CLEAR Conversations: Protecting California’s Working Landscapes

California’s iconic rangelands support cattle, wildlife, open space, and rural communities, while covering millions of acres across the state. But according to Michael Delbar, CEO of the California Rangeland Trust (CRT), those landscapes—and the families who steward them—face increasing pressure from development, rising costs, and public misunderstanding about agriculture.

In a recent episode of CLEAR Conversations, Delbar discussed the work of the California Rangeland Trust and why protecting working ranches is about far more than preserving scenery.

“These lands are an economic engine for the state,” Delbar said. “They provide food production, wildlife habitat, clean air, clean water, open space—all of those ecosystem services people benefit from every day.”

Founded 28 years ago by the California Cattlemen’s Association, the California Rangeland Trust was created to help ranching families voluntarily conserve their land through conservation easements. At the time, few organizations understood both conservation and the realities of ranching operations.

“There weren’t organizations that really understood the ranching business,” Delbar explained. “For ranchers, entering into a perpetual conservation agreement is a huge decision. They wanted to work with people who understood what they do and why they do it.”

Today, the organization has permanently protected more than 433,000 acres across California, from Siskiyou County to San Diego County. Earlier this year, the Trust celebrated a major milestone: its 106th conserved ranch and the interest from landowners continues to grow.

“We have another 90-plus ranching families in the queue representing more than 250,000 additional acres,” Delbar said.

The urgency behind that work is significant. California continues to lose approximately 47,000 acres of agricultural land each year to development and land conversion.

“And once it’s gone, it’s gone forever,” Sellers pointed out.  

For Delbar, protecting those landscapes means preserving much more than ranching itself. Working rangelands support biodiversity, groundwater recharge, wildfire management, recreation, and carbon storage while also producing food and fiber. To help quantify those benefits, the California Rangeland Trust partnered with researchers at University of California, Berkeley to conduct an ecosystem services study examining the public value of conserved ranchlands. The results helped put numbers behind the concept of conservation.

Researchers found that for every public dollar invested in conservation easements, Californians received an estimated $3.47 in return through ecosystem services and environmental benefits. The study also estimated that the annual public value of services provided by conserved ranches totaled approximately $1.44 billion.

“When we talk to policymakers, numbers matter,” Delbar said. “Now we can say this isn’t just important philosophically—it has measurable economic value.”

CRT is now working with UC Berkeley researchers to update the study using its expanded conservation portfolio. Delbar emphasized that partnerships with universities and research institutions are critical to helping agriculture communicate its environmental role more effectively.

“Ranchers know intuitively that what they do matters,” he said. “But academia helps provide the science, the data, and the credibility to demonstrate that.”

That connection between science and agriculture is especially important in conversations around sustainability—a word Delbar says can sometimes feel abstract to the public.

“For ranchers, sustainability means being able to pass the ranch on to the next generation,” he said. “If a ranch has lasted seven generations, that’s sustainability.”

At the same time, ranchers face mounting economic and regulatory challenges. Rising fuel costs, compliance expenses, and development pressure continue to threaten the long-term viability of working landscapes.

“We're the number one ag state, but it’s hard to do business in California,” Delbar said. 

Still, he remains optimistic because of the growing interest among ranching families who want to permanently protect their land. CRT has also expanded its public outreach efforts to help urban audiences better understand what happens on working landscapes many Californians rarely see firsthand. One example is the organization’s award-winning documentary, You Just Can’t See Them From the Road, which highlights the stewardship, conservation, wildlife habitat, and food production taking place on California ranches.

“The idea was to show people what’s happening beyond what they can see from the highway,” Delbar said. “The work ranchers are doing in those mountains and open spaces.”

The film has screened at dozens of film festivals and earned multiple awards while helping bridge the gap between urban and rural audiences.

For Delbar, improving public understanding of agriculture remains one of the most important challenges ahead.

“There’s a lot of misinformation out there,” he said. “That’s why partnerships with researchers and organizations like the CLEAR Center are so important. Science helps tell the real story.”

That emphasis on connecting science and agriculture was recently echoed at the California Rangeland Trust’s annual awards, where CLEAR Center Director, Dr. Frank Mitloehner received the Conservation Impact award for his work advancing the science and public understanding of livestock emissions and grazing systems. Delbar noted that Mitloehner’s research and outreach have helped challenge widely circulated misinformation about the environmental impacts of animal agriculture, while also elevating the role of grazing lands in climate and ecosystem solutions.

“And so when it came time to discuss who to select for the Conservation Impact award, it took us about three seconds to come up with Frank’s name,” Delbar said. “He is well deserving of the award.”

Looking ahead, Delbar says his greatest hope is simple: finding the resources needed to conserve more ranches before opportunities disappear.

“What keeps me up at night is missing the chance to keep a family on the land,” he said.

But every completed conservation project brings relief—and optimism.

“When we close a project and see the joy and relief from those families knowing their ranch will stay intact for future generations,” Delbar said, “that makes all of it worth it.”