Skeeter Bowers stands in a pen in front of hundreds of noisy, lowing calves at Brighton's sorting pens, and does a kind of play by play. Here, are the savannas - the grasslands - and they stretch as far as the eye can see. "To the average person, when they think Florida, they think of Mickey Mouse and sunny beaches. Skeeter Bowers, a cattle owner and tribal member at Brighton, loves it. The white boots, called "Lakeport Loafers," are for swampy water. Even before first light, cowboys in pickups show up with their horses, a few wearing spurs and some wearing white rubber boots and spurs. This year, there were 67 families participating. And every summer, over a two-week period, roundup comes at first one reservation and then the other, including all the family cattle owners as one big collective. They have tags in their ears tracing their lineage. They're sold on the Internet in the spring. The Seminoles raise a hardy breed called "Brangus," a cross between Brahmin and Black Angus - about 10,000 of them. It took decades of trial and error, different breeds and better genetics for the Seminoles to get the quality reputation they have today. Those Apache cattle weren't nearly adequate, and many died. "And that was the carrot that got my people to come to the Brighton reservation." They acquired this property and worked with us to have cattle - they actually brought cattle in from the Apache Mescalero reservation," said Johns. Alex Johns, 42, was born at Brighton, and is an officer with the Florida Cattlemen's Association. It's where the modern cattle herd was begun in the 1930s, even before the Seminole Tribe of Florida was federally recognized and incorporated in 1957. The 36,000-acre Brighton reservation, with an abundance of grassland and natural roughage, is 75 miles north from Big Cypress, near Okeechobee. "So, even though we'd been living here for 10,000 years, we were considered enemies of the state." "We wasn't recognized American citizens." All Native Americans have been U.S. government, " says Alex Johns, natural resources director for the tribe. "I don't know if we were the only - but one of the few - that never did sign a peace treaty with the U.S. ![]() (So did the original cows, which are known as "Florida Cracker cattle" - but they're just for show.) And certainly, by the late 1700s, explorers chronicled the many thousands of head belonging to the great Seminole leader known as "Cowkeeper." But those historic herds were all but wiped out in wars against the Seminoles in the 19th century, which nearly took out the tribe, too. The tribe likes to say cattle is "in our DNA," ever since Ponce de Leon brought over Andalusian cattle in 1521. is a major player in the cattle industry. Florida, with its lush grasslands, ranks 10th in the nation for its beef cattle herds - nearly 2 million head. The earliest Florida cowboys were native people. ![]() through Florida with the Spanish Conquistadors in the 1500s. But the first cattle, historians believe, entered what is now the U.S. Cattle roundups and cowboys usually bring the Old American West to mind. On the Seminole reservations of South Florida, July and August are cattle roundup time. "Cattle in my family goes all the way back to my great uncles. But a lot of people don't realize we've been deeply involved with cattle all the way back to the 1700s and 1800s," says Moses Jumper, beneath pictures of his forebears wearing Seminole tribal dress. "A lot of people look at us as wrestlin' alligators, and the casinos and all that. At the Big Cypress Reservation, Moses Jumper is a tribal elder and owner of nearly 300 head - and a fourth-generation cattleman. ![]() Recently, on a hot summer morning with cumulus clouds towering overhead, black cattle grazed in South Florida fields, dotting the horizon along with clumps of palm trees. Chris Green, a tribal member, and his son get the dogs out early to round up a herd at Big Cypress Reservation.Ĭarlton Ward Jr/National Geographic Creative
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