Agricultural Lands

Facts About Ranchland Conservation

• Forty-two percent of Wyoming is privately owned. Twenty percent of Sublette County is privately owned. Ninety percent of the state's private land base is in agriculture. Ninety-nine percent of Sublette County’s private land base is in agriculture.

• Agriculture is the state’s third leading industry – annually generating $1.5 billion in revenue. These dollars serve to support local businesses.

• Fifty percent of the winter habitat for Wyoming’s major big game species is located on private land.

• Ranchland fragmentation has been identified as one of the top four threats to the future integrity of the West’s public lands.

• Nationally, 70% of threatened and endangered species spend some portion of their life on private land, 37% are completely dependent upon private land for their survival.

• Development and fragmentation of rangelands affect water quality and quantity through increasing siltation, runoff, and pollution, and reducing filtration.

• Agriculture lands in Wyoming require an average $0.54 in public services (fire and police protection, roads, busing to area schools etc.) for every dollar of property tax revenue they generate. In comparison, rural residential development requires $2.01 in public services for every tax dollar produced.

• Studies have predicted that 48 million people will be added to the West by 2050, resulting in 26 million acres of open space being converted to residential and commercial development. Of the eleven western states, Wyoming is expected to have the third highest growth rate.

• If the 20 counties that comprise the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem were considered a state, it would be the fastest growing state in the country.

• Wyoming ranks eleventh nationally in terms of the percent of housing units that are second homes. Among the neighboring states, Wyoming is second only to Montana in the rate of second home construction.

• In the United States, between 1982-2001, 33.5 million acres of land (an area the size of North Carolina), have been converted to development, of which 9.8 million acres (about the size of Maryland and Delaware) were rangelands.

• The number of Wyoming agricultural operators 65 years of age and older has more than doubled from less than 12 percent in 1964 to nearly 26 percent in 1997. Conversely, the percentage of Wyoming agricultural producers age 34 or younger has declined nearly 60 percent from over 15 percent in 1982 to a little over 6 percent in 1997.

• Experts predict 50% and 75% of ranches in the West will change hands in the next 10 to 15 years.

• Polls have shown that the loss of working family farms and ranches is Wyoming voter’s number one conservation concern.

Sublette County contains 3,154,160 acres of land—more land than Delaware, Rhode Island and Connecticut. Of this land, 81% (2,565,998 acres) is publicly owned, and the remaining 19% (591,162 acres) is privately owned. Sublette County is known throughout the world for its open spaces, abundant wildlife, scenic beauty, and ranching heritage. 99% or 585,732 acres of the private land in Sublette County is in agriculture. Ranches occupy the most agriculturally productive lands in the County and are critical to the area’s wildlife through their location along valleys and waterways that frequently serve as winter range, birthing sites, and travel corridors. These contributions of ranchlands extend far beyond the borders of ranches themselves due to the fragmented and intertwined nature of public and private land ownership within the County and the state as a whole.

However, in many areas of Wyoming, ranches and ranchland are disappearing. Studies have predicted that 48 million people will be added to the West by 2050, resulting in 26 million acres of open space being converted to residential and commercial development (American Farmland Trust study). Of the eleven western states, Wyoming is expected to have the third highest growth rate. These pressures for land conversions are compounded by low profit margins from ranching, the increasing average age of ranchers, a lack of recruitment of new individuals into the profession, and high inheritance taxes. As the land becomes fragmented, the wildlife habitat, watersheds, and scenic splendor sustained by Wyoming ranches for generations are being swept away forever.

The GRVLT understands these concerns. Unlike most Wyoming land trusts, the GRVLT strives to conserve working ranchlands – and the open spaces, watersheds, wildlife habitat, and other ecological values that they include.

1) We are Sublette County’s only locally-based land conservation organization.

2) We were specifically founded to support the conservation of Sublette County’s ranchlands by focusing on work with agricultural landowners. Our conservation easements do not interfere with day-to-day ranch management.

3) We maintain a board of directors composed primarily of agricultural producers who have a first-hand understanding of ranching and community issues. These Board members are familiar with the importance and challenges of maintaining working landscapes. One of our major advantages as a locally-based agricultural land trust is that landowners can trust in us and have the confidence that the GRVLT understands their concerns and will work with them to effectively protect and improve the environmental quality of their ranches and the economic stability of their ranching operations.

Local ranches define Sublette County, but families intent on keeping their land in agriculture face a variety of threats to their way of life, including steadily rising land prices resulting from development pressure and challenges created by shifting world markets and domestic farm programs.

The GRVLT works one-on-one with landowners to create the best possible solutions to their conservation and estate planning interests. In the face of mounting economic pressures, conservation easements and neighborhood cooperation can provide a flexible, voluntary private sector solution to many of the issues facing Wyoming's agricultural community.