Building on what we have learned from the Valle Grande Grassbank

Originally published in Rangelands, June 2007

Excerpt:
"A Grassbank is defined as a physical place, as well as a voluntary collaborative process, where forage is exchanged for one or more tangible conservation benefits on neighboring or associated lands. Grassbanks are one of the innovative initiatives spawned by efforts to conserve working landscapes.

In 1997, author and conservationist Bill deBuys had a question on his mind: could cattle, curlews, prescribed fire, ranchers, environmentalists, and the U.S. Forest Service all get along together?

To find out, Bill assembled the Valle Grande Grassbank, located on a 36,000-acre allotment of national forest land on Rowe Mesa, 25 miles east of Santa Fe, New Mexico. In assembling it, he set three goals for the Grassbank:

• To improve the ecological health of public grazing lands for the benefit of all creatures dependent on them;
• To strengthen the economic and environmental foundation of northern New Mexico's ranching tradition, which is arguably the oldest in the nation;
• To show that ranchers, conservationists, and agency personnel can work together for the good of the land and the people who depend on it."

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