Rangeland Changes in Santa Barbara County

Rangeland Fallowing:
The Removal Of Cattle From Rangeland

Ranching in Santa Barbara County is threatened by a host of factors, among them: increased land costs and/or lease rates; higher costs of production; lower prices at the market; and an increased regulatory burden, which in turn increases the costs of production. All of these self-reinforcing constraints combine to threaten the vibrancy and viability of ranching in the county. And on top of all these other constraints, rangeland conversion and the loss of available grazing lands means that cattle producers have less available land to support their operations.

A Santa Barbara Issue:

• Since 1984, over 200 rangeland parcels over 100 acres experienced some amount of conversion to vineyard or cannabis
• The acreage of these parcels totals over 89,000 acres!

See how a team of researchers used the SBC Conservation Blueprint to understand the issue of rangeland conversion and grazeland fallowing in Santa Barbara, and what they found! This is detailed in an ESRI Story Map!

There is also a Rangeland Changes Guide and Case Study on the Blueprint’s Atlas that you can check out too! It features datasets and maps related to rangeland fallowing in Santa Barbara County.