Holistic Management International
Healthy Land, Healthy Food, Healthy Lives
Each year, the Quivira Coalition, Holistic Management International, and the American Grassfed Association collaborate to convene ranchers, farmers, conservationists, land managers, scientists, and thought leaders to share knowledge, build community, […]
With 27 years of ranching experience using Holistic Management, Wayne has had an identity crisis. When he joined the 11 000-acre family ranching business he called himself a cattle rancher. He changed to calling himself a grass farmer. Later still, he called himself a soil-microbe farmer, though he has always marketed beef. Privileged to work with his father, Tom Knight, who was an early adopter of Holistic Management under Allan Savory – Stan Parsons consulting, Wayne enthusiastically increased and intensified the practices HMI teaches. He became a Certified Educator in 2006 and was actively involved with the Southern African CE community organization, Community Dynamics. He has spoken at numerous conferences in Southern Africa, trained and mentored farmers, hosted open days on his property, and has written about his positive results using Holistic Management. Before joining the team at HMI Wayne served as a board member of the organization for 8 years. Through his enthusiasm for Holistic Management Wayne has traveled widely visiting farmers who practice high-density, long recovery grazing practices in Southern Africa, Australia, and the US. As a young graduate with a Science degree in Agricultural Economics from the University of Natal, South Africa, he traveled across the US west working on ranches in Nebraska, Kansas, Colorado, California, and New Mexico. When not involved in Holistic Management you will find him fishing, birding, hiking, or exploring wild spaces and places with his family. An enthusiastic traveler, hunter, and photographer, he loves discovering new places and making new friends.
Adelene is a resident of Arkansas and loves exploring the state’s natural trails. Her passion for education and technology led her to earn a master’s in learning systems technology from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. With her professional experience managing student/client databases and instructional design, Adelene will bring skill and understanding to her role as Office Manager & Instructional Designer at HMI. Her focus on making education more accessible to diverse communities is evident through her volunteer work as an board member for a scholarship program. Adelene is devoted to creating educational opportunities that align with HMI’s mission to promote healthy, resilient lands and thriving communities.
Seth Wilner has been a Holistic Management International Certified Educator since 2005. For 22 years he has worked as an agent educator with University of New Hampshire Cooperative Extension where he specializes in farm business management with an emphasis on whole farm planning.
Seth works across the state and throughout the Northeast Region. He has delivered numerous presentations on Holistic Management throughout the northeast region, including several multi-day workshops for both farmers and agricultural service providers. He received his B.S. from the University of Connecticut in soil science and his M.S. from the University of Wisconsin in Soil Fertility. Seth also served in the Peace Corps working with farmers in Senegal, West Africa from 1993 to 1995.
Seth’s areas of interest are in: financial planning, enterprise analysis, cost of production, effective communication, goal setting, whole farm planning, effective adult education, program development, program evaluation, and Beginning Farmer/Rancher Curriculum. Seth feels one of his most used talents in farms is systems analysis. He especially likes to hone in on social and financial systems as they relate to moving towards farm sustainability. Recently, due to demand, Seth has focused a great deal of his efforts on succession planning and farm transfer work.
Dana was first introduced to Holistic Management in the 1990s while working in the Texas Hill Country. She strongly believes that Holistic Management can positively impact families that are on the land, the communities they are a part of, and larger landscape resource regeneration efforts.
With 7+ generations of farmers and ranchers on both sides of her family, Dana appreciates the joys of living with the land, while understanding those complexities can be challenging.
Having spent time in Texas, Colorado, and Wyoming, Dana currently lives in Tishomingo, Oklahoma where she and her family run a small cow/calf operation with horses and pecans. Her husband, Marc, comes from a Colorado/Wyoming ranching background. In fact, they met and married when he was managing one of the last large ranches in Jackson Hole. Their son, Rio, has carried on the tradition with a strong career in FFA and ranching. He now conducts agriculture and natural resource research as part of his studies in Biosystems and Agriculture Engineering at Oklahoma State University.
Dana feels blessed that her time growing up on the family outfit connected her with deep roots to the land. Her father, Joe, led the family in seasonal harvests based on his traditional ecological knowledge and native ways of knowing all aspects of nature.
“Anyone who spent time with my Dad experienced his stories and the passion he had for hard work and being outdoors,” Dana said. “Whether it was working cattle, harvesting pecans, or fishing, he made it an adventure that you never forgot. We all owe so much to him and the legacy he created.”
Taking his lessons to heart, Dana has worked for conservation organizations on the local and national level and with the Teton Conservation District in Jackson, Wyoming where she provided education and collaboration activities for landowners and nature-lovers. She has over 35 years of experience developing programs and writing grants.
“From bees, to quail, to fish, to people, my Dad taught me that good stewardship is key to a healthy, happy life for all,” Dana states. “I look forward to working with others who are striving to realize that holistic balance ~ with health and revitalization for the land, water, nature, families, and community.”
Sarah Robertson grew up in Taos, New Mexico and has always been passionate about land stewardship, growing things, and nurturing others. After completing a BA in Communication from the University of New Mexico and working with local non-profits, she started her journey as a first-generation farmer. Since 2015, she has been learning and growing alongside her husband on various leased properties in Albuquerque, NM and running a small market farm with goats, chickens, and a CSA. In her role as Programs Assistant at HMI, Sarah brings her enthusiasm for regenerative agriculture, devotion to supporting others, and drive for lifelong learning and growing.
Jozua Lambrecht is from South Africa and divides his time between their home in Somerset West and their family farm in Sutherland, one of the coldest places in South Africa, where they farm with sheep. He is married to his wife Therese and they have two daughters.
Jozua has a background in education and is passionate about how people learn and change. He did his first course in Holistic Management in 2002 and completed the Certified Educator Training Program in 2006. He also did a Permaculture Design Course in 2001.
Jozua has been involved for over 20 years in adult education and worked on a variety of sustainable development projects in rural communities in Southern Africa in which the Holistic Management framework was used in various ways to develop appropriate curricula and training courses. He also worked extensively with the Africa Centre for Holistic Management in Zimbabwe adapting the Holistic Management framework for communal farmers and communities in Africa where full-time herding is still the preferred livestock management strategy. He also does facilitation, strategic planning and conflict resolution for farming and ranching families by using the Holistic Management framework.
Alejandro Carrillo is a fourth-generation rancher, and he is quite familiar with the challenges of running a profitable cattle ranch in the Chihuahuan desert. Because annual precipitation seldom exceeds nine inches, every drop counts when it comes to growing more grasses. Grazing year-round with only sea salt as an input, he is not willing to waste any water in such a brittle environment.
An on-going drought that ranchers faced on these arid landscapes forced Alejandro to look for better ways of doing things, so in 2005 he took his first Holistic Management class. Since then, he has traveled and learned from ranchers around the world and through trial and error, he has adapted these learning experiences into his ranching environment. Today, Alejandro can carry three times more cattle than neighboring ranches on a per-acre basis, while substantially lowering his inputs. To accomplish this, he has relied on his adaptive grazing observation and management skills, selecting cattle that thrive under his conditions and management, and developing a solid, well-distributed, reliable water system to graze every paddock anytime of the year.
Before getting his boots on the ground full time, Alejandro worked as a software engineer in various countries. He has a Bachelor of Science degree in computer science from Monterrey Tech and a Master of Science degree in technical management from Johns Hopkins University.
Jared L Talley was born and raised in Southwestern Idaho and now seeks to help rural communities adapt and thrive in a rapidly changing world. He is an Assistant Professor in the School of Public Service at Boise State University, earning his PhD in Philosophy from Michigan State University and his MPA in Environmental Policy and Natural Resource Management from Boise State University. An environmental philosopher by training and an interdisciplinary scholar in practice, he seeks to better understand how communities relate to the land and how this relationship poses obstacles and opportunities for collaboration and governance. In doing so, he studies the role of science in collaborative policy, the role of place in environmental identity, and the role of the imagination in mediating both. Specifically, he studies grazing management and public land permitting, community-led conservation programs, rural education and entrepreneurship, place-based environmental governance, and the imaginative experience of our natural and built environments — all in the contexts of the intermountain American West.
Brian lives on the New South Wales Mid North Coast in Australia and is a full-time Holistic Management Educator through his and his partner, Kerry’s training company, Inside Outside Management. Brian, a born and bred Zimbabwean, looking to expand his environmental / agricultural knowledge related to their wildlife, cattle, and cropping business attended a week-long workshop run by Allan. Inspired after implementing Holistic Management practices on the farm, he attended HMI’s educator training at the Africa Center for Holistic Management in the late 1990‘s. He immigrated to Australia in 2000 and has delivered Holistic Management training and mentoring across Australia and in New Zealand since 2004, this has included the nationally accredited Diploma in Holistic Management, and as a guest lecturer for the Southern Cross University Regenerative Agriculture degree. Brian is excited to be on the the HMI board and to be part of a like-minded team as HMI works on the cutting edge of new programs.
Ann has worked in the nonprofit world for almost 25 years, creating and directing national programs, collaborating with over 100 non-profit and government entities to create positive impact among producers and land stewards seeking to build & maintain sustainable farms, ranches and healthy land. Her fund development work has included raising over $1 million for national whole farm planning training for beginning farmer programming. Ann served as HMI’s Executive Director from 2015-2020. Ann has been a Holistic Management Certified Educator since 1998 and has practiced and taught Holistic Management® in multiple capacities for 25 years. She also has facilitated classes (onsite and distance learning), taught workshops and presented at conferences. She has written countless articles, helped develop agriculture-based software for financial and grazing planning and written a training handbook, At Home with Holistic Management: Creating a Life of Meaning. Ann also taught courses at Indiana University, Wittenberg University, and Antioch College. She earned her BSED from Ohio University and her PhD from Indiana University. When she isn’t serving as HMI’s Education Director, Ann is Chief Goatherd on her small farm in the Manzano Mountains and Captain of her Earthship (a house made out of tires with photovoltaics, composting toilet and rainwater harvesting) southeast of Albuquerque, New Mexico with her wife, Ellen. Read Ann’s blogs.
Marie von Ancken is a Programs Manager for HMI, advanced ceramic apprentice, and anti-oppression activist. She is passionate about environmental justice and regenerative farming as a solution to transforming our food system and addressing climate change. She grew up in Corrales, New Mexico, where her family raised chickens and has spent significant time living in Finland, France, and Nicaragua. She has participated in numerous international non-profit efforts and has worked closely with the Communitas Foundation, a non-profit providing educational and extracurricular support for at-risk youth in Central America. In 2017 she joined the board as co-director and treasurer of the foundation. Marie was a Rotary International Exchange student to Naantali, Finland her junior year of high school and continues to work with Rotary’s Youth Exchange Program facilitating talks on culture shock and intercultural communication. She is fluent in Spanish and Finnish, conversational in French, and works as a Spanish interpreter with indigenous artist communities from Central and South America. As Program Manager at Holistic Management International, Marie has spent the last five years developing learning opportunities, both locally and internationally, that aim to educate farmers, ranchers and food advocates in agricultural practices that increase organic matter in the soil, grow nutrient-dense foods, and sequester carbon while empowering them to strengthen their businesses and improve their quality of life. Marie has a bachelor’s degree in International Business Management and Sustainability Studies from the University of New Mexico/College of Charleston/IPAG School of Business – Nice, France. She is an Aldo Leopold Land Ethic Leader and is glad she “will not be young in a future without wilderness.”
Carrie Stearns has been with HMI since 2009 and serves as our Director of Communications & Outreach. She loves working creatively in a field that supports a healthy food system for all, regenerates land and water sources, empowers agricultural producers, and teaches responsible animal husbandry. Read Carrie’s blogs.
Kathy Frisch is passionate about regenerating our lands, fostering health and well-being for those who manage them, and revitalizing entire communities through the practice of Holistic Management. As Program Director with HMI, she works with Certified Educators across the world to deliver training and support for the implementation of Holistic Management. She has been involved in Holistic Management since the late 1990s when her enthusiasm for nutrient-dense, traditional foods motivated her to begin a small-scale 20-acre homestead farm in North Texas, and then develop infrastructure and enterprises for a 250-acre ranch. Her personal practice of Holistic Management includes cow and goat dairying, pastured poultry, grass-fed beef and lamb, honeybees, fruit trees, vegetable gardens and native pecans. As an HMI Professional Certified Educator, she has provided consultation and education across the US ranging from small family farms to large ranches. Read Kathy’s blogs.
Kelly and her husband, Mike, live near Lloydminster, Alberta, Canada where they operate a family ranch running owned and custom yearling cattle with a small cow herd. They also have another ranch near Debden, Saskatchewan. Kelly has been involved with Holistic Management for close to 25 years. She became a HMI Certified Educator in the late 1980’s and has taught a number of courses and work with many family producers and management groups. Kelly writes the Cow Trails and Pony Tales blog and has recently started a unique event business, doing local food events, cowgirl retreats, a women’s conference and more. Kelly’s father, Dennis Wobeser was an HMI Board member and upon his end of term, Kelly took his place as HMI’s Canadian representative.
Kevin hails from the San Francisco Bay area where he spent many years working for the 11th Hour Project, making and managing many grants in the Ecological Agriculture program. It was through this work he was introduced to the practice of Holistic Management, which Kevin sees as a tool to promote better environmental stewardship of rangelands. Kevin recently launched his own foundation, The Regenerative Agriculture Foundation, which will allow him even more opportunities to fund and support efforts in responsible and sustainable agriculture. Kevin joined the HMI Board in 2014 and currently serves as the Development Committee Chair.
Jonathan is a fourth-generation farmer in the Blackland Prairie near Rogers, TX. He went off to “a better future away from the farm” as the prevailing culture had taught him, where he earned a degree in business. The best part of college to Jonathan was meeting his wife, Kaylyn, with whom he moved to Fort Worth to begin their respective careers in business. However, several years later, the instinct to farm was stronger in his blood than he realized. The two decided in 2007 to move back to the family farm where Jonathan would work with his father until a future transition of ownership could occur.
The family farm had taken the shape of most in the industrial era. It had become an efficient machine, void of diversity, and at-risk to many forces beyond the reach of the family. In addition to growing unrest and disconnect between their farming methods and their belief that God created the earth for them to steward well, the combination of increasing input costs, low product prices, and increasingly extreme weather-related crop failures had taken the shine off the dreams to continue the family farm. Despite the difficultly of the realization that the family farm would end with his father, Jonathan made the decision to leave the farm in mid-2011.
It was a last-minute decision to attend a meeting about soil health that changed the trajectory of Jonathan’s life and would lead to an introduction to many of the leading practitioners of regenerative farming. The common thread among the leaders Jonathan met was Holistic Management.
The decision to stay on the farm and learn to manage it holistically was made in late 2011. Since then, Jonathan and his family have been on an amazing journey of learning and discovery. The farm is now home to Jonathan’s parents, his sister’s family, Kaylyn’s parents along with Kaylyn and Jonathan. The family manages multiple enterprises of grass-finished beef, a cow/calf herd, grass-finished lamb, breeding ewes, pastured pork, and pastured eggs.
Jonathan also works as a soil health consultant and works with Green Cover Seed as a cover crop consultant for Texas and the southeastern U.S. He currently serves on the board of directors for The Grassfed Exchange.
“HMI played a very important role in the direction of my life personally and also our family farm. Because of the gratitude I have for the organization’s role in our lives and the global impact HMI has and has the potential to have in the future, I felt a deep sense of honor and duty to accept the invitation to serve HMI as a member of the Board of Directors,” says Jonathan.
Ariel Greenwood lives in New Mexico in the winter and Montana in the summer. She studied psychology and agroecology in college, and started farming as a teenager in North Carolina and began working with livestock in California. For the past five years she has worked with pigs, goats, and sheep, but primarily has managed and raised beef cattle in operations ranging from small herds with locally marketed grassfed beef to managing multi-thousand head of yearling stocker cattle. She and her partner, Sam Ryerson, have a management LLC, Grass Nomads. They sometimes consult other operators and landowners as well as practice holistic planned grazing. Their work is generally on large, rougher country where they utilize dogs, horses, and aim for relatively short grazing periods. Ariel writes for such websites as Civil Eats, Humans and Nature, and Fibershed, as well as her own blog, and regularly speaks to media about the issues and complexity surrounding grazing. She also serves as a founding board member/treasurer for Contra Viento Journal, an arts & literature periodical about rangelands. Her first exposure to Holistic Management was in 2012/2013 when she took grazing planning, financial planning, and biological monitoring courses through Spencer Smith of the Savory Institute’s Jefferson Hub. She feels fortunate to have entered livestock agriculture largely motivated by the principles inherent to Holistic Management and with a lot of support from other practitioners and teachers. She finds the grazing planning principles and context/goal development framework to be absolutely indispensable. Ariel feels honored to be asked to join HMI’s board as she sees HMI’s focus on high-quality, on-the-ground instruction and influence to be sorely needed. She sees herself helping connect with younger/aspirational producers and practitioners. She is also passionate about helping to bring distant, marginal land into focus for urban or non-practitioners—showing the real change happening on the landscape with the broader public who are intrigued and skeptical of “regenerative grazing.” She sees the psychological savvy inherent to Holistic Management as most needed in farming, ranching, and land management.
Hailing from Springfield, Illinois, Walter is a CPA with an “agriculture niche.” He believes our soils are a piece of the biological capital farmers and ranchers manage in order to have the profitable impact to promote thriving rural communities. Walter became acquainted to Holistic Management after winning a Holistic Management class in a drawing. He has a passion for healthy soil and sees Holistic Management as a way all land stewards can regenerate degraded land. Walter has been a HMI Board member since 2014.
Danny holds the John T. Jones Chair of Economics at Austin College in Sherman, Texas where he is the Director of the Freshmen Seminar Program, Director of the Will Mann Richardson Lectureship Series and Austin College’s Director of the Jno T. Owens Conference. Danny began attending HMI workshops in preparation for teaching a course in Environmental Economics and these helped enforce his understanding of sustainable land management. Danny is a founding member of the Council for Healthy Food systems and in coming onto the HMI Board; Danny is particularly focused on how HMI can better connect with higher education. He hopes to erect effective and formal programs that help aid younger generations in better understanding sustainable and holistic resource use. Danny is currently serving as HMI’s Board Chairman.
Breanna Owens lives in Los Molinos, California with her son Will. She runs a small cattle and sheep operation based in Tehama County, California utilizing mostly leased private and public lands. She recently started working with the California State University—Chico Center for Regenerative Agriculture and Resilient Systems, along with working the last few years with a ranching-conservation collaborative called Working Circle Proactive Stewardship that developed as a result of wolves expanding their range to Northern California. For the past six years she worked with Point Blue Conservation Science as a Senior Range Ecologist and Program Coordinator for the Rangeland Watershed Initiative, a partnership program with NRCS. She is a mentor through Quivira’s New Agrarian Program. She is also the current chair of the California Rangeland Conservation Coalition and a California Certified Rangeland Manager. Breanna grew up in Northern California on a cow-calf ranch, attended Chico State and Colorado State University—Fort Collins. She is motivated by a love for the agriculture industry…for the people, land and livestock that are a part of it. She is inspired by the current conversations and opportunities in highlighting the linkages between the agriculture and conservation communities. Breanna was first introduced to Holistic Management when working for her family in high school and college on a cattle and sheep ranch on the big island of Hawaii. She was also introduced again during courses through the Western Center for Integrated Resource Management at Fort Collins, and more recently through a series of Holistic Management workshops with the Jefferson Center for Holistic Management (a Savory Institute hub) as part of the Ecological Outcome Verification program. Breanna believes that the Holistic Management framework has critical value in supporting people, communities, and industries in decision-making and management at all scales and within all contexts. She would like to learn from others how they have used Holistic Management, how they’ve put the principles into practice, and engage in conversation and programs to effectively support others in thinking about systems-based decision making and management.
Allen Williams is a 6th generation family farmer and founding partner of Grass Fed Insights, Standard Soil, Soil Health Consultants and Soil Health Academy. He is also a partner in Joyce Farms, Inc. He has consulted with more than 4200 farmers and ranchers in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, and South America on operations ranging from a few acres to over 1 million acres. Allen pioneered many of the early adaptive grazing protocols and forage finishing techniques and has spent the last 15 years refining those. He is a “recovering academic”, having served 15 years on the faculty at Louisiana Tech University and Mississippi State University. He holds a B.S. and M.S. in Animal Science from Clemson University and a Ph.D. in Livestock Genetics from Louisiana State University. He has authored more than 400 scientific and popular press articles, and is an invited speaker at regional, national, and international conferences and symposia. Major areas of research and business focus include soil health, cover crop/livestock integration, adaptive forage & grazing management, high attribute pasture-based meat production, and alternative marketing systems. Allen and his colleagues specialize in whole farm and ranch planning based on the concept of regenerative agriculture. Their approach creates significant “value add” and prepares the landowner for multiple enterprise/revenue stream opportunities that stack enterprises and acres. This approach allows for enhanced profitability and/or investment value. They routinely conduct workshops and seminars across North America. He is featured in several of the Carbon Nation film series, “Soil Carbon Cowboys” (www.soilcarboncowboys.com) and has a recently released book co-authored with Teddy Gentry, “Before You Have A Cow”. Allen is a regular contributor to GRAZE and The Stockman Grass Farmer and has written articles for the “Organic Broadcaster” and many other publications. Several of his presentations and webinars can be found on the Pasture Project website at www.pastureproject.org. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Grass Fed Exchange and the Mississippi Sustainable Agriculture Network, is a Core Team Member of the Pasture Project, and Co-Investigator for Team SoilCarbon. He also serves as an officer in the Starkville Civitan Club and is active in his local church.
Carter F. Randolph, Ph.D. has been engaged in agriculture for most of his life. At age 13 he began his agricultural career as a farmhand for Louis and Louise Nippert on the Greenacres Farm. He then attended the University of Cincinnati and received his MBA in 1979 and his PHD in Finance in 1986. In 1988, he assisted Louis and Louise Nippert in establishing the Greenacres Foundation and became the first employee. Today, he is a Founder, Trustee and President of Greenacres. Greenacres farm activities include multi-species grazing (In Practice Article in January/February 2009, #123) and vegetable production. In addition, Greenacres provides customized experiential learning opportunities for area school children and in 2015 hosted over 28,000 visitors. Each program at Greenacres is designed to meet the needs of the classroom teacher and utilizes sustainable agriculture, environment, water quality, equine, cultural arts and culinary arts to design the hands-on experiences. Greenacres is located in Cincinnati, Ohio and serves children from the inner city and suburbs.
Jim Parker is a rancher/investor, who first served on HMI’s Board of Directors in the late 1980s. Originally from Parkersburg, West Virginia, he and his wife, Carol, have made their home in Colorado since the late 1970s. “Sixteen years ago,” says Jim, “two important events occurred. My second child was born and I attended my first Holistic Management class. Life on our Colorado ranch was never again the same and that was a good thing. Holistic Management also began to change the way I interacted within other diverse business interests and my participation on several non-profit boards.” He served two terms on the Colorado Agriculture Commission, bringing a perspective shaped by Holistic Management, served as president of the Colorado River Watershed, and has been active and held leadership positions in various livestock and conservation organizations. “In my years of studying, social, economic, and agricultural issues, I have become ever more convinced that the Holistic Management decision making process has an absolutely crucial role to play in addressing the crisis of resources we now face,” says Jim. “I can think of no more hopeful or critical cause to be involved with than Holistic Management.”
Greg Judy and his wife, Jan, run a grazing operation on 1620 acres of leased and owned land in Missouri. They use Holistic High Density Planned Grazing to graze cows, cow/calf pairs, bred heifers, horses, sheep, pigs, and stockers. They direct market grass-fed beef, lamb and pork. Greg wrote NO RISK RANCHING, Custom Grazing On Leased Land” in 2001. In 2008 Greg wrote a second book COMEBACK FARMS, Rejuvenating Soils, Pastures and Profits with Livestock Grazing Management. Greg has given numerous talks and schools all over the United States on the benefits of Holistic High Density Planned Grazing, leasing land, multi-species grazing, custom grazing and wildlife management. The Judys hold Holistic High Density Grazing Schools at their farms teaching the principles of HHDG. Greg quit his off farm job in 2009 and is now a full-time rancher and consultant.
Clint Josey was raised in Dallas, Texas. He attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology, United States Naval Academy, University of Texas at Austin, and Southern Methodist University and earned a B.S. in Petroleum Engineering and M.S. in Mathematics. Clint has worked as an independent in oil and gas exploration from 1954 to present. Beginning in 1974, Clint bought ranches in Cooke County, Texas and has always been interested in good land stewardship. He became interested in Holistic Management in 1983 through Allan Savory. Clint began serving on the Board of Directors of the Center for Holistic Resource Management in 1984. In 2007, Clint became Vice-President and Chairman of the Board of The Dixon Water Foundation.
Will Harris is a fourth-generation cattleman, who tends the same land that his great-grandfather settled in 1866. Born and raised at White Oak Pastures, Will left home to attend the University of Georgia’s School of Agriculture, where he was trained in the industrial farming methods that had taken hold after World War II. Will graduated in 1976 and returned to Bluffton where he and his father continued to raise cattle using pesticides, herbicides, hormones, and antibiotics. They also fed their herd a high-carbohydrate diet of corn and soy.
These tools did a fantastic job of taking the cost out of the system, but in the mid-1990s Will became disenchanted with the excesses of these industrialized methods. They had created a monoculture for their cattle, and, as Will says, “nature abhors a monoculture.” In 1995, Will made the audacious decision to return to the farming methods his great-grandfather had used 130 years before.
Since Will has successfully implemented these changes, he has been recognized all over the world as a leader in humane animal husbandry and environmental sustainability. Will is the immediate past President of the Board of Directors of Georgia Organics. He is the Beef Director of the American Grassfed Association and was selected 2011 Business Person of the year for Georgia by the Small Business Administration.
Will lives in his family home on the property with his wife Yvonne. He is the proud father of three daughters, Jessi, Jenni, and Jodi. His favorite place in the world to be is out in pastures, where he likes to have a big coffee at sunrise and a 750ml glass of wine at sunset.
For nearly 35 years, Alisa Gravitz has led Green America, the national green economy organization. Green America develops marketplace solutions to social and environmental problems with a key focus on climate, sustainable agriculture, fair trade and responsible finance. Green America operates the nation’s largest green business and consumer networks. Ms. Gravitz is a leading expert on how families and businesses can “go green,” saving money and resources. She is also a nationally recognized leader in the social investment industry. She authored Green America’s acclaimed Guide to Social Investing, with over a million copies in print and the popular Guide to Community Investing. As part of Green America’s Center for Sustainability Solutions, which focuses on transforming supply chains, she also co-chairs innovation networks on carbon farming, sustainable agriculture and clean electronics. Ms. Gravitz’s board service includes Ceres, Positive Future Network, Network for Good, Non-GMO Project and Underdog Foundation. She earned her MBA from Harvard University and her BA in economics and environmental sciences from Brandeis University. Green America is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
Deborah Clark and her husband Emry Birdwell run a stocker operation of 5,000–7,000 head on the 14,000-acre Birdwell & Clark Ranch in Clay County, Texas. The enterprise mix consists of 2,000 stocker cattle on leased wheat acres and one herd of approximately 5,000 head at the ranch using a high density grazing management plan. The primary goals of the grazing practice are to consistently improve range conditions, soil health, and cattle productivity. A secondary interest is assessing and monitoring the impact of high density grazing on wildlife and habitat with a focus on bobwhite quail. Emry has been a practitioner of Holistic Management since the early 1980s and Deborah has been involved in Holistic Management since 2009. As a Certified Educator Deborah works to help others learn to manage their resources in a way that keeps the business, land, family, and community healthy.
Ron Chapman, founder and principal of Magnetic North LLC, www.MagneticNorthLLC.com, is an inspirational and motivational speaker and consultant specializing in organization development and personal and professional growth. The core of Holistic Management is getting to root causes, he says, and that likewise forms the core of Ron’s consulting work. The phrase he uses over and over again with clients is: “An incomplete understanding of any problem or situation will always lead to an incomplete solution or action. But when complete understanding occurs, appropriate actions become readily apparent.” Ron is an award-winning speaker and workshop leader as well as a long-time public radio commentator, winner of the 2004 and 2001 National Federation of Press Women Award for Personal Commentary and the 2002, 2003 and 2004 Best Radio Feature Awards from the New Mexico Broadcasters Association for his radio programs exploring social and cultural concerns, including Holistic Management. He is also the author of four books, and three audio sets which focus on creating new perceptions and thereby transforming our lives and the organizations of which we are a part. Ron holds a Masters Degree in Social Welfare from the University at Albany (New York), a Bachelors Degree in Business from Valparaiso University, and Toastmasters International’s highest recognition of International Accredited Speaker. His clientele includes non-governmental organizations like the World Health Organization, non-profits including Habitat for Humanity, government units such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and private sector organizations including HealthSouth Corporation. From 2004 to 2014, Ron served as a member of the Board of Directors of HMI, which includes three years as Chair. In recent years he has launched a new initiative, www.SeeingTrue.com, which is a platform for transformational perspectives and a budding forgiveness practice.
Sallie Calhoun attended Rice University and graduated with a BSEE in 1977. She moved to the Bay Area immediately after graduation and worked in the high tech industry for 25 years. Since 2000, Sallie has been involved in a variety of activities in the fields of local, sustainable agriculture and philanthropy, serving on numerous for profit and non-profit boards. Sallie is an avid tennis player and hiker and enjoys traveling. Sallie and her husband Matt have two children and live in Paicines, California.
William Burnidge is an integral leader in both The Nature Conservancy’s Colorado state program and North America Agriculture program. As the Sustainable Grazing Lands Program Director for Colorado, his work involves building and testing tools to improve conservation, business and quality of life conditions on commercial cattle ranches. William also strives to define and improve incentives that advance sustainable practices. Integral to his job, William collaborates with NGO, agency and beef value chain partners to share and support proven tools and approaches that advance sustainable grazing goals. Among his many career accomplishments, William’s successful 10-year management of the Conservancy’s 14,000-acre Fox Ranch as both a nature preserve and a commercial ranching operation has positioned him as a well-respected and sought-after expert on the integrated management of grazing lands. In 2017, William – in addition to his Colorado program work – began working as a Sustainable Grazing Lands Coda Fellow for the North American Agriculture Program. He is providing much-need insight and technical guidance to promote the use of conservation planning among key players in the beef supply chain to achieve significant environmental, social and economic benefits. Since joining the Conservancy in 2005, William’s list of accomplishments include advancing the sustainable use of the Ogallala Aquifer in Colorado, protecting vital lands in northeast Colorado with conservation easements, and helping shape renewable energy strategies for the Colorado state program and the North America region. He also managed the Conservancy’s relationship with the Colorado State Land Board, providing technical guidance for its energy development programs, support for management of its large ranch assets, and input to its stewardship programs and policies. Prior to joining the Conservancy in Colorado in 2005, William worked in consulting and with the U.S. Business Council for Sustainable Development to advance large corporate sustainable development projects. He earned his MBA and MS in Environmental Policy at the University of Michigan and his BS in Wildlife Management and Biology at the University of Wisconsin – Stevens Point. Outside of work, William enjoys life in Colorado with his lovely wife and two delightful daughters.
Brad Schmidt lives in Volga, South Dakota where he is a Regional Agronomist for Ducks Unlimited. He graduated from South Dakota State University in 2017 with a Bachelor’s in Agriculture Science and has been involved with Regenerative Agriculture for about seven years. He was able to convert the family farm in southwest Minnesota to 100% no-till, with diverse cropping rotations, diverse livestock enterprises, cover crops, and rotational grazing. He is also a co-owner in the farm’s direct marketing business for their meat products. The farm goal is to be 100% pasture and grass-fed in the near future. When Brad was in college he came across a video of Gabe Brown on YouTube, thus starting his obsession. During college, he was fortunate to work for Dr. Dwayne Beck of Dakota Lakes Research Farm who became his mentor. After college, he was employed by Cronin Farms of Gettysburg, South Dakota working alongside Dan Forgey. He was then hired on with Ducks Unlimited to head up their Soil Health Program. He has traveled around the United States and Canada, working with producers to help change and adapt their practices. He also works with large companies on their “sustainability” goals and how they can better work with the farmers and ranchers that produce their products. Brad’s first introduction to Holistic Management was a conversation he had with Ray Archuleta during college who advised him to read Allan Savory’s book. After reading Holistic Management, he attended a number of Savory’s talks and watched his YouTube videos. Brad’s first introduction to HMI was through HMI’s Board Chair, Walter Lynn. Brad is looking forward to sharing his experiences and failures as a young producer interested in regenerative agriculture and Holistic Management. He wanted to serve on HMI’s board because it’s important to future generations of this world to understand the system processes. “No matter what walks of life we come from whether it’s urban or rural, we are all connected,” says Brad. Like Dr. Beck always says, we need to be forward-thinking 600 years into the future. In my short tenure of that 600 years, I hope I can help make a difference any way I can.” HMI would also like to thank Robert Potts of the Dixon Water Foundation for his years of board service. He steps off from the board after completing his board term.
Jim and his wife, Sara, live in Vinita Oklahoma where they operate a cow/calf and stocker cattle ranch.. Jim spent 35 years in the banking industry, retiring in 2010, but continues to use his professional experience as HMI’s Chair of the Finance and Audit Committee. Jim became interested in Holistic Management in the late 1980s after reading about how Holistic Management was being used in the Southwest. Shortly after, he took a Holistic Management course and has since been integrating the HM principles into his own operation. Jim firmly believes that as HMI moves forward with its educational offerings that we will be able to provide a positive impact on landscapes and the people and families that are on the land.
Delane lives at the Taos Pueblo in Taos, New Mexico. He is the Executive Director of the Indian Nations Conservation Alliance. He earned an M.S. in Ranch Management and Agribusiness from the King Ranch Institute for Ranch Management at Texas A&M University-Kingsville and a B.A.Sc. in Agribusiness/Agricultural Business Operations at Oklahoma Panhandle State University. He also serves on the board of directors for Navajo Agricultural Products Industry and is the former chair of the Native American Rangeland Advisory Committee for the Society for Range Management. Delane has been drawn to Holistic Management for a number of years but took his first formal Holistic Management training through HMI’s Whole Farm/Ranch Land Management Training course in 2016 with Kirk Gadzia. Delane is excited about being on HMI’s board and brings his expertise with tribal lands to share with the organization.
Avery is the Director of Community Impact Initiatives and Vice President of Soil Health for the Globetrotter Foundation, based in Paicines, California. She has a BA from Hamilton College (2003) and a Master’s degree from the Yale University School of Forestry and Environmental Studies (2008). Prior to joining Globetrotter’s team, she was the president of Impairative LLC, a consulting company dedicated to activating authentic relationships between the people, land, and animals in our emergent food system by strategically pairing philanthropy with regenerative opportunities. Prior to that, Avery worked for the Quivira Coalition, a non-profit in New Mexico dedicated to building resilience on Western working landscapes, as a program director from 2008 to 2012, and then as the executive director from 2012 to 2015. She has a successful history of building partnerships between diverse constituencies comprised of other non-profit leaders, businesses, philanthropists, ranchers/farmers, scientists, federal and state land management agencies, youth, and tribes. In addition, Avery has experience in fundraising, human resource management, financial planning, risk management, strategic decision-making, and facilitation. She is a Wyss Conservation Scholar, an Audubon TogetherGreen Fellow, and a recipient of the 2011 New Mexico Business Weekly’s “40 Under 40” Award. She was a founding board member of the National Young Farmers’ Coalition and currently serves on the boards of Holistic Management International and the New Mexico Farmers’ Marketing Association, as well as the Advisory Council of the Western Landowners Alliance.
Avery is deeply honored to join the Board of HMI. With a decade of experience in working with several of HMI’s “sister” organizations, joining the Board feels like “coming home.” HMI is the undisputed leader in regenerative problem-solving and Avery feels fortunate for the opportunity to work in service to this remarkable team.
Before making his way to HMI, Oris spent time employed for the only shelter that serves homeless women and children in Albuquerque. There he learned about the stigma associated with homelessness and learned about the unique challenges facing homeless women and children. He is an animal rescuer, bicycle rider, avid gardener, and sun worshiper. Being born and raised in the Land of Enchantment, Oris feels a deep connection with the holistic traditional customs of New Mexico.