Interview with a Wild Woman: Deborah Clark
A glimpse in the life of Deborah Clark of Birdwell Clark Ranch
“Wild women are an unexplainable spark of life. They ooze freedom and seek awareness; they belong to nobody but themselves yet give a piece of who they are to everyone they meet.” - Nikki Rowe
When a friend and colleague suggested I contact Deborah Clark, of the Birdwell and Clark Ranch, in Clay County for an article featuring a woman in agriculture, I did not realize how well-known she and her partner and husband, Emry Birdwell, are in the agricultural community for their holistic approach to ranch management. Being an archaeologist for NRCS, and not a conservation planner, I had to research grazing methods to understand what is so different about the High Intensity, Low Frequency (HILF) grazing strategy they utilize.
Before I learned more about her present, I wondered what kind of previous experiences led to her life in holistic management. Turns out that Deborah has had an interest in archaeology since college and graduated from Southern Methodist University in Dallas with an Anthropology Degree. A formative experience for her was spending a summer at SMU-in-Taos, which is “an enchanting atmosphere that inspires collaboration between students, faculty, and the community” Master’s Degree in Public Health from UTSPH; her thesis was on Midwifery in East Texas and ended up working in Public Health alongside her first husband, a dentist with whom she shares a daughter and a penchant for travel. When that chapter of her life closed, she moved back home to be her “dad’s son,” working in, and eventually running her family’s business in telecommunication construction before and during the fiber optic boom of the 1990s. She is no stranger to stepping outside her comfort zone to take leadership positions.
“Retiring” to a new Venture
Deborah has taken on the hardest job she has had to date when she and her partner Emry Birdwell “retired” to the “Edward’s Ranch” they purchased near Henrietta, Texas in 2004. The ranch has deep roots in Clay County with beginnings in the late 1800s by two pioneer families: J.L. Hudgins and Bryant Edwards. They knew it was a good ranch and the opportunity of a lifetime, but they were also warned that they would be judged on “how well they kept out the mesquite.” The pair have since made the 12,000-acre Birdwell and Clark Ranch their own striking example of regenerative grazing.
Deborah and Emry were the third family to “own” the ranch, but vestiges of the ranch’s heritage live on at the ranch headquarters with pieces of its original furniture scattered throughout, a roasting pot they still cook in, and a photographic monument showcasing the original owners. This pair also honors the past by looking to how grassland prairies were historically “managed” by huge roaming herds of buffalo. More on that in a bit.
While Emry was a third-generation rancher and a “master grazer,” Deborah experienced a big learning curve, but did not come to this partnership empty-handed. She brought many years of experience successfully running her family’s business. But learn she did -- about wildlife, soil health, weather, the market, animal health, labor, herd impact, the list goes on. Her thirst for knowledge is evident when she speaks. She gobbled up every bit of information she could in a variety of ways, from workshops, to classes, to mentorships, to working with her hands and watching with her own eyes what benefits can be had from holistic management, including herd impact.
This concept works in two ways, by concentrating animal impact to mimic historic herds of 50,000 bison across the prairie who grazed and trampled the forage to create litter and organic matter, which held water by protecting it from evaporation, and kept the ground cool enough for wildlife to inhabit. Additionally, they defecated (fertilizer), kicked up seed beds, and moved on. By letting the land rest, it makes favorable conditions for a huge diversity of grasses and forbs. This management strategy is time and labor intensive, but wildly effective.
You would think the 2011 drought would have hurt the ranch, but instead of viewing it as a disaster, Deborah and Emry consider it a boon. It forced their hand to create one big herd and to address the water situation head on. The Birdwell and Clark Ranch partnered with NRCS-Texas to install 25-miles of pipeline throughout the ranch to facilitate a mobile watering trough concept (propane tank cut in half lengthwise and on wheels) Emry came up with during a “Michelob Ultra Epiphany Moment.” They don’t know if he was the first to come up with this flexible solution to water scarcity and high use area erosion, but they will certainly not be the last to use it.
As a result, the Birdwell and Clark Ranch saw a dramatic impact and boasts a current lack of bare ground, incredible biodiversity, and an emergence of a soil health indicator plant, Eastern Gamagrass, in 2013 that continues to make its way throughout the ranch. According to a Holistic Management International Case Study, in their third year of drought they had their best financial year yet, increasing their gain from 250-lbs per head pre-drought to 300-lbs per head. Their per-acre gain runs about 100-120 lbs. per acre where the county average sits at 40-60 lbs. per-acre. They continue to run one herd of about 5-6,000 head of stocker steers moving them about 4-6 times a day between several of the 140 available paddocks ranging in size from 45 to 90 acres each, based on how the grass is growing on the ground in that paddock at that moment.
Listening to Deborah Clark speak is inspiring. I asked what kind of advice she would give to aspiring ranchers. Among all the workshops, classes, societies, communities, and hands-on experience, traveling stands out to her. Travel is one of the most important tools to help keep an open mind to ideas commonly perceived as nontraditional. From her I learned many things in the short time we spoke, but here are a few pieces of wisdom I extracted from this experience. Allow hardships (such as a drought) to open your eyes to opportunities you may not have had without them. Get out of your comfort zone to seek out opportunities. Foster natural curiosity and encourage life-long learning. Be open to a better way.
To me, this is a beautiful story of resilience where a passionate love of the land and real stewardship mentality has reaped amazing rewards, for the ranchers, for the animals and plants, and for the land itself. By tackling a problem holistically and using cattle as a tool, to make rainfall more effective and to produce wildlife habitat, Deborah Clark and the Birdwell and Clark Ranch is poised to inspire a new future and help heal the land.
When I asked how the apparent male-dominance in all the fields in which she has held leadership roles affected her, she gracefully shrugged off the query and mentioned how proud she is at how far agriculture has come. To paraphrase, she said, there are many notable women in agriculture which may appear from an outsider’s perspective to have employed backseat roles, such as bookkeepers, but have always been the glue that keeps it all together.
