Knowledge Rich Ranching - Paperback

by Allan Nation (Author)

"Knowledge Rich Ranching will expose you to what you need to understand when you sit down to the kitchen table on winter nights to determine how not only to make it through another year, but to develop a long-term economically sustainable farm or ranch."--David W. Morrison, Rural Papers

In today's market, knowledge separates the rich from the rest.

Knowledge Rich Ranching is not a how-to book on raising cattle. It is a book on how the cattle business works. It has not been sanitized nor edited by Ms. Rosy Scenario. It is about the way things really are. It is about fear and greed, and how the commodity business eats alive the naive and unaware. In today's market, it is knowledge that separates the rich from the rest.

Knowledge Rich Ranching is packed with guidelines for how to read and profit from the upside-down swings of the cattle cycle. It describes various bookkeeping methods and tax tips; covers cost cutting to eliminate profit leaks; reveals the secrets of high profit grass farms and ranches; details strategies for using Management-intensive Grazing in humid and arid climates as well as during adverse weather conditions. And it explains family and business structure with suggestions for estate planning to keep today's ranch or grass farm viable and profitable for future generations.

While focused on raising cattle, the principles in Knowledge Rich Ranching apply equally to producers of other livestock enterprises--sheep, in particular, which run backwards to the cattle cycle and can add a complementary enterprise to an existing cattle operation. Anyone who has profit as his or her goal will benefit from this book. It is the first to cover the business management principles of grassland farming and ranching.

Author Biography

Allan Nation served as the editor of The Stockman Grass Farmer magazine from 1977 until his death in November, 2016.

Begun in 1947, it was Mississippi's oldest farm publication. Based in Ridgeland, Mississippi, The Stockman Grass Farmer is an international publication that covers management-intensive grassland enterprises for producers of pasture-raised livestock. This includes stocker cattle, grass finished beef and lamb, and pasture-based dairying. It is the only monthly publication in North America devoted solely to management-intensive grassland farming in all its aspects.

The son of a commercial cattle rancher, Nation grew up in Greenville, Mississippi. He traveled to some 30 countries around the world studying and photographing grassland farming systems. In 1987, he authored a section on Management-intensive Grazing in the USDA Yearbook of Agriculture and served as a consultant and resource for Audubon Society Television Specials, National Geographic, WTBS, PBS, and National Public Radio. He received the 1993 Agricultural Conservation Award from the American Farmland Trust for spearheading the drive behind the grass farming revolution in the United States.

Nation was a featured speaker at ranching and grasslands conference and authored 11 books on pasture-based livestock and artisan meats and milk products.