Don Casey of Cypress Mill will be honored for outstanding contributions to the Texas State Soil and Water Conservation program at a Conservation Awards Banquet for Region 2 on May 7, 201 in Wall.
Area 2 consists of 44 districts in the Texas Hill Country, and west to El Paso. There are five regions in the state. Casey was selected Conservation Rancher for the Pedernales Soil & Water Conservation District last October. Casey has been a district co-operator for 38 years, since May 1982. He maintains an up-to-date conservation plan and works closely with the local conservation district.
In addition, Casey will be honored as the 2019 Texas State Conservation Rancher for the entire state in October. Information compiled by the Pedernales District was submitted to the Region, and then the five regional winners were evaluated by another TSSWD committee. The award will be presented to Casey Oct. 29, 2019 in San Antonio.
Steven Meier, agricultural teacher at Lyndon B. Johnson High School, received the runner-up Conservation Teacher award for Area 2. Meier will also be honored at the banquet next week.
Casey was nominated for the Area 2 award by Pedernales district Natural Resources Conservation Service (NCRS) District Conservationist C.A. Cowsert and Conservation Planner Nathan Orsak. Orsak compiled a presentation, with pictures provided by his family, one of which was a photo of Casey on a horse with his grandfather, Victor Wenmohs, who began as a cooperator in March 1949.
The Pedernales district specifically noted Casey’s grazing management, which includes rotation of feed and mineral locations and maintenance of a pristine Kleingrass pastures, which isn’t used by wildlife. He was also lauded for his brush and wildlife management on the 1,000-acre ranch, of which he is the fifth generation to operate. He and his daughter run an Angus fall cow-calf operation.
“Don’s improved grass management on both his and his neighbors’ properties seems to have really changed the Cypress Creek,” Cowsert said. “The creek is running clearer than in the past.”
Casey notes that the creek was used to power a mill generations ago, near the former two-room school house and now Post Office in Cypress Mill.
“We’ve got 23 species of mammals, six exotics and seven domestic mammals on the ranch,” he said.
When Casey leads tours on the ranch, as he did for the Pedernales district last fall for its annual Field Day, he points out the varieties of grasses and wildlife favorites, such as Texas kidneywood.
“You don’t want to have a monoculture,” he said. “The trick is rotation, rotation, rotation and to emulate the actions of the buffalo herds that once grazed the land here. They never grazed more than 50 percent of grass down, and that what we work to achieve here to avoid overgrazing.”
Casey, a mechanical engineer from the Univ. of Texas (and proud Longhorn), has used his training in many ways at the ranch, such as offsetting gates diagonally from the road so that loaded trailers can pull off the road safely with room to open a gate.
The purpose of the Conservation Awards Program is to recognize and honor Soil and Water Conservation Districts (SWCDs) and individuals who have dedicated their time, efforts and talents to making wise use of renewable natural resources.
Sponsors of the Area Conservation Awards Program are the Texas State Soil and Water Conservation Board, the Association of Texas Soil and Water Conservation Districts the 216 SWCDs in Texas.
