20 Wildlife and Ranching: From Externality to Profit Center Barry H. Dunn CONTENTS Theoretical Change: The Emergence of Capitalism 356 The Power of Policy 356 From Theory to Policy to Management: Wildlife as an Externality 357 The Jeffersonian Grid: The Lens with Which We View Wildlife and Natural Resources 357 Manifest Destiny: The Power of a Belief System 359 The Homestead Act of 1862: Economic Development and Exploitation 360 An Alternative View of Resource Use 361 From Theory to Policy to Management: Wildlife as a Profit Center 361 The Creation of Diamonds 361 Changing Definitions and Creating Opportunities 363 Concluding Thoughts 363 References 364 Truth resides in panoramic view rather than a local view of events. Polybius, Greek statesman, 2nd century On the scale of human history, the emergence of ranching as a business is a very recent phenomenon. Raising and harvesting grazing animals for food, fiber, and by-products on large acreages of semi- arid rangeland is certainly not. But, doing it in the context of a for profit business, for the sustenance of the inhabitants of towns and cities many miles distant, began only after the U.S. Civil War. It was primarily a response to the economic drivers of the industrialization and urbanization of American society. It followed the destruction of America’s indigenous herds of bison (Bison bison), pronghorn (Antilocapra americana), elk (Cervus elaphus), and deer (Odocoileus spp.) on its prairies and rangelands as a result of policy decisions concerning Native Americans, immigrant settlement, and economic exploitation. The creation of ranches with cowboys, a transportation system of cattle drives, and a central auction marketing system were all utilitarian responses to economic opportunity. By the turn of the twentieth century, the use of rangeland resources for the production of sheep and cattle had became a major force in America’s food and fiber system, and grew dramatically through the first half of that century. For all but a few visionary leaders, like Theodore Roosevelt, John Muir, Aldo Leopold, and the Kleberg family of South Texas, wildlife on America’s rangelands were an after-thought to settlement and a means to short-term economic gain.After the Civil War, wildlife was viewed asan externality to the food and fiber system ofAmerican agriculture — an un-bargained-for cost or benefit. The benefits 355 © 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC 356 Wildlife Science: Linking Ecological Theory and Management Applications of wildlife were largely for hunting for food and as recreation for a few. The costs of the decimation of entire populations of wildlife species were ignored. The turn of the twenty-first century has brought with it new demographic, social, and economic realities. America’s population is three to four generations removed from production agriculture, and is 98% urban or suburban. Its citizenry is relatively affluent and has increasing sources of disposable income. Their image of and the value they place on wildlife and the open spaces of rangeland resources has changed dramatically. The cow–calf and stocker production of the beef industry are the only remaining use of rangelands in America’s food system. Hunting and observing wildlife is now bargained for, as reflected by land prices, lease rates, and state and federal laws and regulations. Places like “The Last Great Habitat” of South Texas are no longer considered part of the great American desert, but are treasured for their ecological diversity. As a result, ranchers and land managers have new and exciting business opportunities, and the American society has a chance to redeem itself. THEORETICAL CHANGE: THE EMERGENCE OF CAPITALISM The theoretical debate of the eighteenth century concerning emerging economies centered on egal- itarianism and the development of capitalism as a functional replacement for what in retrospect is referred to as feudalism (West 1975). In the eighteenth century, feudalism represented the historical context of property ownership, government, service, and commerce, which helped fuel the Amer- ican and French revolutions. Much of the wealth and power in Europe during this era still resided in aristocratic families that had gained its title by heritage or marriage. The migration of Europeans to the Americas was driven not only by religious oppression, but also by the desire for economic opportunity, and away from restrictive tenant relationships of land and resource ownership and man- agement that emerged in the waning years of feudalism. By the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the feudal and aristocratic system of land ownership and commerce lay in collapse, as multiple famines and disease outbreaks swept across Europe. And yet, much of the property and associated resources continued to be owned and controlled by aristocratic families. Adam Smith’s theory of a capitalist economy, where property and rights to access could be earned, found a fertile proving ground with the birth of the United States. Polices relating to land and resource ownership and use that emerged in the young United States reflected a rejection of its European roots. These policies sought to provide opportunity and access as rights of citizenship. However, they also set up a riddle. For the most part, land was to be held in private ownership (Macpherson 1975), but wildlife was from the earliest days of our nation regarded as a public good. So, over 200 years later, much of the habitat of thousands of wildlife species is privately owned, while wildlife itself belongs to the public. Can publicly owned wildlife be successfully managed when their habitat is privately owned? Attempts to solve the riddle are reflected in dynamic law and policy (Anderson and Hill 1975), but are forever framed by foundational policies and the social morays they reflect. THE POWER OF POLICY Public policy represents the manifestation of accepted theory by a society. Both historical and present- day policy of the United States toward the wildlife resources of North America serve as excellent examples of the complex nature and power of public policy. The present-day state and nature of these resources are a reflection of past public policy. Societies exhibit their collective will through the policies that they adopt either through processes of consensus or abdication. Many, like laws or regulations, are developed through debate and discussion and are clearly stated, communicated, and need various methods of ratification. Others are unstated and reflect the will, opinion, or belief systems of the day. Others still reflect the opinions and wishes of elite minorities; either class, © 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC Wildlife and Ranching 357 economic, religious, or political. They are policy because the majority abdicates their responsibility due to ignorance, ambivalence, or apathy, or as a result of various forms of force or coercion by the minority. At any one time, public policy of a society is a mixture of law, regulation, and the will, opinion, and belief systems of the majority, the minority, or both. Policy is also complex and dynamic. It exists in many different organizations and levels within a society. Policy can also appear to be at times schizophrenic, as different segments of society push conflicting agendas and programs. The future state of wildlife resources in Texas, the United States, and North America will be a direct result of the wisdom of present-day policy, in the context of their biological and ecological potentials. FROM THEORY TO POLICY TO MANAGEMENT: WILDLIFE AS AN EXTERNALITY While the history of extinction or near-extinction of wildlife species like the passenger pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius), beaver (Castor canadensis), and bison, during the nineteenth century has an economic aspect, the management of wildlife during our nation’s first 100 plus years is a classic example of an externality: un-bargained-for costs and benefits. During that time, wildlife was alternatively viewed as a source of food or fiber, short-term economic gain, leverage point for agendas, or as competition for scarce resources. That is not to say that economic benefits were not gained by the exploitation of wildlife. Some individuals and organizations in the nineteenth century made fortunes from the harvest of wildlife, but they were un-bargained-for. Licenses were not required to hunt passenger pigeons or bison, or any species. Millions of acres of prairies in the western United States were grazed at no cost for decades by individuals who controlled the limited water resources around creeks and rivers. Ahundredyears later, the costs and benefits of these myopic decisions areincalculable, and policy was the driving force. While the creation of wildlife and natural resources as an externality has policy roots in countless laws, regulations, court opinions, and unwritten views and value systems, three are offered as examples. THE JEFFERSONIAN GRID: THE LENS WITH WHICH WE VIEW WILDLIFE AND NATURAL RESOURCES The Land Ordinance of 1785, drafted by Thomas Jefferson, was one of the most important pieces of legislation affecting land and resource use in American history. In the original American colonies, land ownership and title had followed the ancient method of metes and bounds. This surveying system described a parcel of land in terms of the natural features and adjacent parcels that it was in relationship with, such as trees, streams, and rocks. The metes-and-bounds system led to constant conflicts between land owners, and land owners and governments, as the natural features that it was based upon changed over time. Jefferson’s proposal became the most influential land use policy in the United States until the Homestead Act of 1862 (u-s-history.com 2006). It provided for a very strict grid with which land would be surveyed and on which both governments and commerce would be based. It has become known as the “Jeffersonian Grid” (Encarta 2006). Its basic unit is a rectangle, referred to as a township. A township consists of 36 “sections,” each 1-square mile and consisting of 640 acres (Figure 20.1). Each section can be easily subdivided into “quarters,” which consist of 160 acres, and be further subdivided into 40-acre units (Figure 20.2). This surveying methodology was applied to all land acquired by the United States in the Northwest Territory, the Louisiana Purchase, and the annexation of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. Today, it remains both the fundamental methodology relating to the commerce of land and the basis of many levels of government (Figure 20.3). © 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC 358 Wildlife Science: Linking Ecological Theory and Management Applications 36 31 32 33 34 35 36 6 1 654321 6 13 18 17 16 15 14 13 18 24 19 20 21 22 23 24 19 25 30 29 28 27 26 25 30 36 31 32 33 34 35 36 31 16543216 12 7891011127 FIGURE 20.1 Diagram of the sectioning of a township in the Jeffersonian grid. FIGURE 20.2 Diagram of the division of a section in the Jeffersonian grid into 160-acre “quarters” and further division into 40-acre “40s.” Adoption of national, state, and local policy in the late nineteenth century encouraging individual ownership and management of land and its resources reflects the rapid adoption of Adam Smith’s theory of capitalism. If Jefferson, as the author of the Constitution, described and defined how citizens of the United States would be governed, it can be argued that his “Jeffersonian Grid” described and defined how its citizens would view land and natural resource management. In the agrarian communities of Jefferson’s era, one family could live off the products of 40 or 80 acres, and ship surpluses to support nearby villages and towns. However, the blanket application of the “Jeffersonian Grid” through policy to the ownership and management of land in the arid and semi-arid regions west of the 100th meridian has proven to be unsustainable. The external- ities are incalculable. In regions where an acre, 40 acres, 80 acres, or a quarter section is not enough land to sustain even a single cow for a year; basing land, natural resource, and business decisions on these homogenized micro units has led to many unexpected outcomes. These would © 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC Wildlife and Ranching 359 FIGURE 20.3 Example of the Jeffersonian grid as shown in farm ground. include soil loss due to the cultivation of highly erodable land, overgrazing of grasslands, deple- tion of water resources, and loss of wildlife habitat due to fragmentation of land ownership and management. MANIFEST DESTINY: THE POWER OF A BELIEF SYSTEM In 1845, an influential journalist named John L. O’Sullivan coined the phrase “manifest destiny” to advocate the United State’s annexation of the Republic of Texas (The World Book Encyclopedia 1993a). O’Sullivancontinued to use the phrase in his writings, arguing that it was God’s intent that the United States should control all of NorthAmerica: “it isAmerica’s manifest destiny to overspread the continent” (Encarta 2006). While the term “manifest destiny” has been used to generically describe a broad nineteenth century philosophy towards U.S. expansionism, its influence in American policy and resource management was completely theoretical. While widely debated, this philosophy/theory expressed an underpinning belief that the United States had been chosen by God, because of its virtue, to spread its institutions across the continent and, later in the century, into regions of the Pacific. While the roots of manifest destiny can be traced to the Bible and the early leaders of the United States including Thomas Jefferson and John Quincy Adams, this was not a benign philosophy idly debated by our nation’s elite. It became the theoretical underpinning of wide-ranging policy that impacted the use and management of the natural resource wealth of the nation. Manifest destiny was at least symbolic of nineteenth century America’s belief system towards its mission. At most, it was a fundamental expression of racism and arrogance, whose policy outcomes were the genocide of © 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC 360 Wildlife Science: Linking Ecological Theory and Management Applications NativeAmericans, the decimation of multiple wildlife populations, destruction of native ecosystems, and depletion of our nation’s mineral wealth. The long-term implications of this theoretical belief system on management of wildlife and natural resources are wide spread and long lasting. It is staggering to consider that, in the past 200 years, the United States has lost complete biomes covering millions of acres and biological diversity in many others. During the second half of the nineteenth century, many key wildlife species in the Great Plains region of the United States faced extinction or became extinct. For example, beaver, bison, elk, antelope, white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), whooping cranes (Grus americana), passenger pigeons, and many upland bird species. While the story of population decimation for each species varies, the theme is very similar; that wildlife species and their habitat were placed on the earth for the unbridled use of Americans in their quest to fulfill their destiny of controlling the North American continent and beyond. If the success of expansionism based on the philosophy of manifest destiny is measured by the achievement of the original goals of its proponents, it was very successful. If its un-bargained-for costs, its externalities, are considered, it should give pause to current leaders and policy makers in charge of policy directed at the management of wildlife and natural resources. THE HOMESTEAD ACT OF 1862: ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND EXPLOITATION While Texas was not included, the Homestead Act of 1862 is symbolic of the settlement of the arid and semi-arid regions of the United States, and of its consequences on wildlife and natural resources. It remains the classic example of the effects of fragmentation of land and management on wildlife and natural resources. It was signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln in 1862. It had been debated for many years, but had become politically viable only after the succession from the Union by the southern states. The Homestead Act turned over 270 million acres of government-owned land in 30 states to private citizens for a nominal filing fee and the where-with-all to spend the required time on the parcel of land to “prove it up” (National Park Service 2006). Its purpose was a mixture of expansionism, economic development, and the achievement of Jefferson’s dream of a democracy based on the strength of the yeoman farmer. In response, immigrants, predominantly from feudal Europe, streamed to America for opportunity and freedom. The result was 600,000 homestead claims by 1900 and over 310,000 newly established farms (National Park Service 2006). The produce of these farms became the food supply for the industrialization and urbanization of the United States. While fraud and corporate misuse of the Homestead Act are widely reported and discussed (Nebraska Studies 2006), the nature and scope of the footprint of the homesteaders is not. There are thousands of anecdotal reports of the indiscriminate use of wildlife as a food source and the rapid decline in populations of deer, elk, pronghorn, bison, upland game birds, and waterfowl. There are also countless reports and stories of every available tree in the landscape being used for fuel or timber. The requirement of the Homestead contract to break the grasslands into farmland is a matter of fact (The World Book Encyclopedia 1993b), and the expansion of these acreages into millions of tilled acres of highly erodible soils is credited as the seed for the dustbowl of the 1930s. What is lacking is a comprehensive accounting of the aggregate impact of the settlement of the west on wildlife populations, ecosystem diversity, water, and fragmentation. The widespread adoption of barbed wire as a delineating fence line of ownership and control is also emblematic of the fragmentation of one of the world’s largest grasslands. Its ownership and management remain fragmented 144 years after the passage of the original act. In 1906, Liberty Hyde Bailey, Dean of Agriculture of one of the most prestigious universities of its time, Cornell University, summarized it this way: “farming has not yet adapted to the natural conditions and climate and market and other environmental factors” (Bailey 1996). © 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC Wildlife and Ranching 361 It is noteworthy that Texas was the only State in the west that was not homesteaded, and that, in 2006, it is home to the “Last Great Habitat” and many privately owned ranches that are of a size and scope rare in other states. Is it coincidental? Or is it the result of different policy applied to land ownership and use, many years ago? AN ALTERNATIVE VIEW OF RESOURCE USE During the second half of the nineteenth century, proposals for viewing land-based resources in alternative ways were also part of American history. Perhaps the most famous were those of John Wesley Powell. In the 1870s, Major Powell was head of the Geographical and Geological Survey of the Rocky Mountain Region, which in 1879 was consolidated with other efforts to form the U.S. Geological Survey. His extensive travels in the semi-arid and arid regions of the west led him to propose a very different land use policy concerning these regions of the United States. On April 1, 1877, Powell set forth his philosophical and pragmatic plan for the development and settlement of the west in his “Report on the Lands of the Arid Region of the United States, with a More Detailed Account of the Lands of Utah” (Stegner 1992). Wallace Stegner summarized the report as “a complete revolution in the system of land surveys, land policy, land tenure, and farming methods in the West, and a denial of almost every cherished fantasy and myth associated with the westward migration and the American dream of the Garden of the World” (Stegner 1992). Powell proposed that the lands of the West be settled and developed for agricultural purposes based not on a standard “quarter section” per homestead, but on their site potential as defined by precipitation, soil, and water. His views were not widely held, and development and settlement of the West proceeded based on the policies represented by the Jeffersonian Grid, manifest destiny, and the Homestead Act of 1862 (Manning 1995). FROM THEORY TO POLICY TO MANAGEMENT: WILDLIFE AS A PROFIT CENTER In his classic and foundational book on capitalistic economies published in 1776, The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith wrote (Smith 1937): The things which have the greatest value in use have frequently little or no value in exchange; and on the contrary, those which have the greatest value in exchange have frequently little or no value in use. Nothing is more useful than water: but it will purchase scarce anything; scarce anything can be had in exchange for it. A diamond, on the contrary, has scarce any value; but a very great quantity of other goods may frequently be had in exchange for it. This has become to be known as Smith’s “diamond/water paradox” (Figure 20.4). This theory describes the concept of consumer value based on scarcity and abundance. It contains the fundamental principle that perfectly explains how American society has changed its value of and attitude toward wildlife and wildlife habitat. In nineteenth-century America, wildlife was as abundant as water, and of little value. In twenty-first-century America, wildlife is like a diamond. It has little utility, but because of scarcity, it has extreme value. THE CREATION OF DIAMONDS The lens with which we view, exchange, and bargain for land and its related benefits like wildlife has been unchanged for over 200 years. It is still an acre, a “40,” a quarter section, or a section. But, over our nation’s history, policies at the national level related to wildlife and natural resources have © 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC 362 Wildlife Science: Linking Ecological Theory and Management Applications Price 0 Quantity of water FIGURE 20.4 Adam Smith’s diamond/water paradox (Adapted from Case, K. E., and R. C. Fair. 1996. Principles of Economics, 4th edn. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall). changed dramatically. The first National Wildlife Refuge was established in 1903. The National Park System was created in 1916, and the Taylor Grazing Act was passed in 1934. The Natural Resources Conservation Service was formed in 1935. The nation’s wilderness areas are 42 years old, and the Endangered Species Act is 33 years old, is up for renewal, and is highly controversial. Were these historic and watershed pieces of legislation reactionary responses to the decimation of wildlife populations and natural resources that took place during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries? Or perhaps they were the driving force of change, or a reflection of changing values? They were most likely reflections of all three. During the past 30 years, populations of many wildlife species have recovered to acceptable levels. But the number of bison, bald eagles, and many other important wildlife species can still be counted in the thousands, not millions. Many waterfowl and upland birds remain relatively scarce because of an unrelenting destruction of the prairie habitat in which they nest. For example, despite policy efforts to take land out of agricultural production to improve wildlife habitat with programs like the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), there were almost an identical number of acres harvested for crops in 2002 as in 1974 (USDA-National Agricultural Statistics Service 2004). This means that for every acre farmers and ranchers enrolled in programs like CRP to improve wildlife habitat, they converted an equal number of acres of untilled native prairie to crop production and destroyed wildlife habitat. Access is also a part of scarcity, and access to wildlife has become complex. While the federal lands of the western United Statesare home to many wildlife species valued by hunters and sportsman, access to them is restricted by regulation of harvest numbers, remoteness and ruggedness of terrain, and the expense in dollars and time to travel to them. Access to many upland game birds and waterfowl is also restricted by property ownership, mostly by farmers and ranchers, whose number is shrinking. In 2002, there were approximately 2.13 million farms and ranches in the United States, nearly 500,000 fewer than in 1974 (USDA-National Agricultural Statistics Service 2004).As a result, access to private land for the purpose of hunting is controlled by dramatically fewer individuals. Also, as the business of hunting becomes a larger and larger part of ranching and farming, access for many interested individuals may actually decrease, as large acreages are removed through private and restrictive leasing. So, with an ever-increasing human population, and access to wildlife restricted by regulation, ownership, land use, and cost, consumer demand for wildlife as game has created a scarcity. Wildlife has become, as Adam Smith described, “a diamond.” Evidence is reflected in the increase in rural land prices in the counties of South Texas that have growing hunting- and wildlife- centered businesses. The Texas Real Estate Center (2006) reports that average rural land prices in © 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC Wildlife and Ranching 363 the ten counties that make up the Rio Grande Plains region of Texas have increased from $462 per acre in 1996 to $1200 per acre in 2005, a 159% increase in the 10-year period. They also report that average rural land prices during the same period in the nine-county South Coastal Prairie region of Texas increased from $750 per acre to $1450 per acre. These dramatic increases reflect interest in hunting, guaranteeing the purchaser access to scarce resources. CHANGING DEFINITIONS AND CREATING OPPORTUNITIES Ranching has historically been associated with the production of food and fiber. But ranching is being redefined as the management of financial, biological, and physical inputs inherent to arid and semi- arid rangelands (Butler 2002). These inherent inputs would include the indigenous wildlife found on a ranch. This change necessitates a fundamental shift in thought processes to include the management of wildlife resources in ranch management. Management is defined as handling with a degree of skill (Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary 2001). Perhaps then, this represents an acknowledgement that in the twenty-first century, wildlife is no longer a wild resource, but is largely the result of decision making by the owners and managers of ranches. Control switches from public policy directed toward resources treated as externalities to the management of scarce resources by individuals who have vested interests in the outcome of their decision making (Rasker et al. 1992). Economic opportunity has been created and businesses follow. Commercialization of wildlife resources is controversial (Rasker et al. 1992). In 1877, John Wesley Powell warned against it (Stegner 1992). Management regimes can range from non- consumptive uses like photography, to intense commercial hunting of native game, to the importation of non-native wildlife species for either or both consumptive and non-consumptive uses (Barber and Schulz 1997). Ethical questions arise. For example, will the enjoyment of wildlife for consumptive and nonconsumptive uses be only for the wealthy? Will the profits derived from wildlife be returned to the people, communities, and land from which they are derived, or removed to distant met- ropolises? In the future, wildlife may be valued for intrinsic qualities not recognized in today’s marketplace. If the concept of national security is expanded to include biodiversity, then wildlife and its management may have values beyond current paradigms (Chardonnet et al. 2002). Certainly, market-driven economies are full of examples of the abuse and misuse of economic opportunity. It is the responsibility of all interested parties to engage in the development of policies and business models directed toward and concerning wildlife resources and the emerging privatization of their associated benefits (Child 1995; Sethi and Somanathan 1996). CONCLUDING THOUGHTS During the development of the United States, management of its wildlife resources was founded upon the emerging theory of capitalism, and framed with a series of polices that created societal paradigms in which wildlife was managed as an externality. Examples of those policies include the Jeffersonian Grid, manifest destiny, and the Homestead Act of 1862. The impact of the historical management of wildlife resources of the United States has been dramatic. In a theoretical free-market economy, private ownership and management of scarce resources allows for the benefits of that ownership and management to go to those willing to invest in them. It also places upon the owners and managers the burden and responsibility for the stewardship of those same scarce resources. The relatively recent movement to create wildlife-oriented profit centers in ranch businesses is a dramatic shift in the management of wildlife resources and will have many expected, but also many unexpected, outcomes. The riddle remains intact 230 years after it emerged. How should publicly owned wildlife resources be managed when critical parts, if not the majority, of their habitat remains under private © 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC 364 Wildlife Science: Linking Ecological Theory and Management Applications ownership? Changing societal attitudes toward and values of this nation’s wildlife resources creates opportunity for concerned parties to learn from the past to enhance the future through enactment of thoughtfully developed and judiciously applied policies concerning management of its wildlife resources. REFERENCES Anderson, T. L., and P. J. Hill. 1975. The evolution of property rights and a study of the American west. J. Law Econom. 18:167. Bailey, L. H. 1996. The State and Farmer. St Paul: University of Minnesota. Barber, E. D., and C. E. Schulz 1997. Wildlife, Biodiversity and Trade. EnvironmentandDevelopment Economics 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Butler, L. D. 2002. Economic survival of western ranching: Searching for answers. In Ranching West of the 100th Meridian: Culture, Ecology, Economics, R. L. Knight, W. C. Gilgert, and E. Marston (eds). Washington, DC: Meridian Island Press, p. 196. Case, K. E., and R. C. Fair. 1996. Principles of Economics, 4th edn. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Chardonnet, Ph., B. des Clers, J. Fischer, R. Gerhold F. Jori, and F. Lamarque. 2002. The value of wildlife. Rev. Sci. Tech. Off. Int. Epiz. 21:44. Child, G. 1995. Wildlife and People: The Zimbabwean Success. Harare, NY: Wisdom Foundation. Encarta, Manifest Destiny, United States History. 2006. http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761568247/ Manifest_Destiny.html. Macpherson, C. B. 1975. Capitalism and the changing concept of property. In Feudalism, Capitalism and Beyond, E. Kamenka, and R. S. Neale (eds). New York: St Martin’s Press, p. 106. Manning, R. 1995. Grassland: The History, Biology, Politics, and Promise of the American Prairie. New York: Viking. Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary, 10th edn. 2001. Springfield: Encyclopedia Britannica. National Park Service. 2006. Homestead National Monument of America, The Homestead Act. http://www.nps.gov/home/historyculture/index.htm. Nebraska Studies. 2006. The Impact of the Homestead Act on Nebraska. http://www.nebraskastudies.org/0500/ frameset.html. Rasker, R., M. V. Martin, and R. L. Johnson. 1992. Economics: Theory versus practice in wildlife management. Conserv. Biol. 6:338. Sethi, R., and E. Somanathan. 1996. The evolution of social norms in common property resource use. Amer. Econ. Rev. 86:799. Smith, A. 1937. The Wealth of Nations, Modern Library Edition. New York: Random House. Stegner, W. 1992. Beyond the Hundredth Meridian. New York: Penguin Books. Texas Real Estate Center. 2006. Trends in Texas Rural Land Values — 2005. http://recenter.tamu.edu/data/agp/ rlt20.htm. The World Book Encyclopedia. 1993a. Chicago, IL: World Book, Inc., 13:141. The World Book Encyclopedia. 1993b. Chicago, IL: World Book, Inc., 9:304. USDA-National Agricultural Statistics Service. 2004. United States Summary and State Data, 2002 Census of Agriculture, AC-02-CD-1, 16. u-s-history.com. 2006. Public Land Policy Ordinance of 1785. http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1150.html (accessed May 2006). West, F. J. 1975. On the ruins of feudalism-capitalism. In Feudalism, Capitalism and Beyond, E. Kamenka, and R. S. Neale (eds). New York: St Martin’s Press. © 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC . to wildlife and natural resources have © 200 8 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC 362 Wildlife Science: Linking Ecological Theory and Management Applications Price 0 Quantity of water FIGURE 20. 4. Statistics Service. 200 4. United States Summary and State Data, 200 2 Census of Agriculture, AC-02-CD-1, 16. u-s-history.com. 200 6. Public Land Policy Ordinance of 1785. http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1150.html (accessed. food and fiber system ofAmerican agriculture — an un-bargained-for cost or benefit. The benefits 355 © 200 8 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC 356 Wildlife Science: Linking Ecological Theory and Management