Your legacy is something you ponder when you reach a certain age. According to Merriam-Webster, a legacy is:

1. something (such as personal property or money) that is willed to someone by a person who has died

2. something transmitted by or received from an ancestor or predecessor or from the past.

 I know it’s been on my mind recently. I’d like to share the story of my friend and former boss, Gary Krause, and his amazing legacy.

 GARY’S LEGACY

Gary has left all but 30 acres of his 1,670-acre West Texas ranch to The Nature Conservancy. This means that, after three years of hard work, the Krause Ranch will be protected in perpetuity from development or fragmentation.

 HOW GARY’S LEGACY CAME ABOUT

As a child, Gary would sometimes accompany his father, a West Texas USDA County Agent, on visits to area ranches to persuade landowners to adopt conservation practices. Additionally, he spent three years on a farm with his grandparents. After they moved to town and his father wouldn’t take him to a ranch any time he wanted, Gary got it into his head that he craved one of his own.

 By 1983, Gary began to turn his childhood dream into reality. He bought his first piece of Hill Country property in 1983. The land was going to be turned into a subdivision, but fortunately, the developer went bankrupt. After that, he kept buying up land, one piece at a time.

LEGACY OF LEAVING IT BETTER THAN HE FOUND IT

Fortunately, Gary worked to leave the land to us in better shape than he found it. The White settlers who came before him wrecked the land by chasing off the Native Americans and killing all the buffalo. The buffalo used to come every few years. By stomping the ground, they would aerate it and eat everything in sight, allowing the plants to grow back, fertilized with tons of buffalo dung. The Native Americans would intermittently ignite fires that burned the small, pesky cedar trees that sucked water out of the earth. But the settlers hated fires and made sure they didn’t occur.

 Lastly, they overgrazed the property, allowing the cedars (technically called Ash juniper) to crowd out all other plants and take over the land. Keeping the cedar at bay is a full-time job, and Gary has a father-son team dedicated to keeping them under control.

 Who knew?

 WHY GARY’S LEGACY MATTERS

 In Texas, 95% of the land is privately held, and places such as Krause Ranch are being broken up as cities expand into the countryside. According to the Texas A&M Natural Resources Institute, the Lone Star State loses about 640 acres of farm and ranchland each day to land conversion.

 Most importantly, the Krause Ranch is home to an artesian spring that a long-term Texas Parks and Wildlife study shows contributes about a billion gallons of water a year to the Frio River. The river also receives water from more than four additional miles of spring-fed creeks and streams on the ranch. This water feeds into the Edwards Aquifer. The City of San Antonio depends on this water table for drinking water.

 Protecting land such as Gary’s, is vital in our battle against climate change.

 LAST THOUGHTS ON GARY’S LEGACY

Gary has left me some big shoes to fill. While we cannot all leave such a labor of love to posterity, we can all leave a meaningful legacy by living lives that positively impact those around us.

 What will your legacy be?

 The tale of this remarkable legacy is documented in A Resurrection of Springs: Krause Ranch and the Frio River Hill Country by Texas A&M Press. This beautiful coffee-table book is chock-full of gorgeous pictures of the ranch’s flora and fauna.

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