Columnists - The Durango Herald

John Simpson: School board veils intent, cost of bonds approved in recent election

While I am pleased that the School District 9-R bond issue passed in the November election, I am concerned with the subterfuge planned for the next step of the process. The school board told...

DATE: Dec 8, 2020 | CATEGORY: Guest Columns

Action Line passes the torch

Dear Action Line: Is it true you took a job with city and are giving up the column? – Dazed and Confused Dear Dazed: It is true. This is my final column. I have taken a job with the ci...

DATE: Dec 7, 2020 | CATEGORY: Action Line

Hey, neighbors: We will be cooking holiday meals for you

If you’ve read my articles over the years, you probably have a good sense of my upbringing. My grandpa, my dad, my sister and I were either born in Durango or nearby (my grandpa ...

DATE: Dec 7, 2020 | CATEGORY: From the Extension Office

Michelle Goldberg: The MAGA Revolution Devours Its Own

Gabriel Sterling, a Georgia election official and longtime Republican, held a news conference this week in which he excoriated Donald Trump’s lies about voter fraud and the threats of violen...

DATE: Dec 5, 2020 | CATEGORY: Guest Columns

Our View: Despite district’s best efforts, some students are falling behind

Despite district’s best efforts, some students need more help to catch up

DATE: Dec 5, 2020 | CATEGORY: Guest Columns

The sweetest gift – from me and to me!

It all just sort of happened. The news that my granddaughter had to begin her high school years online instead of in person devastated me. I remember how fun high school was – the crushes, t...

DATE: Dec 5, 2020 | CATEGORY: Authentic Aging

Moving on from 2020 without Rita

I saw a joke the other day on the internet saying that “2020” is going to be considered a term used for profanity. We have a new four-letter word in our vernacular. I laughed (we ...

DATE: Dec 5, 2020 | CATEGORY: From the Chamber

Mom sides with son-in-law over daughter

Dear Abby: I got divorced a year ago. Before it became final, there were many court appearances. My husband told my mother we were divorcing because I was unfaithful, which is true. What...

DATE: Dec 4, 2020 | CATEGORY: Dear Abby

Celebrating gratitude during a global pandemic

This year’s Thanksgiving was markedly different. Many of us followed the vital public health protocols to limit celebrations to those in our households, upending generations of tradition cen...

DATE: Dec 4, 2020 | CATEGORY: Creating Community

Biden needs to rollback the rollbacks on the environment

In early 2017, not long after President Donald Trump moved into the White House, his chief adviser, Steve Bannon, said the administration’s aim was the “deconstruction of the administrative ...

DATE: Dec 4, 2020 | CATEGORY: Guest Columns

Thomas Friedman: Dear Joe, Iran is not about the nukes anymore

With the assassination by Israel of Iran’s top nuclear warhead designer, the Middle East is promising to complicate Joe Biden’s job from Day One. President-elect Biden knows the region well,...

DATE: Dec 4, 2020 | CATEGORY: Guest Columns

Tension makes holiday outlook bleak

Dear Abby: I woke up crying this morning. The holidays are fast approaching, and many of them I spent with my younger sister “Leyla” and her family. It has been a tradition because our p...

DATE: Dec 3, 2020 | CATEGORY: Dear Abby

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