What Does a Cattle Rancher Like ‘Yellowstone’s John Dutton Really Make?

If there’s one constant in Yellowstone, it’s the Dutton Ranch. John Dutton (Kevin Costner) and his family fight to keep the land by any means necessary, often resorting to blackmail or straight-up murder to do so. But like other shows in the Taylor Sheridan television empire, Yellowstone exaggerates a few details when it comes to displaying the life of a cattle rancher. Chief among them is how much a cattle rancher actually makes, which is a far cry from the luxuries the Duttons seem to employ on their ranch.

Cattle Ranchers Don’t Make That Much in Real Life – Especially in Yellowstone

Prior to the final stretch of Yellowstone episodes, Variety sat down with real-life rancher Jessie Jarvis to get her opinion on the series. Jarvis was fairly open about what was real and what was exaggerated, especially the opulence of the Dutton ranch. She said that real life ranches don’t have the kind of equipment that’s front and center on Yellowstone:

The Duttons are very wealthy, and that does not track with the majority of farms and ranches in America right now. We don’t own a helicopter. A lot of the pickups and trailers that are featured, they are top of the line, like Dodge Trucks and Bloomer Trailers. They are used in our industry, but they’re actually more on the Western sports side of things, not necessarily what you would find if you were to walk into a family farming and ranching operation.

A look at the average earnings of a cattle rancher back up Jarvis’ words, since the pay will vary based on the state. ZipRecruiter lists the annual salary for Montana cattle ranchers as $79,116, which breaks down to $38.04 per hour. That’s much more than most jobs, but not enough to afford a helicopter or a Dodge truck. In contrast, the place where cattle ranchers do pull down the most money is in New Brunswick, where they can pull down a whopping $136, 976 a year. There are also challenges that ranchers can face, like “cattle bloat” – depicted in great detail during the Yellowstone episode “Only Devils Left” – and recent concerns about the meat industry affecting the environment, which has forced ranchers to reconsider how they approach their duties.

‘Yellowstone’ Gets Some Parts of the Cattle Ranching Business Right

While Yellowstone might make cattle ranching seem more lucrative than it actually is, it did get some parts of the buisness right according to Jessie Jarvis. Jarvis revealed that most ranches are usually family-owned, and those owners have to deal with land encroachment. Obviously, there’s far less backstabbing and moral ambiguity involved, but there are very real issues being brought up. Matt Pierson, a real-life Montana rancher, also brought up how the series captures the stress of ranching when talking to Men’s Health. Yellowstone might turbocharge the drama, but it doesn’t shy away from the difficulty of what a cattle rancher’s life is like. If you do watch the series and think “I could pull that off”, you might want to think twice.