Together We Are Stronger…

I was first introduced to the concept of consumer outreach when I received the National Beef Quality Assurance Producer of the Year award in 2009.  I did not realize it at the time, but the award was actually the first catalyst to the creation of this blog.

Shortly after winning the award, I participated in the Farmer Goes to Market initiative which led me to the National Grocers Convention to speak with retailers about animal welfare.  What followed were a series of trips around the country (California, Texas, New York City etc.) speaking to groups of people that were interested in where their beef comes from.

As I sharpened my public speaking skills, the number of invitations to engagements rose until one day I realized something very important.  As much as I loved to share my farm and speak to others about how I raise beef, I loved my family and my farm even more.

They are the light of my life…

When I traveled:

• I missed the crooked half smile that lights up my husband’s face when I tease him.
• I missed the laughter of my girls as we shared our day.
• I missed the quiet dawn at the feed yard when it was just me and my animals and the work that soothes my soul.
• I missed burying my head in my horse’s mane and breathing in his scent.
• I missed home.
  

  She’s a lot like her Mama…

This realization put me into a real quandary.  I knew that reaching out to others outside of my farm was important, but the passion that I felt for raising food was contingent on being at home with my family on the farm.  It was at this point that I began to blog—blogging was a compromise—I could still share my farm, but I could do it without leaving home…

We are all in this together…

The lingering question, then, becomes “is that enough?”.  Can I and other farmers create transparency regarding food production through social media?  I do not know the answer to that question but a group of diverse agricultural organizations have come together to help figure it out.

How is he cared for and how does he make beef?

This alliance, USFRA (U.S. Farmer Rancher Alliance) is working hard to offer people, like me, some additional savvy and support as we look outside of our farms and into your living rooms.

Currently, the USFRA is searching for the “Faces of Farming and Ranching” in the United States.  This is a nationwide search for a few individuals who are excited to share the story of their farm or ranch with those folks that have interest.  USFRA is in the final stages of choosing the “faces” and has it narrowed down to 9 finalists who have expressed an interest in traveling across the United States to share the story of agriculture.

Janice and her family…

I am proud to say that Janice Wolfinger has made the final cut of finalists.  Janice and her husband, Jake, together with their two daughters have both a cow herd in Ohio and a small cattle feed yard in Nebraska.  Janice is currently taking a hiatus from teaching (she is a certified FFA instructor/teacher), and is looking to continue her love of education in a different role—as a Face of Farming and Ranching.

I would like to ask you all to go to http://www.fooddialogues.com/faces-of-farming-and-ranching/janice-wolfinger and vote for Janice.  You can vote for her every day between now and December 15^th.  Please help me to help Janice to have the opportunity to share her wonderful story through USFRA!

I am so thankful for Janice and her willingness to give of her time to participate in this program.  I am proud to call her a fellow cattlewoman and look forward to all of her great work on behalf of myself and the other hundreds of thousands of beef farmers in the United States.  You can also check out her blog at http://www.fortheloveofbeef.blogspot.com.

Thank you for taking the time to help!

Defining the Basic Needs of a Bovine…

What are the basic needs of a bovine which ensure good care and welfare?

I believe that cattle need the following things to thrive and achieve their God-given potential in the production of beef:

• A consistent and clean source of feed and water.
• A comfortable environment in which to live and express normal bovine behavior.
• Good preventative health care that includes proper vaccination, deworming, and vitamin/mineral intake.
• A caregiver who understands how to properly interact with the animal, and works to consistently reduce the stress that the animal experiences.

I believe that this care can be provided in a variety of environments—on a grazing pasture or in a feed yard. 

There will certainly be times when weather challenges make them temporarily difficult to obtain, but these cornerstones of good care drive quality bovine welfare.

In order to ensure the practical application of these welfare cornerstones, the Beef Quality Assurance Program focuses on 3 basic areas of education for cattle farmers:

• Feed Ingredient Selection
• Processing (vaccination) and Animal Treatment Records
• Animal Care and Husbandry (welfare) Practices

Because cattle are food animals, two other areas of focus exist in the BQA program, to ensure that the beef that our animals produce is safe and healthy:

• Feed Additives and Medications
• Injection Site Management

He is grown with the express purpose of providing a high quality source of protein for all of us to eat…

When I asked Dr. Griffin what the most important function of the BQA program was, he responded:

The major focus of BQA today is the accumulation and dissemination of animal husbandry (care/welfare) ideas and techniques from people all across the United States.   As cattle caregivers become more knowledgeable stewards, this allows cattle to grow and reproduce at their God-given genetic potential in the environment in which the cattle are raised and kept. Animal husbandry-appropriate to the animal’s needs- and within its given environment, will accomplish the objectives that we all seek … sustainability and the production of safe beef.

After the Thanksgiving Holiday, we will take a closer look at each of the 5 areas of focus for Beef Quality Assurance and discuss their role in ensuring good cattle welfare.

 

The Basic Premise Behind Quality and Appropriate Cattle Welfare…

He views the world from a different perspective.

Thinking on a different cognitive level.

His needs are basic and may sometimes seem rudimentary to human eyes.

While those needs may appear simplistic, they are innately tied to his vitality.

His good health is intrinsically tied to the safety of our food.

He is a food animal—he feeds our families.

He is a bovine and his job is to produce high quality and safe beef.

I am his caregiver, and it is my job to offer appropriate care that meets his needs and allows him to reach his God-given potential.

When he reaches this potential, the cycle is complete and I have successfully raised a safe and healthy beef product that comes from animals that are humanely cared for.

Animal Welfare–The Great Sea of Confusion!

When I learned that I was pregnant with my first child, I went looking for information on pregnancy.  I’ll never forget standing in a book store in Omaha open-mouthed and shocked at how many different books existed on the topic.  I was completely overwhelmed and left the book store without making a purchase.

A couple of weeks later I asked my doctor for suggestions on what books to read.  She gave me a great book that I read throughout my pregnancy.  I learned an important lesson that day—when you do not know anything about a topic, it is best to look to someone who is knowledgeable for help…

I seem to rarely be without an animal at my side–whether it is a horse or a bovine at the feed yard, or a dog or a cat at my home…

I think that the topic of animal welfare can be incredibly complex.  Many, many diverse groups and individuals have thoughts on the subject and, as a result, even getting a simple universal definition of the term is challenging.  If you were to Google the term, you are likely to get a landslide of confusing and sometimes conflicting information on the topic.

As convoluted as the term animal welfare can sometimes be, I think that the idea of good animal care is incredibly important.  I love animals. They have always played a pivotal role in my life.  Growing up I was surrounded by dogs (my dad is the ultimate dog lover), and we spent the weekends hunting for quail and ducks on ranch pasture ground about 60 miles from our home.

My brother and I, many years ago with the quail that Christie (the dog) pointed and our parents shot.  My mom makes a wonderful quail dinner…

Until I arrived in Nebraska in 1997, I personally knew of two types of animals—pets and wild game animals.  As I went to work at our cattle feed yard, I began to learn about a third type of animals:  food animals.  While I have always been an omnivore, up until that point I knew very little about raising food animals on a farm.

Fortunately, as I went to work at our feed yard, I was successful in finding good people and good information which helped me to learn appropriate care and welfare relative to this new type of animal.  It was during this transition that I began to look at the topic of animal welfare from a new perspective—from the eyes of a caregiver of food animals.

Understanding them,and understanding the goal of safe and healthy food makes me a good caregiver…

When I look back at the last 16 years, there is one program and one individual that have consistently guided me in my search to offer high quality and appropriate care to my cattle.  The program is the Beef Quality Assurance Program, and the individual is veterinarian and rumanint nutritionist Dr. Dee Griffin.  I met Dr. Griffin only a few weeks after I moved to Nebraska. His passion for “doing things right” motivated me to search for greatness on my farm—Something that I still do each and every day.

A great man—Dr. Griffin has dedicated his life to understanding good cattle welfare and mentoring others in their search to humanely raise cattle and produce high quality beef.

I am going to take a series of posts to talk about Beef Quality Assurance, and I have enlisted Dr. Griffin to help me in this journey.  I hope that by the end, you all will feel more comfortable and more knowledgeable about animal welfare relative to cattle and the production of beef.  Please feel free to ask questions—I don’t want any of you to have the same puzzled and overwhelmed expression on your faces as I did all those years ago standing in a book store looking for someone to help me through what appeared to be a great sea of confusion!

Learning To Let Go…

Last Friday night, my daughter’s cat “Snickerdoodle” was hit by a car and killed on the road in front of our house.  I wondered why she had not come running the night before, as she usually does, when I called for her at bedtime.

Megan with Snickers when she was a kitten…

Snickers was an adorable gray and white cat that brought our family a tremendous amount of joy.  We buried her on the edge of our horse pasture wrapped in an old t-shirt that Megan had decorated with the message: “I love you Snickers.  You always made me smile and gave such wonderful kisses.  I miss you.  Have fun in heaven.”

Although she is no longer with us, this little cat received nothing but love during her time at the Feed Yard Foodie house…

In the last 15 years, our family has lost two dogs, three cats, and one horse.  We held a funeral for each of the animals, and all but the horse are buried in the pasture.  Every time that we are faced with this I find myself saying, the only thing worse than losing a beloved pet would be never having had them to love and enrich your life. Somehow, that does not seem to make saying goodbye any easier.

Holding a funeral for our lost pets allows my girls to learn to let go.  From the creation of personal prayers, to reminiscing about the lost pet, to singing Amazing Grace as we tearfully end the service, this ritual gives us the opportunity to grieve and acknowledge the loss.  It also provides hope and reaffirms our belief that God will welcome the lost animal into his spiritual oasis.

He is grown for the express purpose of providing food, but his life is still meaningful and it is my responsibility to provide good care to him…

Although I view my cattle at the feed yard in a much different light than our family’s pets, I still feel a sense of loss and disappointment when one of them dies.  It is as though I have failed in my job as caregiver.  I am supposed to care for and raise these animals with the goal of keeping them healthy and creating safe and wholesome beef—when one of them dies, it is like a personal failure.

For me to be successful, every single one of my animals must thrive on my farm…

We benchmark and track the percentage of cattle that die during their stay at the feed yard.  My goal is 0%.  I never seem to quite be able to achieve that, but it is not for a lack of trying.  Severe weather plays a large factor in determining how many animals I lose, but other factors also play a role.  The bottom line is that whenever an animal is stressed, he is more likely to get sick and/or die.

Good care starts on the ranch. For the animal to thrive high quality and consistent care must be provided from the first day that the calf is born…

Over the past 15 years, our death loss percentage at the feed yard has decreased significantly.  I believe that this is due to my focus on reducing total stress on each one of my animals.  It starts with how my rancher partners care for their animals early in their lives, continues with limiting shipment stress, and culminates with ensuring an easy transition and consistent comfort at the feed yard.

The continuation of good care at the feed yard ensures good health and high quality beef.

I tell my children, no matter how good you are—you can always get better and these words are forefront in my mind as I work to improve animal care and hone in on the elusive 0% death loss.  Today, my death loss rate is less than 0.5%.   Somehow, that does not ease the guilt that I feel when we discover a dead animal in one of our pens.

Although they are food animals, not pets, I believe that each bovine’s life holds value and a small part of my heart weeps every time that I lose one.  Living on a farm has made me a realist.  With that metamorphic transition comes the necessity to let go when one of my animals dies.  But, each time that I am forced to let go, I form a greater resolve to work harder to achieve that 0% goal.

I am personally responsible for each one of my animals…

All animals, whether they are pets or food animals, hold intrinsic value to our society.  It is all of our jobs to provide the best possible welfare so that each one has the greatest chance of living a productive life—whether it is a beef animal that is grown to provide high quality protein for human nurishment, or the beloved pet that our family said good bye to last weekend.

Good Is The Enemy Of Great…

Good is the enemy of great.  I had never heard this expression until my daughter’s Cross Country coach made it the mantra of this year’s season.  We all strive to be good at what we do—do we sometimes settle for good when we can be great?

AG and her coach—after her first Junior High Cross Country win…

How do we protect ourselves from falling into complacency just because we are good?

I am always amazed at the “life lessons” that I learn from parenting and mentoring my girls.  I encourage them to dream big and set goals to help those dreams become reality.  Possibly even more important than establishing and reaching goals is the commitment to create new goals once the old ones have been accomplished.

Moving the bar higher with each successful accomplishment protects us against

 good becoming the enemy of great.

As I reminded my favorite 7^thgrader this weekend to set new goals for the remainder of the Cross Country season (she has reached all of the ones that she set at the beginning of the season), I found myself thinking that I might need to take my own advice.

The care I offer to them determines the quality of their life and the quality of the beef that they make…

More than a decade ago, I made the commitment to change the management philosophy at my cattle feed yard.  I promised myself that a renewed focus on quality—quality animals, quality care, and quality beef—would permeate both my business plan and the everyday actions on my farm.

To accomplish this, I made the following goals:

• To become my own cattle buyer (http://feedyardfoodie.wordpress.com/2011/10/13/the-cattle-buyer/)…
• To work with my rancher partners to improve the care that we offer to our animals and the quality of the beef that those animals produce…
• To follow animal performance all of the way through the packing plant to ensure that I am producing high quality beef…
• To reconfigure the way that we offer care at the feed yard with the focus on “what is right for the calf”…This required developing a solid understanding of bovine psychology and implementing what I call holistic care.

Today, I am the cattle buyer and work directly with the ranchers who provide more than 85% of my cattle.  I also follow those animals all of the way through the packing plant to understand the quality of the beef that they make.  Finally, our focus at the feed yard is to provide consistent and appropriate care to our animals with our days revolving around their needs.

I believe that I am good at what I do.  We benchmark cattle performance (health, pounds of weight gained each day, the amount of feed required to get that weight gain, and carcass quality at the packing plant) to ensure that I am good at what I do.  The bottom line is that when I offer good care, my cattle thrive and make good beef.

A tasteful, highly nutritious steak that comes from a humanely raised animal is the goal…

What I realized last weekend was that although I am good, I need to work to be better.  A reader recently asked why I wean any calves at the feed yard when I know (and scientific studies show) that the animals would get along better if they were weaned on the farm of origin.

The answer to that question is that sometimes my ranchers ask me to wean their calves at the feed yard when it would be logistically difficult for them to wean them on the ranch (this year we are weaning about 15% of our cattle at the feed yard instead of the home ranch).  While our decisions are mostly based on the availability of natural resources (feed for the cattle), perhaps I need to work harder to encourage all of my ranchers to look for ways to more consistently wean their calves on the home ranch.

Perhaps if I placed more of a priority on this, I could shift my cattle care from good to great…I think that after I get finished weaning calves in a few weeks that I need to take the time to make a new set of goals for myself to ensure that good is not the enemy of great on my farm.

Playing Peek-A-Boo…

It is an old wives’ tale that the phases of the moon determine how easily calves wean.  Although I am a stalwart believer in science, I put great faith in the wisdom of the “old timers”.  I also have weaned enough calves over the past 15 years to realize that there are some things that cannot be explained by textbooks…

We weaned our first group of calves the day after Labor Day.  They weaned so well that I was feeling like a genius.  The second set of calves (weaned last week) brought back a little bit of humility into my life…

Both sets of animals were “set up for success” with minimal stress and an excellent preconditioning health and nutrition history.  They also both originated on ranches only about 20 miles away from my farm.

Sometimes the calves arrive in stock trailers like these, and sometimes they come on a semi-truck…

My cowboy attributes the difference in weaning ease between these two groups to the phase of the moon—I think that he is a smart guy…

So, how do I tell an easy weaning experience from a more challenging one?  Here is a list of things that I look for in order to make an accurate decision.

• How long did the calves display anxious behavior and “search for mama”?  Or, when looking at it from the other side, how long did it take for the calves to achieve contentment in their new surroundings?
• How easily did the calves learn how to eat out of the bunk and drink out of the water tank?
• Did the calves maintain good health during the weaning period? (The first 2 weeks are critical and we watch them closely for 4 weeks.)
  

  He’s calm and he’s comfortable in his new home…This is the goal.

The answers to these three questions not only determine the success of the weaning transition time, but they also determine the stress and fatigue level that my guys and I experience during each weaning episode…

When newly arrived calves are not yet completely acclimated, they can be very difficult to keep in the home pen—they want to leave the pen to search for mama.  I laugh that they play a very determined game of Peek-A-Boo…

She’s good help…

I was thankful for my two favorite blondes last week because the three of us took the “sunset shift” at the feed yard babysitting the newly arrived cattle.  The time of day that the animals search the hardest and are most likely to try to leave the home pen are dawn and dusk.

She’s good help too…

I solve the dawn challenge by exercising the calves during that time which begins by allowing them to leave the pen to search, but ends by showing them that the home pen is where they will find feed, water, and comfort.  It works very well and shortens the length of time that the calves “look for mama” because they learn quickly that they can take care of themselves.

The beautiful promise of a new day…

Dusk is a bit more challenging.  I do not like to exercise the calves at that time for two reasons: 1. It does not correspond with one of the two feeding times of the day, and 2. If something goes wrong I do not have time to fix it because darkness falls and impedes my ability to see!

The setting sun draws the day to a close and reminds me that darkness will soon prevail…

The first night that the calves were at the feed yard last week, the majority of the steers were able to escape from the home pen to play a rousing game of Peek-A-Boo.  It took me a while to figure out how they were getting out of the pen, but it turns out that they were able to squeeze in between the gate and the fence post and also underneath the gate.

Some extra dirt underneath the gate and a chain put an end to most of the Peek-A-Boo game…

I am happy to report that the calves are now thriving in their home pens and are fully acclimated into the feed yard.  I have to admit that playing Peek-A-Boo with calves can be tiring and make for long days. I relish the successful feeling that I get when my animals settle in.  This victory carries me forward to the next bunch of calves!

We will wean a set of calves each week for the next three weeks.  Each weaning experience will be unique, and also ensure that there is never a dull moment on the Feed Yard Foodie farm!

Weanin’ Calves…

I remember when I weaned each one of my girls.  It was a transition time and while it was not always easy, it was definitely necessary.

My youngest daughter on the day of her birth–it is hard to believe that she used to be that little!

Time passes, things change, babies turn into toddlers and before you know it they head off to school.  The next day (it seems) you wake up and your “baby” is taller than you…

Almost 8 years later, she is the tallest child in her 2nd grade class–she has a few more inches to go to catch me but not very many! Her oldest sister already has several inches on me which she considers very cool…

While animals are undeniably different than humans, there is also a time to wean.  This time is contingent on available nutrition (for both the cow and the calf), and the age of the calf.  The drought of 2012 has necessitated earlier than normal weaning for many calves in Nebraska.  The availability of nutrient rich grass is scarce as Mother Nature has not provided well for us this summer.

This little guy was only a couple of weeks old when this picture was taken—he will come to me next week as an 8 month old calf that weighs about 500#…He was weaned on his home ranch about 6 weeks ago due to lack of grass for his mama to graze.

The nutritional requirements for a nursing cow are high, and it is a more efficient use of our current limited supply of natural resources to wean the calf from the cow.  Both animals will prosper more efficiently without being dependent on lactation.

The milk requirements for this calf increases as he gets larger with age. When he gets to weighing about 500#, it becomes hard on the mother cow to continue to nurse him. This is a good time to wean the calf…

Sometimes calves are weaned on the home ranch in neighboring pastures from their mamas.  Sometimes the necessary feed is not available on the ranch so the calves are weaned on another farm.  Weaning is undoubtedly a stressful time for both the cow and the calf—it is a time of transition and change.  During this transition time, it is important to teach the calf how to satisfy his own needs without his mama.  There are things that I can provide and teach my animals as their caregiver to help them make this transition.

The water tank and mineral licks shown here are similar to what the animals had on the home ranch.  This familiarity is vitally important during the transition phase…

Through the acclimation process, I teach the calves where the feed bunk and water tank are in addition to helping them realize that everything that they need is in the new home pen.  Acclimation is a very powerful tool for me as I wean calves—by helping the animals realize that a pen with fresh feed, water, and their herd-mates is a good place to be, my calves experience less stress and stay healthier.

The prairie hay we feed to them is also very familiar to the calves as it is the same grass hay that they ate alongside their mama’s before weaning…The added wet distillers grains gives the calf the protein and nutrients that he needs to take the place of mama’s milk…

It is very rewarding for me to watch my calves quickly reclaim contentment and begin the new phase of their lives in the feed yard.  Content calves that look for the feed truck with anticipation as it delivers prairie hay, wheat straw, and wet distillers grains grow well and will ultimately make great tasting beef!

sept. 2012 weaning calves 035

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Over the next couple of weeks, I will talk in more detail about the care that I offer to these younger (an average of 8 months old) animals as they move off of the ranch and into the feed yard.  Keeping them content and healthy as they move through the transition is incredibly important (and time consuming).  I will do my best to continue my bi-weekly posting, but if I miss a post please know that it is only because long hours at the feed yard kept me from writing…