151 how does a cattle farmer from texas withstand a drought in the summer of 2011 as oppressive heat and drought hit texas grasses were dying and cows were running out of food to eat to save their cattle ranchers were forced to truck their cows to fields of healthy grass but as several farms were turning to dust cattle rancher jon taggart of grandview texas continued run his business im proud to say that we harvested cattle every week of the year through that entire drought he told abc news ginger zee and jon taggart who started finishing cattle on grass in 1999 abc news how did taggart stay open while other farmers were struggling the reason was because we planted those deeprooted native grasses that were designed by somebody a lot bigger than us to survive those droughts he said watch full episodes of food forecast floridas orange crops have been quietly dying for over a decade as growers fight to save them taggart has been raising grassfed and grassfinished beef since 1999 and owns three stores in texas called burgundy pasture beef while most beef that is sold in stores is finished on grain to fatten them up taggart and a small but growing number of farmers are feeding their cows grass exclusively for their whole lives that makes the grass as important to the farm as the cows themselves jon taggarts farm in grandview texas soil health has helped the farm withstand drought abc news we want an extremely diversified plant population warm season grasses cool season grasses grasses that germinate early grasses that germinate later that diversity of grass has kept taggarts soil healthy even as texas faces droughts the grasses ability to hold on to water when it rains has helped keep his farm healthy as drought and heat hit texas more farmers have followed taggart amid the starved soil jonathan and kaylyn cobb were ready to sell their family ranch until they learned that focusing on soil health could breathe life back into the land and save their family farm the cobbs had put their farm on the market until a sixthgeneration cattle farmer dr allen williams told them about entirely grassfed beef could revive their soil through rotational grazing ginger zee visits ranchers jonathan and kaylyn cobb who saved their soil by introduction grassfed cattle abc news rotational grazing starts with farmers breaking their land into paddocks or plots of grass and they move the cows from paddock to paddock to eat the grass sometimes theyll move the cows multiple times a day depending on the season this strategy revitalized the soil that was once unusable because of the droughts in texas that have been hard to bounce back from it used to be thought that you had to use a plow and till the soil up so you could get oxygen in there said jonathan cobb every time youre doing that you lose that aggregation and just have powdery soil