Lighting A Match To Preserve Nebraska’s Prairie

Prescribed Fire Creates Healthy Grasslands For Cattle And Tourism

Throughout the Great Plains you’ll hear the axiom: “What’s good for the bird is good for the herd.” For Nebraska Sandhills rancher Sarah Sortum, this rings especially true. Not only do the Sortums rely on the grasslands to feed their cattle herd, they also need healthy, native prairie to support a nature-based tourism enterprise on their ranch. 

Sarah owns and operates the Switzer Ranch near Burwell, Nebraska in partnership with a host of family members. This includes her husband and their children, as well as Sortum’s parents and her brother and his wife and children. The ranch was homesteaded in 1904 as part of the Kincaid Act. The family is proud to be raising the fifth generation on their section of heaven in the Sandhills.

About 20 years ago, the family launched a business called Calamus Outfitters, which specializes in hunting, river trips, bird watching and ranch habitat ecotours. 

“We started to make management goals around wildlife on our ranch. It’s such a win-win situation because anything that we do to benefit wildlife benefits the system as a whole, which supports our ranching business as well,” Sortum explains.

Stopping The Spread Of Eastern Redcedars

The ranch relies on the rolling Sandhills and its native grasses to produce both cattle and wildlife. However, over the decades, unwelcome visitors have put down their roots. Literally.

When Nebraska was homesteaded, settlers were encouraged to plant trees around their homes to provide a windbreak, according to Shelly Kelly, executive director of Nebraska Sandhills Task Force. 

“It’s really important to have a little bit of a break from the wind now and again. However, if the windbreaks included cedar trees, those trees did not stay in their neat little rows,” Kelly explained.

When redcedar trees sneak out of windbreaks, they transition from purposeful to problematic. Eastern redcedar are fast-growing, water-guzzling trees that spread quickly and are difficult to eradicate. They pilfer precious water resources and outcompete native prairie plants.

“On a scientific level woody encroachment is fast, although it looks slow in our eyes. We can look back at pictures and see the encroachment happening,” Kelly says.

Using Fire To Kickstart Native Grasses

The Sandhills Task Force is enhancing the prairie and surrounding communities by partnering with the Nebraska Great Plains Grassland Initiative to address woody encroachment. This rancher-driven, science-based initiative is led by Working Lands for Wildlife, a partnership under the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service.

“The GPGI is bringing together landowners and different organizations to tackle woody encroachment,” says Kelly. “We need to keep our grasslands intact, keep our wildlife populations healthy, and keep communities thriving.”

The Switzer Ranch, among others, adopted prescribed fire as a tool to battle back the trees. In the spring of 2022 five different burns helped restore grasslands throughout the Sandhills, according to Kelly.

The idea of setting fire to precious resources initially gave Sortum trepidation. “It’s hard to make yourself light that match,” Sortum admits, “but after you see what happens, how great the grass looks and how the cattle love it, you know it was the right thing to do.”

Grasslands Are Assets For Future Generations

Sortum is passionate about the ways that cattle and wildlife coexist in the Sandhills. Through careful stewardship and management, her family is positively impacting the landscape in a way that will yield benefits far into the future.

“We can use our cattle as a tool to enhance the environment for our wildlife species,” Sortum explains. “Take grassland birds—they need grazers on the land. Grazing has shaped the Great Plains for eons. If you take grazing off the land, the wildlife is going to suffer.”  

In addition to enhancing habitat for wildlife, stewarding natural resources can boost rural economic development. Natural resources are rural communities’ biggest asset, Sortum says, and are what will keep future generations in the Sandhills.