In the high country of the northern Wasatch Mountains, lies what is left of one of the West’s largest ranches. Deseret Live Stock Company was reputed at various times to be the largest private landholder in Utah and the single biggest producer of wool in the world. The ranch began as a sheep operation, but as it found success, it also ran cattle. Incorporated in the 1890s by a number of northern Utah ranchers who pooled their resources, the company was at the height of successful operations in the mid-twentieth century when a young Dean Frischknecht, bearing a recent degree in animal science, landed the job of sheep foreman. In his memoir he recounts in detail how Deseret managed huge herds of livestock, vast lands, and rich wildlife and recalls through lively anecdotes how stockmen and their families lived and worked in the Wasatch Mountains and Skull Valley’s desert wintering grounds.

The high feed grain prices of the last few years and the resulting high prices for heavy feeder cattle relative to lightweight feeder calves may provide economic incentives to market cattle from rangelands as yearlings. A majority of the economic studies investigating the profitability of retained ownership of beef calves to sell as yearlings have used a budgeting technique to compare a straight cow-yearling operation retaining all calves, to a straight cow-calf operation selling all calves. In this study linear programming was used to develop an optimum combination of various livestock marketing alternatives for maximizing net ranch income. Two typical Utah ranch sizes (150 and 300 head of brood cows) were modeled and optimum range livestock marketing schemes were developed using linear programming analysis. Based on average Utah cattle prices for 1970-1975 the optimum range livestock management alternatives for both ranch sizes in terms of maximizing net ranch income was to reduce the cow herd 25 percent and use the released feed resources to retain all steer calves for sale as yearlings. Retention of heifer calves was not profitable and they were sold a t weaning. Net ranch income for the optimum strategy was only slightly higher than the income of the base cow-calf operation for the small ranch. The large ranch showed a larger gain in net ranch income from retention of yearlings. The capital requirement of the optimum strategies was three to five percent less than for the base cow-calf operations. A reduction in the size of the breeding herd to accommodate retained yearlings would result in a reduction in the number of feeder livestock marketed. Potential decreases in U. S. beef production from 1 to 4 percent were estimated if 25-100 percent of the ranchers in the 11 western states adopted the optimum management alternative. These reductions would result in an increase in the price of beef in the U. S. of 1 to 6 percent.

Western Stock Ranching was first published in 1950. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions. Successful management of a stock ranch today requires a thorough, specialized knowledge of the land, the livestock, and the financial methods involved. This facts and figures study by an expert with long experience as a range economist deals with the working problems of sheep and cattle ranching and provides authoritative information on how to operate a ranch profitably. The business of ranching is analyzed in terms of markets, prices and incomes, management standards and guides for production, financial planning and reports, production cost analysis, ranch appraisal, rangeland management, and procedures in the use of government lands. The various natural regions of the West are surveyed and the types of ranches found in each section are described. In addition to considering in detail everyday ranch problems, the author realistically discusses the long-range problems confronting western stock ranchers as a group. Photographs, tables, sample accounting forms, and actual case illustrations add greatly to the usefulness of the book. Owners and operators of stock ranches, persons planning to enter the business, professional agriculturalists specializing in credit, marketing, or management, and teachers of courses in ranch management and economy will find this an invaluable reference or text.

In the high country of the northern Wasatch Mountains, lies what is left of one of the West’s largest ranches. Deseret Live Stock Company was reputed at various times to be the largest private landholder in Utah and the single biggest producer of wool in the world. The ranch began as a sheep operation, but as it found success, it also ran cattle. Incorporated in the 1890s by a number of northern Utah ranchers who pooled their resources, the company was at the height of successful operations in the mid-twentieth century when a young Dean Frischknecht, bearing a recent degree in animal science, landed the job of sheep foreman. In his memoir he recounts in detail how Deseret managed huge herds of livestock, vast lands, and rich wildlife and recalls through lively anecdotes how stockmen and their families lived and worked in the Wasatch Mountains and Skull Valley’s desert wintering grounds.