Where Does Your Food Come From?
An Interview with Michael Pollan
Word for Word Program Archives, American Public Media
http://wordforword.publicradio.org/programs/
From June 8, 2007 Word for Word Program, American Public Media:
"Even if you're not a farmer, journalist Michael Pollan says you should still pay attention to what is in the farm bill, which is up for renewal this year in Congress. Pollan, author of The Omnivore's Dilemma, argues agricultural policy affects everything from the obesity epidemic to global warming to national security. Pollan made the case for a more "sustainable" food production system in an April 19 speech at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum. "
Sunday, June 17, 2007
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Soil, Grass, & Genetics School
By Steve Campbell
When I found out Gearld would be putting on a school in Ontario, Oregon, come April 2007, I was excited about having another chance to learn from him. In my opinion, I don’t think a person can get too much of Gearld Fry. It was to be a three-day event focusing on soil, grass and cattle genetics. Doug Gunnink would be the other half of the expert instructor duo. The day before the conference Gearld was somewhat concerned. Doug Gunnink would not be coming and he asked me if I thought he could fill up three days without him. I was confident that he could.
The students were grass farmers from different locations (Montana to California) with backgrounds and varying years of experience and time in the livestock business. After signing in and refreshments, Gearld started with his normal gusto, speaking on the subject of linear measurement. It wasn’t long before the hands went up and the questions started.
By Steve Campbell
When I found out Gearld would be putting on a school in Ontario, Oregon, come April 2007, I was excited about having another chance to learn from him. In my opinion, I don’t think a person can get too much of Gearld Fry. It was to be a three-day event focusing on soil, grass and cattle genetics. Doug Gunnink would be the other half of the expert instructor duo. The day before the conference Gearld was somewhat concerned. Doug Gunnink would not be coming and he asked me if I thought he could fill up three days without him. I was confident that he could.
The students were grass farmers from different locations (Montana to California) with backgrounds and varying years of experience and time in the livestock business. After signing in and refreshments, Gearld started with his normal gusto, speaking on the subject of linear measurement. It wasn’t long before the hands went up and the questions started.
Gearld explained why it requires an animal of specific physical proportions to utilize grass efficiently and that it is very difficult to find such animals in any real quantity because of the past 50 years of breeding for the feedlot industry. I could see the class digesting the information and trying to understand why the relationship between rump length and shoulder width with is so important on a cow. They were trying to grasp the concept that a certain amount of red meat is lost for every inch that the heart girth is less than the animal’s top line. As Gearld explained these relationships, I could see nods of understanding from some and furious note taking by others.
Gerald showed the group three pictures of escutcheons and once again, the hands went in the air. One dairy farmer was beginning to relate and made remarks about one of his cows that would drop off in milk shortly after becoming pregnant. Her escutcheon would reveal this characteristic. Gearld continued explaining details about the escutcheon, more commonly referred to as the “milk mirror.”
He discussed how an animal can be visually judged for its ability to produce gourmet meat. Fineness of bone, hide texture, glandular function, feel of the hock, condition of hair coat, shape of escutcheon, location of adrenal hair whorl, presence of yellow tail flakes, and even temperament are all indicators of an animal’s propensity to hang on the rail as gourmet beef or produce offspring that make gourmet beef.
What really got the group buzzing was the information about how one can tell if a cow is pregnant by observing her adrenal and pancreatic hair whorls and what the sex of the calf will be just by certain hair patterns on the cow’s tail.
Day 2
The second day started with lessons about the refractometer and how to use it as a tool to measure pasture quality. A refractometer is a small hand-held device that measures the brix level. Brix is the term given for the level of sugar. The level of sugar can correspond to mineral content. We measured the brix of several grass samples brought in from farms nearby. Looking through the refractometer like a small telescope, if one sees a clear distinct horizontal line that indicates that the calcium level is good. A person can verify that with pH paper without having to send the forage sample out for a lab analysis.
Gearld talked about how it takes a grass with a brix of 10 or above to have enough “energy” to put quality fat on an animal. The samples we looked at had readings ranging from 6 up to 11.
Every student was given an hour-long cassette recording of Doug Gunnink’s 2004 lecture at the Acres USA conference, titled “Grading Prime on Grass.” In his talk he speaks of the need for balanced forage, which is vital regardless of what the soil test report reads, to allow an animal to reach its potential during the finishing phase. With balanced, nutrient rich grasses, we can fatten the correct type of animal just like a feedlot can but using our pastures instead.
The most important factor to customers is meat quality and consistency. There are a lot of people who are willing to try a new product if it is claimed to be good for their health, but it is the flavor and eating experience that keeps them coming back – a must for repeat sales.
After lunch, we went out to the Livestock handling facility. Everyone was anxious to see on live animals what Gearld had just explained earlier in the classroom. Our subjects for evaluation were a few heifers belonging to one of the producers in attendance. Gearld took a handful of hide around the 12th rib and pulled. “She’s a three,” he says out loud.
Gerald showed the group three pictures of escutcheons and once again, the hands went in the air. One dairy farmer was beginning to relate and made remarks about one of his cows that would drop off in milk shortly after becoming pregnant. Her escutcheon would reveal this characteristic. Gearld continued explaining details about the escutcheon, more commonly referred to as the “milk mirror.”
He discussed how an animal can be visually judged for its ability to produce gourmet meat. Fineness of bone, hide texture, glandular function, feel of the hock, condition of hair coat, shape of escutcheon, location of adrenal hair whorl, presence of yellow tail flakes, and even temperament are all indicators of an animal’s propensity to hang on the rail as gourmet beef or produce offspring that make gourmet beef.
What really got the group buzzing was the information about how one can tell if a cow is pregnant by observing her adrenal and pancreatic hair whorls and what the sex of the calf will be just by certain hair patterns on the cow’s tail.
Day 2
The second day started with lessons about the refractometer and how to use it as a tool to measure pasture quality. A refractometer is a small hand-held device that measures the brix level. Brix is the term given for the level of sugar. The level of sugar can correspond to mineral content. We measured the brix of several grass samples brought in from farms nearby. Looking through the refractometer like a small telescope, if one sees a clear distinct horizontal line that indicates that the calcium level is good. A person can verify that with pH paper without having to send the forage sample out for a lab analysis.
Gearld talked about how it takes a grass with a brix of 10 or above to have enough “energy” to put quality fat on an animal. The samples we looked at had readings ranging from 6 up to 11.
Every student was given an hour-long cassette recording of Doug Gunnink’s 2004 lecture at the Acres USA conference, titled “Grading Prime on Grass.” In his talk he speaks of the need for balanced forage, which is vital regardless of what the soil test report reads, to allow an animal to reach its potential during the finishing phase. With balanced, nutrient rich grasses, we can fatten the correct type of animal just like a feedlot can but using our pastures instead.
The most important factor to customers is meat quality and consistency. There are a lot of people who are willing to try a new product if it is claimed to be good for their health, but it is the flavor and eating experience that keeps them coming back – a must for repeat sales.
After lunch, we went out to the Livestock handling facility. Everyone was anxious to see on live animals what Gearld had just explained earlier in the classroom. Our subjects for evaluation were a few heifers belonging to one of the producers in attendance. Gearld took a handful of hide around the 12th rib and pulled. “She’s a three,” he says out loud.
What Gearld has done is made a scoring system using the numbers of one through five (one being the best) to grade each of the following traits of an animal: hide, hair, rib bone, hock, cannon bone, escutcheon, loin and adrenal whorl placement.
- With the hide, you want a soft, pliable feel that can be pulled several inches away from the animal’s side and then spring right back when you let go.
- Hair should be uniform in texture, short and shiny with no hairs standing up along the backbone.
- The rib bone (12th or 13th) that is flat, or even better, has a dip towards the center of it denotes tender meat in the animal. Conversely, a bone that is rounded in the middle (convex) is attached to coarse meat. The jaw bone is the same as far as wanting it to be flat or dipped but not rounded.
- A person can take their thumb and forefinger and feel just above the hock, where the tendon goes into the hamstring muscle. A really good eating animal will feel like skin against skin. The more connective tissue in the meat, the thicker and more “grainy” the feel will be in this area.
- The cannon bone on the front leg should be short in length and small in diameter for high quality meat. As the cannon bone decreases in diameter below the knee, it should then slowly taper out to the top of the ankle and then smoothly connecting to the hoof.
- There is little written information about the escutcheon or “milk mirror.” One book written by F. Guenon from France in 1873 goes into great detail about this amazing physical characteristic. It is another of the hair patterns that lets an observer see into the makeup of the animal. The hair in the area from the udder to the vulva (anus on a male) should be very short, shinny, soft and growing in an upward direction. The rest of the hair on the back of the animal, surrounding the escutcheon is growing in a downward direction. The preferred esctucheon tends to resemble a shovel with a broad handle lying directly behind the tail and the “spade” spreading out each side of the udder on the inside and back of the legs. In general, the larger and more refined each part is, the better.
- When Gearld talks of the loin, he is referring to how the muscle behind the shoulder blade blends in with the rest of the spine. A #1 would be a smooth transition whereas any thing with a higher number has a progressive increase in the amount of dip behind the shoulder.
- The adrenal hair whorl is a circular formation of hair along the backbone where the hair is actually laying in a 360° pattern. When this is located close to the shoulder blades, it’s a good indicator of quality meat, but a #1 will be positioned in front of the shoulders.
We put each animal through the chute and Gearld, working with his linear measuring calipers, explained the readings he was getting. During that entire process anyone interested was given the opportunity to try their hand at measuring. It’s quite critical that animals stand square and remain calm to get accurate readings. Once the animal was measured and released, Gearld continued to discuss both the deficiencies and positives and how those numbers related to what we saw with our eyes on that animal in the holding pen. We evaluated more animals for the physical traits listed above, which provided more opportunity for everyone to grasp the concepts and lesson.
Once we returned to the classroom, Gearld reviewed what we saw with our eyes and felt with our hands at the chute. I don’t believe many had ever been taught such a method for evaluating cattle. By this time, most people had some level of informal introduction to one another but now each would formally introduce themselves, give a description of who they were, where they lived and what part the cattle business played in their life. It was quite interesting to hear each other’s stories and it allowed each of us to appreciate the different paths that had brought us together for this seminar.
Day 3
On the third day we gathered a new mix of forage samples to test. People were remembering, what I call, the “crisp line” as they were looking through the refractometer as well as the benchmark of 10 for good grass quality. Gearld shared with us a couple of soil and plant samples that were taken from his garden. In some areas where the soil was deficient, the plant test was okay, and the reverse also showed up. We soon had questions that were best left for Doug Gunnink to answer. I bet he gets a lot of phone calls this spring.
Gearld talked about how to use a forage samples to balance the minerals we supplement our cattle. Robert Pul’s book, Mineral Levels in Animal Health - Diagnostic Data, was discussed and referenced. Gearld showed us how to decipher the information on the tags of mineral bags. He went through the calculations to convert PPM numbers and % numbers into mg/hd/day. This again brought lots of questions. For a better description, read Gearld’s newsletter on minerals at http://bakewellrepro.com/minerals.html
Once we returned to the classroom, Gearld reviewed what we saw with our eyes and felt with our hands at the chute. I don’t believe many had ever been taught such a method for evaluating cattle. By this time, most people had some level of informal introduction to one another but now each would formally introduce themselves, give a description of who they were, where they lived and what part the cattle business played in their life. It was quite interesting to hear each other’s stories and it allowed each of us to appreciate the different paths that had brought us together for this seminar.
Day 3
On the third day we gathered a new mix of forage samples to test. People were remembering, what I call, the “crisp line” as they were looking through the refractometer as well as the benchmark of 10 for good grass quality. Gearld shared with us a couple of soil and plant samples that were taken from his garden. In some areas where the soil was deficient, the plant test was okay, and the reverse also showed up. We soon had questions that were best left for Doug Gunnink to answer. I bet he gets a lot of phone calls this spring.
Gearld talked about how to use a forage samples to balance the minerals we supplement our cattle. Robert Pul’s book, Mineral Levels in Animal Health - Diagnostic Data, was discussed and referenced. Gearld showed us how to decipher the information on the tags of mineral bags. He went through the calculations to convert PPM numbers and % numbers into mg/hd/day. This again brought lots of questions. For a better description, read Gearld’s newsletter on minerals at http://bakewellrepro.com/minerals.html
After lunch, we finished with the introductions that we didn’t get to the previous afternoon, then went to the livestock facility to measure and assess some Lowline cattle. We measured one bull and two heifers. The full blood Lowline heifer scored high. She presented a very good visual picture of an animal that would thrive on grass while her crossbred herd mate was a good example to the class of animal that would produce good meat but take much more time to do it.
It seemed like the school had just started and it was time for Gearld to head to the airport to catch a plane. People continued to ask him questions right up to point where he had to leave for Boise. I have yet to get “too much” of Gearld Fry and I believe those that just spent the last three days with him would say the same thing.
It seemed like the school had just started and it was time for Gearld to head to the airport to catch a plane. People continued to ask him questions right up to point where he had to leave for Boise. I have yet to get “too much” of Gearld Fry and I believe those that just spent the last three days with him would say the same thing.
Technology & Its Role in Food Production
By Ridge Shinn
Dan Barber, chef and co-owner of Blue Hill at Stone Barns in Pocantico Hills, N.Y., is author of an article in the July 2007 Food and Wine. This article is a result of Dan Barber's interest in how we use technology in sustainable and emerging agricultural systems.
Gearld Fry and I used ultrasound quite a bit in the early days of Bakewell and Hardwick Beef to sort cattle for processing and more importantly to sort out mother cows that would work in our grass-fed , grass-finished programs. Today we use a number of visual appraisal techniques to do the same sort of evaluation. We have found the correlations to the ultrasound readings to be quite high and now prefer to teach producer's how to "see" their cattle and the total health and quality by these visual signs or hide, hair bone and structure.
As mentioned elsewhere on the website, we do use brix readings from a refractometer to learn about the quality of the grass that our cattle eat. This tells us about the sugar content and nutrient density of the grass. Once we have determined the values we use a number of fertilization, cultivation and grazing techniques to increase the brix readings.
I invite you to read this fascinating article by Dan Barber.
http://foodandwine.com/articles/creating-flavor-in-the-field/print
By Ridge Shinn
Dan Barber, chef and co-owner of Blue Hill at Stone Barns in Pocantico Hills, N.Y., is author of an article in the July 2007 Food and Wine. This article is a result of Dan Barber's interest in how we use technology in sustainable and emerging agricultural systems.
Gearld Fry and I used ultrasound quite a bit in the early days of Bakewell and Hardwick Beef to sort cattle for processing and more importantly to sort out mother cows that would work in our grass-fed , grass-finished programs. Today we use a number of visual appraisal techniques to do the same sort of evaluation. We have found the correlations to the ultrasound readings to be quite high and now prefer to teach producer's how to "see" their cattle and the total health and quality by these visual signs or hide, hair bone and structure.
As mentioned elsewhere on the website, we do use brix readings from a refractometer to learn about the quality of the grass that our cattle eat. This tells us about the sugar content and nutrient density of the grass. Once we have determined the values we use a number of fertilization, cultivation and grazing techniques to increase the brix readings.
I invite you to read this fascinating article by Dan Barber.
http://foodandwine.com/articles/creating-flavor-in-the-field/print
A New Life
By Gearld Fry
Some time ago, an article came to my attention describing the birth of a baby. Like many of you, I had always assumed that there was some mechanism in the mother that triggered the process of labor. But that’s not true. The fascinating real story is the same … whether we’re talking about a human baby or a cow and her calf.
At a very precise moment nine months after conception, a hormone leaves the unborn fetus’ brain. It travels across the placenta, enters the maternal circulation, and makes its way to the mother’s pituitary gland. Although this hormone is a very complex chemical, its message is quite simple: I am ready, start the delivery process. My lungs have matured enough to breathe on my own, my heart is strong enough to assume control, my gastrointestinal tract is prepared to process food, and my brain is eager to start learning about this world and environment I will live in. My ten trillion cells are poised to work together.
So it is the unborn fetus, not the mother, who makes this decision. Then, the mother and unborn fetus orchestrate the journey.
This journey is often cited as the most dangerous moment in the developing mammal’s life. Indeed it might be, yet every aspect of the process is well-coordinated, prearranged, rehearsed for millennia, and designed to bring a new life into being. Even the seams in the fetus’ skull bones have not yet fused, so that its unusually large head will be pliable enough to make it through the birth canal. As the process unfolds, the adrenal glands even add a blast of stress hormones to help the fetus cope with the stress.
The new-born baby will not breathe until it has cleared the birth canal. Anything sooner would lead to certain suffocation. It also will not tarry too long. Rising carbon dioxide levels and falling oxygen concentration will prompt that first breath. Otherwise, there could easily be permanent brain damage. The inner working of the newborn knows precisely when to breathe, how deeply to breath, and how to clear the debris inhaled from the amniotic sac.
Moments before the mother and newborn baby completely disconnect, the newborn receives a last-minute blood transfusion from the umbilical cord. The placenta, which has been purposefully storing nutrients for this moment, infuses extra nourishment. And there is evidence that the fetus sends some of its own stem cells into the mother’s blood stream. These newly discovered microchimera stem cells seem to be purposefully left behind to help maintain the mother’s health. The newly born babies’ survival might depend on it.
It is a beautifully choreographed moment; one that never fails to move me.
By Gearld Fry
Some time ago, an article came to my attention describing the birth of a baby. Like many of you, I had always assumed that there was some mechanism in the mother that triggered the process of labor. But that’s not true. The fascinating real story is the same … whether we’re talking about a human baby or a cow and her calf.
At a very precise moment nine months after conception, a hormone leaves the unborn fetus’ brain. It travels across the placenta, enters the maternal circulation, and makes its way to the mother’s pituitary gland. Although this hormone is a very complex chemical, its message is quite simple: I am ready, start the delivery process. My lungs have matured enough to breathe on my own, my heart is strong enough to assume control, my gastrointestinal tract is prepared to process food, and my brain is eager to start learning about this world and environment I will live in. My ten trillion cells are poised to work together.
So it is the unborn fetus, not the mother, who makes this decision. Then, the mother and unborn fetus orchestrate the journey.
This journey is often cited as the most dangerous moment in the developing mammal’s life. Indeed it might be, yet every aspect of the process is well-coordinated, prearranged, rehearsed for millennia, and designed to bring a new life into being. Even the seams in the fetus’ skull bones have not yet fused, so that its unusually large head will be pliable enough to make it through the birth canal. As the process unfolds, the adrenal glands even add a blast of stress hormones to help the fetus cope with the stress.
The new-born baby will not breathe until it has cleared the birth canal. Anything sooner would lead to certain suffocation. It also will not tarry too long. Rising carbon dioxide levels and falling oxygen concentration will prompt that first breath. Otherwise, there could easily be permanent brain damage. The inner working of the newborn knows precisely when to breathe, how deeply to breath, and how to clear the debris inhaled from the amniotic sac.
Moments before the mother and newborn baby completely disconnect, the newborn receives a last-minute blood transfusion from the umbilical cord. The placenta, which has been purposefully storing nutrients for this moment, infuses extra nourishment. And there is evidence that the fetus sends some of its own stem cells into the mother’s blood stream. These newly discovered microchimera stem cells seem to be purposefully left behind to help maintain the mother’s health. The newly born babies’ survival might depend on it.
It is a beautifully choreographed moment; one that never fails to move me.
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