Print edition: 
An Oklahoma cattle ranching family has purchased more than 2,500 acres of Butler County land for its operation.
The Chain Land & Cattle Co., a cattle ranching operation based near Canton, Okla., paid a little more than $4.5 million at auction earlier this month for the Flint Hills Ranch. The ranch, east of Augusta, is owned by Jim and Sally Reeves.
Monte Chain, a spokesman for the buyer, said the group will use the land for cow-calf production.
The Chain ranch has land holdings in several states for its 2,000 head of cows. It raises black and red Angus cattle, along with Limousin cattle.
"For the past 25 years, we've sent our old cows into the Flint Hills on leased pastures," Chain said. "If you put them in in the spring, you might get one more calf out of them. They've done really good on the Flint Hills grass from April to October."
Chain's ranching company raises all-natural beef, marketed as hormone-free without implants or growth stimulants.
The land, in three tracts, was auctioned by Sundgren Realty of El Dorado and Farm & Home Realty of Cheney.
"It's certainly one of the nicer ranches we've ever sold," said auctioneer Jeremy Sundgren of Sundgren Realty.
Owners Jim and Sally Reeves are scaling their operation back, Sundgren said.
"They're slowing down," he said. "It's a lot of land, and they're planning ahead. They will continue in the cattle business, just at a little bit slower pace."
The land sale is one of the largest local deals in recent memory because large ranchers are buying land rather than selling, Sundgren said.
"It's a real strong land market, but the reason you don't see a large amount of good-sized land sales is that large land tracts are in tight hands," he said.
"People who own the larger amounts of land are still acquiring, and a lot of these larger land tracts are being passed to another generation."
Rural real estate has emerged as a "serious investment alternative," Sundgren said.
"There are a lot of people who have or are making a lot of money, and not a lot of options in terms of investment," Sundgren said. "The stock market hasn't been kind to people, you don't get any return on a CD and the value of a dollar isn't great.
"Land is a place where people turn for investment potential, and farmers and ranchers have been able to take advantage of strong commodity prices and make a good living."
