It has been more than 54 years since Dad wrote The Lasater Philosophy of Cattle Raising. At the time, he was battling a severe drought in northern Mexico, and Mom encouraged him to write down the history of the Beefmaster breed and my grandfather Tom Lasater’s unique ideas behind it. In many ways, it was simply an exercise to take his mind off the brutal lack of rain./p>

What neither of them expected was ­­­the lasting impact the book would have. More than five decades later, it is now in its seventeenth printing. We still sell or give away around 30 copies every month. (If you’d like a free copy, just come visit us!) You would think that everyone interested in these ideas would have read it by now—or that the concepts would have become outdated. Instead, interest seems as strong as ever because the principles remain just as relevant to grass-based cattle production today./p>

A certain kind of cattle producer is drawn to the Six Essentials. They are usually searching for a more harmonious way to produce beef on grass. They want cattle that fit their environment, rather than forcing the environment to fit the cattle. More often than not, they are seeking a more holistic, natural approach to ranching.

Those of us who make our living from the land recognize that beef production has, in many places, drifted out of balance. Ranchers often rely heavily on improved pastures, monocultures, chemicals, irrigation, and other artificial means of producing forage. We feed more grain than nature intended. These are valuable tools when used appropriately, but they also have unintended consequences. Sometimes we forget that God managed His grasslands with massive herds of buffalo. Nature maintained its own balance, and everything benefited—including the Native Americans whose lives depended on those herds.

At its core, ranching is about stewardship of both land and livestock. Each depends on the other for success, creating a remarkable symbiotic relationship. Healthy cattle fertilize the soil, distribute seed, stimulate plant growth, and, when properly managed, provide periods of intensive grazing followed by the rest that grasslands require to recover.

Healthy soils and healthy watersheds are ultimately what produce heavy calves and cows that breed back year after year. Those two outcomes remain the foundation of ranch profitability. Today, we seek to mimic the natural movement of buffalo through some form of planned or strategic grazing. Every operation looks different depending on its environment, infrastructure, and goals, but the principle remains the same: concentrated animal impact followed by adequate recovery.

At Isa Beefmasters, we don’t own any land. We operate entirely on leased grass. Believe me, I wish every day that we owned a large ranch, but that simply isn’t how our story unfolded.

For more than 30 years—and throughout Dad’s career before mine—leasing grass worked remarkably well. Grazing was generally available and affordable. That has changed dramatically over the past decade. Recreational land ownership—much of it centered around hunting—has increased tremendously. Many landowners who once kept livestock year-round now prefer seasonal grazing or no cattle at all. At the same time, land values and lease rates have climbed sharply.

My completely unscientific estimate is that 30 to 40 percent of Texas grazing land is now underutilized or out of livestock production. Every landowner has the right to manage their property however they choose, but the unintended consequence is often declining rangeland health. Without grazing animals, we frequently see increased erosion, invasive brush and weeds, greater wildfire fuel loads, and declining soil function. Grasslands evolved with large grazing animals, and in many situations they benefit from their presence. One only has to look at the increasing wildfire challenges across many regions where grazing has declined to recognize that excess vegetation must be managed somehow.

Dad’s cousin Matt Brown passed away last year, but prior to his passing we were honored to purchase his registered Trueheart Beefmasters herd and lease one of his ranches.

Red Mill Ranch (pictured here) consists of 1,871 acres divided into 20 paddocks averaging less than 100 acres each. Electric fencing and strategically placed shared water points allow cattle to move efficiently through the system. The cows spend roughly five days in each paddock before moving to fresh grass, allowing every paddock to receive more than 100 days of recovery.

The results have been remarkable. Red Mill is by far the most productive ranch we manage, and the cows absolutely love it. When they hear a pickup coming, they run toward the gate because they know fresh grass is waiting on the other side.

To my earlier point, we could never have justified investing in this level of infrastructure on leased land. We are incredibly grateful that Matt did, and we are honored to continue his legacy of progressive grazing management and outstanding Beefmaster genetics.

Our family’s involvement with intensive grazing stretches back many decades. When Allan Savory first came to the United States in the late 1970s, he shared office space with Mom and Dad as they helped organize some of the earliest Holistic Resource Management seminars. His central message—that properly managed livestock can become an important tool for restoring degraded grasslands—was revolutionary then and remains highly relevant today.