Do we really even know what we've done?

[rkaiser]

This new study about the effects of red meat on our diet has got me thinkin. Do we truly know what we have done by changing the way we grow beef in this country over the last 30 or 40 years?

Ever since we introduced the oxen like cattle into our beef herd and pumped them up with hormones we have increased the carcass weights of our stock. Mostly to the benefit of the factories that pump the carcasses down the line and make money from larger, or simply longer knife or saw cuts.
The old saying from the boys who are in the know LOL that we still get paid by the pound for our animals has all but become a joke as we aren't getting paid enough in the conventional marketplace to scratch out a living let alone show profit or grow our businesses. Wow ---- we've increased the size of the average carcass in Canada by 200 pounds in the last 30 years. Has it made us any money yet????

So what else do we or should I say don't we know. Do we know for sure that the conventional beef market has not made our product less healthy? Do the studies on individual carcasses prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that conventionally raised hormone filled carcasses are better for us than naturally raised stock?

We get slammed all the time by the boys in the conventional biz to sell on our positives and leave conventional beef alone, but how do those of you who raise conventional hormone filled oxen defend against these new claims about the healthiness of your product? Are you SURE that these new studies are wrong? Is this fast grown "Fertilised Beef" as healthy as you say it is? Do you feel that the tomato that you buy in Safeway that is grown in a hydroponic environment with nothing but chemicals and fertilizer is as tasty or nutritious as the one I grow in my all natural garden? Would you really like to grab a steak from the Costco counter and come out for a taste test on our barby in front of our store on 4th st. in Calgary with the media on hand?

We know for a fact that one of the only places that humans can receive a natural dose of CLA ... one that is absorbed naturally by our bodies.... is from a ruminant bovine whose system has not been assaulted with starch to kill off the bugs in the rumen that produce CLA or many other good fatty acids. Don't get me wrong --- I like and produce beef raised on a 65% barley diet in the end, but am still trying to figure out other natural supplements to keep them bugs alive.

Should we continue to ignore this fact or the fact that the consumer actually likes a smaller cut of meat. A rib eye steak that you can cut and inch or more thick and still make less than 12 ounces? Just to make the factories happy? Cause it ain't profiting any of you; unless you are simply margin operators out for profit and nothing more yourselves.

Let's have er boys.... Tell me I'm a wacko if you wish. Or wake up and smell the friggin roses. Maybe the Europeans are smarter than our American cousins when it comes to the effects of hormone implants and not simply using the ban as a protectionist ploy.

[farmers_son]

I am not sure what point you are trying to make. I gather you retail meat from a store in Calgary. I am guessing hormone free… possibly mostly grass fed beef. Are you looking for other producers to say hormone grain fed beef is second rate to build market for your product?

You will certainly get a lot of agreement with your statement “we still get paid by the pound for our animals has all but become a joke as we aren't getting paid “enough” in the conventional marketplace to scratch out a living let alone show profit or grow our businesses.” However that is a bit of a motherhood statement and if you asked anyone in the value chain I doubt any would say they are getting paid enough. “We” always want more. I am left thinking what would be enough? Maybe if I got a $1000 for a weaned calf and $900 for a cull cow that would be enough. Of course since everyone else would be getting the same money the price of land and pasture would quickly rise then I would need more for my calf and cull because I was not getting enough.

I will not defend hormone fed beef. I use implants but I recall a thread in these pages where many do not. I doubt very much if you will find a commercial sized feedlot that does not use implants unless they had lined up a solid market for the hormone free product. Ranchers Beef at Balzac did make efforts to supply the very small tariff free hormone free market that presently exists into Europe and I tried to participate with them on that but it never worked out for whatever reason. Mostly because Ranchers went broke but they did have trouble making sales, I know that for a fact. I did leave my calves without implants that year and got to see first hand how much more it costs to raise a calf without implants.

I do know efforts are being made to increase sales of hormone free beef into the Europe. Up to this point Europe has been very protective of their market and typical imports have been low quality, low cost, grass fed product. I have quite a few reservations that Europe will ever open their market to our Canadian grain fed beef which would compete one on one with their producers. I tend to think there will always be a high tariff wall for our product into that market.

I have heard for years consumers want a smaller steak. They also want bigger houses, more fuel efficient cars, smarter and better behaved kids, prettier wife perhaps a mistress, better job with less work, holidays in warm places and so on. So what? It is one thing to survey consumers and ask what they want but if you do not ask at the same time how much more will they pay for that product or what else they are willing to do without then you have no information at all.

The industry is already producing the type of animal that sells and makes the most of whatever profit is to be made. I raise the type of cattle I do because to the best of my knowledge that makes me more money than if I did something else.

[vagabonddreamer]

rkaiser...i know that at a 4-H level for the last 6 or 7 years the judges (mostly imports from alta and sask) here in BC have been stressing to the kids that the days of 1400-1500 lb finised animals are all but over...that the market place cannot support the huge cuts any more...they have been picking grand champions in the 1275-1375 pound range...i wonder if that is consistent with the rest of the western provinces and 4-H programs???

we have definitely gone the way of as much "all natural" as we can...short of 100% grass feeding...

FS...muahahahaha...i want ALL those things....vs

[smcgrath76]

Take a read of this...
http://www.vcmtools.ca/consumer_data.php
It is a pretty interesting report.
Most of us sell cattle, but the price is based off beef demand / credits and cost of production.
I don't know if we are on the right track with beef marketing. Maybe instead of a packing plant we should be building a tannery. I do know a lot of people will bid any profits back into inputs.
Maybe the real question is what are we actually doing to add value to beef and byproducts? I would argue not much compared to pork, chicken and soybeans.

[rkaiser]

Gee whizickers FS.... You play around on here like you don't know who I am. That's your little game bud. I have no fear of saying what I need to say and telling folks my name.

www.kaiserscelticcattle.com

for those of you who don't know.

I am not trying to drum up support as much as I am asking fellows like our resident ABP/CCA delegate FS if he would like to take a challenge. Follow your hormone injected beef calf from it's 1800 pound raw boned momma through the system. Hopefully that calf is from a continental sire who would push 3000 pounds or one of the British bulls that fit the frame 8 category and the same weight range. If you don't have any animals like this FS, then maybe follow one of the neighbors calves through the chain.

Grab a rib eye from one of these beasties and bring it over. We'll throw it on the Barby beside mine and have a beer while we wait for the steaks to cook.

We can chat about your European dream that says they don't want our beef. Ha ha --- they who... The only reason we are not over there right now is because the big boys are supplying product from their plants in other parts of the word and don't wnat to screw with their little Canadian monopoly. You know darn well that if --- IF North America ever met the non tariff quotas in the EU, they would open more. The little ABP CCA EU protectionist issue ain't gonna flow well with my Coors light.

Sorry if you don't understand my musing FS. You could take a cut at me like old Roy Ruttlegde did and call me a pot smoker.... LOL

I actually like some of your opinions and hope that some day you shake things up at ABP/CCA and climb the ladder.

Bottom line old boy. Do you feel that you are doing the best job you can to supply the children of our planet with the most wholesome healthy product that you possibly can, or are you simply in the business for the bucks?

Where do you get your steaks from?

I feel awfully good selling parents of Autistic children wieners with no preservatives, hormones, or antibiotics. And offering the people of Calgary the alternative that the European continent is accepting as a more healthy alternative.

Or we could continue the ABP/CCA approach and tell them they are full of beans...LOL.... and never sell them any beef.

[farmers_son]

I have no doubt your hormone free beef cooks up good on the barby. And so there is no question I did try to go hormone free for the European market with Ranchers Beef. There were a lot of upfront costs that I had to incur to prove my calves were indeed hormone free and it seemed like a very limited market... that is just my impression.
Sales opportunities in Europe were definitely limited. I am sure there are lots of producers, myself included, who would love to produce hormone free beef but there is a cost to doing that and I need to be paid more for that kind of calf. If you are successful in marketing hormone free beef direct through retail that is great. I have played the retail game in the past and have really come to appreciate the benefits of sticking to farming.

As I understand it, CCA is seeking to open markets in Europe. Actually it is the federal government that has to get us market access but as far as I know efforts are being made in that direction. It appears to me as long as Canada insists on protections for supply managed commodities like milk and eggs that Europe will never budge on allowing us any meaningful access to their market. But hey that is just my opinion. Europe does import South American beef which probably has to pay the high tariffs to get into the market. If there was a profit to be made selling into Europe it would be already happening. No one is leaving money on the table these days.

I am not an organic producer but that does not make me some kind of bad guy. I do have financial pressures, debt to repay and obligations to meet so I have to pay attention to the “bucks” as you so succinctly put it. I have never sold an animal that I did not believe was healthy to eat and have dispatched several to the bush because I was concerned that I would not want to eat them myself so I would not sell them. Implanted calves do grow and gain faster, that is a fact. My cattle are healthy and I sell a healthy product which is sometimes implanted with hormones; respecting all the withdrawal dates and proper procedures. I am sure the product you are peddling is healthy too and if you can make a better buck then me than more power to you.

You have tried in the past to paint me in the past as some kind of ABP flunky and I assure you that is no more true than you being a some kind of pot smoker.

[per]

This outfit switched to a grass, no hormone, later calving (not late enough), calve em, rough winter em, grass em operation to try to raise a healthier product. We use tools like refractometers and EC meters to try to balance the grass for the animals. We went that route to raise a better (IMO) product for our family. It turned out that as we started to go down the route of a different way of doing things it became more profitable, not less. Our Gross income was a little smaller but our net was larger. You keep raising those high input animals on unbalanced fertilized grass (we went to legumes and other odd and unusual things) and it will reap a rather (again IMO) less healthy and less profitable product. Take one thing out of the program (implants for eg.) and it might not help or even make it as fs says less profitable. Change the whole paradigm and I think the elusive profit is possible. My books said our cattle business was in the black last year. In fact every year except 2003. Just my observations. And yes Randy I think your Waco, that's what I like about you. I guess I just joined your Waco club in the eyes of some here.

[smcgrath76]

I tend to agree with you per. the paradigm shift for us was more important than tweaking a "production" system.
We now provide less "support" for our local agribusiness community - many of these owned by locals, but the small support we do provide will be for a lot more years than under the production paradigm. No one is going to bid for our fuel contract.
Now we look for synergies with neighbours and other potential partners and our primary product is certainly changing to be not grass or cattle (and probably not even beef). We are entering an era of selling food, sequestering carbon, providing habitat, etc. and we are not going to wait for the government to outline how it is going to pay for those services.

[kato]

I think we might be part-time Wacko's. We've been cherry picking different management tools from all over the place if they would work for us.

Traditional management is.. We still start calving in February. BTW, the first three calves born in the "nice" weather of April caused us more grief than the previous 120 combined. We still raise Continental breed cattle.

New Age managemement is. We don't use implants. Quit that a long time ago. We graze corn until a week before said early calving. Even under our so called conventional management, our herd spends a little less than 100 days in the yard, not the 200 days most people use to compare the costs of the two methods. The Continental breed cattle we raise are moderate framed, and easy fleshing.

I think you have not be afraid to be a Wacko when it makes you money. But you have to remember that not every idea works on every operation, and pick your options carefully.

My husband was at the auction last week when some so called holistically raised calves came through the ring. One little guy was so weak and run down from "living naturally" that he collapsed and had to be dragged out. As for the profitability of this particular operator, there were a couple of guys in suits in the stands writing down the prices, so I bet we can all guess who they were.

Some guys just aren't doing it right, and if it's not done right it ain't going to work, no matter how cutting edge and progressive it sounds.

[per]

Randy, I would be interested in a BBQ taste test in June or July. Could be lots of fun.