Final Reflections
November 2024

I’ve put a lot of thought this summer into what it was I wanted to be able to say in this essay. The prompt and intention is to write about what I’ve learned. The goal, I suppose, is to demonstrate the invalubility of this program, give insight to future applicants, and serve as a kind of encouragement and thank you note to all those who hold a stake in the game — who would like to know if the program is successful. 

This seems to me like a fairly high bar for one essay. My first impulse was to write a very thorough account of the hard, practical skills I’ve been able to gain experience with. Many of which were ones I had no plans to learn. Ranching is a trade with endless opportunities for stretching the scope of one’s knowledge. I learned how to set mouse traps really well. I learned how to cut bull calves and pull horseshoes. I’ve almost learned that come by means left and away means right. (My canine co-worker has learned to just go the way I point, so the benefit of this is debatable.) 

If I sat down and wrote down all the big and small things I’ve learned or started to learn, I’m sure I could nicely fill this essay out. What I would really like to talk about, however, is I suppose a soft skill. Something I’ve been thinking about quite a bit since I started going down the path of working in agriculture. That is, what is the reason to do it? What is the answer to the meaning of life, the universe, and everything? Should I keep ranching? The hours tend to be overly long, the work is usually hard — both physically and sometimes mentally. The locations are usually limiting on social contact, grocery runs, cell service. The money can be difficult. Working for somebody else you probably won’t make much. Starting your own enterprise you’ll make even less, and very likely fail. 

When I was raising 4-H lambs, I asked a sheep rancher if they had any advice on raising sheep. “Get out now while you still have some money,” were the words I received. But they were words meant with humor. He certainly wasn’t trying to get out. But why not? Plenty of people do try it and quit after they work a job where they pencil out that they make half minimum wage when they figure the hourly, or that the equipment they’re expected to use is pushing 50, doesn’t run half the time and hobbles the other at best. Some people can’t handle the frustration of trying all afternoon to get cows to go in a gate they very well ought to see. 

One of the great things about ranch work is that it gives you time to think. Dickens wrote pretty successful (if depressing) novels by walking up to 20 miles a day. Physical tasks are good like that. Why just fix fences when you could fix fences and come up with problems to worry over, that’s my philosophy. So while sitting on a hill waiting for sheep to wake up, or fixing fence, or any other task that requires time but only so much thought, I’ve been applying myself to formulating an answer to the question of why I, or anyone, would want to make a career out of ranching. 

One reason I’ve heard, particularly in the regenerative world, is to do it to be the change the world needs. I think that’s a pretty admirable mindset. My hangup with that is that there are plenty of other things you could do in the ag sector that don’t require you to do the work directly. So what is the motivation to be the boots on the ground?

What I’ve come up with to explain ranchers essentially boils down to two things. Thing number one, people who make it are a particular mix of patient and stubborn. This is more or less what the western community refers to as grit. It’s a desire to prove oneself against adversity, and to complete tasks. It’s got to be tempered by the ability to see when you need to adapt. Sometimes what you set out to do isn’t going to work, and it’s going to take a lot more time, and possibly different methods than you set out to use. That’s where the patience is essential. The constant problem solving is addictive to people if they have the ability to see it through. 

The second answer I can come up with is that ranchers are fundamentally romantic. Some of them may quit me right there. They are not a demographic that would likely admit to that in seriousness. Ranchers are factual. Realistic. Hands dirty, hard numbers. Not sentimental about death or suffering. The facts of life and cruelties of nature are met with dry, sarcastic humor and a move along. And I’m certainly not knocking the method. It’s a whole lot more fun than walking around with a long face all the time because things are dead and life is hard. 

“Romanticizing the west” is a phrase I think most people have heard before. When I think of the phrase, I imagine riding a horse into the sunset somewhere. There might be some dramatic rock outcroppings. Not rocks where you’re riding, though. That will be a smooth, lightly vegetated expanse unmarred by gophers. Your horse will be behaving and traveling at a perfectly controlled pace. You will have completed all your tasks and are riding into the sunset purely by choice, not because it’s about to get dark. It is, of course, 75 degrees with a light breeze. 

The reality of ranch work is that riding a good horse in good weather into the sunset is definitely on the table. The catch is that it’s the perk of the other ninety-nine percent of the job. You can argue with me about what percent romantic you are, but for me I’m going to call the perfect moments one percent. I do think everyone has them; moments where you look up and realize everything is beautiful and you have the best job on the face of the earth. 

My point is that you have to be at least a little bit romantic in order to justify a lifestyle that’s ninety-nine percent mud, blood, and suffering off the other one percent. So I guess that’s my best conclusion. That you’ve got to have the grit to get satisfaction out of the ninety-nine, and that little bit of romanticism to ride the high of the one. 

I don’t know if I’ll keep ranching the rest of my life. Very little of what I’ve done up to this point has been what I’d planned for it to be. Things have a way of being unexpected. But I do know that I have a lot of love for it. I’m grateful for how the experience has allowed me to grow as a person, and for the skills I’ve been able to learn or at least begin to. It’s a job I don’t think it would be possible to ever entirely learn. There’s always something to improve at. That’s part of what makes it so interesting. My hope is that the unexpected allows me to keep going. I don’t think I’m going to get tired of it any time soon.

How did you get interested in agriculture? And what are you hoping to gain from your apprenticeship?
May 2024

Hello, my name is Morgan Smith. I grew up in Western Oregon on the edge of the urban-rural divide. My family lived about 25 minutes from town, where properties expanded to 5-20 acres. Lifestyles ranged from low-budget homesteading to perfectly manicured homes. Free roaming goats of unknown breeding were interspersed with sleek, high-dollar horses. 

My family was part of the homesteading branch; with unruly gardens, scattered chicken coops, and a trailer constructed from plywood and salvaged bedframe steel parked below the house. We had chickens, sheep, goats, and cattle. Like a lot of people who end up in agriculture, I was fascinated by all of them. I spent hours decoding chicken communications and tracking bumblebees.

When I was 10, I started participating in 4-H. There I was introduced to raising animals as a business. I learned how to track costs and weigh them against value, and how different traits could be optimized for different purposes.

I was just as interested in other people’s animals as I was in the ones at home, so I also started picking up odd jobs. This began a period of small-scale networking. People are hard-wired to teach young people about the world, so I got a lot of opinions while stall cleaning and pet sitting. I saw how the same animals could be raised, fed, and treated completely differently. 

I became interested in which way, if any, was the “right” way of keeping land and animals. I also became interested in people’s perceptions of livestock and food, and in the relationships people have with an issue in which every living person is a stakeholder.

At 17, I started taking classes at the Community College and got on track for an Animal Sciences degree. While I was studying, I tried to frame ideas about the very basics. I wanted to know if keeping living creatures for the purpose of slaughter was something you could ethically justify. I wanted to know whether eating meat was healthy and an effective way to feed a growing population. I wanted to know if the answers to those questions could be compared between animals that are radically different, like chickens and cattle. 

What I discovered was that these questions are quite controversial, and so complex getting a straight answer is essentially impossible. In some ways, this was about the worst outcome I could have gotten. I’m a straightforward person, and I love a black and white answer. What I consider to be a good outcome was that I’m not willing to pursue or support any one legalistic system of thinking. 

What I’m hoping to find through this internship is a style of management that does its best to consider things from multiple angles, and to be open to change. What drew me to holistic management is that it allows for the intersection of multiple styles and values; including  traditional knowledge, science, and practicality. I feel optimistic that it’s a step towards agriculture that values innovation and sustainability.

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