The 737-acre hay farm at Sand Creek Ranch northwest of Buffalo, Wyo., sold at public auction for $1,915,500, or $2,599 per deeded acre.

There are no building improvements on the north-central Wyoming ranch, but included in the deal were six new center pivots that irrigate 650 acres, with the remaining land under a new K-Line irrigation system.

“The sale came with extremely good water rights that deliver 9.36 cubic feet of water per second, along with a first-class irrigation system,” says John Pearson, owner of Buffalo, Wyo.-based Pearson Real Estate Co.

SOLD AT AUCTION: This 737-acre Wyoming hay farm sold for $1.9 million.

John Jenkins and his wife, Carol Voigt Jenkins, along with business partners, sold the farm to Goddard Ranch LLC, a family ranching and farming operation that owns property contiguous to the hay farm at Sand Creek Ranch.

The new irrigation system will boost alfalfa and alfalfa-grass hay production from around 300 tons per year to about 2,000, which will help the land compete with the development of rural subdivisions.

Pearson says that most of the farm near the foot of the Bighorn Mountains was recently placed under a conservation easement.

This is part of an overall development by Mr. and Mrs. Jenkins and their business partners, who divided 99 acres within Sand Creek Ranch into one-acre rural residential lots.

“These home sites were carefully mapped out so the viewshed and open spaces are protected, and agricultural lands around these home sites are protected from additional development because of the conservation easement,” Pearson says.

He adds that this is a unique development because the home sites are clustered into small neighborhoods while the bulk of the lands remain as open spaces, unlike many of the rural subdivisions in Sheridan and Johnson counties and across Wyoming, which have chewed up entire ranches and farms.

The 99 home sites were not part of the land sale to the Goddard Ranch.

North-central Wyoming

A Buffalo, Wyo., couple who wanted a small cattle ranch purchased the 437-acre Krezelok Ranch between Buffalo and Sheridan, Wyo.

The original listing was 283 acres for $800,000 ($2,827 per deeded acre), but additional acres were added to complete the deal, says John Chase, co-owner of Sheridan-based Chase Brothers Properties.

Though the selling price wasn’t released, the transaction brought more than the original asking price since additional acres were involved, Chase says.

Among the amenities is a modest, newer ranch-style home, an older guest house and shop, along with excellent dryland grass production.

Chase notes that the property had been owned by the same family since it was homesteaded.

“The sellers wanted to retire and move to town,” he says.