Consumers Demanding Cage-Free Eggs
by Ridge Shinn

It is exciting to see the consumers "pulling on the rope" and getting what they demand. Whenever I speak to consumer groups, I always remind them that they are the key to reviving the rural economy. As Wendell Berry says, "Eating is an Agricultural Act." Your food dollar votes definitely affect what gets raised for market and how it is raised.

I predict that 100% grass-finished beef will be one of the next very scarce products. Our challenge is that the ramp up time is 2.5 years for grass-fed beef, rather than a number of months, as for cage-free egg operations.

Read a recent New York Times article (from Aug. 12) about cage-free egg demand.

Raw Milk in the News
by Ridge Shinn

There seems to be growing interest in raw, unpasteurized milk drunk straight from the cow. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration banned interstate sales of unpasteurized milk 20 years ago, but adherents claim raw milk is healthier to drink.

August 8, 2007 New York Times published a very interesting article about the interest, and controversy, over this topic. You be the judge.


Read the article.

Return of a Dread Disease
by Ridge Shinn

We are both saddened and alarmed that foot-and-mouth disease has reappeared in English cattle, specifically on two farms in Surrey. This is a very contagious disease, as we recall from the outbreak of 2001. As a recent editorial in The New York Times noted, "It is really worth hoping that this outbreak is contained and its cause discovered as quickly as possible. The rural economy of Britain suffered a horrifying blow from mad-cow disease in the 1990s, followed, with surprising swiftness, by an equally horrifying blow from foot-and-mouth disease. Those two diseases changed the agricultural landscape and, especially, how people felt about it."

Click here to read the complete August 8, 2007 editorial here (printed in PDF format).

A Recommendation
by Ridge Shinn

Tune into the most recent things to cross Allan Nation’s desk. Allan Nation, the long time editor of the Stockman Grassfarmer, was promoting grass-farming long before it was popular. His vast knowledge, relationships accumulated over the years, and his passion for a steep learning curve keep him constantly in front of the pack. I always turn to Allan’s Observations when I get my new issue of the magazine to see where he’s been, what he has read and his critical appraisal of what he has learned.

If you don’t get the magazine, you should at the least visit his blog: http://www.stockmangrassfarmer.net/Allan_Blog.html

Diversity and Concentration
by Ridge Shinn

In the realm of animal breeding, there is a lot of discussion and indeed disagreement over the quest for diversity and the use of concentration in breeding programs. I would propose that both have their place.

As a founding director of the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy (www.albc.org) and one of the two researchers that surveyed the American Milking Devon in 1977 and encouraged creation of the American Milking Devon Association (www.milkingdevons.org), I feel qualified to speak to the importance of diversity. All breeds, subsets of breeds and landrace breeds are important to preserve. I think we all agreed that diversity is healthy and if we look at nature, we see that the ecosystems that are the most diverse are also the most robust and stable. There is something healthy about diversity. In terms of markets, diversity is critical since markets change and it is hard (read it takes a long time) to change breeds.

Three good examples of breeds that disappeared or were revived by market pressure are the Curly Coated Pig, the Texas Longhorn, and the North Devon:

1. The Lincolnshire Curly Coated Pig, a really fat pig, was quite popular in a time when lard and animal fat had a very important economic role. Animal fat was used as industrial oil as well as cooking oil. When these market needs changed, this breed actually died out in 1972 and is today extinct.



2. In the case of the Texas Longhorn, www.tlbaa.org, this was a breed that had dwindled to a perilously small population in the 1960s in this country. In its hey-day, who knows how many millions of these cattle existed. In the 1960s, when the trend away from fat cattle began, when folks began to look for lean and hardy cattle, there were only a few thousand. At that time, the Texas Longhorn was rediscovered and returned to serious popularity with many registrations and many, many crossbred cattle as a direct result of market pressure.



3. Another success story is the North Devon. This breed was included on the ALBC Conservation Priority list as “critical” as recently as 1997. Now this breed is enjoying a remarkable resurgence because it addresses the consumer’s demand for fat, 100% grass-finished beef (www.northamericandevon.com). It was always noted as the butcher’s breed and fell by the wayside in the last 40 years because it is “too easy fleshing” for the feedlot system that has evolved in this country. If your production modality is grass, then an early, maturing breed that fattens easily on grass and delivers an excellent meat to bone ratio is very desirable.

Preservation of diverse, heritage, minor, and regional breeds of livestock is a critically important job and I commend ALBC and its dedicated staff for the job they have done in the past 30 years. It is essential to the health and vibrancy of our agricultural potential. Who knows what the next market need will be? Hopefully ALBC and other similar organizations around the world will have successfully preserved breeds that will meet the need.
Preservation of diversity within the breed also makes the most sense in terms of keeping as many options as possible open.

Product Consistency

On the other hand, when farmers begin to bring product to consumers, they find that the consumer would like to have a similar product each time they buy. In other words, if customers buy a fat, tender steak this week, they will clearly be disappointed if next week they get a lean, tough steak. Variability and diversity are a problem in the market place. One can argue that differences are valued in the market place and I would agree; a quick trip to New York City will acquaint you with the diversity of the market, for instance, in the live animal markets in the Bronx a very skinny, intact billy goat will bring the highest price, some markets want lean (Laura’s lean beef www.laurasleanbeef.com). Some markets want fat, prime steak (Lobels of Madison Ave, NYC www.lobels.com).

The challenge for producers to make a sustainable living with livestock products is finding their niche and then learning how to make the consumer’s experience repeatable. If your customers want fat and you bring lean, they will be disappointed. So the question becomes, How do producers create a repeatable quality in their livestock?

Selection and Concentration are the options:

• Producers can evaluate all their animals at harvest time and then only harvest the animals that fit their customers’ needs and then sell the rest to the commodity market. Many programs have been based on this methodology -- for instance, using ultrasound to scan live cattle to determine eligibility. The cattle industry sorts for quality once the cattle are slaughtered and the carcasses can be evaluated by a USDA grader. Most small to medium size cattle operations cannot afford a grader and definitely cannot afford to discard or sell for a low price part of their annual harvest.


• The other option is to concentrate the desirable qualities of your livestock and have less variability and more repeatability. One of the best ways to do this is to breed close. Many folks today talk about linebreeding or inbreeding (“linebreeding is if it works and inbreeding is if it doesn’t” is the joke) and feel this is a good thing. The only thing linebreeding or inbreeding will do is concentrate genes. It will concentrate good genes or bad genes. In other words, if you have a terrible udder and you inbreed, you will fix this trait. On the other hand, if you have excellent conformation, great meat quality and tenderness, you can fix these traits.

Linebreeding includes breeding close relatives and is seen by much of the livestock industry as a heretical practice although it has been used as a tool for years in horse breeding and dog breeding. It must be paired with merciless culling; in other words the resulting offspring must be evaluated and culled if they show a problem.

Historical Results
Robert Bakewell, the famous animal breeder and the man we named our genetics company after www.bakewellrepro.com, summed it up this way: “Breed the best to the best regardless of the relationship.” His stunning results are quite well known. Remember, he had a large diverse pool of livestock to begin his selection from and then he put his masterful plan to work concentrating characteristics he and the market desired. He created very prepotent sires as a result and was able to produce large numbers of animals with very similar, desirable qualities.

Today, we find that concentration is almost totally lacking in the cattle industry because of fears if inbreeding repression and the possible resulting problems. My response to this worry or criticism is to cull mercilessly and eat the problems. The promotion of hybrid vigor by the industry and university system has created a situation where the great majority of commercial cattle are crossbred. Even some notable breeds like the Angus include a lot of crossbred, F1, or upgraded animal. Most breeds have become very diverse and have squandered the qualities of repeatability and indeed quality.

Prepotency is critical to the success of a sustainable livestock industry whether it is big farms or small. Prepotency, the ability of a sire to pass his qualities to all his offspring, is very rare today. It is only accomplished by concentration either intentionally or unwittingly. Repeatability is a tool the producer needs to make a living with cattle.

In conclusion, it is important to keep and maintain all breeds, subsets of breeds and landrace breeds and I applaud the efforts of those who are involved in this missionary type work. On the other hand, there is an important place for concentration of breeds and subsets of breeds to create truly prepotent sires that can produce “cookie cutter” offspring. Concentration and diversity should not be competing endeavors but both should be embraced by all as both being necessary for our agricultural future.

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. "

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.

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.

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

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.