Who owns the majority of U.S. grazing land? Why have environmentalists and ranch

Most U.S. rangelands are federally owned and managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Ranchers are allowed to graze cattle on BLM lands for inexpensive fees, which many public lands advocates see as an inducement to overgrazing. Thus ranchers and environmentalists have traditionally been at loggerheads. In the past several years, however, ranchers and environmentalists have been finding common ground, as they team up to preserve ranchland against what each of them views in common as a threat?the encroaching housing developments of suburban sprawl. While developers will often pay good money for ranchland, many ranchers do not want to see the loss of the wide open spaces and the ranching lifestyle that they cherish.