Columnists - The Durango Herald

‘Compassion, collaboration, a willingness to listen and learn’

For the last six years, I have called Durango home. This community has been instrumental to my growth, development and advancement as a young adult. Durango has beautiful landscapes, amazing...

DATE: Mar 5, 2023 | CATEGORY: Opinion

‘Lodgers tax to subsidize affordable workforce housing, not tourism’

“Affordable Housing” is a phrase you’ll hear from other candidates in this election. Don’t get tricked into thinking that these candidates have anything in mind other than the status quo. Mo...

DATE: Mar 5, 2023 | CATEGORY: Opinion

Voluntary stopping eating and drinking

Sometimes conversations with other elders are about how we want our deaths to be. We want them gentle, peaceful, surrounded by loved ones (or not). Many friends of mine have died recently. O...

DATE: Mar 4, 2023 | CATEGORY: Authentic Aging

Seed swaps, exchanges and sales can help solve sold-out woes

Back in 2021, and even lingering into 2022, there was a shortage of vegetable seed available to gardeners (and even farmers). All sorts of factors led to scarcity, and you could lay blame wi...

DATE: Mar 4, 2023 | CATEGORY: From the Extension Office

Diabetes struggle causes concern

DEAR ABBY: My best friend, who is 54, has had Type 1 diabetes since she was 9. She takes two insulin shots a day – one in the morning and one in the evening. We live together, and at night h...

DATE: Mar 4, 2023 | CATEGORY: Dear Abby

Public education a public good – we are its beneficiaries

In Colorado, as elsewhere in our nation, conservative activists are challenging what they view as “liberal indoctrination” of schoolchildren by the “woke” public education system. Florida Go...

DATE: Mar 4, 2023 | CATEGORY: Guest Columns

Two words: ‘Keep out’

Thoughts on fishing, navigating private property

DATE: Mar 3, 2023 | CATEGORY: Flies & Lies

Living arrangement has woman feeling trapped

DEAR ABBY: I live with my longtime boyfriend, “George,” and his 88-year-old father, “Frank.” Frank is not your average 88-year-old. He does almost everything anyone in their 60s would do. Ho...

DATE: Mar 3, 2023 | CATEGORY: Dear Abby

ON stops at The Hive

Steve Fall and his band ON operate like a mom-and-pop store in the independent music business. They’re an everything under one roof operation, from self-production and the release of their ...

DATE: Mar 2, 2023 | CATEGORY: Downtown Lowdown

Durango High School student performs song with Green Day

Band shares video of her playing guitar via social media

DATE: Feb 28, 2023 | CATEGORY: Talk about Town

No appreciation for man’s preferred dress

DEAR ABBY: I am a man who has been wearing lingerie for the past few decades. I discovered my love of panties when I slipped into my first pair at 17. At 22, I discovered the fun and sexines...

DATE: Feb 28, 2023 | CATEGORY: Dear Abby

Receiving the full experience

When was the last time you tasted your food? Like, really tasted it? Oftentimes we move through our days not fully engaged in what we’re actually doing. We’re thinking about something else o...

DATE: Feb 28, 2023 | CATEGORY: Nourishing Morsels

Photos: Cowboy Gathering Social and Parade

Photos: High County Cattle Auction

High Country Cattle Auction brings top-notch stock and country charm to Southwest ColoradoFamily run, generational business dates back to 1940s

BREEN – The family-owned and operated High Country Cattle Auction is “in the bones” of the Cugnini family, said third-generation owner Chris Cugnini. The business was founded by Chris’ grandfather, Pat Cugnini, in the 1940s. Pat then passed the business down to his son, Duane Cugnini, who then turned the business over to daughters, Becky Hawkins and Chris Cugnini, whose daughters plan to take over the family business one day. The auction, which takes place once or twice a month from April to January at 13062 La Plata Highway (Colorado Highway 140) near Breen, attracts ranchers, farmers and those in the cattle industry from far and wide.

Former Durango resident Steve Greenburg has been attending the High Country Cattle auction for more than 40 years, and continues to travel to Breen all the way from Arizona, where he now lives. He attended the September auction last week, where around 1,200 animals were up for sale. Greenburg said effective bidding takes concentration and a practiced hand. “You want to make sure you don’t pay too much,” he said. “And if you do, you want to buy the business.” Amber Belvin, employee of 15 years and Chris’ operations “sidekick,” said bidders are most often looking for signs of good health in an animal, like a plump, filled-out body. If bidding on a herd, a look of uniformity among the animals is key to a good purchase, she said.

Despite Greenburg already having a handful of filled out bidding cards marking the cattle he had won within an hour of the Sept. 23 auction, he said the day was young. One sale day last year culminated in Greenburg taking home 22 semi-trucks worth of cattle, he said. Chris said Greenburg is one of the auction’s longest-term and most generous supporters. “(Greenburg) pays top-dollar,” Chris said. “And (that) makes me feel good, because we’re giving back to (the sellers). I know these people around here, and they’re the hardest working people on the planet. If I can get them 10 or 20 cents more per pound, then that makes us happy.”

Cattle auction prices have gone up in recent years, both at High Country and nationally, Chris said. This year, animals are going for $2,500 to $3,000 a head – double and triple the average prices from last year. The increase, Chris said, is in part because of a screw worm making the rounds in cattle in Mexico, which has lowered the number of cattle coming in from the south, along with people subdividing and selling cattle branches, and local cattle herd numbers diminishing, which has increased demand.

Chris called the price increase “good and bad.” “It’s great if you’re a seller, because there’s prices that you’ve never seen before,” she said. “Older men come in, (and they) can’t believe the prices. Some of them do this for a living, and they count on that, so they’re so happy.” Belvin said some smaller farmers opt to buy less cattle during price surges like this, but echoed Chris’ sentiment about sellers being ecstatic about the unprecedented profit.

Local cattle farmer Lawrence Martinez entered 59 steers and 95 heifers in the auction Tuesday. Martinez has been involved in the High Country Cattle Auction “pretty much forever,” but recent years have been especially fruitful for sales, he said. “These last few years, we’ve been coming here to sell, because this is the place to go,” he said. “I wouldn’t sell anywhere else. (The market here has) been so good.”The auction’s community roots and generational touch doesn’t stop at the Cugnini family: Shane Hatch, the auctioneer, took over the job after his father’s death, Belvin said.

The auction serves as an opportunity for community members to get together and bond, Belvin said. “When we do have an auction, it’s a great place where local farmers and ranchers can get together and talk,” she said. “They come to the cafe, and they talk about the hay, and the drought situation, and I think it’s a good connecting point.” Chris and Belvin both expressed feeling glad the auction can supply so much generational value to the local farming and ranching community. “I mean, what other business can you think of around here that’s the same, right?” Belvin said. “We’re fair, and we’re very meticulous at our jobs. We take it very seriously, because this is (some peoples’) livelihood.”

For the Cugninis – and long-term employees like Belvin, who have become an honorary part of the close-knit High Country Cattle Auction family – the heart of the business aligns with the heart of the local farming and ranching community. “We’re just good, hard working people – Americans – that want to make a good living, and live off this great land,” Belvin said. epond@durangoherald.com

Family run, generational business dates back to 1940s