Bavaria and Montana Agri*Culture Exchange

During the last few years Marie and I have received numerous inquiries from production companies to use our ranch (and livestock and employees) to film a "reality" show. We have never considered participation in such an activity. In fact, the HPR, before we purchased it in 1995 was used for Marlboro commercials, but not since our family has owned the ranch.

Late last summer Marie got a call from Julia Kelbling, Associate Producer at StoryHouse Productions in Munich, Germany and Washington, D.C. Julia described a project that I felt was constructive and informative. The project was to film the activities of a young farmer in Bavaria, Germany, then take the German farmer to a ranch in Montana, USA and contrast Bavarian farming with Montana ranching. The show was to air on the Prosieben channel (www.prosieben.de) to German-speaking audiences in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria. In addition to helping German-speaking audiences understand cattle ranching in southwest Montana, I thought it would also be nice for our manager, Urs Schmidlin (who is from Switzerland), and our German daughter-in-law, Sabine (Bine) from Hemhofen, Bavaria, to have their families in Switzerland and Germany see the show. As it turned out, the German farmer's farm in Rugendorf, Bavaria is only an hour from Bine's village of Hemhofen.

The Germans arrived at the HPR late one evening in early September of last year, late enough to see the splash of clear stars in the Big Sky. It took us only minutes to realize that we had agreed to a very credible project from some wonderful professionals who were "blown away" by Montana. The producer, Mirella Pappalardo, in the next two days orchestrated the filming of various ranch activities, such as how we surface irrigate (a new concept for Germans), how we repair and maintain approximately 70 miles of barbed wire fencing, how we break colts, rope Calves and brand and doctor them, and many other ranch chores and activities.

When the Bavarian farmer, Michael Dressel, emerged from the AspenView cabin the next morning wearing gum boots and factory-looking blue coveralls, we knew we had some differences! We quickly introduced Michael to Wranger jeans, cowboy boots, chinks (e.g. chaps), and a cowboy hat. When Michael was dressed western, Urs took Morrison, one of our nicest family Quarter horses, to Michael. After orientation in the arena (compliments of Sherry and Urs), Michael was ready for work on horseback. In the next two days of filming the German film crew and Michael got introduced to roping, branding, doctoring, fence repair (both barbed wire and jackleg), and many other ranch activities. It was amazing how impressed the Germans were with everything, even my Ford F350 diesel pickup!

We quicky made friends with our German guests. They were such nice people. The show aired in November of last year and we got a DVD of the segment shortly thereafter. It was a charming production. Hopefully, some German-speaking audiences are now more informed of how we cattle ranch in Montana. The show depicted a beautiful contrast between two of the most beautiful landscapes in the world. The show also accurately portrayed the differences between German and American "AgriCulture". How informative and enjoyable it was to see Bavarian "FarmLife" contrasted with Montana "RanchLife". Another contrast for me is this contructive and informative project compared with those who would use RanchLife and its culture and icons as a backdrop for the promotion of their "Life"styles and agenda, which are neither constructive nor informative to this rancher.

Our Cowboy hats are off to Mirella and Julia and their very competent associates at StoryHouse Productions. Our hats are also off and our friendship extended to Michael and his family. If you would like to view photos of our German friends and their activities in Bavaria and Montana, go to our web site (http://www.ranchlife.com/photo_bavariamontanaexchange.htm) and click on the "Montana/Bavaria AgriCulture Exchange" album.