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8A – Daily News – Saturday, June 12, 2010 Agriculture & farm Our bus driver said we trav- eled 1,063 miles visiting ranches on the Western Livestock Journal Colorado High Country ranch tour. Raftopoulos Ranches is one of Colorado’s largest sheep and cattle ranch operations. The ranch was started in the 1920s by Steve Simos, a Greek immigrant. He returned to Greece in 1934 to marry Georgia Viahos, and they returned to Craig, Colo. to his sheep ranch. After his death in 1948, Georgia returned to Greece in 1950 and married George Raftopoulos, whom she had known since childhood. They ranch Grilling Colorado style at the Carpenter Ranch Jean Barton returned to Colorado to continue the 3,000 head sheep operation and had two sons, John and Steve, who now operate the ranch and expanded it to include cattle. John said the winters are hard here, and the sheep win- ter near Rock Springs, Wyo. They run about 12,000 ewes, with Chilean or Peruvian herders for every thousand head. The bands that graze in the summer are split into 1000 ewes with 1,400 lambs. The big white dogs are used to protect against predators, (eagles, crows, fox and bear.). The Rambouilet ewes are large, about 170 to 180 pounds with a fine fleece. The shearing is done by New Zealand or Australian crews. As we drove along the county road we saw the herders on horseback with the ewes and lambs in the sage- brush on the rolling hills. The ranch has an interest in a feedlot where the lambs are fed and processed. The cattle operation was interesting because artificial insemination is important, with as many as 1,700 females inseminated each year. At first different breeds of cattle were tried, and they kept an interest in the calves in order to get carcass data. The cows were getting big and wild, so they bought a group of replacement heifers from Mon- tana and started AI. The first two years of AI, all the cows were bred to New Design 878, breeding 2,200 cows. This was fol- lowed by using Conneally Lead On for two years, and now he is using Median Focus, and they AI only 1,400 cows now. When choosing New Design he had to have at least 90% percent accuracy in his EPDs breeding the entire cowherd to one bull was taking a big risk. Lead On was a negative back fat bull, and his daughters didn't winter well in this cold area. Only AI sired females are kept for replacements now. After weaning the heifers go to Walden, where they are AI in a feedlot, breeding after synchronizing. Ultrasound in August. The heifers will calve the end of February. The ranch also purchased 700 registered Angus cows from the Dakotas. The AI bull calves are weaned in September, and put on a high roughage ration and scanned every 30 days. In middle December they will save 500 good bulls to use for breeding the commercial herd and sell 150 to 200 bulls to neighboring ranchers. The lower end will be castrated by banding, and put in a feedlot. 95 percent have gone choice when harvested. Raftopoulos said they had built a lot of corrals using Temple Grandin ideas. The circle corral we visited was where they AI the cows. We were 55 miles from Utah and 12 miles from Wyoming. They use Charolais bulls for a terminal cross, and the commercial unit is turned out on the desert to calve. When asked about brush control, the Mayberry fire burned 27,000 acres. BLM requires them to stay off for two years after a fire goes through. Some brush is sprayed with herbicide. The water is from springs or drilled. About 200 foot to water where we were, with 15 miles of piped water to troughs on the range. Five men work as irrigators on the meadows that are cut for hay. The better land was homesteaded, and the ranch has 65,000 acres. They graze on 500,000 acres of BLM and Courtesy photo Grilling done at the Carpenter Ranch. USFS lands. It is 100 miles from Craig to the ranch head- quarters. In the middle of July it can be 95 to 100 degrees, but nights are cool after August 15. When asked about keeping records, John Raftopoulos pulled his little red book out of his shirt pocket. The men on the tour cheered, because he wasn’t using a laptop computer. Hayden, Colorado had gasoline for $2.91 and diesel for $2.99. There were tulips, jonquils, flowering cherry and crab apple trees in bloom in the yards in town. Our next visit was the Carpenter Ranch, outside of Hayden. It is currently owned by The Nature Conservacy, and managed by Geoff Blakeslee and his wife Betsy, who oversee the ranch and museum since 1996. The Nature Conservacy owned cattle until 4 years ago, and the resource (grazing) is now leased to a local family. There are 1,000 acres irrigated by water from the Yampa River. “Confessions of a Maverick” an autobiography of Far- rington Reed Carpenter was for sale in the museum. “Ferry” Carpenter was known as a Hereford breeder, starting in 1909, but he had obtained a diploma from Princeton and Harvard Law School in 1912. Came to New Mexico in 1901, in the summer for his health. In 1906, his mentor John B. Dawson had moved to Hayden and Ferry worked for room and board there. He proved up a 160- acre homestead in 1907 while a sophomore at Princeton. In 1934 President Franklin D. Roosevelt named Car- penter as director of the Division of Grazing under the Taylor Grazing Act. This historic measure charged Car- penter with the responsibility of bringing federal control to 142 million acres of unclaimed public domain. He was fired by Secretary Ickes three times, but President Roo- sevelt, who admired mavericks, reinstated Ferry after every firing. In 1946 Ferry’s Grazing Service and the General Land Office were merged into the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Today’s version of BLM is not what he had in mind. Jerry York sold advertising to Ferry Carpenter, before he died in 1980. He remembers seeing the library in the office, which is still there. The bulls were sold private treaty, and priced as to their value. The first bull sale lun- cheon was slices of baloney, white bread and water. Ferry was frugal. There were two carcasses on the rotisserie grill, and I became a vegetarian when I saw the skinned heads still attached. Several members of our group raise lambs, from small flocks to the thousands of head, and they said it was mutton — not lamb, since it was stringy, tough and strong flavored. There were beans, potato salad, pasta salad, roll and butter, plus cookies, lemonaid and water. The Northern California Wool Growers had their annu- al Lamb barbecue for members at Woodson Bridge last Sunday. There were four lambs that had been barbecued. The lamb and Dutch oven riblets were delicious. Con- gressman Wally Herger was present for the event. We had an opportunity to explore old town Steam- boat Springs, population 9,815 and elevation 6,728 feet, although Main Street was torn up with construc- tion. Loaded cattle trucks were going west to summer range, and empty trucks were headed east on I-40. Things were quiet since it was offseason, after skiing and before summer. 4” Wave Petunia Hrs: 9am-6pm Monday-Saturday LIC #808524 Call For Free Information Toll-Free (800) 464-1403 or (530) 365-1403 6183 MEISTER WAY ANDERSON, CA 96007 (530) 365-1403 (800) 464-1403 Buy 1 get 1 FREE Garden Center 766 Antelope Blvd. (Next to the Fairground) Happy Planting!!! Red Bluff 527-0886 80-85% Lean GROUND BEEF Thick Sliced BACON Boneless Skinless CHICKEN THIGHS $ $ $ 269lb. 339lb. 189lb. 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