True Rupert Murdoch just purchased the 340,000 acre Beaverhead Ranch working cattle ranch in Montana. The land is good for grazing not crop production. Excluding the Arizona land most of Gates’ land is crop production land and he has the wealth to pay the taxes on the land even if he leaves the land fallow. When the term sustainable farming is used the motives of the land owner IMO are political not agricultural.
“...Rupert Murdoch just purchased the 340,000 acre Beaverhead Ranch...”
Only 113,000 acred are deeded — the other 226,000 acres are LEASED.
Leases can be terminated very quickly in this state - especially if the owner/s are being nefarious.
In Gates’ case I’m way more suspicious of industrialization. That’s been going on here in the West for a long time. I remember the Jolly Green Giant pulling out of Dayton. That giant pea picker was one of my landmarks gunning my Harley thru the Palouse. I had to slow down for it because it was fun to gander at. Farther south US Gypsum pulled out.
There is no legitimate crop that will pay the taxes on 12G/acre farmland. But anything that is irrigated by the Grande Coulee system is high yield property. Gates will have to buy off a set of county commissioners to get the zoning he would need to change from agriculture. Our own guys have rolled over easy for solar and/or wind farms tho so that’s a wild card ou there? I could see an Intel style chip factory there. Walla Walla has Whitman College so there is plenty of stuff to build from.
Not that it matters but I nearly froze my butt off playing a football game there-—in four inches of snow. We didn’t know it had snowed so didn’t have our fuzzy socks.