Maggie Roberts Goddard helps drive a herd of Angus cattle past the Wind River Range in Daniel. In Sublette County, some 70,000 head of cattle and calves make up the historic backbone of the area’s economy. (Angus M. Thuermer Jr./WyoFile)
There may be no more beautiful a place to run cattle than Daniel, where sagebrush hills and grassy meadows give way to Wyoming’s tallest mountains in the Wind River Range.
Every fall, cowgirls and boys saddle up, turn loose the cow dogs, and bring home their herds, most of which summer on U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management grazing allotments. A 2012 Census of Agriculture listed 398 “farms” in Sublette County, across 777,516 acres. The average size was almost 2,000 acres.
Livestock sales, which make up 85 percent of the market value of products sold, amounted to slightly more than $46 million, the census said. All told, almost 70,000 head of cattle and calves comprise what’s been the historic backbone of the county’s economy and a key factor in keeping the landscape free of subdivisions and ranchettes.
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In the photo above, Maggie Roberts Goddard follows a herd of Angus cattle. Her parents Zach and Patti Roberts operate the Flying V Ranch. Sublette rancher and historian Jonita Sommers identified her for WyoFile.
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