When Kit Laney answered a knock on his door Saturday, law enforcement officers from the U.S. Forest Service handed him a piece of paper announcing his Diamond Bar Ranch in southwest New Mexico would be shut down Wednesday and his 300 head of cattle grazing there would be removed – one way or the other.

Laney was not surprised. He knew someday there would be an on-the-ground confrontation to enforce a 1997 court ruling which says his cattle are trespassing on federal land.

That day has arrived.

Laney insists the land in question belongs to him; the Forest Service says it belongs to the federal government. So far, the federal court is on the side of the Forest Service.

But Laney is not willing to throw in the towel and give up the land that has been in his family since long before there was a U.S. Forest Service

Moreover, in New Mexico, there is a “brand law” that says, essentially, no cattle may be sold or transported out of state without approval from the State Livestock Board.

Local sheriff Cliff Snyder has notified the Forest Service and other state and federal officials that even though the Forest Service has a court order authorizing the confiscation of the Diamond Bar cattle, they “cannot be shipped and sold without being in direct violation of NM Statute.”

His memo also says “I intend to enforce the state livestock laws in my county. I will not allow anyone, in violation of state law, to ship Diamond Bar Cattle out of my county.”