Prime Time Summer 2018

In southern Texas, James Layssard has also been forced to sell cattle to avoid overgrazing on his small ranch near Alice, Texas, where he considers himself to be aggressive in his pas- ture management approach. “If it doesn’t benefit my cows, it goes,” he says. Layssard has worked with his local NRCS office in Jim Wells County to drill a new water well that runs on solar panels. He has laid pipelines to add tanks for rotational grazing and, in one pasture, he has planted Cyprus trees around a well that had par- ticularly high evaporation issues. And like his fellow Texans, he has been actively trying to rid his pastures of mesquite trees and re-plant native grasses. For Layssard’s efforts on grazing management, brush control and his many inno- vative approaches to conser- vation, the Jim Wells County Soil and Water Conservation District honored him as the 2017 Rancher of the Year.

On the Griffin, Sterling and Layssard ranches, fam- ily tradition includes an attitude of stewardship to- ward the land and continu- ally improving conservation strategies. “If we don’t take care of it, nobody’s going to. And if I don’t teach anybody behind

me to take the property, if I don’t set an example, the people behind me don’t know how they are sup- posed to act,” Sterling says. “My family is of the opinion that this is God’s property; we’re just managing it for him.” PT

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In recognition for his conservation efforts, the Jim Wells County Soil and Water Conservation District honored James Layssard and his wife, Jane, as 2017 Rancher of the Year.

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www.akaushi.com • Summer 2018