Adjacent to half a million acres of continuous public lands

Frannie is located in the panoramic Big Horn Basin between the Big Horn Mountains to the East, the Absaroka/Beartooth Mountains to the West, and the Pryor mountain range to the North, magnificent vistas and recreation opportunities abound. A few minutes drive will take you to hunting, fishing, golfing, sight seeing, camping, boating, as well as winter sports of all kinds.

There is no state income tax in Wyoming, but you are only 70 miles from Billings and there is no sales tax in Montana, so you have the best of both worlds. Cody with the entrance to the Yellowstone Park, a daily rodeo in summer and the Buffalo Bill museum is only 45 miles to the west. If you like to go skiing, come to Red Lodge, Montana - a 50 mile route.

The rural nature of Frannie makes it a wonderful place to live and raise children. Come and build your dream home while raising horses, cows or grow row crops. If you don't like to farm yourself, the neighbors are always eager to lease more land for a crop share. There are 4 small homes on the property, but they all lived out their usefulness, even though the present owner put running water in all of them and added a new septic system to one. Well maintained county roads are traversing the ranch, but homestead #1 at the east end of the ranch has end of the road privacy and features fruit trees, corrals, loafing sheds, grain bins and a chicken coop. There is also a mobile home and the original farm house, but the old trees surrounding it and the sound of the waterfall sure would make a great place for a nice home. The owner has heated watering troughs in the corrals and the ranch is well developed with new fencing and watering stations for the livestock. The rancher runs 120-150 cows and four horses on the ranch now, but the land is well suited for row crops as well. There is a sugar beet plant in Lovell and two in Billings. Sugar beets are a cash crop par excellence and are annuals grown from seeds. Sugar beets do best with moderate temperatures and irrigation. Farmers have an extra incentive to grow sugar beets in this area, since, they own the factories that process them through Western Sugar Cooperative. No sugar beets have been grown on this land for years, so it should produce a good yield. In 2009 we are looking at a record harvest and the highest market prices for crystal sugar in 30 years. Since the beginning of 2008, U.S. (wholesale) refined sugar prices have climbed roughly 40 percent, with monthly prices exceeding 30 cents per pound since June 2008. So this is a good time to get into the sugar beet business!

The second homestead near the west end of the ranch also features large trees, corrals, a shop and two small homes. If you would like to build there, you already have two septic tanks in place along with all utilities.

1,900 acres deeded, of which 661 acres are being billed for irrigation rights at $ 24 per acre. An additional 1,420 are leased from the Department of Reclamation for $ 210 annually, making it a total of 3,320 acres. The irrigation comes from the Frannie irrigation ditch; 90% runs through gated pipes, only 10% are open ditches. The rancher grows alfalfa and barley for hay. The annual rainfall there is 4" a year, so the dry land produces mainly salt sage, which is very high in protein.

The ranch can also be bought as two different parcels: The lower part then would be 800 acres deeded (406 acres irrigated) plus 330 acres leased and two homes for $ 700,000 and the other parcel would be 1,100 acres deeded (271 acres irrigated, 100 acres sub-irrigated) plus 1,090 acres leased with a mobile home and a not so livable old farm house (the foundation is bad) for $ 850,000

The ranch is swarming with pheasants, upland birds, mule deer and white tail. Eight acres have been set aside for 500 planted trees and is a wild life preserve. If you would like to rent out the farm land, I called the USDA farm service for Big Horn County and Brian said around Frannie the crop land rental for tillable farm ground is between $70 and $90 per acre and $10-$15 for dry land grazing.

Northwest College, a two year community college and University of Wyoming Outreach center, is a scant 20 mile drive from the ranch. Northwest College offers two year degree programs, Job training and community education, as well undergraduate and graduate programs from the University of Wyoming.

Local attractions include

the Pryor Mountain Wild Mustang Herd,

Big Horn Canyon National Recreation Area,

Yellowstone National Park,

the Buffalo Bill Historical Museum,

Big Horn National Forest, with many Blue ribbon trout streams and the intriguing Route 14A which will lead you to

the nearly 1,000 year old Medicine Wheel. What is now U.S. 14A was originally a wagon track notched into the side of the mountain in about 1880. It was used until the 1920s, when Lovell businessmen began a volunteer labor effort to build an automobile thoroughfare.