 Roger and Meredith Ediger |
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Ranchers
Box T Ranch, Mount Vernon, Ore.
Box T Ranch near Mount Vernon, Ore., started as a dream born in the “old country” of Scotland.
With little more than love and work ethic, Scottish immigrants John and Margaret Masson settled in the United States at the turn of the century and made that ranching dream a reality in 1917. Through a homestead application and a small parcel acquisition of eastern Oregon landscape, the couple established a ranch large enough for two bands of sheep.
However, with the wool market collapse of the early 1920s and a looming threat of foreclosure, the Massons began raising cattle. Today, Roger and Meredith Ediger represent the third generation to operate the family’s 93-year-old farmstead.
Roger says for ranching families everywhere, a ranch represents a working relationship between a family, the land they care for, and the animals and plants that inhabit it.
“For the family it is a way of life that requires a serious dedication to the hard work that makes up their daily lives as stewards of their land,” he says.
As stewards of this finite natural resource, it is the obligation of the ranch family to pass the land to the next generation in better condition than when they assumed care for it.
To be sustainable, Roger adds, ranchers must work the land in such a fashion as to obtain optimum production for forages, both crop and natural, not only for their livestock but also for the varieties of wildlife that also inhabit the land.
“As stewards of this finite natural resource, it is the obligation of the ranch family to pass the land to the next generation in better condition than when they assumed care for it.”
