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Building a more resilient California

We all have a reason to love California.

From our coastlines and forests to our valleys and open spaces, California’s landscapes are part of what makes this state home. Ranchers share that connection—and for generations, they have worked to care for these places while raising food for families across the state. Through managed cattle grazing, ranchers are helping create healthier landscapes, support wildlife, and build a more resilient California.

Reducing wildfire risk

Managed cattle grazing has the power to help mitigate wildfire spread and intensity. By reducing vegetation that can become fuel for catastrophic wildfire, grazing helps ranchers manage landscapes and support wildfire preparedness.

Wildlife Conservation

California’s working ranches provide important habitat for wildlife and help maintain open spaces across the state. Ranchers care for more than 38 million acres of California’s forests and rangelands, creating landscapes where people, livestock, and wildlife can coexist.

Food Sustainability

Managed cattle grazing connects healthy landscapes with the food we eat. By converting California’s grasses into nutritious beef, ranching supports a natural cycle that benefits both people and the environment.

Why ranching families are key to healthy public lands

Meet a ranching family in Northeastern California in out newest video

Getting to Know California’s Ranching Families

California’s cattle ranching families help make California resilient.

California Feedlots Myths vs. Facts

California’s cattle feedlots are critical to the state’s food system, supporting a safe, affordable beef supply while advancing California’s policy priorities on organic waste diversion, methane reduction, and environmental stewardship.

5 Reasons California Is Lucky to Have Cattle Ranchers

California cattle ranchers do more than raise beef—they help steward over 38 million acres of rangeland, support wildlife habitat, and reduce wildfire risk through managed grazing. From corned beef on your St. Patrick’s Day plate to protecting open spaces, here are five reasons California is lucky to have ranchers.

Grazing is California's superpower

See why on a Bay Area ranch

When managed responsibly, grazing cattle help reduce wildfire risk, support healthy landscapes, provide wildlife habitat, and produce food for families across the state. Ranchers are using this powerful tool every day to help build a more resilient California. We believe in the power of grazing, and we believe in California.

See how wide open spaces make California resilient.

Get to know some of California's lesser known treasures: wide open spaces

Hear from the experts

"It’s easy to assume that grassland birds need grassland habitat, but it’s more nuanced than that. Just as there are different species of grassland birds, those different species have different habitat needs. By design, rotational grazing creates areas of short, mid, and tall cover that serve multiple species."

Matt AllshouseAudubon California

"Livestock systems … are too precious to society to become the victim of simplification, reductionism or zealotry. These systems must continue to be embedded in and have broad approval of society.”

The Dublin DeclarationOF SCIENTISTS ON THE SOCIETAL ROLE OF LIVESTOCK

"Some of our most biodiverse habitat for wildlife and plants are created by cows and by the ranchers that steward them. California needs grazing because cows remove about 12 billion pounds of dry forage or fine fuels, as we call it, from our rangelands every year... They're the most widespread, vegetation management activity and fire prevention activity we have in California today."

Dr. Lynn HuntsingerUC Berkeley

“There are areas where grazing is divided by a fenceline. On the side without cattle, the grass is tall and not much else is growing there. But just on the other side of the fence, there’s a healthy field of wildflowers where cattle have been."

Joseph Terry, senior wildlife biologist Sacramento Fish and Wildlife Office

Californians making a resilient California.

Stories of Californians working to make the Golden State's more resilient

Resilient Rancher: Markie

Markie Hagemean Jones is a wife, an animal lover, an appraiser and a mom. Like most moms, she juggles a lot. She is also a first generation cattle rancher.