Each spring I am honored to witness hundreds of elk and deer migrating along the Conejos River through my ranch. Foxes and coyotes also cross my property. Such awesome experiences are made possible by wildlife habitat connectivity.
For anybody unfamiliar with this term, it refers to the opposite of disconnected, fragmented landscapes. As the Western Slope Connectivity Project has emphasized, the need of animals to roam and migrate is vital. For large mammals in particular, the ability to rove suitable unfenced, unoccupied habitat across geographic regions is how they avoid inbreeding, how they establish new territories and how they find food and water — activities that also enable them to resist illness and adapt to an ever-changing climate.
As a fifth-generation landowner, I was glad to see that two state legislators, Rep. Perry Will (R-New Castle) and Sen. Jessie Danielson (D-Wheat Ridge), introduced Senate Joint Resolution 21-021 into the Colorado Legislature this month. The Senate passed the resolution and it awaits action in the House. This bipartisan legislation aimed at protecting wildlife habitat connectivity at the landscape scale is an important step toward creating safe passageways for wildlife, which is stopped in its tracks by roads and highways, fences, buildings and other man-made structures throughout the state.
I myself have a deep and abiding connection to land. My family settled near the town of Antonito in the 1850s and 30 years later established the historic ranch where I now live. García Ranch Headquarters was recently listed on the National Register of Historic Places to preserve the Indo-Hispano culture that has supported the agro-pastoral traditions of the San Luis Valley since the first Spanish-speaking families settled here in the 1850s.
I grew up in the ranchero tradition, herding sheep then, later, cattle, learning from my father’s Basque sheepherders and my older brother how to take care of and respect the animals, how to irrigate and put up hay and carry out other traditional ranch activities.
My support for the proposed legislation derives from my experience of the principle of transhumance, which refers to the practice of moving animals including sheep and cattle through what would be their natural migration routes in accordance with the seasons. Traditionally, during seasonal cycles, ranch animals are herded overland through connected corridors of movement established by land tenure patterns and by nature. The practice of transhumance by ranchers allows the animals to follow their typical migration patterns through the various ecotones, or transition regions between habitats, at different elevations.
I learned from my older brother the priorities by which a rancher lives, guided by the ecological values involved in caring deeply for land and animals and maintaining the Indo-Hispano heritage of conservation. And I firmly believe a rancher’s chief priority is to protect lands – and the wildlife migrating through them – which provide a wholesome living while supporting a holistic view of nature. This belief, which I hold deep in my blood and bones, is the reason why I so fervently support Colorado Senate Resolution 21-021 to protect Colorado’s habitat connectivity.
I also support the legislation because the land doesn’t belong to me; I belong to the land. We all do, really.
In a talk I gave at the Headwaters conference in 2013, I said:
“The swallows and wrens that return each year teach me not to cling too strongly to my homeland here on el Rio de los Conejos. Yes, they return here to nest and raise their young, as I once did. But they do not stay beyond that season of their lives, which are too short for lingering, no doubt. They travel on, to where I know not. Nor do I know where they come from. It is enough that they know. And they remember well enough to repeat their cyclical journeys their whole lives, to which there is a mystical completeness, like the all-encompassing environment of earth and sky surrounding every single being.”
Reyes García retired as professor of philosophy and environmental studies at Fort Lewis College in 2010. He lives year-round on his family ranch in the San Luis Valley.
