses to convert forages, which are more difficult to digest, into useable nutrients. The cecum is similar to the rumen in cattle, goats and sheep. Like a rumen, the cecum of a horse contains microorganisms which feed on less digestible feed ingredients and convert them to useable energy, protein, minerals and vitamins. After absorption into the bloodstream from the small intestine and cecum, nutrients are transported to body organs and tissues for metabolism.

Protein requirements for horses range from 10% to 16%. Higher protein intake is needed for work, muscle development, growth and lactation. High quality protein sources include soybean meal, linseed meal, cottonseed meal, dried whey and dehydrated alfalfa meal. Multiple protein sources provide a better balance of amino acids, the building blocks of protein. Signs of protein deficiencies include poor growth, lack of milk production and unthriftiness.

Energy is available from carbohydrates, fats and excess protein. Carbohydrates are the main source of energy for horses. Forages, grains and molasses contain high levels of carbohydrates. Carbohydrates are divided into sugar, starch and fiber. Fiber is further divided into hemicellulose, cellulose and lignin. Even a horse does not produce enzymes to digest cellulose or lignin; however microorganisms in the cecum do convert cellulose to usable energy. Lignin found as a higher percentage of fiber in mature forage or poor quality forage is indigestible. A good example of a feed ingredient that contains a large amount of lignin fiber is oat hulls. Fat is an excellent source of energy for horses. Fat is a concentrated energy source

30

having 2.5 times more calories per pound than carbohydrates. High energy horse feeds contain 6% to 10% fat. Fat supplements range from 20% to 100%. Vegetable oils such as soybean oil, corn oil, rice oil and wheat germ oil are excellent sources of fat for horses. Body condition is the best measure of adequate dietary energy. The body condition scoring system of 1 – 10 is used for horses. A body condition score of less than 5 means the horse needs more energy. Horses above 7 need less energy. The body condition score of 5 - 6 is considered ideal. This score is described as having the ribs covered, but the ribs can be felt with slight pressure. Many horses need little additional energy, other than the amount supplied by forage.

Mineral intake is very important to young growing horses and broodmares. In addition, all horses will thrive and live longer if minerals are provided. Macro minerals, which are fed in larger amounts than trace minerals, include salt, calcium, phosphorus, potassium, magnesium and sulfur. Beneficial trace minerals include manganese, zinc, copper, selenium, cobalt and iodine. Selenium gets the most attention because the amount fed is controlled by law…0.30ppm of added selenium to the total diet (including hay or pasture). Commercial mineral mixes, fortified grain mixes or vitamin – mineral supplements should be part of the horse’s diet. Mineral deficiencies are involved with unsoundness, structural deformities, poor reproduction and health issues.

Vitamins are very vulnerable to deterioration. Stored feeds and mature pasture will have falling vitamin levels over time. Vitamin supplementation will enhance the horse’s appearance, comfort and health. Important vitamins include Vitamin A, Vitamin D, Vitamin E, thiamine, niacin, riboflavin, pantothenic acid, pyridoxine, choline, folic acid, biotin and Vitamin B12. Older horses will benefit from supplemental Vitamin C. Vitamin deficiencies influence appetite, eyesight, skin, coat and hoof health.

New technologies in horse nutrition include commercially produced amino acids, protected trace minerals and digestive aids. Methionine, one the essential amino acids, is important for healthy hoof growth and can be found in hoof supplements at the necessary 20mg/day for treatment of cracked or abnormal hooves. Protected trace minerals are available as amino acid chelates (zinc amino acid chelate), proteinates (copper proteinate) or polysaccharide complexes (manganese polysaccharide complex). Protected refers to the technology that allows trace minerals to be more easily absorbed into the bloodstream in greater amounts. Digestive aids assist the intestinal microorganisms to harvest more usable nutrients from feed. Digestive aids have been shown to increase the digestible energy from forages by 10% to 15%. Digestive aids also help prevent digestive upset such as colic. Beneficial organisms include Saccharomyces, Lactobacillus, Streptococcus, Bacillus, Enterococcus and Aspergillus.

There are several digestive or metabolic diseases that are influenced by the horse’s diet. Colic is the most common disease affecting horses. Pain caused by intestinal spasm, twisting or compaction is the most recognized sign of colic. Worms have been thought to be the leading cause of colic. Good quality forage, access to clean water, regular exercise, small, balanced meals and digestive aids are important to preventing colic. Cushing’s Disease is related to a problem with the pituitary gland. Horses with Cushing’s usually respond to low sugar and starch in their diet. HYPP (Hyperkalemic Periodic Paralysis) in Quarter Horses can be controlled by lower potassium levels in the diet. EPSM (Equine Polysaccharide Storage Myopathy) is a metabolic problem associated with energy utilization in the muscles. Increasing the energy from fat and hemicellulose and the use of digestive aids can be beneficial to preventing EPSM symptoms. Laminitis or sore, painful feet can be caused by the production of lactic acid in

31

cecum from sugar or starch overload. Laminitis should be prevented before it becomes a reoccurring problem. How should you feed your horse? 1) Feed quality forage. If forage quality is poor, add fiber sources such as alfalfa cubes, beet pulp, or “complete” commercial feeds. 2) Read the feed tag. Check the list of ingredients and guarantees. 3) Provide protein and energy amounts based on appearance, performance and age of the horse. 3) Provide minerals and vitamins daily 4) Feed digestive aids to improve nutrient digestion and help prevent digestive upset. 5) Allow access to fresh, clean water at all times.

32

Heifer Developmenton Rangeland

Dean Fish, U of A Cooperative Extension

Santa Cruz County

Heifer Development in ArizonaOne of the most expensive and important

management programsNeed to calve and conceive early in the

breeding season Provide adequate milk productionRebreed and calve every 365 days Enhance genetic progress of our herdsBe affordable

33

Options

Purchase replacement heifers

Develop in feedlot, farm or irrigated pasture

Develop on range

Goals

Need to weigh 60 – 65% of mature weight at breeding

650-700 pounds (English)

750-800 pounds (Continental)

34

Heifer Development on Rangeland

Supplemental feed is usually required for heifer development on rangelandChronic feed restriction delays puberty

GnRH

FSHLH

Puberty Traits for Males and Females

Gregory et. al, 1995. USDA-MARC, Clay Center, NB.

Breed 13.5 mos., %Adjusted age,

daysAdjusted Wt.,

lbs.Scrotal Circum.,

cmRed Poll

88.6 359 650 33.1

Hereford39.9 411 695 30.3

Angus57.4 393 697 32.1

Limousin 44.0 408 743 29.0

Braunvieh 94.2 350 732 33.7

Pinzgauer 92.1 360 739 33.0

Gelbvieh 92.9 353 745 34.1

Simmental 86.8 363 758 33.7

Charolais 60.6 391 814 32.2

Comp., 75% Cont. 85.8 366 765 32.7

Comp., 50% Cont. 89.3 361 738 33.6

Comp., 75% Brit. 84.0 368 723 32.8

Females Males

35


500 lb. Heifer to Gain .5 lbs/day

40 44 48 52 56 60

Forage TDN %

0

10

20

30

40

50

Dry Matter Forage Intake Required, lbs.

Maintenance

Gain

DM Intake Possible

Replacement Heifer TDN and Protein Requirements

Heifer Weight

Pasture Repl. Heifers, Gaining .5 lb/day, 58% TDN

% of Body Wt. Forage Intake

Lbs. TDN Lbs. Protein

400 3.2 7.50 0.84

500 2.9 8.50 0.94

600 2.7 9.40 1.04

700 2.5 10.00 1.13

Drylotted Repl. Heifers, Gaining .5

lb/d, 58% TDN

% of Body Wt. Forage Intake

Lbs. TDN Lbs. Protein

400 2.7 6.20 0.84

500 2.4 7.00 0.94

600 2.2 7.70 1.04

700 2.1 8.40 1.13

36


500 lb. Heifer to Gain .5 lbs/day

*Assumes Adequate Protein in Forage

48 52 56 60Forage TDN %

$0

$20

$40

$60

$80

$100

$120

Feed Costs for 150 Days*

Alfalfa Hay @ $ 160 / T

Cottonseed Meal @ $ 180 / T

Corn @ $ 130 / T

Lbs. Fed / Day

TDN Alfalfa CSM Corn

48 9 5 452 8 4 356 6 3 260 3 1 1

Heifer Development with Different Levels of Corn

Lemenager et al., 1980. Journal of Animal Science

Base Ration 0 lbs. 2.7 lbs. 5.4 lbs.

Starting Wt., lbs.

Trial 1 (113 d)fescue hay (poor

quality)516 516 510


quality)494 493 475

Trial 3 (150 d)fescue hay + 1.8

lbs. protein supplement (32%)

481 500 499

Winter ADG, lbs.


quality)-0.18 0.35 0.62


quality)-0.09 0.29 0.53

Trial 3 (150 d)fescue hay + 1.8

lbs. protein supplement (32%)

0.49 0.79 1.15

Supplemental Corn Fed

37

Heifer Development with Different Levels of Corn

Conception Rates (60 d breeding season)

Lemenager et al., 1980. Journal of Animal Science

Average All Trials 0 lbs. 2.7 lbs. 5.4 lbs.

Fall Weight, lbs. 496 502 493

Winter ADG, lbs. 0.07 0.50 0.80

% Conception 69.2 73.9 83.5

% Rebreeding after 1st Calf

67.3 75.4 87.1

Supplemental Corn Fed

Heifer Development on the R100

San Carlos Apache Tribe

Study by Univesity of Arizona, Ray et. al, AZ Ranchers' Mgmt. Guide

0 4.2 5.6

Weaning Weight (10-6) 396 396 400

ADG, lbs. -0.21 0.43 0.66

Ending Weight (3-23) 361 468 513

% Calving 0 31 54

% Calves Weaned of total

20 36

% Calves Weaned of those calving

65 66

Supplement, lbs. / day

38

Consequences of Nutritional Mismanagement Increased age at puberty Lower conception ratesGreater degree of calving difficultyCalves born later in breeding season Lighter weaning weights Later rebreeding of first calf heifers

Reductions in lifetime productivity Increased culling rates

Nevada Heifer Development System

Meet target weight

Body condition score of 5 or greaterReproductive tract score of 3 or better

Pelvic area exceeding 150 square centimeters at 12 months of age

Torrel et al. and Conley et al., 1993 Proc Western Sec. ASAS, vol. 44

39

ConclusionsSupplementation is necessary to

achieve target weightsAnalyze forage to match supplement to

heifer needsLeast cost supplement will save moneyDo your own financial analysis to

determine your replacement programUse good management tools, such as

pelvic measurementsApply selection pressure for puberty

Thank You!

40

False Gods, Ecological Myths, and Biological Reality

Dr. Charles E. Kay

A Solution to the Pleistocene Overkill Problem The authors of this edited volume are in general agreement that native people had a significant impact on their environment, but Broughton (Chapter 3) and Martin (Chapter 1) apparently do not agree on why the Pleistocene megafauna went extinct. While Martin attributes their demise to overkill by America’s original discoverers, Broughton has reservations. Broughton, moreover, is not alone in his criticism of Martin’s Pleistocene Overkill hypothesis (Pielou 1991:251-266). At least three major objections have been raised to the idea the Paleoindians killed-off the American megafauna. First, critics point out that there are few documented aboriginal kill sites relative to the presumed megafauna population. In New Zealand, for example, where most scientists agree that humans killed-off the moas, there is archaeological evidence that thousands upon thousands of moas were killed and eaten by early Polynesian hunters (Anderson 1984, 1989b; Cassels 1984; Trotter and McCulloch 1984; Holdaway and Jacomb 2000). Yet in the Americas, there are but a handful of mammoth (Mammuthus spp.) and mastodon (Mammut spp.) sites with spear points embedded in the animals (Pielou 1991:251-266, Stuart 1991). Simply put, if Paleoindians killed-off the American megafauna, why are there not more documented kill sites? Second, the available evidence indicates that there were relatively few Paleoindians (Pielou 1991) – there certainly were not the human population densities that occurred later. Thus, critics of Pleistocene Overkill wonder how so few people could have killed-off so many megafauna. And third, there are many megafauna species that went extinct for which there is no evidence of aboriginal hunting; i.e., there are no known kill sites for many megafauna species (Pielou 1991; Stuart 1991). There is also a fourth, though usually not stated objection to Martin’s hypothesis – how could humans kill such large animals with such “primitive” technology? After all, Paleoindians had only spears and atlatls and the megafauna were huge, and presumably very dangerous. It is my contention, however, that these objections to Pleistocene Overkill appear valid only because all participants in this debate, and I do mean all participants, even Paul Martin who has studied this subject the longest, have made a fundamental biological error. Although not explicitly addressed by Martin, he and virtually everyone else, who have studied this subject, have assumed that America’s megafauna were food-limited. That is, they assumed that predators had no significant effect on herbivore populations, and thus the herbivores were exceedingly numerous. Artistic renditions of the American Pleistocene invariably depict a landscape teeming with large numbers of megafauna species. These depictions, however, are little more than “Garden of Eden” mythology. Instead, as I explained in Chapter 8, the American megafauna were predator-limited, not food limited (Geist 1989, 1998). There was, after all, a suite of very large, and presumably very fierce, carnivore predators during the Pleistocene, including short-faced bears (Arctodus spp.), the American lion (Panthera leo), sabertooth cats (Smilodon spp. and Homutherium spp.), and the dire wolf (canis dirus), among others (Geist 1989; Pielou 1991; Stuart 1991). The short-faced bear (A. sinus), for instance, was more than twice the size of a modern grizzly (Ursus arctos) and could run at speeds approaching 60 km/hr (Geist 1989; Pielou 1991).

41

Elsewhere, I have explained how predators limit ungulate populations (Kay 1996), and as shown in Table 9.1 predators have a significant effect on prey densities. In the case of caribou (Rangifer spp.), wolves (Canis lupis) and bears (Ursus spp.) can decrease the herbivore’s density by more than two orders of magnitude. That is, carnivore predation alone can reduce caribou population densities to only 1 percent, or less, of what the habitat is capable of supporting. While across northern Canada and Alaska, wolves and bears commonly keep moose (Alces alces) populations at only 10 percent, or less, of habitat carrying capacity (Kay 1996, and references therein; Bergerud and Elliott 1998). Thus, if American Pleistocene herbivores were predator-limited, as Geist (1989, 1998) and I contend, then there may have been only 1-10 percent of the megafauna population generally assumed by others. That is, unlike New Zealand where there were no predators (Anderson 1984, 1989), the megafauna in North and South America were kept at low population densities by the combined activities of many different carnivorons predators. Moreover, the climate during the Pleistocene was much colder, and therefore less productive than it is today both in terms of basic plant productivity and in the number of animals those habitats could support (Pielou 1991). Table 9.1. The Impact of Carnivore Predation on Caribou Populations in North America Mean Caribou Density Caribou Population Predation Intensity (number/km2) Island herds None 7.45 Migratory herds Low 1.08 Mountain herds Moderate 0.15 Eastern-forest herds High 0.03 Note: In eastern Canadian forests where caribou have no effective antipredator strategy, wolves can take caribou populations to very low levels, especially in areas where wolves have alternative prey such as white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianes). By dispersing to high-elevation areas to calve, mountain caribou avoid some of the effects of wolf predition, but wolves still have significant impact on those herds. By migrating long distances, caribou can avoid most impacts of carnivore predation, but those populations still have lower densities than herds on islands without predators. Long-distance migrations primarily evolved as a strategy to avoid predation, not as a strategy to secure additional food (Bergerud 1990, 1992; Seip 1991; Crete and Huot 1993:2295). Mean caribou densities from Seip (1991;47). Given the above, what would happen when a super-predator, Paleoindian, entered the scene? Figure 9.1 is the graph of predator-prey interactions in Alaska that was discussed in Chapter 8. First, it is important to recall that initially the moose population was kept well below habitat carrying capacity by the combined action of wolves and grizzly bears, and that predation had a similar, though smaller effect on Dall sheep (Ovis dalli). Second, note that only a few moose hunters are involved, and that there are relatively few moose killed by humans – archaeologically there would be few moose kill sites. Next, note that the hunters never kill a single Dale sheep – archaeologically there would be no Dall sheep kill sites. Finally, note how the addition of a small amount of human predation on one species, moose caused the entire system to collapse. This is called a cascading trophic effect – where the addition of one factor, in the case human hunting, causes the entire system to change. This is similar to what I believe happened when aboriginal people first entered the New World. This idea, in fact, was originally proposed by Janzen (1983), but has largely been ignored by those involved in the Pleistocene Overkill debate.

42

Figure 9.1. Model of Alaskan wolf-ungulate interactions simulated under circumstances in which human harvest of moose triggered a catastrophic decline in both predator and prey. Without hunting, wolves, moose, and Dall sheep numbers are low but relatively stable. The addition of a small amount of human moose harvest, however, destabilizes the entire system. Even after hunting is halted, wolves continue to drive the moose population downward. The wolves then switch to Dall sheep and drive those numbers down as well. In this simulation, wolves go extinct before they can kill the few remaining ungulates, allowing prey populations to recover. This would not be the case, though, if humans continued to prey on the ungulates. Grizzly bear predation on newborn moose calves, and to a lesser extent adults, is also important in this system, but the factor was not modeled separately. Instead, grizzly predation was included in the calculation of moose survival rates internal to the model. Note that few moose are actually killed by human hunters and that hunters do not take even a single Dall sheep. Adapted from Haber (1977) and Walters et al. (1981). Figure 9.2 depicts the cascading tropic effect that I believe occurred when Paleoindian hunters entered an already predator-limited ecosystem. Moreover, this model accounts for all the major objections to the standard Pleistocene Overkill hypothesis. First, very few Paleoindians are required. Second, there are relatively few megafauna kill sites, and third, even if Paleoindians focused on only a few especially large prey, that was enough to trigger a cascade effect where other megafauna were decimated by Pleistocene predators.

43

Figure 9.2. Proposed model of predator-prey interactions when Paleoindians first encountered America’s Pleistocene megafauna (based on Figure 9.1). Depicted is a cascading trophic effect caused by the addition of a super-predator, Paleoindians, into an already predator-limited ecosystem. Note that (1) there are few Paleoindians, (2) there are relatively few megafauna kills, and (3) for some species there are no kill sites. Humans enter the system at t=0. This also explains why places without predators, like New Zealand, have large numbers of aboriginal kill sites and large numbers of kills, while the Americas do not. In New Zealand, not only were herbivore (moa) densities much higher than they were in America’s predator-limited Pleistocene systems, but in New Zealand, humans had to kill all the large flightless birds. In North and South America, however, once humans pushed the system beyond a threshold, Pleistocene carnivores did most of the actual killing. By cascading down the list of available prey species, Pleistocene carnivores were able to take species after species to low levels, which Paleoindians and the few remaining carnivores then hunted to extinction, as per the optimal-foraging models discussed in this volume. Bergerud and Elliott (1998) reported a similar cascading trophic effect in northern British Columbia where wolves took species after species to very low levels. As Fisher (1996) and Ward (1997) have explained, there certainly is no evidence that the Pleistocene megafauna died out due to a lack of food, as is required by all climatic change models (see Chapters 1 and 8). What then about Broughton’s suggestions that humans could not have killed-out the Pleistocene megafauna because native hunters did not kill-off moose, elk (Cervus elaphus), deer (Odocoileus spp.), and other species (see Stuart 1991:522)? According to Geist (1987a, 1987b, 1996, 1998), many of the remaining megafauna, including moose, elk, and grizzlies, are of Old World ancestry and only recently entered the New World. Thus, those species were able to coevolve with earlier hominids and most likely were not as naïve as indigenous American megafauna. Odocileus, on the other hand, are all New World species, but they are generally

44

smaller than the megafauna animals that went extinct – since smaller species usually have higher rates of intrinsic increase than larger animals, that fact alone may have saved them from extinction (Diamond 1994, 1989). In addition, as discussed in Chapter 8, post-Pleistocene hunters caused numerous local extinctions. Aboriginal hunters, for instance, controlled the biogeography of moose throughout western Northern America (Kay 1997f). Moreover, Hildebrandt (pers. comm. 1998) has suggested that elk only persisted in California where they had local refugia, where they could at least partially escape human hunters. That is, Hildebrandt has observed that elk remains are only found in California archaeological sites that are near tule swamps (see Kay (1994a) for an example of how elk used tule swamps for escape cover) – elk remains are not found in the California foothills or mountains, where elk now commonly occur. Other species such as modern bison (Bison bison) may have actually been created by aboriginal hunting. According to Geist (1996), the Pleistocene long- or big-horn bison (B. latifrons) evolved into today’s smaller, shorter horned bison solely as a response to human predators. That is, the reason modern bison look the way they do and behave the way they do is because of intense election pressure exerted by native peoples. Even seemingly low levels of human hunting can have major impacts on the numbers, distribution, and behavior of wildlife, especially the larger sized animals most favored by native people. Since the early 1960s, Diamond (1984, 1992b, 1997) has spent large amounts of time in remote areas of New Guinea with people armed only with bows and arrows, and other “primitive” technology. Thus, Diamond’s (1984:846-847) observations are extremely instructive as to the impact “primitive” people have on wildlife.

While virtually all of New Guinea is within the hunting territory of some human group, the hunting impact would seem nevertheless to be minimal in much of New Guinea. Human population density often averages less than one person per square mile, and parts of a territory are visited only every year or two for a short period by a small band of hunters. Not until I entered the Gauttier (Foja). Mountains by helicopter in 1979 and 1981 was I able to appreciate the impact that even this low hunting pressure exerts. The Gauttier Mountains are an isolated range rising steeply from the swamps of the Meervlakte and the north New Guinea coastal plain. Today no humans live in these mountains, and except in the foothills they are never visited by people from the adjacent swamps. Thus, the Gauttier Mountains may be one of the few forested areas in the modern world whose animals are still naïve to man.

Elsewhere in New Guinea the largest native mammals, tree kangaroos, are nocturnal, uncommon, and extremely shy. I have never seen one in the wild outside the Gauttiers. In these mountains the tree kangaroo (Dendrolagus matschiei) is common and diurnal and permitted me to approach it openly within 10 meters. Wallabies elsewhere in New Guinea are also very shy. In twenty-four months I had glimpsed about six individuals as they fled after being surprised. In the Gauttier Mountains I found the wallaby (Dorcopsulus vanheurni) abundant, saw it daily, and was again able to approach within 10 meters. Displays of Uamblyornis bowerbirds elsewhere in New Guinea have been witnessed only by concealed observers. In contrast, a male A. flavitrons in the Gauttiers displayed for twenty minutes to a female, while I stood in full view at the bower.

The contrast between my experience in the uninhabited Gauttier Mountains and everywhere else in New Guinea suggests that even infrequent visits by hunters eventually

45

transform the behavior of surviving prey species. Until I had worked in the Gauttiers, I was mystified to understand how the few Maoris in the vastness of New Zealand’s South Island could have killed all the moas, and how anyone could take seriously the Mosimann-Martin hypothesis of Clovis hunters eliminating most large mammals from North and South America in a millennium or so. I no longer find this at all surprising when I recall the large kangaroo Dendrolagus matschiei remaining on a tree trunk at a height of 2 meters, watching my field assistant and me as we talked nearby in full sight. The low densities of these mammals elsewhere in New Guinea, even in areas visited annually only by nomadic hunters, illustrate how susceptible large, K-selected mammals with low reproductive rates are to hunting pressure.

Persistence Versus Abundance Broughton (Chapter 3) acknowledged that native people had a significant impact on wildlife populations but only when and where human populations were particularly dense. Optimal-foraging models, however, suggest that even relatively low native populations still had major impacts on high-ranking species. As Smith and Wishnie (2000) explained, persistence in and of itself, does not imply conservation or that people had no impact on their environment. Contrary to the common notion that Native American diets were primarily meat (McCabe and McCabe 1984:28), it has long been noted by anthropologists that aboriginal people should more appropriately be called gatherer-hunters, instead of hunters-gatherers, because historically and for the preceding 10,000 years as well, 80 percent to 90 percent of aboriginal diets were nonungulate foods, primarily lower-ranked vegetal resources, fish, and small animals (Kay 1994; Kelly 1995). This means that large mammals were not common and that ungulate densities were significantly lower than presently found in National Parks and other areas. At current winter densities of 20 to 40 elk per km2, optimal-foraging models predict that aboriginal diets in Yellowstone should have been nearly 100 percent elk but since elk are rarely found in Yellowstone or any other western Intermountain archeological sites, this can only mean that today’s ungulate densities are not representative of earlier times. Elk are a little more common in Pacific coast archaeological sites only because those animals had a partial refugia from native hunters I thick, usually wet, coastal forests (Kay 1994a). The fact that elk and other ungulates may persist in some archaeological records does not mean that those species were as abundant as they are today (Smith and Wishnie 2000). Whatever the site-specific circumstances might be, though, I think both Broughton and I would agree that unhunted wildlife populations are not the condition which prevailed at any time since native people entered the Americas. Racism If, as the authors in this edited volume contend, the evidence is so overwhelming, why then have ecologists, resource managers, and the general public turned a dear-ear and a blind-eye to what aboriginal peoples really did? Stewart (1963:119, 121) addressed this issue, as relates to native burning, over 35 years ago, and his comments are instructive.

Views of peasants and country folk belonging to the same race and culture as the investigators are placed below consideration, but ancient practices and explanations of red Indians and black Negroes warrant no serious thought, even if known. Usually the

46

white scientists refuse to learn the ways of the colored aborigines, whether New World or Old World because it is assumed such children of nature could contribute nothing to modern scientific inquiry.

The fact that even the more historically minded American ecologists have started their evaluation of the influence of man upon nature with the landing of the Pilgrims follows from the view that American Indians were part of nature like other animals. Aborigines could be ignored more easily than buffalo as forces of nature. Not only scientists, but whites of European ancestry have always found it difficult to take the Indians seriously enough to learn from them. The relationship between Indians and whites started with the assumption that the Indians were only part of the natural environment. This logically led to the point of view that the American natives had nothing to teach sophisticated Europeans. One would not ask the deer and antelope about scientific problems! Europeans whether still living in Europe or in colonies in America, Australia, or New Zealand, have similar attitudes toward all aborigines.

Although Stewart (1963) did not spell it out, it is clear what he was talking about – racism. People today universally assume that they are superior to earlier people and especially to natives (Sluyter 2001). Diamond (1997:19-22) is the only ecologist I know who claims that hunter-gatherers, on average, were smarter and genetically more fit, than human populations today. Instead, “primitive” societies are invariably equated as “backward,” or worse (Waller 1999; Rasmussen 2000; Foreman 2001). While some readers may object to the use of the term racism, which is defined by Webster as “usually involving the idea that one’s own race is superior,” this clearly describes how aboriginal people in the New World and elsewhere, were treated by colonial powers, as well as the nation states that followed (Cronon 1992; Pratt 1992; Demeritt 1994; Wishart 1997; Kearns 1998; Sluyter 2001). From discussions with various ecologists and the lay public, it is clear to me why they look to climatic change instead of Pleistocene Overkill to explain megafauna extinctions – racism. We, after all, are certainly “superior” to Paleoindians, yet we lack the intestinal fortitude and knowledge to hunt modern elephants with spears, and stone-tipped ones at that. Thus, it is inconceivable that aboriginal people could have killed-off mammoths, mastrodons, and the other megafauna employing such “primitive” technology (Johnson et al. 1980). Besides, experimental tests using Clovis weaponry on African elephants have shown that stone points are relatively ineffective if they strike ribs or other bones (Frison 1989). In reality, though killing mammoths with stone-tipped spears was exceedingly simple, despite modern depictions to the contrary. In fact, if you gave me 100 stone-tipped spears, I would guarantee 95 dead mammoths. Absurd? Not at all. Today’s ethics demand that animals be killed quickly and cleanly. On most animals this requires heart-lung shots and high-powered rifles. But on elephants, heart-lung shots do not produce instantaneous kills and thus can allow the beast to injure the hunter before the animal actually expires. Instead, safari hunters prefer brain shots with solid (nonexpanding, copper-jacketed steel bullets) in a .458 or larger rifle – most countries that still allow sport hunting mandate .375 as the minimum allowable caliber – they do not call them elephant guns for nothing. Stone-tipped spears are incapable of penetrating the bone needed to reach an elephant’s brain, and even the 3-4 ft of penetration required for a killing heart-lung shot is doubtful (Frison 1989). How did Paleoindians routinely and safely kill mammoths and other Pleistocene megafauna? Simple, they struck them in the guts. One spear – one mammoth.

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While a gut-shot is the last thing modern hunters even want to do, it is the simplest way to safely kill such large animals with spears. Even when gut-shot with large-caliber modern weapons, such wounds do not instantaneously kill because no vital organs are struck – and the animal can travel a long distance before he or she succumbs. Gut-shots often take days to kill an elephant-sized animal, but they will always kill the animal, any animal, due to peritonitis. In fact, most any spear wound will kill an elephant, because the animal’s large bulk closes the wound. This prevents the wound from draining and the animal dies from blood poisoning or some other secondary infection (Moss 1988). Moreover, wounded animals, and especially speared elephants, often flee into water or swamps (Moss 1988), as this usually affords them some protection from their pursuers and allows them to quench their wound-driven thirst. This is why many of the mammoth kill sites that have been unearthed in North America were originally bogs or swamps when the animals died. It is not because healthy animals became stuck in the mud when they attempted to drink, as is commonly believed and portrayed in contemporary drawings. In fact, African elephants seldom become bogged, except perhaps when starving during periods of extended drought (Douglas-Hamilton and Douglas-Hamilton 1975; Moss 1988). Thus, the easiest and least dangerous way to kill an elephant, or any other megafauna, is to spear it in the guts and then follow it until it dies or until the animal becomes so decrepit that it can be safely killed by other means. This is an exceedingly deadly strategy, especially on naïve animals that have never before seen a human predator, such as occurred when Paleoindians first discovered the New World – especially large mammals that, like moose (Kay 1997a), probably evolved a strategy to stand and hold their ground when faced by carnivore predators. Standing your ground and defending against predators was a very effective strategy when megafauna species had to protect themselves and their young from Pleistocene carnivores, but it was certain death when employed against human predators who could strike a deadly blow without direct physical contact – something the animals had never before experienced; i.e., humans, unlike carnivores, kill at a distance (Kay 1994a). If the spears or atlatl darts were poisoned, they would have been even more effective. Poisons do not preserve archaeologically, so we may never know, but at European contact, native people in Africa did use poisoned weapons to kill elephants (Johnson et al. 1980). In fact, that practice was so deadly, it was quickly banned by colonial administrators (Adam and McShane 1992). Hunter-gatherers in Africa still use poisoned arrows to kill giraffes (Giraffa spp.) (O’Connell et al. 1988), while Alaskan Aleuts once used poisoned harpoons to kill whales. They would simply strike the whales from open kayaks and sooner or later the whale would die and wash up on some beach, where the animal would be found. Poisons are not ethical by today’s standards, but nonetheless, they are exceedingly effective. Exponential Growth Rates Several authors in this edited volume discussed how wildlife populations rebounded after the animal’s were freed from native hunters, and how Europeans later misinterpreted the abundant wildlife that they saw as the “natural” state of the pre-Columbian Americas. Preston’s account of California and Neumann’s discussion of the passenger pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius) myth were especially telling. Still, it is difficult for some to imagine how a system could go from so few animals to such abundant wildlife in only 100-150 years or less. Table 9.2, though, provides insight into how quickly populations can actually increase due to exponential

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growth. Passenger pigeons, for example, had an especially high intrinsic rate of natural increase (r) because they often produced two or more clurches per year (Neumann 1985). If we assume a 40 percent annual rate of increase, which undoubtedly is low for this species, and if we start with 100 birds in year one, by year 50 there would be 48.5 billion pigeons, and in 100 years 23,500 trillion birds (Table 9.2) – clearly more than enough to darken the skies. Even deer and elk commonly have rates of increases of 10-30 percent per year; i.e., r = 0.10 to 0.30 (McCorquodale et al. 1988; Unsworth et al. 1999).

Similarly in Chapter 8, I discussed the 60 million bison myth. Assuming that the American Holocaust first decimated native people on the Great Plains ca. A.D. 1600, as reported by Ramenofsky (1987) and Kornfeld (1994:198), how long would it take a pre-Columbian population of 1 million bison to expand to 60 million animals? If the herd’s annual increase was 30 percent per year, only 14 years; r = 0.20, 21 years; r = 0.10, 41 years; and r = 0.05, 82 years (Table 9.3). That is, even at only a 5 percent yearly increase, a population of 1 million animals would grow to 60 million in just over 80 years. Moreover, r values for free-ranging, modern bison have commonly been reported in the 10-20 percent range (Houston 1982; Van Vuren and Bray 1986; Gates and Larter 1990; Clow 1995:267). Thus, the wildlife population irruptions postulated by Preston and others are biologically feasible due to the animal’s potential for exponential growth. This also applies to the original peopling of the New World.

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Table 9.3. Rate of Bison Population Growth for Various Intrinsic Rates of Natural Increase (r) r Time (yrs.) 0.05 0.10 0.20 0.30 5 1.28 x 106 1.65 x 106 2.72 x 106 4.48 x 106 10 1.65 x 106 2.72 x 106 7.39 x 106 20.09 x 106 13.67 1.98 x 106 3.92 x 106 15.39 x 106 60.34 x 106 15 2.12 x 106 4.48 x 106 20.09 x 106 90.02 x 106 20 2.72 x 106 7.39 x 106 54.60 x 106 403.43 x 106 20.5 2.79 x 106 7.77 x 106 60.34 x 106 25 3.49 x 106 12.18 x 106 148.41 x 106 30 4.48 x 106 20.09 x 106 40 7.39 x 106 54.60 x 106 41 7.77 x 106 60.34 x 106 50 12.18 x 106 148.41 x 106 70 33.12 x 106 80 54.60 x 106 82 60.34 x 106 100 148.41 x 106 Some object to the very idea of Pleistocene Overkill because they cannot imagine how quickly the Americas were colonized by Poleoindians. As Diamond (1997:45) noted, though, if the Americas were first colonized by as few as 100 Paleoindians, and assuming an annual rate of increase of only 1.1 percent per year, then within just over 1,000 years there would have been 10,000,000 native people in the New World. If, on the other hand, the rate of increase had been 2.5 percent per year – a rate that has been reported for modern hunter-gatherers (Hill and Hurtado 1996), then in 500 years there would have been 26.8 million natives in the Americas (Table 9.2). And if those people had migrated south at an average distance of no more than 10 miles per year, within 1000 years humans would have occupied all of South and North America (Diamond 1997:45). In geologic time, this is only an instant, and in the archaeological record would appear as near-instantaneous overkill. Thus, there certainly would have been more than enough people to accomplish that task (Alroy 2001). Aboriginal Burning In addition to the materials reviewed by Williams in Chapter 7, there are several ecological data sets that suggest aboriginal burning once accounted for most fires in the West, as well as in eastern forests. Brown et al. (1994), for instance, compared the U.S. Forest Service’s Prescribed Natural Fire Program with pre-European settlement fires in the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness Area along the Montana-Idaho border. Based on stand-age analyses and fire-history maps, Brown et al. (1994) were able to determine how frequently various forest types burned in the past and then they compared those data with how frequently the same vegetation types burned from 1979-1990 when lightning-caused fires were allowed to run their course. Brown et al. (1994) reported that, on average, the area burned during pre-European times was nearly twice as great as the area burned by lightning fires alone today. Moreover, low-elevation montane areas that once had the highest fire frequency, now seldom burn. Since the overall climate has not changed significantly, it is unlikely that lightning-caused fires burn less area today than they

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did in the past. Instead, it is likely that there are fewer fires today because native people no longer fire the land they once did. A similar situation exists along the east slope of the southern Canadian Rockies. In the past, fires were exceedingly frequent, while today lightning-caused fires seldom occur (White 1985; Kay et al. 1994, 1999; Kay 1995a, 1997d, 2000; Kay and White 1995; Barrett 1996; White et al. 1998. Heathcott 1999). In some vegetation types, fire return intervals are now 100 times greater than they were in the past. Lower montane valleys that once burned every five years or less now do not burn at all. Based on this and other evidence, Parks Canada has concluded that native burning, not lightning-caused fires, was critical in maintaining what heretofore was believed to be the “natural” vegetation mosaic of the southern Canadian Rockies (White et al. 1998). That is to say, there simply are not enough lightning-caused fires to account for historical burn and vegetation patterns (Heathcott 1999). Before European settlement, aspen (Populus tremuloides) burned at frequent intervals throughout western North America, and it is generally assumed that those fires were started by lightning (e.g., Houston 1982). Research and experience, though, have proven that aspen is extremely difficult to burn (Brown and Simmerman 1986). “Asbestos type” and firebreak” are terms often used to describe aspen (DeByle et al. 1987). Crown fires in conifers drop to the ground when they encounter aspen and, before autumn leaf-fall, spread only short distances into aspen stands (Fechner and Barrows 1976). DeByle et al. (1987) noted that “wildfires that had burned thousands of acres of shrubland or conifer types during extreme burning conditions usually penetrated less than 100 feet into pure aspen stands.” Lightning-fire ignition rates for aspen are also the lowest of any western forest type, and overall ignition rates are less than half that for all other cover types, including grasslands (Fechner and Barrows 1976). Aspen readily burns only when the trees are leafless and understory plants are dry – conditions that occur in early spring and late fall (Brown and Simmerman 1986; Peterson and Peterson 1995). Before May 15 and after September 15, when aspen is normally dry enough to burn, however, there are low lightning strikes and virtually no lightning fires in the Northern or Southern Rocky Mountains (Nash and Johnson 1993) (See Figs. 9.3 and 9.4). So if aspen burned at frequent intervals in the past, as fire-frequency data and historical photographs indicate it did, then the only logical conclusion is that those fires had to have been set by Native Americans, who used fire to manage various plant communities (Kay 1995a, 1997d, 1997b).

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Figure 9.3. Frequently distribution of lightning strikes on the Fishlake National Forest, south-central Utah. When aspen is normally dry enough to burn during early spring and late fall, there are few lightning strikes. This is true throughout western North America. Graphed are 164,497 lightning strikes, 1985-1994. Lightning data from the Bureau of Land Management Automatic Lightning Strike Detection System, Boise, Idaho, as provided by the Fishlake National Forest, Richfield, Utah.

Figure 9.4. Frequently distribution of lightning-caused fires on the Dixie and Fishlake National Forests in south-central Utah. When aspen is normally dry enough to burn during early spring and late fall, there are few lightning strikes (figure 9.3) and virtually no lightning started fires. Although there are virtually no lightning fires capable of burning aspen, historical photographs (Kay 1997b) and fire-history data indicate that aspen burned frequently in the past (Bartos and Campbell 1998). This suggests that these earlier fires were set by native people. Forest fire data (1960-1996) from the Dixie National Forest, Cedar City, Utah, and the Fishlake National Forest, Richfield, Utah.

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Similarly, prior to park establishment, Yellowstone’s northern range had a fire-return interval of once very 25 years (Houston 1973, 1982). Yellowstone has had a “let burn” policy for nearly 30 years now, yet during that period, lightning-caused fires have burned practically none of the northern range. In 1998, fire did burn approximately one-third of the area, but according to agency definitions, that was “unnatural” because fires was started by man, not lightning. Besides, the 1988 fires are thought to be a 100-300 year event (Schullery 1989a, 1989b), so similar fires could not have caused the original 25-year fire frequency. Despite a series of recent droughts, why has Yellowstone’s northern range remained virtually unburned? Park biologists contend that this is because “lightning has chosen not to strike very often on the northern range” (Despain et al. 1986:109). That assertion, though, is not supported by data from the Bureau of Land Management’s Automatic Lightning Strike Detection System, which shows that, on average, lightning strikes the northern range four times per km2/yt (Kay 1990:136-137). So lightning strikes, but why doesn’t the range burn? The answer is that when most lightning strikes occur, the herbaceous vegetation is too green to carry a fire (Kay 1995a). Thus, it is likely that the park’s original 25-year fire frequency was entirely the product of aboriginal burning. At European contact, ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa) forests in Arizona, New Mexico, and throughout the Rocky Mountains were open and park-like, but have since developed into impregnable thickets due to the ingrowth of smaller trees, which, in turn, has created the current forest health crisis (Covington and Moore 1994; Fule et al. 1997). The open nature of the original forests, as well as the more recent proliferation of smaller trees, is generally attributed to modern fire suppression and the lack of lightning fires. That is to say, it is commonly believed that lightning historically was the primarily ignition source, not native people (Seklecki et al. 1996; Swetnam and Baisan 1996a). This interpretation, though, is not supported by lightning frequency data or time of fire-scar analyses. In the Southwest, over 95 percent of lightning strikes occur after July 1 (See Fig 9.5a), while historically, 85 percent or more of ponderosa pines were scarred by fire during April, May, and June (see Fig. 9.5b). Now despite the relatively low incidence of lightning fires early in the season do burn a disproportional area due to generally dry conditions at the time of year (Barrows 1978; Baisan and Swetnam 1990:1562; Swetnam and Betancourt 1990), but lightning fires alone still cannot account for the magnitude of early-season fire scarring seen during pre-European times (Barrows 1978). In many mountain ranges today, there simply are not enough lightning fires to have caused the high fire frequency observed prior to European settlement (Baisan and Swetnam 1997:3). Thus, it is logical to assume that a large proportion of the “natural” fire regime in pine forests and other regions of the Southwest was actually due to aboriginal burning (Bonnicksen 2000). There are several lines of evidence which indicate that aboriginal burning was also common in eastern deciduous forests (Hamel and Buckner 1998; Bonnicksen 2000). These include the lack of lightning fire, the original structure of the forests, and species composition changes that have occurred since European settlement, among others.

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Figure 9.5. (a) Frequency distribution of cloud-to-ground lightning strikes in Arizona and eastern New Mexico during 1989 and 1990 (Watson et al. 1994:1720); (b) frequency distribution of fire-scar data for the Southern Rockies. Clearly most trees were scarred by fire when there were few lightning strikes. Timing of fire scars determined by microscopic analysis of fire damage to individual growth rings. From Brown and Sieg (1996), Fule and Covington (1999), Fule, et al. (1997). Swetnam and Baisan (1996b). Although lightning is common in most eastern forests, lightening-started fires are very rare (McCarthy 1923); Barden and Woods 1974, 1976; Harmon 1982; Bratton and Meier 1998), because when lightning strikes are most frequent during July and August, eastern deciduous forests are too green to burn. Like western aspen communities, eastern deciduous forests will readily burn only when the trees are leafless and the understories dry – conditions that generally occur only early in the spring or late in the fall, and during both those periods there are few lightning strikes and even fewer lightning-caused fires. Fire history studies, however, have shown that prior to European settlement, fires were common in the eastern U.S. – may more than can be accounted for by lightning alone (Bratton and Meier 1998; Bonnicksen 2000:259-269). Therefore, the only logical conclusion is that burning by native people was once widespread in many eastern forests, similar to conditions in the West. At European contact, many eastern forests were open and park-like, with little undergrowth (Day 1953; Olsen 1996; Bonnicksen 2000). Like ponderosa pine forests in the West, most eastern forests were once composed of large, widely spaced trees “so free of underbrush that one could drive a horse and carriage through the woods” (Botkin 1990:51). Like western forests, though, most eastern deciduous forest are now choked with dense underbrush and smaller regenerating trees. The only way to create open park-like stands in either western or

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eastern forests is for those areas to have been subjected to a high frequency of low-intensity surface fires. In eastern deciduous forests this would have required fires either early in the year before the trees leafed-out or in late autumn after leaf-fall. During both those periods, though, lightning-caused fires seldom occur. Thus, the only way for eastern forests to have displayed the open-stand characteristics that were common at European settlement is if those communities had regularly been burned by native people as part of aboriginal land management activities. An even more compelling piece of evidence is the species composition changes that have occurred in eastern forests since European colonization (Bonnicksen 2000). For the last 3,000-4,000 years, or longer, much of the eastern United States was dominated by oak (Quercus spp.), American chestnut (Castaneo dentate), and pines (Pinus spp.), all fire-tolerant, early successional species (Myers and Peroni 1983; Delcourt et al. 1986, 1998; Clark and Royall 1995; Cowel; 1995, 1998; Olson 1996; Delcourt and Delcourt 1997, 1998, 2000; Bratton and Meier 1998; Hamel and Buckner 1998; Bonnicksen 2000). Since European contract, however, oaks and pines have been replaced by late-successional, fire-sensitive species, such as males (Acer spp.) (Botkin 1990:51-71; Abrams 1998; Bonnicksen 2000). That is to say, the species composition of many eastern forest had been maintained for thousands of years by frequent fires – fires, as we have seen, which could only have been set by native people. It is equally clear that aboriginal burning created the many eastern prairies and “barrens” reported by early Europeans (Campbell et al. 1991; Belue 1996; Barden 1997; Bonnicksen 2000). Canebrakes (Arundinaria gigantean), too, likely owned their existence to native burning and other aboriginal land management practices (Platt and Brantley 1997) – all because land managers continue to deny the importance of aboriginal burning; (Boyd 1999). In Australia, where aboriginal people still actively manage parts of their ancestral lands, Yibarbuk et al. (2001) compared the biological effects of human ignitions with those of lightning-caused fires in an adjacent national park, and reported that native burning maintained the area’s original high biodiversity, while lightning-caused fires were having severe negative effects in the national park where human ignitions were banned. “We attribute the ecological integrity of the site (outside the park) to continued human occupation and maintenance of traditional fire management practices. The implication of this study is that the maintenance of the biodiversity of the Arnhem Land plateau requires, intensive, skilled management that can be best achieved by developing co-operative programs with local indigenous communities” (Yibarbuk et al. 2001:325-326). Aboriginal Populations This subject, no doubt, will be debated by anthropologists for years to come, and as evidence continues to accumulate, I predict that the generally accepted number of native people in the New World at Columbian landfall will rise and then rise again. One-hundred million native people in North America and 150 million more in South America, may be the upper estimate today (Chapter 8), but in time, 1 suspect those figures will become more widely accepted. What has not been generally recognized by most participants in this debate is the fact that human population densities in parts of the Americas may actually have been considerably higher than they were in Europe at comparable points in time, because as we have already seen, the New World lacked the crowded diseases common in other parts of the world (McNeill 1976; Crosby 1986). Preston (Chapter 5) suggested that there may have been 1,000,000 native people in California alone, but I suspect the final number may be as high as 2-3 million or more. After

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all, it was not until Stannard (1989) completed a detailed archaeological reconstruction of the pre-European population in Hawaii that the world realized those islands contained as many as 1,000,000 native inhabitants, and how, within 150 years of European discovery, that number had fallen to 50,000. According to Stannard (1992:xi-xiii),

Just twenty-one years after Columbus’s first landing in the Caribbean, the vastly populous island that the explorer had renamed Hispaniola was effectively desolate, nearly 8,000,000 people – those Columbus chose to call Indians – had been killed by violence, disease, and despair. It took a little longer, about the span of a single human generation, but what happened on Hispaniola was the equivalent of more than fifty Hiroshimas. And Hispaniola was only the beginning. Within no more than a handful of generations following their first encounters with Europeans, the vast majority of the Western Hemisphere’s native peoples had been exterminated. The pace and magnitude of their obliteration varied from place to place and from time to time, but for years now historical demographers have been uncovering, in region upon region, post-Columbian depopulation rates of between 90 and 98 percent with such regularity that an overall decline of 95 percent has become a working rule of thumb. What this means is that, on average, for every twenty natives alive at the moment of European contact – when the lands of the Americas teemed with numerous tens of millions of people – only one stood in their place when the bloodbath was over. To put this in a contemporary context, the destruction of the Indians of the Americas was, far and away, the most massive act of genocide in the history of the world. But since the genocidal component has so often neglected in recent scholarly analyses of the great American Indian holocaust, it is the central purpose of this book to survey some of the more virulent examples of this deliberate racist purge, from fifteenth-century Hispaniola to nineteenth-century California, and then to locate and examine the belief systems and the cultural attitudes that underlay such monstrous behavior. Moreover, the important question for the future in this case is not “can it happen again?” Rather, it is can it be stopped? For the genocide in the Americas, and in other places where the world’s indigenous peoples survive, has never really ceased. As recently as 1986, the Commission on Human Rights of the Organization of American States observed that 40,000 people had simple disappeared in Guatemala during the preceding fifteen years. Another 100,000 had been openly murdered. That is the equivalent, in the United States of more than 4,000,000 people slaughtered or removed under official government decree – a figure that is almost six times the number of American battle deaths in the Civil War, World War One, World War Two, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War combined. Almost all those dead and disappeared were Indians, direct descendants of the Mayas, creators of one of the most splendid civilizations that this earth has ever seen. Today, as five centuries ago, these people are being tortured and slaughtered. The murder and destruction continue, with the aid and assistance of the United States, even as these words are being written and read. And many of the detailed accounts from contemporary observers read much like those recorded by the conquistador’s chronicles nearly 500 years earlier.

There is also another factor we need to consider – how many people are required to have a significant impact on their environment? The answer is surprisingly few. Alroy (2001)

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recently developed a computer simulation model for the original human colonization of North America and now those people interacted with the Pleistocene megafauna they hunted. Alroy (2001: 1893) assumed “slow human population growth rates, random hunting, and low maximum hunting effort,” so his model is extremely conservative. Nevertheless, North America’s original inhabitants still hunted the magafauna to extinction without any necessity of invoking climatic change. Moreover, the maximum human population was only slightly more than 500,000 people. That is to say, 500,000 people were sufficient, in and of itself, to account for the megafauna extinctions. Thus, even if you discount Stannard (1992) and all the others, who have repeatedly revised pre-Columbian native populations upwards, and cling to the low estimate of 2 million natives in North America, that was still four times more people than were likely required to eliminate the Pleistocene megafauna. If 500,000 people could have wiped out the megafauna, just imagine what 2 million people could have done, or 10 million, or 100 million. Another way to determine what size aboriginal population would have been necessary to have had a significant impact on prey populations is to compare wolf and human population densities. Studies in North America have shown that wolf populations commonly range between 10 and 40 animals per 1,000 km2 (Messier 1994; Bergerud and Elliott 1998; Eberhardt and Peterson 1999) and that such densities can keep ungulate populations at 10 percent or less of what the habitat could otherwise support (Kay 1996). This translates into an estimate of 22,000-875,000 wolves for all of North America, well below any estimate of pre-Columbian aboriginal numbers. Moreover, as explained elsewhere (Kay 1994a), humans are Muchmore efficient predators than wolves, or other carnivores. So if this number of wolves kept ungulate numbers at 10 percent or less of what the habitat could support, the addition of even two million native people would have taken prey populations significantly lower. In short, whatever aboriginal population estimate you favor, there were more than enough native people to account for the impacts discussed in this book. In fact, if it had not been for various prey refugia, such as the aboriginal buffer zones discussed earlier, there likely would have been no large mammals left at all. Political Implications After years of study and internal debate, I have come to the conclusion that “wilderness” must be purged from our legal system and the American psyche. Not only am I opposed to the “creation” of any more officially designated wilderness, but all existing wilderness areas should be deauthorized, and the Wilderness Act repealed, because it is racist legislation. By permitting this deception to continue, not only do we ignore the genocide of the past, but we allow it to color our ongoing treatment of America’s original owners. This does not mean that the bulldozers should be turned loose, but that we need to seriously rethink man’s role in nature. We could simply choose to call them Roadless Areas, but if those lands are to maintain the biological diversity they had prior to European arrival, which appears to be the generally accepted standard (McCann 1999:16), then they must be actively managed, as was done by aboriginal people. To do otherwise will lead to the ecological destruction of the very areas society is trying to protect (Buckner 2000; Yibarbuk et al, 2001). Yellowstone National Park, for example, now contains some of the worst overgrazed riparian areas in the nation (Kay 1997c, 1997g, 1997h; Kay and Walker 1997; Keigley 1997) because park managers and environmentalists refuse to abandon misguided concepts of “wilderness” and “natural regulation,” while ignoring the fact that

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aboriginal people were once a critical component of that and other ecosystems (Keller and Turck 1998; Spence 1999; Burnham 2000; Foreman 2001). Not only is this biologically incorrect, it is also morally indefensible (Spence 1999). Almost all environmental activitists have enthusiastically supported the reintroduction of wolves into Yellowstone (Kay 1996). Claims that wolves need to be restored, though, because “every species that was in the park when white men came to the region is still there, except one (the wolf)” (Dawidoff 1992:40) are racist in character, as are similar claims about restoring the wolf as the system’s top predator. Native Americans were the ultimate keystone predator, not wolves, and native people once structured Yellowstone and other ecosystems (Kay 1998; Kay et al. 1999). If we really want to restore Yellowstone’s preeminent predator, then the public should be lobbying for the return of the park to Native Americans. Instead, by inference, they denigrate native people by assuming they were irrelevant, or worse, that they were America’s original conservationists (Keller and Turek 1998; Spence 1999; Burnham 2000; Foreman 2001). While calling native people conservationists may appear to be the only kind thing people of European, Asian, or African ancestry have ever had to say about aboriginal people, in reality, it only serves to hide the genocide that befell America’s original owners (Spence 1999; Sluyter 2001). Moreover, the fact that native people were generally not conservationists actually strengthens aboriginal land claims. By modifying the land, they clearly established ownership even by European standards – and make no mistake about it, all the land was owned and occupied prior to the events set in motion by Columbus (Keller and Turek 1998; Krech 1999; Redman 1999; Spence 1999; Thornton 1999; Whelan 1999; Burnham 2000). No doubt some native people may find this book offensive because, in part, it deals with data and science, not religious views of nature, be they Christian or Native American (Deloria 1995). So be it, but without a factual understanding of what happened in the past we will never know where we have been or where we may be headed. The desired result is not some preordained management philosophy, be it liberal or conservative, but a better understanding of humans and our place on this planet. Science, after all, has steadily replaced other interpretations of the natural world only because time has shown that it more accurately predicts the future than any other method. Science is not perfect, because humans are not perfect, but until a method with greater predictive power is discovered, science certainly is better at interpreting the past and predicting the future than any alternatives. Just because people in the past may not have conserved resources we now value, there is no indication their ancestors today will do the same. Finally, to paraphrase Smith and Wishnie (2000:516), this book’s critical examination of aboriginal conservation, or the lack thereof, is not meant to provide any support for those who believe that preservation agendas take precedent over human rights, or that environmental protection justifies political or economic disenfranchisement of native people. Land claims and other indigenous rights should not be predicted on environmental preservation. Conservation, after all, is not a criterion for property rights employed by any modern state, so it is unethical, as well as unjust, to impose that condition on native people.

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Lewis and Clark, Aboriginal Overkill, and the Myth of Once Abundant Wildlife

Dr. Charles E. Kay

Introduction

It has long been postulated that Native Americans were conservationists who had little or no impact on wildlife populations (e.g; Speck 1913, 1939a, 1939b). Studies of modern hunter-gatherers, however, have found little evidence that native people purposefully employ conservation strategies (Alvard 1993, 1994, 1995, 1998a, 1998b; Hill and Hurtado 1996), while archaeological data suggest that prehistoric people routinely overexploited large-mammal populations (Broughton 1994a, 1994b, 1997; Jones and Hilderbrant 1995; Janetski 1997; Butler 2000). Kay (1994, 1995, 1997a, 1997b, 1998, 2002) has even proposed that Native Americans were the ultimate keystone predator who structured ecosystems ca. 12,000 B.P. to 1492 A.D.

To test these competing hypothesis, I performed a continuous-time analysis of wildlife observations made by Lewis and Clark on their expedition across South America in 1804-1806 because their journals are often cited as an example of how the West teemed with wildlife before that area was despoiled by advancing European civilization (Botkin 1995, Patten 1998:70, Wilkinson and Rauber 2002). Lewis and Clark were the first Europeans to traverse what eventually became the western United States, and many of the native peoples they met had never before encountered Europeans. In addition, historians universally agree that Lewis and Clark’s journals are not only the earliest, but also the most detailed and accurate, especially regarding natural-history observation (Burroughs 1961, Ronda 1984, Botkin 1995). Thus, the descriptions left by Lewis and Clark are thought by many to represent the “pristine” state of western ecosystems (Craighead 1998:597, Patten 1998:70, Wilkinson and Rauber 2002). Botkin (1995:1), for instance, described Lewis and Clark’s journey as “the greatest wilderness trip ever recorded.”

Methods

I used three measures to quantify the wildlife observations recorded by Lewis and Clark in their original journals, which have recently been re-edited and republished (Moulton 1986, 1987a, 1987b, 1988, 1990, 1991, 1993 – hereafter cited only by volume and page). First, game seen. If Lewis and Clark reported old sign of species, that was assigned a value of one, fresh sign a two, and if they actually saw the animal, a three. This included bison (Bison bison), elk (Cervis elaphus), white-tailed deer (Odocolleus virginianus), mule deer (O. hemionus hemionus), black-tailed deer (O. h. columbianus), moose (Alces alces), pronghorn antelope (Antilocapra Americana), bighorn sheep (Ovis Canadensis), grizzly bears (Ursus arctos), black bears (U. americanus), and gray wolves (Canis laptus). This was done each day for the entire 863 days of the expedition.

Second, game killed. On each day, Lewis and Clark recorded the number of animals that were killed to provision their party. In three instances, though, Lewis and Clark reported that “some” white-tailed deer (day 78), elk (day 365), or bison (day 413) were killed. In these cases, “some” was recorded as three animals killed. While on 12 occasions, Lewis and Clark reported that “several” white-tailed deer (days 46, 365, 367, 373, 408, and 811), bison (days 354, 406, 408, and 413), mule deer (day 404), or black-tailed deer (day 602) were killed. In those cases,

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“several” was recorded as seven animals killed. Similar to game seen, the number of animals killed was recorded for all species on all days. Third, herd size. If Lewis and Clark reported sighting large numbers of a particular animal, a value of ten was assigned to that species on that day. A value of ten was also assigned if Lewis and Clark reported killing 10 or more of one species on a single day. I then added game seen, game killed, and herd size values for all species on each day to obtain a daily measure of wildlife abundance. Again, this was done for all 863 days of the expedition. I also developed a similar convention to quantify the relative abundance of native people that Lewis and Clark encountered on their journey. If Lewis and Clark observed old sign, that was assigned a value of one, fresh sign a two, and if Lewis and Clark actually saw Native Americans, a three. If Lewis and Clark met more than ten native people on a given day that was assigned a value of ten. On most days Lewis and Clark traveled together but on a few occasions they took separate routes, most notably on the return trip. In those cases, Lewis’s observations were recorded separately from Clark’s. These conventions produced nearly 40,000 numerical data entries. To facilitate analysis, Lewis and Clark’s route was divided into 55 trip segments, for which mean daily abundances of wildlife and mean daily abundance of native people were calculated. It should be noted that Lewis and Clark generally sent their best hunters ahead of the main party so that game would more readily be encountered. Lewis and Clark left St. Louis, Missouri on May 14, 1804 and proceeded, via watercraft, up the Missouri River through present-day Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, South Dakota, and into North Dakota where they built Fort Mandan in close proximity to the Manda and Hidatsa villages. Lewis and Clark over-wintered at Fort Mandan, and then ascended the Missouri River into present-day Montana during the spring of 1805. After leaving their larger boats and portaging the Great Falls, Lewis and Clark continued up the Missouri to Three Forks before ascending the Jefferson and Beaverhead Rivers, on whose upper reaches they met the Shoshone. After obtaining horses from the Shoshone, Lewis and Clark cached their canoes where Clark Canyon Reservoir is now situated and traveled over the Continental Divide into Idaho and down the Lemhi and Salmon Rivers. From there, Lewis and Clark ascended the North Fork of the Salmon and crossed Lost Trail Pass, re-entering Montana. Next, Lewis and Clark traveled down the Bitterroot Valley to Lolo Creek which they traced to its source. Lewis and Clark then followed the high ridges north of Idaho’s Lochsa River and eventually descended to the lower Lochsa where the explorers met the Nez Perce. At this point, Lewis and Clark left their horses and proceeded via canoe down the Clearwater, Snake, and Columbia Rivers through present-day Oregon and Washington state. Finally, Lewis and Clark built Fort Clatsop and over wintered on the south bank of the Columbia near the Pacific Ocean. During the spring of 1806, Lewis and Clark retraced their route, with minor variations, until the expedition reached present-day Lolo, Montana where the party divided. Lewis ascended the Blackfoot River, crossed the Continental Divide, and proceeded to the Great Falls on the Missouri River, where the party split a second time. Lewis left most of his men to repair the boats cached in 1805, while he and three companions traveled by horseback to Cutbank Creek, where they met the Blackfoot. After the only fatal encounter with native people on the entire trip, Lewis retreated to the Missouri where he rejoined the rest of his men and together they floated down that river until reunited with Clark below the Yellowstone in present-day North Dakota.

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Clark, on the other hand, left Lolo, Montana and ascended the Bitterroot River to Chief Joseph Pass where he entered the Big Hole. From there, Clark crossed to the Beaverhead and refloated the canoes cached in 1805. Clark’s party then proceeded by land and water to Three Forks, where the group split a second time. Clark sent some of his men and the canoes down the Missouri to meet Lewis at Great Falls, while he traveled overland via Bozeman Pass to the Yellowstone. At this point, Clark fashioned canoes and floated down the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers until reunited with Lewis. Lewis and Clark then descended to St. Louis (2:64; 3:6; 4:6; 5:6; 110, 176; 6:6, 80; 7:6; 8:8-9, 49, 84). Results Lewis and Clark’s observations show an inverse relationship between wildlife and native people. Wildlife was abundant only where Native Americans were absent, and if it had not been for the presence of aboriginal buffer zones between tribes at war (Hickerson 1965; Steffian 1991; Martin and Szuter, 1999, 2002; Farr 2001), there would have been little wildlife anywhere in the West. Yankton Sioux Buffer Zone As Lewis and Clark ascended the Missouri River, they met the Omahas and Ottes on day 97 and the Yankton Sioux on day 108. These two groups were at war (2:488) and wildlife was abundant only in the buffer zone between the tribes. Bison, in particular, were found only in the enter of the buffer zone. Sioux-Mandan Buffer Zone Lewis and Clark met the Teton Sioux on day 135, the Arikaras on day 148, and the Mandan-Hidatsa on day 164. Wildlife was not abundant in the area between the Teton Sioux and the Arikaras, but was abundant between the Arikaras and the Mandan-Hidatsa. This was because the Teton Sioux and Arikaras were allied against the Mandan-Hidatsa (3:156, 161, 195-196, 207, 226, 233-234, 243-244, 251, 272-273, 295-297, 304-305; Porche and Loendorf 1987; Bouchet-Bert 1999). That is, peace land had a negative impact on wildlife populations while war had a beneficial effect, similar to the conditions Hickerson (1965) reported for the upper Mississippi Valley (Farr 2001). Missouri-Yellowstone Buffer Zone In 1804-1806 all of Montana between Missouri and Yellowstone Rivers was a six-sided buffer zone between warring tribes (4:21-22, 67, 108-109, 159-160, 216, 222, 354, 379, 401, 426, 437; 5:8-9, 45, 68-71, 77-80, 85, 87-91, 96-97, 102-106, 123-124, 178, 197, 259, 318; 7:242, 250; 8:88, 93-94, 104, 113, 123, 143, 182, 195, 278, 321, 323). The north was controlled by the Blackfeet Confederation, which consisted of five tribes (Ewers 1958), while on the west were the Flathead, Salish, Kootenay, and their allies. The Shoshone occupied the southwest (Trenholm and Carley 1964), the Crow the south-central, and the Sioux, Cheyenne, and their allies the southeast.

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To the east were the Mandan, Hidatsa, and their allies (Ahler et al. 1991). Within this large buffer zone (Martin and Szuter 1999, 2002; Farr 2001), wildlife was relatively more abundant because the warring factions did not hunt along the Yellowstone and Missouri as frequently as they did more secure environments closer to each tribe’s core area. As noted by Lewis and Clark, tribes did venture into the buffer zone, but only in force due to fear of attack. So the Missouri-Yellowstone buffer zone was not unhunted (4:232), instead the area was just hunted less frequently (Farr 2001), which apparently was sufficient to permit greater numbers of wildlife. Deer Lewis and Clark killed more deer than all other large mammals combined, and 94% of those animals were whitetails. By comparison, mule deer were rare and were only found in tribal boundary zones, while blacktails were restricted to the Cascade Mountains west to the Pacific (6:328, 331, 403-404). Even along the lower Columbia, though, Lewis and Clark encountered more whitetails than blacktails. This was because whitetails had a more effective escape strategy than the other deer (Geist 1998, Whitaker and Lindzey 2001, Lingle 2002, Robinson et al. 2002) and thus were less affected by native hunting. Even where native people were abundant, a few whitetails were usually able to survive because, when discovered, whitetails fled into riparian thickets from which they could not easily be dislodged (5:87, 6:403). When chased, Lewis and Clark noted that mule deer and elk fled into the open (4:136-137, 6:403), making those species easier to hunt. Elk Lewis and Clark reported that elk were easier to kill than deer (6:85, 242), which is reflected in the fact that native hunters had a greater impact on the abundance of elk than they did deer. Lewis and Clark did kill a number of elk at Fort Clatsop, but only because they purposefully built the fort where elk were relatively more common and native people infrequent (6:92-93, 95-96, 105, 108, 112). That is, Lewis and Clark sited Fort Clatsop in an intervillage buffer zone to take advantage of the more abundant elk. Nevertheless, Lewis and Clark observed that most of the elk they killed during the winter of 1805-1806 had old arrow wounds (6:208, 210), indicative of intensive native hunting. “Many of the elk we have killed since we have been here, have been wounded with these arrows, the short piece with the barb remaining in the animal and grown up in the flesh” (6:208). Lewis and Clark also described how native people used pit traps to kill elk. “Then pits are employed in taking the elk, and of course are large and deep, some of them a cube of 12 or 14 feet. These are usually placed by the site of a large fallen tree, which as well as the pit (lie) across the (trails) frequently by the elk. (The) pits are disguised with the slender boughs of trees and moss; the unwary elk in passing the tree precipitates himself into the pit which is sufficiently deep to prevent his escape” (6:208). Thus, even in thick coastal forests, elk were being intensively hunted by native people.

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Pronghorn Antelope Native hunting had an even greater impact on the abundance of pronghorn antelope. Despite their great speed, pronghorns were relatively easy for native people to kill (3:176; Freson 1991). Bison Native hunting controlled the distribution and number of bison on the northern Great Plains. The only place Lewis and Clark saw bison, and especially large numbers, was in the center of aboriginal buffer zones between warring tribes. This is similar to what West (1995) documented on the central Great Plains – if it had not been for warring tribes and buffer zones, there would have been few bison anywhere in North America (Kay 2002). Bighorn Sheep Native hunting had an even greater effect on bighorn sheep. Lewis and Clark reported an abundance of bighorns only in the center of buffer zones far removed from native people. Grizzly Bears Native hunters also controlled the distribution and abundance of grizzly bears. This is similar to what Birkdal (1993) reported in Alaska. Aside from one grizzly killed in the Idaho mountains, Lewis and Clark only observed grizzlies in aboriginal buffer zones. Black Bears Based on Lewis and Clark’s observations and kill rates, black bears were less common than grizzlies. Moose Despite spending substantial amounts of time in what is currently prime moose habitat, Lewis and Clark recorded moose only once (6:313, 7:326, 8:95) and that was in the buffer zone between the Blackfeet and the Flathead-Salish. As explained elsewhere, native hunting controlled the distribution and abundance of moose throughout western North America (Kay 1997b). Contrary to what is generally believed, moose are more abundant in the West today (Stevens 1971, Pierce and Peek 1984) than they were in Lewis and Clark’s time, or at any other point in the past (Kay 1997b). Gray Wolves Lewis and Clark observed a direct relationship between the abundance of game and the abundance of wolves. Wolves were common only where game was abundant (4:85). Thus, wolves were largely restricted to the same aboriginal buffer zones as were bison, elk, and other ungulates.

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Dogs and Horses I also recorded the number of dogs Lewis and Clark purchased when game was in short supply, and the number of horses the explorers killed for food. Lewis and Clark killed nine horses and bought (ate) 210 dogs, primarily in the Columbia Basin, where native people were particularly abundant and wildlife was virtually non-existent (7:49, 92). Lewis and Clark also bought large quantities of other foodstuffs from various native peoples, especially corn from the Mandan-Hidatsa and salmon from tribes throughout the Columbia Basin. Discussion Optimal-Foraging Theory According to optimal-foraging theory, high-ranked diet items are move susceptible to overexploitation than lower-ranked items (Smith 1983, Stephens and Krebs 1985, Smith and Winterhaider 1992, Butler 2000). Theoretical considerations and studies of modern hunter-gatherers both indicate that large mammals are the highest-ranked diet items, and that, in general, the larger the animal, the higher its rank (Smith and Winterhalder 1992, Hill and Hurtado 1996). Moreover, if risk to the hunter or travel distances are great, only the highest-ranked diet items should be pursued (Smith and Winterhalder 1992). Thus, optimal-foraging theory would predict that when native people entered aboriginal buffer zones, they should have concentrated their hunting on the larger species, such as bison and elk, causing those species to decline according. This would also imply that Native Americans lacked any effective conservation strategy regarding thee prey items. This pattern was, in fact, observed by Lewis and Clark for as they left various native peoples and entered buffer zones, first white-tailed deer increased followed by elk and then bison. Conversely, as Lewis and Clark exited a buffer zone, bison disappeared first, followed by elk, while some white-tailed deer were usually able to escape native hunters. Furthermore, Lewis and Clark noted that native hunters preferred to kill female ungulates (3:61, 270) due to that sex’s higher fat content, which also runs counter to any conservation strategy (Kay 1994, 1997b, 1998; Kay and Simmons 2002). Alvard (1998b, 2002) recently reviewed the conditions under which evolution by natural relation might favor resource conservation. In short, conservation will only be favored by evolution if the resource is economical to defend. For instance, if 1000 kcal are spent defending a resources, but less than 1000 kcal are derived from that resource, evolution will not favor conservation. For a variety of reasons, including competition from carnivore predators, large mammals were seldom, if ever, economical to defend (Kay 1994, 1998, 2002). Instead the logical, rational thing to do was to kill-out the large mammals as quickly as possible and then move on to other resources, which is exactly what aboriginal people did (Kay 1998, 2002). Counter-intuitively, once that was accomplished, native populations actually increased because people were forced to consume lower-ranked, but more abundant diet items (Hawks 1991, 1992, 1993). There is also an evolved discount rate, which acts to negate a wide range of possible conservation practices (Rogers 1991, 1994).

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Predator-Limited Even within buffer zones, though, wildlife was not as abundant as one might think because the animals were predator, not food-limited (Kay 1998, 2002). Food-limited ungulates invariably destroy berry-producing shrubs and woody riparian vegetation due to repeated browsing, and once willows (Salix spp.) cottonwoods (Populus spp.), and aspen (Populus tremuloides) decline, so do associated species like beaver (Castor Canadensis) (4:189-190), which are dependant upon those plants for food (Kay 1998 and references therein). Lewis and Clark, however, reported that riparian thickets were common in buffer zones, as were beaver and berry-producing shrubs (e.g; 4:70, 145-146, 189-190, 247, 278, 332, 374, 391-392, 399, 414, 419, 428, 435, 451; 5:14, 42, 46, 59). In addition, Lewis and Clark noted that white-tailed deer often had twin fawns or triplets, and that even lactating deer were fat (4:165), which would not have been physiologically possible if ungulate populations had been food-limited. Thus, carnivore predation and occasional hunting by native people (4:232) kept buffer zone ungulate populations well below what the habitat could otherwise support (White et al. 1998, Kay 2002). Estimate of Pre-Columbian Wildlife Populations A number of investigators have cited Lewis and Clark’s descriptions of abundant wildlife without realizing that those accounts only apply to the center of buffer zones (Craighead 1998, Wilkinson and Rauber 2002). Botkin (1995:49-86), for instance, used Lewis and Clark’s observations of grizzlies along the Missouri and Yellowstone Rivers to estimate the number of bears in the western United States prior to European contact, and arrived at a figure of 78,000, which others increased to 100,000 for the entire continent (e.g; Flores 1998:61). Although Botkin (1995:165-169) acknowledged that native people could be important ecological factors, he failed to realize that native hunting controlled the distribution and numbers of grizzlies throughout North America (Birkedal 1993). During pre-Columbian times, there may have been no more than 4-5,000 grizzlies in all of North America because grizzlies were simply large packages of fat meat that native hunters killed at will (Birkedal 1993). Similarly, there never were 60 million bison on the Great Plains, as is widely believed (Shaw 1995, Geist 1996, Kay 2002). Prey Behavior Lewis and Clark also reported a direct relationship between prey behavior and native hunting. In the center of buffer zones, where native people hunted only infrequently, game was relatively tame and could generally be approached (e.g; 4:67, 108). Elsewhere, however, game was exceedingly wary. “the country about the mouth of this river (Little Missouri) had been recently hunted by the Minetares, and the little game which they had not killed and frightened away, was so extremely (sic) shy that (our) hunters could not get in shoot (range) of them” (4:26). “The Borders of the river (Missouri) has so much hunted by those Indians (that) the game is scerce (sic) and veery (sic) wild” (4:39). This also applied to grizzly bears and other animals. “(The bears) appear more shy here (near the Shoshone) than on the Missouri below the mountains” (4:426). “These anamals (sic) (beaver) in consequence of not being hunted (in a buffer zone) are extremely gentle, where they are hunted (though) they (the beaver) never leave their lodges in the day” (4:100). Similarly, in 1819 Long observed that bison fled in panic at the

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mere scent of humans. “The wind happening to blow fresh from the South, the scent of our party was borne directly (to the bison), and we could distinctly note every step of (our scent’s) progress through a distance of eight or ten miles, by the conslernation and terror it excited among the buffaloes. The moment the tainted gale infected their atmosphere, (the bison) ran with as much violence as if pursued by a party of mounted hunters” (Thwaites 1905:255-256) – not unexpectedly, these observations were made in an aboriginal buffer zone along the Platte River (West 1995). This is identical to what Diamond (1984) reported in New Guinea where even low-intensity aboriginal hunting completely altered the behavior of prey species (Kay 2002). Habitat Over the years, I have retraced most of Lewis and Clark’s route across North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Washington, and Oregon and there are no habitat features that could explain the distribution and abundances of the various species observed by the explorers. Lewis and Clark, for instance, did not find any buffalo in the large, treeless valleys of southwest-Montana, which they attributed to the fact that bison had been driven-out and/or killed-out by Shoshone hunters, not habitat characteristics (8:182). At another point in their journey, Lewis and Clark commented on how they could see no difference between the country west of the mountains and the plains along the Missouri, except that wildlife was common only on the latter. “I see very little difference between the apparent face of the country here (eastern Washington and western Idaho) and that of the plains of the Missouri only that these (the Columbia Basin grasslands) are not enlivened by the vast herds of buffaloe (sic) Elk (etc) which ornament the other” (7:196). Bighorn sheep are certainly restricted to areas with precipitous escape terrain, but Lewis and Clark found bighorns common only in the center of aboriginal buffer zones. Other suitable habitat was unoccupied because those areas were more frequently used by native people. Native Populations and European Diseases It has long been known that Native Americans had no immunological resistance to European diseases, but only recently has it been learned that those diseases had a significant impact on native people prior to direct European contact (Dobyns 1983), or how this, in turn, caused abnormal increases in wildlife populations (Neumann 1985, Presion 1996, 1997, 2002, Kay 1998, 2002; Kay and Simmons 2002). European diseases, for instance, preceded Lewis and Clark. The smallpox epidemic of 1780 was especially devastating (Boyd 1985, Trimble 1985), and its aftermath was noted by Lewis and Clark (2:478-482; 3:285, 295, 311-312; 6:81-82, 285, 308). In 1804-1806, Lewis and Clark found four Mandan villages along the Missouri but observed that there had been 12 prior to the 1780 epidemic. Similarly, Arikaras villages were reduced from 32 to 2 (Ahler et al. 1991:57). Thus, if Lewis and Clark had journeyed west in 1775 instead of 1804-1806, they would have met more native people and correspondingly, there would have been even less wildlife (Geist 1998:4-5; Kay 1998, 2002). Furthermore, European diseases may have decimated native populations, throughout the West as early as 1550-1600 (Ramenofsky 1987; Campbell 1990; Kornfeld 1994:198; Preston 1996, 1997, 2002), which suggests that pre-Columbian wildlife populations were likely much lower than even what Lewis and Clark experienced. Butler (2002), who studied resource depression in the Columbia Basin, reported that high-ranked diet items, such as ungulates, increased only after epidemic disease decimated native populations.

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Conclusions Contrary to prevailing paradigms (Lyman and Wolverton 2002, Moore 2002, Wilkinson and Rauber 2002), native people controlled the distribution, abundance, and behavior of wildlife, and large mammals were common only in boundary or buffer zones between warring tribes (Martin and Szuter 1999, 2002; Farr 2001). It is also clear that Lewis and Clark recognized this phenomenon, for Clark (8:328) “observed that in the country between the (Indian) nations which are at war with each other the greatest number of wild animals are to be found.” This pattern can only be explained if native hunters pursued an optimal-foraging strategy and did not employ any effective conservation measures (Alvard 1998b, 2002). Only twice did Lewis and Clark report high wildlife values and encounter large numbers of native people on the same day. In both cases, native hunters were busily killing as many animals as possible (3:176, 253-255). Moreover, Lewis and Clark were only able to complete their journey because of the food, horses, and above all else, knowledge that they received from native people. There were no unnamed streams, there were no unnamed mountains, and there was no wilderness (Kay and Simmons 2002). As noted by Lewis and Clark, the West was even more densely populated prior to the smallpox pandemic that decimated native people in 1780. These data have important implications for anthropology and archaeology; as well as other disciplines. Most anthropological subsistence models, for instance, incorporated the view that native people harvested ungulates at or near sustained yield levels, yet these and other data do not support that assumption (Kay and Simmons 2002). Similarly, cultural or religious beliefs are often invoked to explain how aboriginal peoples interacted with their environment (Krech 1999), yet irrespective of what the various native groups encountered by Lewis and Clark believed, or said they believed, the ecological patterns were identical, at least regarding the hunting of large mammals. Finally, these data support the hypothesis that Native Americans were the ultimate keystone predator who once structured entire ecosystems (Kay 1998, 2002). Thus, national parks, wilderness areas, and the like are entirely unnatural (Kay and Simmons 2002). Acknowledgements This research was supported by a grant from Utah State University and a book contract from Oxford University Press. Susan Durham conducted the smoothing-spline analyses. Fred Wagner, William Preston, Paul Martin, Cliff White, Valerius Geist, Richard Keigley, and Randy Simmons reviewed earlier drafts of this manuscript. Literature Cited AHLER, S.A., T.D. THIESSEN, AND M.K. TRIMBLE. (1991). People of the willows: The prehistory and early history of the Hidatsa Indians. University of North Dakota Press, Grand Forks, ND. 123 pp. ALVARD, M.S. 1993. Testing the “ecologically noble savage” hypothesis: Interspecific prey choice by the Piro hunters of Amazonian Peru. Huntan Ecology 21:355-387.

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ALVARD, M.S. 1994. Conservation by native peoples: Prey choice in a depleted habitat . Human Natures 5:127-154. ALVARD, M.S. 1995. Intraspecific prey choice by Amazorian hunters. Current Anthropology 36:789-818. ALVARD, M.S. 1998a. Indigenous hunting in the neotropics: Conservation or optimal foraging Pages 474-500 in Caro, T, ed. Behavioral ecology and conservation biology. Oxford University Press, New York, NY. ALVARD, M.S. 1998b. Evolutionary ecology and resource conservation. Evolutionary Antrhopology 7:62-74. ALVARD, M.S. 2002. Evolutionary theory, conservation, and human environmental impacts. Pages 28-43 in Kay, C.E. and R.T. Simmers, eds. Wilderness and Political Ecology. Aboriginal influences and the original state of nature. University of Utah Press. Salt Lake City, UT. 342 pp. BIRKELDAL, T. 1993. Ancient hunters in the Alaskan wilderness: Human predators and their role and effort on wildlife populations and the implications for resource management. Pages 228-234 in Braun, W.E., and S.D. Veiss, Jr., eds. Partners in stewardship: Proceedings of the 7th Conference on Reserarch and Resource Management in Parks and on Public Lands. The George Wright Society, Hancock, MI. 479 pp. BOTKIN, D.B. 1995. Our natural history. The lessons of Lewis and Clark. G.E. Putnam’s Sons, New York, NY. 300 pp. BOUCHET-BERT, L. 1999. From spiritual and biographic to boundary-marking deterrent art: A reinterpretation of Writing-on-Stone. Plans Anthropologist 44(167):27-46. BOYD, R.T. 1985. The introduction of infectious disease among the Indians of the Pacific Northwest. 1774-1847. Ph.D. Disseration, University of Washington. Seattle, WA. 599 pp. BROUGHTON, J.M. 1994a. Declines in mammalian foraging efficiency during the Late Holocene, San Francisco Bay, California. Journal of Anthropoligcal Archaeology 13:371-401. BROUGHTON, J.M. 1994b. Late Holocene resource intensification in the Sacramento Valley, California: The vertebrate evidence. Journal of Archaeological Science 21:501-514. BROUGHTON, J.M. 1997. Widening diet breadth, declining foraging efficiency, and prehistoric harvest pressure: Ichthyofaunal evidence from the Emeryville Sheltmound, California. Antiquity 71:845-862. BURROUGHS, R.D. 1961. The natural history of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Michigan State University Press, East Lansing, MI.

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MARTIN, P.S., AND C.R. SZUTER. 2002. Game parks before and after Lewis and Clark: Reply to Lyman and Wolderton. Conservation Biology 16:244-247. MATHSOFT. 1997. S-plus 4: Guide to Statistics. Data Analysis and Products Division, MathSoft Inc., Seattle, WA. MOORE, P.D. 2002. Buffed over bison. Nature 416:488-489. MOULTON, G.E., ed. 1986. The journals of the Lewis and Clark expedition: Vol. 2 – August 30, 1803 – August 24, 1804. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NE. 612 pp. MOULTON, G.E., ed. 1987a. The journals of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Vol. 3- August 25, 1804-April 6, 1805. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NE 544 pp. MOULTON, G.E., ed. 1987b. The journals of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Vol. 4 – April 7-July 27, 1805. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NE. 464 pp. MOULTON, G.E., ed. 1988. The journals of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Vol 5 – July 28-November 1, 1805. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NE. 415 pp. MOULTON, G.E., ed. 1990. The journals of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Vol 6 – November 2, 1805-March 22, 1806. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NE. 531 pp. MOULTON, G.E., ed. 1991. The journals of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Vol 7 – March 23-June 9, 1806. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NE 383 pp. MOULTON, G.E. ed. 1993. The journals of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Vol 8 – June 10-September 26, 1806. University of Nebraska Press. Lincoln, NE. 456 pp. NEUMANN, T.W. 1985. Human-wildlife competition and the passenger pigeon. Population growth from system destahilization. Human Ecology 4:389-410. PATTEN, D.T. 1998. Restoration as the order of the 21st century. An ecologist’s perspective. Pages 69-77 in Keiter, R.B., ed. Reclaiming the native home of hope Community ecology and the American West. University of Utah. Press. Salt Lake City, UT. 178 pp. PIERCE, D.J., AND J.M. PEEK. 1984. Moose habitat use and selection patterns in north-central Idaho. Journal of Wildlife Management 48:1335-1343. PORSCHE, A., AND L. LOENDORF. 1987. The dual function of rock art on the northern plains. Archaeology in Montana 28:57-60. PRESTON, W.I. 1996. Serpent in Eden: Dispersal of foreign diseases into permission California. Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology 18:2-37.

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PRESTON, W.I. 1997. Serpent in the garden. Environmental change in colonial California. California History 76:260-298. PRESTON, W.I. 2002. Post-Columbia wildlife irruptions in California. Implications for cultural and environmental understanding. Page 111-140 in Kay, C.E., and R.T. Simmons, eds. Wilderness and political ecology: Aboriginal influences and the original state of nature. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City, UT. 342 pp. RAMENOFSKY, A.F. 1987. Vectors of death: the archaeology of European contact. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, NM. 300 pp. ROBINSON, H.S., R.B. WIELGUS, AND J.C. WILLIAMS. 2002. Cougar predation and population growth of sympatric mule deer and white-tailed deer. Canadian Journal of Zoology 80:556-568. ROGERS, A. 1991. Conserving resources for children. Human Nature 2:73-82. ROGERS, A. 1994. Evolution of time preference by natural selection. The American Economic Review 84:460-481. RONDA, J.P. 1984. Lewis and Clark among the Indians. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NE. 310 pp. SHAW, J.H. 1995. How many bison originally populated western rangelands? Rangelands 17:148-150. SMITH, E.A. 1983. Anthropological applications of optimal foraging theory. A critical review. Current Anthropology 24:625-651. SMITH, E.A. AND R. WINTERHALDER, eds. 1992. Evolutionary ecology and human behavior. Aldine de Gruyter, New York, NY. 470 pp. SPECK, F.G. 1913. The Indians and game preservation. Red Man 6:21-25. SPECK, F.G. 1959 a. Savage savers. Frontiers 4:23-27. SPECK, G.G. 1939b. Aboriginal conservators. Bird Lore 40:258-261. STEFFLAN, A.F. 1991. Territorial stability as a factor in the occurrence and perpetuation of inter-group buffer zones. Michigan Discussions in Anthropology Hunter-Gatherers Studies 10:89-105. STEPHENS, D.W. AND J.R. KREBS. 1986. Foraging theory: Princeton University Press. Princeton, NJ.

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The Value of Genetic Improvement in Beef Cattle

Shane R. Mathews Mathews Farms P.O. Box 426

Panaca, Nevada 89042 775-962-1318

Biographical Information:

I graduated with a B.S. in agricultural economics from Utah State University in 1994 and received a master of science in agricultural economics from Texas A&M University in 1996. After working for two years on a ranch in Florida, I moved home to Panaca, Nevada in 1998.

I presently work with my father and brother in a family business. We farm 1,100 acres of alfalfa hay, 120 acres of corn silage, and 100 acres improved pasture. We run 320 mother cows, background 2,200 head of feeder cattle, and feed 3,500 head annually in Kansas. I recently initiated a producer level alliance with interested ranchers to improve the health and genetics of calves that we buy. Topic:

Since we began retaining ownership of feeder cattle about five years ago, we have noticed significant differences in the net return of cattle from different origins. Although several factors affect net return, the genetics of the originating cow herd is one of the greatest differentiating factors. Most ranchers struggle to quantify the value of investing in more progressive genetics. My presentation will show the actual monetary advantage of genetic improvement. It is my opinion that the cattle herds of our area are genetically deficient. I have some ideas on how to solve this problem. I guarantee that producers will be rewarded for genetic improvements to their cow herds.

There can be a balance between the traditions of the established generation and the innovation of the rising generation that improves profitability for today’s cow/calf producer. We must be progressive and willing to change as individuals before we can change as an industry.

I will briefly outline our attempts to organize a beef management alliance with ranchers. The concept of cooperatives is not dead. The goal of the alliance is to improve the health and genetics of calves on the ranch and then to give valuable feedback to the rancher as to feeding performance and carcass data. As ranchers use this feedback, they can improve the quality of their product and the profitability of their enterprise.

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Ethanol Expansion, Corn Prices, & the Cattle Industry

Dillon M. Feuz Livestock Marketing Specialist

Utah State University

Proceedings 29th Annual Range-Livestock Workshop

Arizona-Utah-Nevada

Ethanol Expansion

The ethanol industry is in the middle of a major expansion. Government mandated clean fuel regulations and over $60 per barrel crude oil prices have created a major incentive for the ethanol industry to expand. In June 2006 there were 102 ethanol plants operating and 33 more plants were under construction with another 127 plants in the planning stage. By February 2007 there were 115 ethanol plants operating and 70 more plants were under construction and another 293 plants in the planning stage. It is unlikely that all of those 293 plants will be built, but even when the current 70 plants under construction come online, that will be a doubling of capacity in the last two years.

The ethanol industry will use more than 2 billon bushels of corn from the 2006 crop. That represents about 20 percent of corn production. With the plants coming on line in 2007, ethanol production is expected to use more than 3.5 billion bushels of the 2007 corn crop. That would be about 1/3 of last year’s crop. This year farmers may find an additional 8-10 million acres to plant to corn, and if they have above average yields, then corn production may exceed 12 billion bushels. However, even that record level of production will likely leave us producing less corn in 2007 then we will use in the 2007-08 marketing year. What impact will that have on corn price?

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Corn Prices

A look at the Chicago Board of Trade Dec. Corn futures provides some insight into where corn prices have been and where they may be in the future. In December 2005, the Dec contract averaged $1.90 per bushel and in December 2006 the average was $3.60 per bushel. In February, 2007 the Dec contracts for 2007, 2008 & 2009 averages about $4.00, $3.77 and $3.60 per bushel, respectively. It appears that corn prices will have moved to a higher level as a result of the demand for ethanol.

From 1960-1972 the farm price for corn averaged $1.13 per bushel and the fed cattle

price to corn price ratio (fed cattle price $/cwt. divided by corn price $/bu.) averaged 24. Increased exports of corn increased the average price of corn to $2.46 per bushel from 1973-1996 but fed cattle prices also increased and the fed cattle/corn price ratio averaged 26 over that time period. However, the last 10 years have seen corn exports flatten out and corn production increase. Farm gate corn prices have averaged only $2.14 per bushel from 1997-2006. Fed cattle prices have moved to record high price levels over that time period and the fed cattle price/corn price ratio grew to an average of 35. With fed cattle prices expected to average in the mid $90/cwt. range in 2007 and corn prices expected to be near $4/bu. the fed cattle price/corn price ratio will likely be under 24. Relatively cheap corn in the past has been a factor in the increase in fed cattle slaughter weights and has influenced the proportion of calf-fed versus yearling-fed cattle. If the trend towards higher priced corn, as projected based on Chicago Board of Trade Dec. Corn futures, is correct, how will sustained higher corn prices impact the cattle industry? Will some of these feeding trends that I just mentioned be reversed? Cattle Industry

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The cattle industry is being impacted in a number of ways by higher corn prices. A

couple of obvious and directly correlated impacts are higher feeding costs and lower calf and feeder prices relative to fed cattle prices. Another impact is the greater use of ethanol co-products, distillers grains, in cattle rations. A more subtle impact is the influence of higher grain prices on beef demand.

Feeding Costs and Feeder Cattle Prices

The last few years, total feedlot cost per pound of gain has averaged about $0.50. With

current corn prices near $4.00 per bushel and the expectation that prices will remain in the upper $3 – lower $4 per bushel range, total feedlot cost per pound of gain are currently over $0.70 and will likely remain near $0.70 for the next couple of years. That increase of $0.20 per pound of gain adds about $140 to the cost of feeding a 5-weight calf to a finished weight of 1250 pounds and adds $110 to the cost of feeding a 750 steer to a finished weight of 1300 pounds. If feedlots passed all of that added cost back to cow-calf producers in the form of lower prices, the impact would be 550 pound calves would be $25 per cwt. lower prices and 750 pound cattle would be $15 per cwt. lower priced. Other factors, including the quality of feeder cattle, the supply of feeder cattle, and the price of fed cattle will all impact the actual price of feeder cattle. However, you can expect the relative price of feeder cattle and calves compared to fed cattle to be lower as a result of the higher feeding costs.

Corn & Cattle Prices

$1.50

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Omaha Corn Utah 550 lb Steer 5 Mkt Fed Cattle

The price impact on feeder cattle should be less than that implied by the added cost of

gain in the feedlot. The reason is that there are other alternatives to placing calves directly into a

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feedlot. Calves can be held over the winter on the ranch and then grazed on summer pastures, they can be sold to someone who will graze them on wheat pastures or corn stalks or backgrounded on silage or haylage. In fact, with higher costs of gain in the feedlot, there may be a greater number of calves destined to these alternative feeding programs. This would ultimately reduce the number of days the cattle are on feed in a feedlot and consuming corn. This would reduce the amount of corn grain that is needed for the cattle industry and would tend to lower corn price somewhat.

If more calves are placed in background and stocker programs, that would tend to

increase the price of corn stalks, silage, summer grass, and wheat pastures. Given present cattle numbers, there is an excess feedlot capacity. Owners of those feedlots will not likely want them to be empty. Feedlot economics is like the tourist and hotel business; you have got to keep the rooms full to be profitable. With that in mind, I would again expect the price of calves and feeder cattle to not decline the full amount implied by the higher feeding costs in a feedlot.

Distillers Grains

Research has shown that feeding corn ethanol co-products can fit well in a feedlot ration.

Dried distillers grain, wet distillers grain, and wet corn gluten are some of the more popular by-products. The dried distillers grain can be shipped economically some distance. The wet distillers grain and the wet corn gluten must be fed fairly close to the plants for it to be economical. All of these co-products are an excellent source of protein and energy and can be fed in amounts of 30-40 percent of the diet depending upon the specific product.

Erickson, G.E., T.J. Klopfenstein, D.C. Adams & R.J. Rasby. Univ. of Nebraska. 2006 The research shows that there is generally an increase in feed efficiency and an increase in average daily gain with the inclusion of one of the co-products in the diet. As a result, feeding these co-products can reduce feeding costs. However, the price of these co-products has been

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tied quite closely to the price of corn. Therefore, there has not been an opportunity to drastically reduce feeding costs with these products.

Weekly DDG Price vs Corn Price

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0.00

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DDG $/ton Corn $/bu

Will we see an increase in cattle feeding in the corn belt and a decrease in the great

plains? There will again be competing forces at work in the market that will limit growth in corn belt cattle feeding. While some expansion of feeding capacity and capacity utilization will likely occur in proximity to many ethanol plants, other factors may limit this growth in cattle feeding. The current excess feedlot capacity that I already mentioned is one factor and the location of fed cattle slaughter plants is another factor. Environmental regulations in the more humid and more heavily populated corn belt region, where many of the new ethanol plants are located, compared to the high plains will likely also curtail feedlot expansion in the corn belt.

Beef Demand

What does the price of corn have to do with beef demand? Normally one would think of the price of corn influencing costs and therefore influencing the supply of cattle and hence the supply of beef, but not impacting beef demand. However, a couple of substitutes to beef in the market place, pork and poultry, also rely heavily on corn as a feed. The pork and poultry industry are likely experiencing a greater adjustment in their feeding costs than is the beef industry. You don’t here of many people grazing hogs or chickens on corn stalks or wheat pastures or feeding them other roughages. There is also less opportunities for substitution of the ethanol co-products into the diets of hogs and chickens. Therefore, if all other factors were constant in the market place (which they aren’t) then with added feeding costs and reduced

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profitability in the pork and poultry industries, one would expect a reduction in the supply of pork and poultry. I am not suggesting that you will see an actual reduction of pork and poultry supply in the market place, but rather the supply that is in the market place will be reduced compared to what it would have been if there were cheaper corn in the market place. This relative reduction in pork and poultry supply will be supportive of relatively higher pork and poultry prices and therefore will strengthen beef demand and increase the relative price of beef and fed cattle. Conclusion

I don’t have all (maybe none) of the answers to many of the questions that I posed in this article. However, I think we all need to ponder the questions. There is not likely an economists smart enough, or a model sophisticated enough to foresee all of the changes over the next few years. However, I am a strong believer in the power of the market place to allocate resources based on market prices. Farmers will adjust planting and cropping practices and will grow more corn. The cattle industry will alter cattle feeding practices and will feed less corn. Politicians will likely alter farm and energy policy over time. Those changes may have a direct impact on the ethanol industry and on the price of corn and the price of cattle. I do think that over the next 2-3 years, corn will be much higher priced than in the previous 2-3 years. That will impact cattle feeding profitability. Cattle feeders will not bear all of that reduced profitability. They will pass some of it back to cow-calf producers and stocker operators in the form of lower and perhaps more volatile calf and feeder prices. To be successful, cow-calf producers should evaluate all of their marketing opportunities for their cattle. Doing what you have done in the past, may or may not be your best alternative for the future.

arizona – nevada utah · department of agriculture, cooperative extension, college of agriculture...

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