Anchorage Daily News

LAZY MOUNTAIN -- Down a muddy lane on Todd Pettit's 600-acre Pitchfork Ranch near Palmer stands a herd of bison 65 strong.

It's mid-April, but already mosquitoes swirl around their massive heads. They utter soft "woofs" as their leader, a 2,000-pound behemoth named Rumble, swaggers forward to eye a visitor.

These animals are meant for more than life as tourist attractions. Pettit is one of a dedicated band of Alaska farmers raising sometimes-exotic breeds for meat, breeds that include bison, elk and even yak.

It's no easy way to make a living -- high, sturdy fences and the ability to run fast are a must. But ranchers from Kenai to Kodiak to the Mat-Su say they have found eager customers drawn by the health benefits of leaner meat and a desire to eat locally produced food.

"It's kind of taking off," said Ruby Hollembaek, head of the Alaska Diversified Livestock Association. The group represents about 30 farmers statewide who offer products ranging from bison fur scarves to elk sausage.

Hollembaek said she's seen steady growth in the industry over the past decade as farmers have turned from raising cows and pigs to bison and elk.

She and her husband run a 2,000-acre farm near Delta Junction where, after years of raising cattle and swine, they bought their first bison in 1994. At the time, they were looking for something cheaper to feed than cattle, she said.

Now their herds run to 300 bison and 30 elk, which they sell for meat and for on-site hunts that can cost as much as $3,700 a pop. The hunts in particular have proved popular; this winter, the couple had to turn clients away, she said.

'YAK ATTACK'

Just a few miles away from the Hollembaeks' place is the 8,000-acre Sawmill Creek Ranch, home to a herd of 100 yak. These shaggy beasts, which look a bit like walking carpets, are native to Tibet and Nepal and historically serve as pack animals and sources of milk. Yak are big-boned animals with short, angular bodies and weigh as much as 800 pounds. They are typically more docile than bison or elk.

Ruth and Richard Karr started Sawmill Creek Ranch 15 years ago after Richard left the Army. He knew he wanted to farm, and she happened to see a picture of a yak in a book.

"I said, 'Look at these yaks. ... You should look about that,' " Ruth Karr said.

Mary Kaspari of Delta Junction, a nurse, began working at the ranch last year. She said she's sold more than two dozen yak through word of mouth to people in Anchorage, Wasilla and even Hawaii.

Some say they just want to say they've tried it. But many like the health benefits of eating meat that is high in protein but low in cholesterol and fat, Kaspari said.

Her line of work provokes a few laughs. "They called me Mary Mack with the yak attack," she said.

Kaspari, who enjoys yak burger soup and yak lasagna, said yak meat has a "lighter, sweeter flavor" than beef, but isn't gamy like moose. The price for ground yak is also fairly competitive at $3 a pound.

Yet cooking yak isn't quite as easy as slapping a hamburger on the barbecue. Because of its low fat content, the meat, particularly the steaks, needs special care in the cooking, she said.

Overcook a yak steak, and "you can make a wallet out of it," she said.

EAT LOCAL

Hollembaek said Alaska's exotic meat ranchers benefit from a nationwide movement to eat local. The movement stresses eating food produced nearby over grocery-store fare that sometimes has been shipped from thousands of miles away.

Even those clients who hunt on her farm, including those from the Lower 48, say they like that they saw the animal and knew it was healthy, she said.

"They want to see what the animal looks like on the hoof," she said. "They want to make sure it's a clean animal, not sickly."

The local angle is a draw for Mimi Peabody, who lives just four miles from Pettit's farm. She started buying bison from him four years ago after trying locally raised beef. But taste is important too.

A former vegetarian, Peabody said bison burgers are her new comfort food and bison is a regular centerpiece on her dinner table. One Sunday in late April, she and her husband, Will, sat down to plates of barbecued bison ribs steeped in stout and a mashed medley of potatoes, rutabagas and parsnips pulled from her root cellar.

"Quite honestly, I think that the bison is probably the very best red meat I've eaten," she said. "It just has a quality about it. It just has some depth, some flavor."

Taste aside, raising bison and elk has decided advantages over raising cattle. They are far more efficient eaters -- digging up twigs, grass and other browse on their own. And these animals process their hay and grain much more efficiently than cows.

Pettit said his bison eat about 1,000 pounds of hay a day in winter, about half the amount the same number of cattle would eat.

Yet raising animals like bison and elk is clearly not for everyone. For one, there's the matter of keeping them penned in.

Six feet tall, Pettit is a soft- spoken man with a linebacker's build. A thin, crescent-shaped scar graces his cheek, the remains of massive facial reconstruction he underwent after being kicked by a thoroughbred mare. His grandparents built Pitchfork Ranch from scratch after settling the land in 1954.

He started with five bison calves in 1998 after years of working cattle. Six-foot-high wire fence anchored with posts of steel pipe keeps the bison penned; an 8-foot-high fence serves for the elk. And even that sometimes isn't enough to contain the skittish animals.

RUMBLE'S ROAR

Rumble, Pettit's lead bull, for example, once tossed a lesser bull end over horns over a 6-foot fence for challenging his authority. And he doesn't exactly submit to being herded. His roar alone is intimidating, Pettit said.

"The first time I heard it, I looked up for the jet," he said. "You feel it in your chest. It's like a lion. It's unearthly."

Kramer, Pettit's bull elk, can also be a troublemaker. He'll eat from Pettit's hand one moment and try to skewer him on his antlers the next.

"I haven't been hit by them, but I've had some very up close and personal issues," Pettit said.

While the farmers said business has been good, they don't see the market for bison and elk growing all that fast, in part because of the limited number of people with the space and ability to deal with the animals.

Another limiting factor for now is that few opportunities exist for consumers to purchase Alaska-raised bison or elk at local grocers or farmers' markets, Hollembaek said.

Federal rules require meat from animals sold to the public to be killed at certified slaughtering facilities. Yak will submit to being trailered, but elk, bison and musk ox typically do not take well to being moved on anything but their own four feet, she said.

"They get stressed and the hormones get flying and it compromises the quality of the meat," Pettit said.

Instead, customers, like those who buy from Pettit and Hollembaek, have to buy the animal, or part of it, then have it butchered on the farm.

Based on his own experience, Pettit said, he thinks there's room for more ranchers in this business. After ranching for seven years without advertising, he got his first cold calls last year, and had to turn away another 10 people who wanted bison meat, he said.

"I think you could be as big as you wanted to be right now," he said.

Find S.J. Komarnitsky at adn.com/contacts/skomarnitsky or call her in Wasilla at 1-907-352-6714.

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