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Sunday, February 19, 2006

The Tired Out Ranch
Sunday, February 19, 2006
Grant Nelson, Rural Reflections - In the United States, farmers read the writing on the wall. Farm Service Agency wants to make farm payments a policy of the past. Farmers are going to continue farming based on their choice of crop, marketing, efficiency and low overhead. I recently read an article in the Grand Forks Herald newspaper about Tolna, North Dakota Cory Christofferson who uses management-intensive grazing to be efficient and semi-truck tires to keep his overhead low. All of that may soon change, however.

Rancher Christofferson uses truck tires to cross-fence two hundred acres into twenty acre paddocks. The tires cost him little or nothing and are quite indestructible. It takes about 8000 semi-truck tires piled five high to make a mile of fence. The tires also make nice snow fence and their color absorbs sunlight to create warm wind break. The tire fence is solid, works well with management-intensive grazing, costs little and to date has kept 350,000 tires out of our local landfills. North Dakota’s director for waste management in 1997 was Neil Knatterud. Mr. Knatterud sent Cory Christofferson a nice letter stating that the tire fence was an “orderly and beneficial” use for the tires. Christofferson was makin’ money and makin’ the environment better by keeping tires in use and out of the ground. Seems a truck tire can contain up to five gallons of oil as part of it’s chemical structure-an element which you don’t want next to your groundwater.
North Dakota’s Health Department has visited Christofferson’s “Tired Out Ranch” five to ten times in the last seven years. The department doesn’t like the tire fence anymore. They feel it could harbor mosquitoes, rats and create a fire hazard. Tires hold water but so do the many swamps at the ranch. The tires are orderly and open and not heaped which would make it more attractive to rats. Finally, the tires are surrounded by close-cropped pasture. The only way to start a prairie fire would be to bring your own unending supply of kerosene and plenty of matches to keep it lit. There’s only 15 people who live in Minco Township so the tire fence probably won’t cause zoning problems, stunt any new developments or ruin the view. In short Christofferson has turned a major pollutant into a useful product and only wishes to be left alone so his efforts can brighten his family’s future.