Agriculture drives environmental change. Landowners who do not manage their land effectively may experience large losses in production, especially in the face of environmental change. Drought over time decreases agricultural production even more, making farmers increasingly vulnerable to change. Such is the case in Oklahoma's Cimarron County and New Mexico's Union County. Both locations are nationally important cattle and agricultural producers. Yet, drought, changing cattle and agricultural markets, governmental policies, and invasive plants that compete with native grasses threaten cattle and agricultural production and other land use. Since 2000, the region has been experiencing an "extreme" (D3) to "exceptional" (D4) drought. These are the most severe categories of droughts possible. Land managers have to make increasingly difficult land use decisions in order to sustain production, and to feed their families, as well as the rest of the country. This study explores how land users' respond and rebound under such extreme environmental conditions. The study will use a mixed methods approach including surveys, observations, focus groups and oral histories to understand what is currently happening to farmers and ranchers in Cimarron County and Union County. Researchers will also develop a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) database with historical and census data to map out how land uses change over time, and how these changes impact farm families. The research team will include graduate students to help with the study. In addition, forty undergraduate students will also get the opportunity to experience fieldwork in the region and to study land use changes too.
Land users must become more resilient when facing increasingly harsh environmental conditions. The study will look at which land users become vulnerable, as well as why and when they are subject to a loss of or decrease in the quality of their livelihoods. Likewise, the study will also look at how land users adapt to extreme drought conditions and what factors make some land users less vulnerable than others. Results will reveal the ways in which land users become more resilient or able to bounce back. Given that such drought conditions are expected to continue, the project will create usable and timely findings. The study results will be given out to local land users, policymakers, and researchers. User-friendly results will be disseminated to local communities and policy makers in Oklahoma and New Mexico. Copies of the land maps created by the team will be shared with the local County Assessors Offices.
