Issue link: http://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/873545
farm406 34 In California they're stealing pistachios and in Texas, it's cows. Montana's bee hives are disappearing, and so are tools, like plows. We don't like any of this very much. Montana farmers and ranchers have left sheds and shops open for years. They have left expensive equipment, such as combines and tractors, in distant fields with the key in the ignition. Coming from a sense of trust, they have never locked up because it's convenient for them, and they feel that the remoteness of their farms is their protection. Unlike in other states, those living in rural Montana, for the most part, indicate that they have never had anything stolen, but once it happens, they immediately become more aware of the environment inviting theft and the items that are easy prey. "Objects that can be gotten quickly and have no identifiable mark are most often stolen," said Larry Ophus, Chouteau County Sheriff. "Batteries and tools head the list." Rick Morris, a farmer in the Loma area, had three items stolen in May. "I lost a digital battery charger, a two-inch trash water pump, and a tool box containing combine parts located in a shed that we always left open since my brothers worked out of it daily. The perpetrators also cut the cables and tried to take the battery from one of the big trucks, but the battery weighed over two-hundred pounds, and they couldn't lift it. Later the water pump was retrieved several counties away," he said. "We have never had to do it, but now we have locks on those sheds." Nationally, rural crime costs more than $5 billion a year. It's difficult to wrap your mind around what can be taken to turn a buck because thieves take tools, timber, saddles and tack, chemicals, copper pipe or wire, livestock, fuel, lawn mowers, and fertilizer, among other less obvious items. Equipment and tools head the list because they can also be shipped overseas. Right now Montana is not one of the states, such as Florida, Texas, and the Carolinas, where the main purpose of rural theft is to export Far m T heft an d P reven tion It's Better To Protect Assets Now Than To Reg ret It Later Loma farmer, Rick Morris, kneels besides the water pump that was stolen and then later recovered. BY SUZANNE WARING PHOTOGRAPHY BY JOHN AND ELISHA MACK Photo by Eric Visocan