Richard Collins

Richard C. Collins is a native Arizonan, born on a ranch outside of Phoenix, who graduated from the ASU and the UofA on rodeo scholarships. Trained as a research biologist, he worked for US Centers for Disease Control in Guatemala and southern Mexico in the 1970-80s focusing on River Blindness, a disease subsequently eliminated by the drug he was testing there. Collins returned to ranching in the 90's, purchasing a 13,000 acre spread in Sonoita, southeast of Tucson. There, just miles above the border with Mexico, he began to understand through experience the border issues of immigrant and drug trafficking and their impact on his land, our country and on Mexico. Collins' latest book, "Cowboy is a Verb: Notes from a Modern-Day Rancher", University of Nevada Press, 2019, intimately recounts a battle over the endangered Gila topminnow and how he and his neighbors worked with scientists, conservationists, and funding agencies to improve the ranches as well as the ecological health of the Redrock Canyon watershed. Bill McDonald, co-founder of the Radical Center, past president of the Malpai Borderlands Group, and fifth generation rancher, and MacArthur Foundation Fellow calls it, "The best description of ranching in southeast Arizona that I have yet run across". A born storyteller with a flair for words, Collins breathes life into the geology, history, and interdependence of land, water, and native and introduced plants and animals. With both humor and humility, he recounts the day-to-day challenges of ranch life such as how to build a productive herd, distribute cattle evenly across a rough and rocky landscape, and establish a grazing system that allows pastures enough time to recover. In 2008, he joined a congenial group of Mexican riders retracing the pathways of Eusebio Francisco Kino, the 17th Century pioneering Jesuit priest who explored the same borderlands of Arizona and Sonora. Called the Padre on Horseback, each year the riders choose 75-150 miles of Father Kino’s trails and follow them on horseback, traveling much as he did three hundred years prior. The riders include a cross-section of Mexico's growing middle class, bonded by faith in the Catholic Church, love of family and their country, and dedicated to the cause of Kino's sainthood. They are also troubled by America's failed war on drugs and its outdated immigration policies, and they often wonder if the United States is their ally or adversary. The rides, called cabalgatas, form the basis for Richard's award-winning book, "Riding Behind the Padre: Horseback Views from Both Sides of the Border" (Wheatmark, 2014). While telling the details of four annual rides, he takes us "up close and personal" into the ranches and rural areas of the Sky Island borderlands and illustrates how most Mexican families share America’s hopes and dreams. Richard lives and writes from Sonoita, Arizona with Diane, his partner of fifty-plus years. You can learn more about them at www.richardccollins.com.