You may be right about the legal situation, but it seems it’d be better just to send a single cop out there to arrest him to handle it.
I’m likely not as familiar w/the details as you are but consider that just because others pay the fees does not justify the situation either. I’m reading this as an abuse of power by charging unreasonable fees and this particular rancher is the only one protesting it. He did apparently pay them until they bumped them up for some turtle.
Keep in mind that others that couldn’t afford the fees probably went out of business. This is part of the problem of an overly regulated country. The little guy has not chance to get themselves out of poverty.
Of course it would, in a rational world with a rational government.