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The article discusses developments in agricultural practices in Texas during the late-19th and early-20th centuries, with particular focus given to cattle ranching, the enclosure of land with barbed wire, and the growth of cattle feed crops. The author specifically examines the practices of Texas' XIT Ranch. The impact of agricultural industrialization on the ranch is also explained.

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One of the alarming features of the intersection of the world economic crisis with the global food and energy crises has been the tidal wave of large-scale land acquisitions it has unleashed. By enclosing the village commons and extinguishing the customary rights of smallholders, these land grabs are accelerating trends toward large-scale industrial farming and tenure rearrangements favoring international agribusiness. This article situates these developments in the social space of Ethiopia and a specific historical context of transformations in state and property relations. By critically analyzing the designation of the commons as empty or underutilized spaces awaiting redemptive development, it highlights the ways in which the legitimizing claims of terra nullius efface the complex ecologies and distinctive spatial dynamics of social reproduction in the zones designated for enclosures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parks have long attracted historians and archaeologists' attention as discrete features in the historic landscape. Traditionally, the role of parks in the economy of medieval England has been interpreted as being the preserve of deer for the hunting of the aristocracy. Hence literature emphasized their importance as status symbols in the landscape. Recently, their function has been reassessed recognising the wider economic activity of parks with regard to the pasturing of livestock and the valuable wood and timber which they offered. Focusing on a case study of Lilleshall Park, in north east Shropshire, this paper, based on the study of surviving cartographic and documentary evidence, provides an overview of developments in the post-medieval period, exploring the progress of enclosure and conversion of the park into farmland, the place of animal husbandry, the exploitation of deer, and the utilization of wood and timber resources for industrial purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

British colonial rule in India sought to bring the relatively autonomous forest and hill people under its governance through various policies. Land revenue policies combined with modern agricultural technology played a crucial role in expanding colonial state-making in forest and hill areas. This policy lured many land-hungry peasants from plains to migrate into these areas and bring vast areas of uncultivable land into cultivation. This process evicted adivasis (aboriginals) and reduced them to landless agricultural labourers. Others tried to retain their independence by migrating into the remaining forest tracts, which the British and princely rulers now classed as reserved for the sole use of the state. They were banned from utilising reserved forests in the old ways. Although the intention was to make the adivasis into productive subjects of a modern state, the reality was that they ended up as marginalised and excluded from this process. The colonial project of enclosing land thus enclosed the adivasis and stigmatised them as primitive or isolated communities. The isolation of the adivasis was a result of their marginalisation under the colonial rule. In this way, a boundary was created between the plains and hill regions of India, with different standards applying in each. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article discusses the work of Spanish geographer and politician Fermín Caballero, with particular attention to his book "Fomento de la población rural." Caballero's study of the politics of rural populations in Spain during the 19th century is analyzed, including the political management of rural areas, the rural geography and agriculture of Spain and his concept of an enclosed farmstead. A brief history of Caballero's political activity, specifically in working for Queen Isabella II, is also provided.

Market-led agrarian reform is a part of neoliberal agrarian restructuring. It is premised on assumptions that fail to recognise the socially embedded character of land transfers. Agrarian political economy offers an understanding of the processes surrounding land transfers that emphasises social embeddedness. As a consequence of the specific characteristics of neoliberal enclosure market imperatives are now used to deepen capitalist social property relations in the South. Neoliberal enclosure is in turn facilitating the reconfiguration of a 'bifurcated' agrarian structure in which emergent export-oriented capitalist farming sits alongside peasant subsistence-oriented farming. This is part of an ongoing process of expanded commodification of both rural products and rural labour, the latter of which is seen in widespread semi-proletarianisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Amphibians in the upper Midwest use agricultural ponds for breeding. Unfortunately, the risks (both direct and indirect) associated with using these ponds are poorly understood in both amphibian adults and larvae. In order to quantify these risks, we performed a comparison of larval survival rates between agricultural and natural ponds in southeastern Minnesota during the spring and summer of 2001. During this time, larval survival was observed in Rana pipiens tadpoles raised through metamorphosis in enclosures placed in agricultural and natural ponds. In addition, we measured tire levels of nutrients commonly linked with agricultural ponds (i.e., anamonia, total phosphorous, and total nitrogen), and whether or not nutrient concentration was associated with larval survival. No differences were detected in nutrient levels or survival of larvae reared in agricultural and natural ponds. Furthermore, neither nutrient levels nor pond type significantly predicted larval survival. Our data were highly variable, making the interpretation of our results difficult. The enclosures used to rear tadpoles were highly effective and can be easily incorporated into future studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the legal land enclosure that took place in England over a period of more than 400 years. A great deal of the land of England was enclosed in one way or another during the course of the eighteenth century, but in the light of the evidence now available, a strong case can be made out for the seventeenth rather than the eighteenth century as holding the pre-eminent position in the history of English enclosures. Although the source material necessary to enable one to establish precise measurements of the rate of pre-parliamentary enclosure in the various English counties may be lacking, there is no shortage of comment by seventeenth- century observers on the extent of enclosure in their own counties, or in those through which they traveled. A great deal of this contemporary comment has already been well digested in the secondary material now available on this subject. By drawing together the observations of contemporaries and the wealth of secondary material published in this century, it is now possible to suggest a new synthesis for the timing of enclosure in England.

The article discusses the Great Inclosure Movement, which brought into private occupation in Wales. It is averred that transhumance dominated widely and was not eventually eliminated until the middle of 19th century in remote areas. It is averred that pastoral pattern and effect of Inclosure were essentially different in lowland in England wherein the open-field system of cultivable farming was too hampering in its pattern to adapt the needs of new agriculture. The Inclosure in Wales meant the enclosure of rough grazings and wastes exclusively for the comparatively little share of tillable land on low ground had antecedently been introduced and consolidated into self-possessed holdings.