國(guó)家地理:牧野分歧(6)

In 1862, Congress passed the Homestead Act, which gave settlers title to 160 acres of federal land if they were able to "prove up" on the property by building a house and planting crops. But 160 acres weren't enough in the short-grass prairies, so Congress doubled it, then doubled it again to 640 acres for livestock. Today many ranchers feel they need to own thousands of acres and lease thousands more on nearby public land to make ends meet, and keeping the "home place" in the family can require King Lear–like decisions about succession planning. Ranches are big, or they're gone. In that context, land set aside for conservation is land unavailable for ranching families to expand. "It worries me more than water, wind, drought, prices," says rancher Craig French, whose family is involved with the anti-APR movement in Phillips County, across the Missouri River from LaTray.

1862年，國(guó)會(huì)通過(guò)了宅地法，給居民分配了160英畝聯(lián)邦土地的所有權(quán)，前提是他們可以建起房子和種植作物來(lái)證明自己的財(cái)產(chǎn)。但是160英畝的淺草草場(chǎng)是不夠的，于是國(guó)會(huì)把這個(gè)數(shù)字翻了倍，然后為了蓄養(yǎng)牲畜又把數(shù)字翻了一倍，變成640英畝?，F(xiàn)在很多牧場(chǎng)主覺(jué)得他們應(yīng)該有幾千英畝的地，再在附近的公共用地上租幾千英畝來(lái)滿(mǎn)足需求，而要保留家庭用地可能就需要李爾王式的規(guī)劃，比如同意牧場(chǎng)繼承制。牧場(chǎng)一般要很大，否則就沒(méi)了。在這種情況下，牧民家庭就不能占用留出來(lái)做保護(hù)區(qū)的用地。牧場(chǎng)主克雷格·弗倫奇說(shuō)：“這一點(diǎn)比水、風(fēng)、干旱和價(jià)格更讓我擔(dān)心?！彼募胰硕紖⑴c了菲利普斯縣的反對(duì)美國(guó)草原保護(hù)區(qū)運(yùn)動(dòng)，菲利普斯縣和拉特雷隔密蘇里河相望。

French is standing in a corral on a cloudy morning in a pasture just north of APR, where his parents, Bill and Corky French, have convened four generations of family and neighbors to brand their calves. Their forebears settled nearby more than a century ago; the couple run more than a thousand head of cattle on 60,000 public and private acres.

一個(gè)多云的早晨，弗倫奇站在美國(guó)草原保護(hù)區(qū)北邊一片牧場(chǎng)旁的畜欄邊，他的父母比爾和可奇·弗倫奇召集了家里的四代人還有鄰居，去給他們的小牛打上烙印。他們的祖先一百多年前就定居在附近，這對(duì)夫妻在60000英畝的公共和私人用地上蓄養(yǎng)著超過(guò)一千頭牛。

Brandings here are chaotic, cooperative affairs, with families traveling from ranch to ranch to help each other out. Then they get to work: sorting, roping and dragging, wrestling and branding, vaccinating and castrating, calves squealing wild-eyed in rebuke ("Some are kind of theatrical," Craig French says). We associate this part of the world with rugged individualism, but brandings are remarkably communitarian rituals, willing exchanges of time and labor.

打烙印在這里是很混亂的，涉及到合作，一個(gè)個(gè)家庭從一個(gè)牧場(chǎng)跑到另一個(gè)牧場(chǎng)，互相幫助。然后他們就開(kāi)始工作：分類(lèi)、套繩、拖拽、扭打和烙印，注射疫苗和閹割，小牛犢怒瞪著眼睛鳴叫著。（“有一些是在演戲”，克雷格·弗倫奇說(shuō)。） 我們把世界的這個(gè)部分跟粗獷的個(gè)人主義聯(lián)系在一起，但打烙印是非常顯著的共產(chǎn)主義的儀式，需要人們自愿交換時(shí)間和勞動(dòng)力。

"We don't always agree with all our neighbors," says Craig's wife, Conni, "but we always help each other out."

克雷格的妻子康妮說(shuō)：“我們并不是一直跟鄰居的意見(jiàn)相同，但我們總是會(huì)互相幫忙?！?/p>