Cattle rancher: Stolen onions “were my property”

A misguided social media post led countless people to steal a local cattle rancher’s onions, the rancher told ABC-7’s New Mexico Mobile Newsroom.

“It’s my property that people were taking,” said James Montoya, who has ranches in Doña Ana and Sierra counties. “I don’t even know how many people came out here.”

Montoya said Barker Produce donated thousands of onions to feed his cattle. He has 137 who roam on a ranch south of Interstate 10, which he said he leases from the state of New Mexico and the Bureau of Land Management. The onions taken by the public on Monday were in that ranch, Montoya said.

“We’re supposed to keep trespassers off,” Montoya said. “It’s a constant menace.”

The cattle rancher said onions are a cheap, but still nutritious way to feed cattle, especially after a dry season. He’ll mix the onions with wheat, hay or oats. He said alfalfa is $115 per ton, and prices are rising as the cost of gas increases.

“Any little supplement like this that helps us is really great,” Montoya said.

Brandon Barker of Barker Produce said they’ve given onions to cattle ranchers before.

“There’s a lot of cattle that eat onions and chile,” said Brandon Barker, of Barker Produce. “There’s a lot of people who raise animals that can blend onions or chile or any kind of vegetable into their regular feed to help supplement what they’re lacking.”

A number of social media users shamed Barker Produce for “dumping” perfectly good onions in the desert. However, Barker told ABC-7 he donated the “cull” onions, which are too large or small to sell to their customers.

“We get culls from roots, anything that’s not consumable by a human,” Barker said.

Barker Produce also donates a considerable number of “number two” onions to Roadrunner Foodbank, not letting anything go to waste.

“They come in several times a week and pick up anything that we have that’s a number two onion that is consumable by people,” Barker said.

Montoya would like to remind the public to not believe all posts they see on social media. He told ABC-7 dozens of people thought the onions were abandoned, but they were not.

“If you left your car parked in your driveway, it’s not there for me to go and get it as I want,” Montoya said.

He said he won’t press charges against anyone who unknowingly stole them, but he’s frustrated, nonetheless.

“These onions weren’t here for the public, they were here for my cattle.”