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Progressive Practices

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Covering more than 10,500 acres southeast of Lake Placid, Buck Island Ranch is a full-scale working ranch that doubles as a living laboratory for scientists studying how agriculture and the environment interact over time.

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By The Florida Department of Agriculture

Published: October 14, 2007

DAYTONA BEACH – Being economically viable while sustaining the environment is possible and Butler Oaks Farm and Buck Island Ranch are shining examples.

Butler Oaks in Lorida and Buck Island near Lake Placid were two of four agricultural operations in the state recognized Friday for their leadership in promoting progressive environmental practices during the Florida Farm Bureau Federation's annual meeting. Florida Agriculture Commissioner Charles H. Bronson presented the 2007 Commissioner's Agricultural-Environmental Leadership Awards at the Daytona Beach Hilton.

Nominations for the awards were received earlier this year by a screening committee composed of scientific and technical experts with the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, which selected the finalists.

The winners were then selected from the group of finalists by a selection committee made up of representatives from The Nature Conservancy, the state's Water Management Districts, the Florida Farm Bureau, the Florida Cattlemen's Association, the Florida Dairy Association, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, the Florida Fruit and Vegetable Association, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, Florida's Soil and Water Conservation Districts, Florida Citrus Mutual, the Florida Forestry Association, and the Florida Nursery, Growers and Landscape Association.

"We were overwhelmed," Bob Butler said of his reaction to receiving the award.

"We kind of stepped up and gone ahead with the program when they first talked about it."

Butler has made it a priority to find new and more efficient ways to manage the nutrients that come off his land. Lake Okeechobee, a backup drinking water source for millions of Floridians and an important source of water for the Everglades, has long suffered from phosphorus pollution.

The farm has become one of the few operators to voluntarily participate in the South Florida Water
Management District's Dairy Best Available Technologies program.

Butler has reconfigured his dairy's water management system to capture and contain virtually all his surface water runoff for reuse on the farm. An edge-of-farm treatment system encircling the dairy's entire production area holds stormwater in a series of ditches and berms before delivering it to a retention area. If stormwater has to be released, it undergoes chemical treatment before leaving the property.

The farm has also been converted from a traditional dairy where the cows graze in pastures, to a free-stall confinement dairy with advanced self-contained waste-handling technology. The new model allows for better collection and control of animal wastes.

In a partnership with the Farm Pilot Project Coordination Inc., and the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, Butler Oaks is experimenting with new ways to process waste from the barns to create marketable manure. The wastewater, meanwhile, is collected and reused to irrigate hay pastures, which in turn are harvested to feed the cows.

Butler who noted the farm has about 1,850 cows and calves, said he has received a lot of help from various agencies.

Like Butler, Gene Lollis and Patrick Bohlen of Buck Island were elated about the award.

"It's a great honor to be recognized in the agriculture community," said Lollis, ranch manager. "It shows how both agriculture and the environment can co-exist."

The ranch, which covers more than 10,500 acres southeast of Lake Placid, is a full-scale working ranch.

"Everyone who works here fulltime lives here," said Bohlen, director of research.

Buck Island Ranch is on a 30-year lease from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to Archbold Biological Station, a not-for-profit ecological research and conservation organization.

The ranch implements a comprehensive program of environmental stewardship that enhances wildlife protection and habitat conservation, minimizes pesticide use, fertilizes pastures at rates that reduce risk of environmental contamination, protects and improves water quality, and contributes toward better understanding of soil and water conservation.

The ranch includes 4,500 acres of bahiagrass pastures, used as summer pasture, and 5,640 acres of more poorly drained native range, used as winter pasture.

The total cow herd size on the ranch ranges between 3,000 and 3,300, according to Lollis. The revenue to operate the ranch is derived largely from cattle sales, but also includes bahiagrass sod production and the sale of hunting leases.

The cost per cow per year is between $350 and $375, Lollis said.

Buck Island derives its name from a former dry prairie island that was surrounded by lower-lying marshes in the Indian Prairie region between Lake Istokpoga and Lake Okeechobee.

The various habitats – improved pastures, semi-native range, forests and wetlands – support 439 plant species, 168 species of birds, 17 species of fish, 53 species of amphibians and reptiles, and 32 species of mammals. Federal- and state-listed threatened and endangered species present on the property include the Eastern indigo snake, peregrine falcon, Florida sandhill crane, bald eagle, wood stork and occasionally the Florida panther and Florida black bear.

Highlands Today reporter Bill Rogers contributed to this story.

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