At Texas Tech University, students and faculty can find themselves splashing through the cool waters of the Llano River, trekking through mesquite-covered plains, and wading through lush pastures of native grasses. The common piece of each of these experiences? They don’t take place in Lubbock.

Across the state, Red Raider field stations at 3 Rivers Ranch, 7R Ranch and the Texas Tech Center in Junction, Texas, are setting the standard for hands-on learning and research in the Davis College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources—illustrating the concept that, while Lubbock is Texas Tech, Texas Tech is so much more than Lubbock.

Tech Ground in the Hill Country

The idea of Red Raider field stations first began with the acquisition of the Texas Tech University Center in Junction in 1971, said Warren Conway, Ph.D., who serves as director of the Llano River Field Station. Today, this 400-acre property, through which the South Llano River runs, is home to the Llano River Field Station, the largest inland field station in Texas.

Conway, who is also a professor in the Department of Natural Resources Management within the Davis College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, said the Junction station plays a crucial role in developing Texas Tech’s “statewide reputation,” especially in the Hill Country.

Most Texas Tech students first learn about the center in Junction through the overnight lab section of NRM 1401, an introductory-level course in which undergraduates spend a weekend at the Junction property, applying knowledge learned in the classroom to experiential learning stations.

Carsten Groos, a student in the wildlife, wildlands and aquatic science management master’s program, has grown to know the property quite well through his work as a lab teaching assistant for the course over the last two semesters. The immersive aspect of the lab, he said, forces students to get out of their comfort zones and practice critical thinking about classroom topics.

“Getting the hands-on experience through a lab like this one, in a place like this,” Groos said, “it adds a whole new element to the learning experience.”

In the lab, students rotate through five field stations on Saturday—all of which are designed to complement in-classroom learning while also providing opportunities for students to get their hands a little dirty. Topics covered, Groos said, include lessons on radio telemetry, identifying river fish and macroinvertebrates, and setting camera traps.

Wondu Whibesilassie, Ph.D., is the current course instructor for NRM 1401. The class, he said, is open to all majors across campus, and it uses this diversity of students to its advantage.

“Since these kids are from different disciplines, it’s all about creating an inspiration to appreciate nature and then enjoy the different ecosystems that we have,” Whibesilassie said.

In fact, many of the students participating in the lab enjoy it so much they return as volunteers. One such student is Jose Guerra Nunez, a senior NRM major who serves as a learning assistant for the lab.

“I love this river,” Nunez said. “I love this campus.”

Nunez, who said he is a visual learner, echoed Groos’ sentiment of the power of hands-on learning.

“It’s easy to just teach and tell numbers and show pictures in class,” he said, “but when you’re actually out here experiencing, learning—you can get it better.”

The center at Junction is also a critical resource for Davis College researchers. Along with his teaching duties, Groos is conducting research on the property and its surrounding areas. His research focuses on analyzing population densities and habitat associations of white tail deer, axis deer, and aoudads in the Hill Country—a perfect location for his research, he said, just based on the sheer density of animals in the region.

The goal of his research is to provide insights on these species that will inform both public and private land managers. In addition to the benefits of the region’s ecological diversity, Groos said simply being associated with the center in Junction makes his life as a researcher much easier, especially as he conducts research in the surrounding areas.

“It’s a common conversation topic with people in the area,” Groos said. “People know about the Junction campus; people know about the work that goes on here.”

Conway, who is also his advising professor, said research such as Groos’, which requires access to private lands, would be much more difficult to conduct without the center at Junction and the credibility it lends to projects.

“It’s a springboard for research in the region,” Conway said, “through making contacts with landowners and other ranchers and stakeholders in the region, working with them on relevant problems.”

The reputation of the Texas Tech Center at Junction, Groos said, shows that the value of these external properties cannot be overestimated.

“People think of Texas Tech, and they think of Lubbock,” Groos said, “but as a research university, there are so many other campuses and places and opportunities to get out and explore different things while still wearing the Double T brand.”

…as a research university, there are so many other campuses and places and opportunities to get out and explore different things while still wearing the Double T brand.

Carsten Groos

Big Empty, Big Opportunities

A newer addition to the university’s learning properties can be found a little over two hours northeast of Lubbock. Faculty and students alike have begun to cut their teeth on the 3 Rivers Ranch, a 6,000-acre property gifted to the Texas Tech University System in early 2024 by Dr. Fred Koch and the 3 Rivers Foundation for the Arts and Sciences.

The property, located 10 miles west of Crowell, Texas, sits in the “Big Empty,” a region of Texas spanning from Amarillo to outside the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. The area, characterized by its open lands, clear night skies, and sparse populations, represents significant potential for research and teaching within Davis College.

Aaron Norris, Ph.D., has already begun to incorporate the ranch into his syllabus. The associate NRM professor teaches a course on rangeland analysis and management planning, and the ability to apply his teachings to 3 Rivers, he said, has been hugely beneficial.

“It’s a massive, massive asset to us,” Norris said, “because it’s large enough in scale to be truly applicable to the region.”

For Norris, he said 3 Rivers fulfills a departmental need for arguably the most vital resource of all—land. In the past, he and his colleagues have struggled to find a property where they can consistently take students to apply hands-on classroom concepts.

“That’s where the property has so much power and is so beneficial to us,” Norris said. “It’s something that is stable. We can be strategic about it. The students play an integral role in it.”

Norris said 3 Rivers functions as the course’s “home base” over the semester. During their first visit to the property, students are placed in groups and assigned to a quadrant of the ranch associated with a specific recording unit, game camera and set of transects, which are linear paths along which data is routinely collected.

Getting students comfortable with the land, Norris said, is crucial for the success of their management plans. Their second visit to the property is when they begin more intensively monitoring vegetation along these transects, looking at factors like species composition and ground cover to ascertain the health of the land and its potential stocking rate.

“The students go through and actually do an assessment,” Norris said, “utilizing real world data to then come up with how they would manage that property if they were the managers.”

This data, collected in class by students, helps to create an encompassing picture of the property’s current state, which Norris said is vital as the department begins to make strategic decisions regarding range treatments.

As students in his course continue to collect and build upon the findings of previous courses, this has the potential to help shape published research and treatment methods in the future. This coalescence of teaching and research, Norris said, is key in understanding the impact of 3 Rivers.

“The research is where it takes us over the top,” Norris said. “Research is nothing, if it’s not applied.”

One doctoral student in the department, Shaelyn Rainey, said having access to 3 Rivers opens doors for more varied and meaningful research, in part because its management decisions can be directly informed by Texas Tech researchers, a vital difference compared to working with private landowners.

“I’m not saying we’re the managers,” Rainey said, “but we’re kind of informing the manager of what you do, more or less.”

Texas Tech’s influence on the property has injected newfound excitement into the ranch. Cady Alvarado, assistant director for Institutional Advancement at the Texas Tech University System, has worked for the property since 2006—long before it became a part of the university system. She said she looks forward to seeing how Texas Tech continues to expand and improve the ranch.

“The sky’s the limit,” Alvarado said. “A piece of property this size, in a location like we have…it’s just a gem.”

Pastures of Potential

The isolation of the 3 Rivers Ranch stands in stark contrast to Texas Tech’s most recent gift of land. The 7R Ranch, located just southwest of the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, sits in Hood County, an area of booming populations and disappearing agricultural lands.

Murray Randle gifted his 1,500-acre ranch to Davis College as an estate gift, which means the property formally transfers to the college upon his passing. However, Randle has already begun to allow Texas Tech researchers onto his award-winning property, as they build upon the conservation standards he set when he first began improving his land in the mid-1970s.

Conway, director of the Llano River Field Station, has worked closely with Randle before and during this transition phase. He said the location of the 1,500-acre ranch makes it vital in the field of conservation.

“In a nutshell, this will be the only green space here,” Conway said.

When deciding the fate of his land, Randle said he chose Texas Tech because the Davis College shared his vision for the future of his ranch—namely, preventing future development of the property.

“I want this to look like this a thousand years from now,” Randle said. “That’s the whole idea….and an education campus to teach kids what it’s supposed to look like.”

For Randle and Conway, they agreed that “what it’s supposed to look like” entails intensive brush management and grass restoration, practices that Randle has been implementing for the last 50 years. Conway said the property has massive potential from a wildlife and conservation standpoint as a “living lab” both for research and for real-world problem solving.

“When I talk to ranchers and when I talk to stakeholders,” Conway said, “they ask about brush, quail, and grass.”

The property, Conway said, represents almost endless potential for Davis College research and teaching opportunities, from the expansive native grass pastures to the lively populations of wild turkeys, deer, bats and wood ducks on the land.

Norris, the professor currently taking students to the 3 Rivers Ranch, said he looks forward to incorporating the 7R Ranch into his research and lesson plans in the future, especially as it provides access to a completely different ecological region. He also said he thinks the ranch is ideally located for outreach in the growing DFW metroplex.

“It gives us the ability to interact and be impactful for stakeholders in an area where we should be impactful,” Norris said, “and we should be the people that they turn to.”

The 7R Ranch also presents opportunities for outreach with local K-12 schools. Locations for meaningful outdoor learning, Conway said, will continue to become more important as urban centers expand. This will strengthen Red Raider bonds across the entire state as students become exposed to the university.

“That’s Tech ground,” Norris said. “And there’s so many supporters throughout [the DFW] region who finally have something in their backyard.”

The common threads running through each of the properties, Conway said, are the human connections that make all their respective research, learning and outreach possible—from the hills of Junction to the plains of the 3 Rivers Ranch to the pocket pastures of the 7R Ranch.

“Sometimes it’s less about the work,” Conway said, “and more about the relationships.”

Additional reporting and photography by Jordan Albus, Kylie Mask and Lillie Caudle Valdez.