Folks in White Pine County will have to come up with a new insult. The Southern Nevada Water Authority can't be accused of being all hat and no cattle anymore.

The wholesale water supplier for the Las Vegas Valley will soon own about $3.3 million worth of livestock as part of its latest acquisition in Spring Valley, the White Pine County watershed at the northern end of a proposed pipeline to Las Vegas.

The authority board on Thursday approved more than $43.5 million to purchase the 11,800-acre El Tejon ranch and the 1,560-acre Huntsman ranch. The two spreads about 250 miles north of Las Vegas come with 1,881 cattle and 4,290 sheep.

It is the first livestock to be purchased by the water authority, which has paid almost $79 million for seven Spring Valley ranches over the past eight months.

"You are now members of the National Cattlemen's Association and the Nevada Cattlemen's Association," Authority General Manager Pat Mulroy told board members after the vote.

Authority spokesman Scott Huntley offered an unusual clarification after the meeting: Although the authority has officially joined the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, its membership application with the Nevada association is still pending.

El Tejon is by far the authority's largest acquisition. With it, the authority becomes the single largest owner of private land in the mostly empty valley.

Authority officials insist the ranches will continue to operate much as they always have and none of the water associated with the properties will be shipped out of Spring Valley.

To that end, the state's largest water supplier now employs a ranch manager: Brandon Humphries, who worked at the Wahoo Ranch until the authority bought it in December.

Mulroy said her agency will work to improve efficiency at the ranches and use a portion of their surface and groundwater rights to protect sensitive wildlife and offset any negative impacts from the pipeline project.

The authority has applied for state permission to tap billions of gallons of groundwater across eastern Nevada and use it to supply growth and help shield Las Vegas from drought.

Mulroy recently told state lawmakers that her agency needs to begin importing groundwater from rural Nevada by 2015 or the Las Vegas Valley could go thirsty.

Most of that water is in Spring Valley, which Mulroy called "the anchor basin" for the authority's $2 billion pipeline project.

Nevada's chief water regulator, State Engineer Tracy Taylor, is expected to rule on the authority's groundwater applications in Spring Valley in the coming months.

Mulroy said she expects Tracy to grant the authority at least some of the water it's asking for. "It's not a matter of whether he'll give some out but how much."

In a rare break from the board's usual unanimity, new member Chris Giunchigliani voted against the latest acquisitions in Spring Valley. She said she understood what the authority was trying to accomplish but could not support the move.

When asked to elaborate after the meeting, Giunchigliani, a Clark County commissioner, said she was uncomfortable with the authority's entry into the ranching industry and with the amount of money being paid for the properties.

Giunchigliani said she wonders what could be accomplished if that money were used instead to promote more conservation in the Las Vegas Valley.

One outspoken critic of the authority's pipeline plan accused the agency of trying to blackmail White Pine County.

Bob Fulkerson is executive director of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada, which has joined with the White Pine-based Great Basin Water Network to oppose the authority's rural water grab.

He said the authority is trying to force county officials back into negotiations by buying up the ranches and "taking the land off the tax rolls."

"It's bare-knuckle politics that may have had a place in Mulholland's time but not in present-day Nevada policy making," Fulkerson said.

He was referring to William Mulholland, architect of the early 20th century water grab that drained California's Owens Valley to supply growth in Los Angeles.

Mulroy said the authority isn't trying to cheat rural White Pine County out of its property tax revenue, but in the absence of an agreement no mechanism is in place for in-lieu payments to be made.

She said Lincoln County officials seem happy with the water-sharing agreement they struck with the authority several years ago.

"We stand ready to enter into a similar agreement with White Pine County. We will make the (property tax) payments and the retro-payments as soon as that agreement is effectuated," she said.

Only a handful of privately owned ranches remain in Spring Valley. The largest is the 6,300-acre Eldridge ranch, which has been in the family for about 90 years.

Dennis Eldridge co-owns the operation with his brothers and his nephew, but he said they have been "discussing options" with water authority officials.

If the authority can come up with enough money, Eldridge figures the agency will own all of the ranches in the valley one day.

"I think it's just a sweep. That's what they're doing," he said. "I don't think it's a good thing or a bad thing. It's just the way it's going."