I love Texas

Texas - the most organised and generous trip we experienced during the duration of our tour. We landed in Amarillo inside the Texas pan handle and were met by Don Gohmert and Deanna Littlefield from NRCS (Natural Resource Conservation Service). With a full sized coach waiting, a large sign in the foyer welcoming us and gifts including a leather bag and diary, I was taken aback by the generosity shown to us. It remained this way everywhere we went. As hosts, the Texans take a lot of beating. The media followed us for a large part of our trip and made the evening news with various interviews. Like Alberta, most nights finished with a meal at a local farm or business.

The farmers in the Texas pan handle face the same pressures as farmers in Australia; water, or the lack of it. Groundwater is the main supply of water in the pan handle so irrigators rely heavily on it. This will prove problematic in the long term as the aquifer they draw from has a very slow recharge. It's worthy of note that their pumps are not metered. There were also quite a few gas driven pump sites abandoned due to aquifers drying up.

A visit to Greg Methvin's property, who was growing cotton and maize in rotation on a buried drip system in light soils, was just what I'd hoped for. Fifty percent of the cost of the system was financed by NRCS. Finding efficient water systems for farmers in the Texas pan handle is high on NRCS' agenda.

Farming practices vary greatly from country to country and even state to state and Methvin farm was no exception. One case in point was the use of deep corrugations in a raised bed layout. These were about thirty centimetres long along the entire length of a furrow, excluding the furrows that take the most traffic. Greg told us they were put there to do the dual roll of stopping water running down the furrow and eroding the sandy soil out in the event of heavy rain and catching as much water as possible allowing it time to infiltrate through the profile evenly across the field rather than running to the lowest point in the field. A simple yet effective idea on light soils. The other practice I found interesting was the use of Sand Fighters (a cultivator) to work up sandy soil before strong winds were forecast. I found this somewhat puzzling as you would think this would have a devastating effect on a crop in sandy soils with high winds. Apparently, if it isn't done the wind will do more damage. Just one of those little idiosyncrasies in agriculture that I have come across travelling around the world. Texas is a windy state and the pan handle is no exception. This is why it has the greatest number of wind generators in America.

That little red thing is a train !

Everything is big in Texas, at least that's what they say. At High Plains Dairy this was true. Harry De Witt owns and operates a ten thousand head dairy herd with four and a half thousand milking cows going through a seventy-five head rotary dairy. With ten acres of air conditioned shed, it was a very large and clever set up. Harry has used his well travelled experience from working in dairies in Holland to Canada to create a very efficient large scale dairy. The shed is laid out on an inward two percent slope meeting in the middle and draining across a sand trap tapering away from the milking parlour. The slope of the shed allows water to flush down the bedding lane way, cleaning the manure and bedding sand away as it flows down hill. He has created a very simple effluent system that recycles the sand lost out of the cows bedding stalls. It falls out of suspension as the manure is flushed out to settling ponds and is collected in the trap by a bobcat periodically. It is cleaned and spread out to let the hot Texas sun, given time, sterilise it for reuse.

I loved the sign painted on the side of his shed in giant letters “Farmers feed the world”.

The Nuffield GFP allowed me to see a lot of different farm set ups, although a few too many dairies for a tomato grower to take. The High Plains Dairy, however, remains the most impressive dairy I had the opportunity to see throughout my entire tour.

6666 ranch drafting

The highlight of the Texas leg of the trip for me was lunch at the 6666 ranch dining out of a chuck wagon set on the side of a hill overlooking some of the ranch's vast landscape. Under a large canvas marquee there were smiles all round as we watched the rain tumble down and enjoyed some of the best cooked beef and vegetables I ate on the trip - campfire meals just have that “something”. With a heritage going back over a hundred years, this famous ranch has retained it's historic past without becoming a tourist attraction and has remained a true working farm. 6666 is a place where a true cowboy can still be found. A man's horse is his own and no other rider will use it. Everything to do with their cattle is still done on horse back and the ranch has a well respected blood line of Angus cattle that Joe Leathers, the Ranch Manager, has worked hard at achieving. 6666 ranch also have a blood line of quarter horses that is widely respected and well known. The equine centre based on the property was very impressive and reflects their commitment to the welfare of their horses and heritage. A long list of applicants waiting to get the opportunity to work at the 6666 ranch exists with good reason as the staff are well looked after with a local store house providing most of what a cowboy may need. Housing is also provided.

We covered a lot of country and farming businesses during our stay including ethanol plants, wind powered cotton gins, large scale feed lots, cotton under pivots, visits to the quarter horse museum and historic Fort Worth saleyards. It was a great experience and a message to come out of this leg of the trip would be that we share very common problems with the Texans in the pan handle and most of them are centred around water and making it go further.