Feds seize cattle from second Nevada rancher; pickets planned
By Scott Sonner
Associated Press
July 29th, 2001
The Bureau of Land Management seized cattle Saturday from a second Nevada rancher accused of trespassing livestock on federal land, estimating he owes the government $300,000 in back grazing fees and fines.
The move drew an angry response from dozens of state’s rights activists who dispute federal ownership of the land and plan round-the-clock picketing next week at the Fallon livestock yard where many of the estimated 100 impounded cattle are being held.
“The bottom line is they stole my cattle and I’m trying to stick up for my property rights,” said Ben Colvin, 63, one of the ranchers accused of illegally grazing his herd on BLM land since 1995.
“My family’s been in the ranching business since before 1860,” he said.
BLM contractors seized 62 head of cattle owned by Colvin Livestock Co. on Thursday, estimating he owes an estimated $70,000 in back fees and fines.
By Saturday afternoon, they had rounded up about 36 head of Jack Vogt’s cattle in nearby Lida, about 150 miles northwest of Las Vegas, BLM officials said.
In both cases, the BLM has been trying for more than five years to resolve the disputes short of impoundment, BLM spokeswoman Jo Simpson said. Simpson said Vogt’s bill totaled an estimated $300,000.
“This is not our preferred action. We would much prefer the people in trespass get their cows off voluntarily. These things have been going on for a long time,” Simpson said Saturday.
The BLM is involved in various stages of talks with at least seven other Nevada ranchers accused of illegally grazing livestock on federal land, Simpson told The Associated Press.
The BLM plans to sell the impounded cattle at auction if the owners fail to pay the back fees. A deadline for payment has not been set. The agency must provide the owners with five days notice before holding the auction, Simpson said.
Nearly 100 members of the Nevada Committee for Full Statehood who were meeting at a Sparks casino Saturday organized plans for the picketing to begin Monday or Tuesday in Fallon.
“We don’t see anywhere in Nevada brand laws that it says they can do this,” said Jackie Holmgren, a Mineral County rancher and member of the committee.
“They are saying they can just take your property and they can sell it. There’s no due process. No trial by jury. They basically have taken your livelihood.”
Simpson, chief spokesperson at BLM headquarters in Reno, said a court order was not required. She said the agency was acting within the law to enforce livestock grazing regulations.
Craig MacKinnon, BLM’s assistant field manager in Tonopah, said Colvin repeatedly refused to comply with BLM requests to remove the unauthorized livestock since 1995.
The Nevada Committee for Full Statehood, which unsuccessfully pushed property rights legislation in the Nevada Assembly this year, refuses to recognize federal jurisdiction of the approximately 87 percent of the state that is owned and managed by the federal government.
The group includes Cliff Gardner, a Ruby Valley rancher in a court battle with the Forest Service over livestock grazing, several Elko County residents who are fighting the Forest Service over jurisdiction of road near Jarbidge and Janine Hansen, a local conservative activist affiliated with Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum.
“The government coming in and confiscating 60 head of cattle is going to be a terrible economic blow to his family, a terrible hardship on him and his wife,” Gardner said Saturday.
Hansen said the “unlawful actions of the BLM confirms that Nevadans are being treated like serfs and that Nevada has been relegated to the status of a territory of the federal government instead of a sovereign state.”
Churchill County sheriff’s deputies were called to the auction yard in Fallon Thursday night when Holmgren and her husband, David Holmgren, allegedly harassed the truck drivers off-loading the cattle seized without incident earlier in the day, BLM officials said.
“She was raising a little trouble, hollering at the truck drivers. We asked her to leave and that was about it,” said Gary Snow, owner of the Fallon livestock yard. No arrests were made.
Jackie Holmgren denied she harassed the drivers. She said they photographed the cows to document Colvin’s 40-Bar brand for use as evidence.
“We wanted to let him know we felt these cattle are being taken illegally by the BLM because they did not get a court order,” she said.
“They used contract cowboys from Utah to round them up. They took the cows when nobody was there.”
Colvin’s livestock grazing permit was revoked in 1997 and he lost two appeals, BLM spokeswoman JoLynn Worley said.
The BLM served trespass notices and notices of intent to impound the cattle to try to resolve the issue short of impoundment, she said.
The cattle were seized from the Montezuma federal grazing allotment that borders the Nellis Air Force Base stretching more than 90 miles from Tonopah south to near Beatty. The southern end of the allotment is home to wild mustangs and threatened desert tortoises and is under stress from unusually dry conditions, BLM said.
“It’s hot country, it’s very arid. The allotment resource values aren’t that great anyway. The suitability for livestock, especially on the southern end is marginal,” Worley said.
“The tortoise hasn’t figured largely into this, but it is part of the picture,” she said.
Portions of the allotment were closed to grazing in 1996 due to drought and the BLM conducted emergency roundups of wild horses to ease stress on the range, she said.
Jackie Holmgren, who works the Rawhide Ranch between Hawthorne and Gabbs, said recent rains have helped the range. She disputed BLM’s claim that the cattle were damaging the land.
“If it’s in bad condition at all, it’s because they haven’t gathered the horses, she said.
© 2001 Reno Gazette-Journal
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