Agricultural Settlement and Land Use in Mountains - Mountain Geography: Physical and Human Dimensions - page 572

fornia—trucks often transport the stock. Eventually, these too seem destined to give
way to recreation interests, summer homes, and dude ranches where mostly American,
European, and Japanese city dwellers pay money to work a mountain ranch. This in-
volves herding stock to pasture on horseback, complete with “chuck wagon” meals and
tent camp. Aside from this profitable hybrid, transhumance in the United States is no
longer economically significant.
In summary, pastoralism in all variants is a common land-use strategy found in moun-
tains around the world. Though traditional in appearance, numerous external and in-
ternal influences are prompting social and agroeconomic change. Livestock are the pas-
toralists' economic mainstay, but they also depend on reciprocity with sedentary farm-
ers for other goods and services they need. This is different from the next strategy,
where cultivated crops are the primary source of income, but animals are an important
adjunct.
Mixed Agriculture
The importance of mixed farming varies considerably from one mountain region to the
next. It is most widely practiced in the middle latitudes, where it may be either a sporad-
ic and localized phenomenon or the principal land use. The particulars and settlement
vary widely across the mountain world. For example, llamas and potatoes dominate in
the Andes, yaks and barley are important in much of Central Asia, and cattle and corn
prevail in Africa. These differences aside, the ecological principles are similar, as are the
midlatitude agricultural constraints of low temperature, a short growing season, sloping
terrain, poor soil, unreliable moisture, and low plant productivity. Cultural strategies
to ameliorate these conditions include irrigation, terracing, spreading animal manure,
constructing buildings, introducing nonnative plant and animal cultigens, and the in-
direct cropping of marginal areas through animal husbandry. These tactics, along with
constantly evolving social and behavioral adaptations, allow humans to support them-
selves at moderate to high elevations outside the tropics. Even in heavily industrialized
regions of the Alps, Rocky Mountains, Australia and New Zealand, mountain farmers
still abide by the basic principles of mixed agriculture, albeit with some government
support.
Mixed farming and grazing is highly structured. As with the strategies discussed
earlier in this chapter, farmers engage in vertical exploitation at different times of the
year. They emphasize agriculture, since the production of supplemental feed becomes
essential in areas without winter pasture. Accordingly, farmers drive livestock to high
pastures during summer as a matter of expediency, and not because lowland grasses dry
up, as is usually the case for nomadic pastoralism and transhumance. In contrast, the
lush grasses typical of most midlatitude mountain valleys can easily support livestock
during the summer. However, if the animals remain at low altitudes, it becomes difficult
to cultivate fields or reap the hay that sustains livestock through the long winters. This
harvesting of summer fodder—or haying —is a defining attribute of midlatitude moun-
tains (Fig. 11.17).
Permanent settlement in this situation requires the preservation and storage of food
through the nonproductive season. People living in Eurasian mountains rely heavily on
milk and milk products because they can exploit well-fed and protected dairy animals