Editorial Blog

Ag Teachers: When Someone Believes in You

Thu, 21 Sep 2023 17:13:09 GMT

You can’t fit FFA in a box. And you can’t fit ag teachers into one either.

Ag teachers aren’t just imparting knowledge on grain farming or welding or raising livestock or public speaking or growing vegetables or wiring drones. They are helping young people figure out who they are and what they want to do in life.

How that looks is different all across the country, but the end result seems to be fairly consistent. Empowered young people that are a little bit closer to finding their dream. Through experiences outside the classroom and an investment in time beyond the school day, ag teachers are able to learn more about their students to try to figure out what makes them tick.

When I interview people in agriculture, they often share stories of how their ag teacher impacted their life. I know I will always be grateful for my ag teacher’s dedication to helping me and three other teammates get down the road to judge livestock.

I remember Mr. Van Winkle clearly saying, “I may not be able to coach you, but I’ll get you there.” You see, he wasn’t a livestock judge. And he’d be the first to tell you that. But he knew that the four of us had a passion and a little bit of talent, so he found a way to help us reach our goals. He even took us to Europe to compete.

Mr. Van Winkle invested hours upon hours driving us to workouts, contests and clinics. He didn’t care how far it was or what it cost, he always found a way. At the end of the day, he believed in us. So we believed in ourselves, too.

As E.E. Cummings said, “Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit.”

When I look back at what I learned in FFA, that is one thing I’ll never forget. If you want something in life, with hard work and dedication, there’s nothing you can’t do. That confidence and belief in yourself is something you can’t learn from a book.

Now the table has turned. As a mother, having someone invest in my children like that means the world to me. The sacrifice their ag teacher makes hits home a little harder because time is more precious to me now as a parent. It’s not lost on our family when we see the time Mr. McCabe invests away from his kids to help our kids.

So, on National Teach Ag Day, I just want to say thanks to all the teachers who take the time to inspire, encourage and help the next generation of leaders find their way in the most noble industry in the world – agriculture.

Related Articles:

10 Ways FFA Made Us Better

FFA Has-Been? No, Your Role Just Changes

Growing Deep Roots

National FFA Convention: Farm Journal’s Inside Perspective

12 Reasons Why We Need FFA More Than Ever

It's Time to End the Checkoff Squabble

Thu, 22 Sep 2022 05:29:13 GMT

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, in his majority opinion upholding the constitutionality of the beef checkoff, wrote: “The message set out in the beef promotions is from beginning to end the message established by the Federal Government.”

Handed down in May 2005, Johanns v. Livestock Marketing Association confirmed the checkoff’s status as government speech. The vote brought together an unusual alliance of justices who often represented polar extremes. Voting with Scalia was Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Sandra Day O’Connor, Clarence Thomas, Stephen G. Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsberg.

Some 13 years later, tensions remain high over America’s beef checkoff, with a new legal challenge that seeks to deliver a crippling blow to the state beef councils in 15 states (see Contentious Battle Continues Over the Beef Checkoff ). The lawsuit was filed against the Montana Beef Council last year by Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund (R-CALF), alleging that state beef councils are private entities and are not subject to the ruling of the Supreme Court’s 2005 decision.

Defending this new case is USDA, the Cattlemen’s Beef Board (CBB) and the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA). R-CALF is supported in its efforts by the Organization for Competitive Markets (OCM) and lead counsel David Muraskin of Public Justice.

Outside the courtroom, R-CALF and OCM have come under scrutiny for their ties to the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), an animal rights organization with a history of legal battles seeking to undermine food animal production. Both R-CALF and OCM deny any relationship or monetary help from HSUS, though it’s clear Public Justice attorneys are on the case pro bono until—should they prevail—they can petition the court for their fees.

Despite denials of any relationship with HSUS, coincidental connections between the groups and its players are disturbing. For instance, “Public Justice is supported by trial lawyers and radical environmentalists,” says Rick Berman, executive director of the Center for Consumer Freedom. “One of its two food project attorneys formerly worked for HSUS. It’s outrageous that R-CALF is joining hands with a fanatical anti-agriculture activist group and their lawyers.”

Ironically, should R-CALF prevail in the case, checkoff collections will continue, though 15 states could lose control of their half of that money. Managing those funds would become the responsibility of the CBB, which would mean a smaller voice for local cattlemen, not a larger one.

Consumer demands are rapidly evolving. Twitter, for instance, didn’t exist when
Scalia declared the checkoff constitutional, and checkoff-funded programs such as social media campaigns are crucial today.

Logic suggests it is time to end the bitter industry infighting and legal maneuvers over the beef checkoff.

No Smear Campaign, Unpaid Whistle Blower Retorts

Public Justice Attorney Claims “Smear Campaign” Against R-CALF and OCM

OCM Stands Firm in Quest for Checkoff Transparency

HSUS, R-CALF, OCM: Guilt by Association?

5 Hard Lessons Learned from a Year of Virtual FFA

Thu, 22 Sep 2022 00:56:24 GMT

As I shut the door behind me and gave her one last smile, I felt the nerves set in. I wandered around aimlessly for a while, watching the minutes pass by. Virtual FFA contests are a little weird, especially if you are a parent. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to “get lost” this past year during my daughter’s FFA activities. Instead of helping quell her nerves about in-person judging and how to “enter the room,” we’re trying to help her figure out lighting, country internet and chairs that don’t squeak or swivel to prepare for another Zoom chat.

At times I get bummed out for her – nearly her entire FFA experience has been virtual due to the pandemic. As a former FFA member, I believe some of the best parts of FFA were getting to know my fellow FFA members on long van trips to a judging contest or meeting up with other chapters in our section for contests and leadership clinics.

FFA centers around community – whether it’s meeting some of your best friends, building young people to be future leaders in agriculture or participating in competitions and being exposed to a wide network of industry leaders.

A virtual FFA community can only fill the gap so far. While I am extremely grateful FFA has worked hard to find alternative solutions and create opportunities for its members during the pandemic, I believe the very things FFA members have missed out on this year drive home the biggest reasons why FFA is so important.

1. FFA is for everyone.
As a young child, Emily Webel decided she would not be in FFA because the jackets weren’t pink. Even though her dad was an ag teacher and she grew up in an FFA family, she didn’t want to pursue a career in agriculture so she says she didn’t see the need to be in FFA. But then she met her husband Joe, an “FFA lifer” as she affectionately calls him. Since then, she’s watched how FFA has impacted her older children and she says she gets it now.

“This is a place for lots of kids – lots of kids who may not have had a place otherwise. This organization is a place where you can turn your hobby or passion or skill or just something new into a tangible path for career development. We all may not play in the NBA, but we all need to learn how to speak in public and run a meeting properly. We need welders, someone to care for animals and, you know, feed us. Those are skills that are important,” says Emily, who’s raising her family on a farm near Farmington, Ill.

2. FFA opens doors to mentors.
There is something completely hard and completely wonderful about trusting people to mentor your children. When our daughter joined FFA, we vowed we would take a step back and let her experience what it’s like to have someone besides your parents invest in your life. Why? It’s so important for kids to begin expanding their network while they are at home. As parents we play a pivotal role in bringing up our kids. Still, when someone from the outside decides to pour into you, it gives you a confidence that you just can’t get from your parents.

FFA creates many ways for mentors to interact with our young people through competitions, tours, workshops and interviews. Their advice, insight and suggestions for improvement help FFA members learn one of the most valuable lessons in life – successful people are always learning and growing.

Can you experience mentorship over Zoom? Sure. Wherever two people gather – even if it’s virtual – creates a space for growth. But as Emily points out, you just can’t replicate that same experience in a virtual space.

“Just going through pictures of our girls meeting officers at state convention is one knife to the heart that is twisting...we need people. FFA, and the ag community as a whole for that matter, is about relationships and legacies being built. We are missing that portion big time,” Emily adds.

3. FFA builds perseverance.
Eudora FFA president Cody Loganbill of Eudora, Kan., admits his FFA experience online has been a struggle at times.

“I would love to say my FFA experience has been close to perfect after being online for the past year. However, that is simply not the case. Similar to the other organizations I am involved in, communication and the desire to do new things has decreased substantially while going virtual,” Loganbill says. “Every online contest and convention has changed from an amazing opportunity to meet new people, to a chore that fewer and fewer members are willing to participate in.”

Although he is a huge supporter of FFA, he says it’s a completely different experience on a computer screen. Still, he has learned many lessons this past year.

“Virtual FFA has taught me to persevere through hard times. I believe that when our organization gets back to normal, FFA members will be more thankful for the hands-on experiences and members will be more active than ever before in contests and conventions,” Loganbill adds.

4. FFA invites collaboration.
Moving a 600-student ag department from an in-person to virtual environment was not an easy task, says Doug Simms, animal/vet science instructor at Manor ASD in the Austin, Texas area. Because Austin was considered a “hotspot,” they’ve had very little in-person learning opportunities since the pandemic struck.

Although everyone can’t wait to return to “normal,” Simms says this experience has helped him become comfortable with Zoom and has allowed him a new way to connect students with industry leaders. Google Classroom has also been a highly effective way for students to have interactive coursework.

“I really believe that the virtual component will continue to help further FFA by connecting programs large and small to one another and will further empower our young people to be the future leaders of agriculture,” Simms says.

The virtual learning environment helped FFA members become more self- sufficient and discover new ways to collaborate, says Joe Webel, lead grain originator, nutrition services at The Maschhoffs and a member of the Illinois FFA Foundation Board of Directors.

“The state and national FFA organizations have done as good of a job as possible to find ways to provide online positives for their memberships. However, it’s a real shame for those young people elected to serve as state and national officers that they are not getting the normal experience either,” Joe says.

5. FFA is a bridge to more.
Sadly, the time FFA members lost during the pandemic won’t be returned. But that said, Joe believes the strongest leaders and top students with committed teachers have found a way to overcome the challenges of the pandemic and have continued to do so.

“Some students have spent the time individually to prepare and compete in the altered environment and have been able to get a positive experience from that. The top 10% of kids that would thrive in the previous normal environment have found a way to be involved and continue to build their skills, even in this ‘altered’ environment,” Joe says.

He is concerned this virtual environment has not been able to serve the giant “middle of the pack” with positive experiences they would have had during a normal year. For example, he describes the kids that go along for the ride one time to fill out a team and realize they like the experience they received. This discovery can start a chain reaction of greater service and engagement.

“These kids represent a big chunk of our schools, and during the COVID shutdown, they didn’t get anything. No matter how much coaxing and urging the instructors on the other side the camera pleaded that ‘We’re all in this together,’ they didn’t answer the call,” Joe says. “Maybe they lack the support and push at home to be a self-starter, or just need that daily in-person contact with a teacher to remember they are cared for, but those souls are the ones that have been left behind during this year.”

Of course, this is not just an FFA issue, he adds. It will be interesting to see what happens when more activities can be held in person and a sense of normalcy returns.

I don’t know when or if normal will return. But if you believe in the life-changing power of FFA, find someone in the middle of the pack (or on the fringe) you can encourage to get more involved. Take time to check in on them and link them to other kids in FFA, ask questions about their supervised agricultural experience, encourage them to try a career development event or simply share your FFA story and how the things you learned through FFA have made a difference in your life today. Sometimes the best thing we can do is reach out and invite others to experience more.

Read more from Farm Journal’s PORK:

Ag Teachers: When Someone Believes in You

5 Lessons FFA Taught Your Mother

Unpopular County Fair Opinion

More Than a Jacket: Karlene Krueger’s FFA Journey

It Takes All of Us

A Little Peace in the Struggle

Carbon Tax on Beef? Where’s the Science and Logic?

Wed, 17 Mar 2021 19:45:43 GMT

Twelve people have died in Serbia this year due to a measles outbreak, including two children, a tragedy blamed on the lack of vaccinations.

Last year brought the emergence of “raw water” as a drink craze. Raw water is spring water that’s unfiltered, untreated and unsterilized. Oh, and it sells for more than a bottle of fine whiskey. Consumers of raw water have been warned it’s a dangerous fad that promises health benefits but delivers dysentery.

Those are just two popular furors that ignore science – and even simple logic – placing science-deniers at their own peril. Recognizing the sheer ignorance of those trends, health professionals must be frustrated that their constant dissemination of scientific facts goes unheeded.

So it is with beef. You know, as the scourge of the Earth. It’s the giant, man-made environmental asteroid destroying our planet. Such thoughts are rapidly gaining traction among the type of folks who might be inclined to drink raw water.

New York Times contributing op-ed writer Richard Conniff pushed the beef-as-environmental-boogeyman theory Sunday. He claims to love eating beef, but writes “our collective love affair with beef…has gone wrong, in so many ways.” Conniff believes it’s time for a carbon tax on beef .

A carbon tax is not a new idea, but a recent paper published by French scientists suggests a carbon tax on beef as a way to meet European climate change targets. Conniff is intrigued by such a tax, justifying it to readers by regurgitating some often misused sins of livestock, such as: livestock are responsible for “14.5% of global emissions,” which is “more than the emissions produced from powering all the world’s road vehicles, trains, ships and airplanes combined.” Conniff wrote, “Livestock consume the yield from a quarter of all cropland worldwide. Add in grazing, and the business of making meat occupies about three-quarters of the agricultural land on the planet.”

Dude, did you think about that last sentence when you wrote it? Grazing is a logical use of land that is unsuitable for growing kale or heirloom tomatoes. Vast stretches of the Western U.S. should offer an example of that idea, but grazing is also the dominant agricultural activity in places far removed from the Mountain West.

For perspective, Mr. Cunndiff, take a drive west on Highway 2 in Nebraska from Grand Island to Alliance, or go north on Highway 77 in Kansas from El Dorado to Manhattan. There you will find the “sea of grass” Spanish explorer Francisco de Coronado described nearly 500 years ago.

Here’s the context around the statement “livestock occupy three-quarters of the agricultural land.” A third of the Earth’s landmass is desert – i.e. not much food production. A little more than one-third (37%) is devoted to agriculture. Of that, about 11% is used to grow crops.

Logic suggests we would greatly reduce our food supply if we stopped using livestock to convert grass and sunshine into milk and meat. Which is also the scientific conclusion researchers at USDA’s Agricultural Research Service and Virginia Tech arrived at with a study published in the Proceedings of National Academies of Sciences .

Their take? A healthy and sustainable food system depends on having both plants and animals. For those of us who don’t drink raw water, it’s good to know science supports some of the things logic suggests are true.

In an article published on Medium , Sara Place, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association senior director, sustainable beef production research, said the study suggests that without animal agriculture, “We’d reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. by 2.6 percent, and 0.36 percent globally — but we’d also upset our balanced food ecosystem and lack essential dietary nutrients to feed all Americans.”

Place also noted the important role livestock such as cattle play in our sustainable food system. “Taking human inedible food and ultimately making it nutritious. Specifically, cattle act as upcyclers — meaning they eat grasses and plant matter leftover from human food production and upgrade them into nutritional, high-quality protein. In fact, they produce 19 percent more edible protein than they consume.”

Science and logic both seem to refute the theory that eliminating livestock from our diet would mitigate climate change.

Strength in Community

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:51:39 GMT

We’ve all seen the headlines over the years, and some very recent, about professional dissatisfaction and burnout among veterinarians, and tragically, a higher-than-average rate of suicides. Research methods might skew the numbers, but the problems are real.

During the conference, several prominent veterinarians shared heart-wrenching stories of personal loss and emotional challenges. Discussions touched on the need for veterinary schools, professional organizations and individuals to engage in efforts to protect the emotional well-being of veterinarians.

But if bovine veterinarians are dissatisfied with their career choices, it certainly was not evident during the conference. Veterinarians and student members packed meeting rooms for sessions covering clinical skills, research, practice management and all aspects of cattle health and well-being.

Large contingents of bright-eyed veterinary students from across the country eagerly soaked up knowledge, running from one session to the next and wishing to be in three places at once. During breaks, meals and receptions, students literally glowed with the opportunities to interact with senior veterinarians of legendary status, and those icons of the profession displayed pure joy in the chance to encourage and contribute to the success of younger colleagues.

Meal tables rang with laughter and conversation as old friends caught up and new friendships formed. Topics ranged from families and football to “war stories” and good-natured debates about professional topics.

Even for me, a guy who just writes about veterinary issues, these professional conferences work like a deep-cycle battery charger. Part of that effect comes from learning about promising new advancements in veterinary medicine and cattle management, but much of the recharge results from the waves of enthusiasm, optimism and passion that wash over and through the community of participants.

Like BRD, emotional health is a complex, multi-factorial issue, and I won’t claim to know answers. I have, however, discussed this topic with mental-health professionals who uniformly agree that professional events provide significant emotional support, especially for rural veterinarians who work in relative isolation.

Join your professional associations, then go a step further by attending their conferences whenever possible, not just for the CE, but for the lasting recharge. Special bonus – when you bring a positive outlook, you not only help yourself, you add amperage to the community power that recharges your peers as well.

Next year’s AABP Conference will take place in Louisville, September 24 to 26, and other beef and dairy organizations have outstanding events scheduled between now and then. For newer DVMs, AABP will hold its third annual Recent Graduates Conference in Columbus, Ohio, on Feb. 21 and 22, 2020. Visit AABP.org for information.

For more on this topic, see these articles on BovineVetOnline:

Suicide Awareness: Vets More Than 2X More Likely To Take Own Lives

Is There Really a Rural Veterinarian Shortage?

A State of Need

Beyond Meat ‘Tastes Like Overpriced Falafel'

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:49:48 GMT

George Atuan has some interesting and astute observations about your competition, and a vision that may impact your financial success. His latest column is titled “Beyond Meat: An Overpriced Falafel.”

Wait…this is more than just a carnivore’s rant about fake meat. Atuan is a financial columnist for Seeking Alpha, and his study of the plant-based protein startup was designed to help him offer sound investment advice for Beyond Meat stock.

I, along with other card-carrying members of the Heartland Chapter of GCA (that’s Gravy Connoisseurs of America) am convinced fake meat will remain a niche player in the meat industry for the foreseeable future. But how fast these fake meat products capture market share is dependent on money from investors, so the observations of someone like Atuan are important.

George Atuan is the founder and portfolio manager at RedFox Capital, Santiago, Chile , which offers investment advice to high net worth individuals and institutional investors. He holds a Bachelor of Applied Science from the University of Toronto, an MBA from York University and he speaks English, Spanish, Portuguese and Arabic. Whew.

He writes as a free-lance contributor to Seeking Alpha, which offers market insights and financial analysis, investment ideas and stock research written by finance experts.

Atuan is not a dietician or a chef. But, after an in-home comparison of beef burgers and Beyond Meat, Atuan declared the plant-based stuff tasted like “overpriced falafel.”

That word sent me scrambling for a dictionary, because (for me) Atuan might as well have been using Arabic words. Falafel, according to Webster, is “a small croquette made with ground chickpeas or fava beans and spices, often served with salad and tahini in pita bread.”

Here’s Atuan’s description of his first bite of the Beyond Burger:

“At first, I couldn’t pin it, but the second bite took me to my teenage years back in Bethlehem in the Middle East... that is when I realized that Beyond Burgers are just glorified Americanized falafels.”

But, while we may like his comparison, we’re not interested in Atuan’s taste buds. His financial and stock expertise is what we want. Well…if you’re anti-fake meat, Atuan doesn’t disappoint.

Indeed, he offers seven reasons for not buying Beyond Meat stock. Here’s the list:

Problem #1: Tasty, but far from tasting like a real burger.

Problem #2: No moat. Meaning – when better products are made the competition will quickly copy any upgrades.

Problem #3: Tough Competition Ahead. Think Tyson, Nestle and other global behemoths.

Problem #4: Production Bottleneck. Beyond has co-manufacturers, which actually put the product together, and to grow Beyond needs more partners.

Problem #5: Unattractive business economics in steady-state. As Beyond expands it will cease being a niche player, and thus compete with meat packers and find lower returns.

Problem #6: Not a Healthy Substitute. Beyond’s patty has more fat, less protein and four times as much sodium as a beef burger.

Problem #7: Valued to perfection. Atuan says to justify Beyond’s $150 stock price, sales have to reach $22 billion by 2030. Analysts on average forecast full-year 2019 sales of $205 million. In other words, current sales are less than 1% of $22 billion.

Presently, the Beyond patties are priced about 2.4 times higher than the real stuff. I’m no Wall Street analyst and I can’t speak a lick of Arabic, but cowboy logic suggests reaching sales of $22 billion in 10 short years is a tall order.

Related stories:

Fake Meat, Real Men, Happy July 4th

Rabies Roundup

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:49:43 GMT

While rabies remains one of the most threatening zoonotic diseases worldwide, vaccination has greatly reduced the incidence of infection among pets, livestock and even wildlife, and human deaths due to rabies have become rare. Even so, veterinarians must maintain vigilance to detect rabies cases in livestock and prevent human exposure through contact with domestic or wild animals.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently hosted a “Vital Signs” webcast focusing on rabies, changing risk patterns and rabies prevention. The program featured CDC Principal Deputy Director Anne Schuchat, MD, and Emily Pieracci, DVM, with the CDC’s Rabies program.

Dr. Schuchat notes that rabies infection, once symptoms manifest, is nearly always fatal. In the not-so-distant past, the disease was relatively common and justifiably feared. Two medical advancements turned the tide: vaccination, particularly for dogs, and use of post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) in human patients.

In the United States, mass vaccination of dogs began in the 1950s, when dog bites were the most common cause of human rabies infections. With widespread, mandatory vaccination, the United States virtually eliminated the type of rabies that normally circulates in dogs by 2004. Unvaccinated dogs can still contract rabies from wildlife, but currently dogs make up only about 1% of the reported rabies cases in animals in the United States.

Dr. Pieracci notes though, that since the 1990s, the CDC has documented three times more rabid cats in the United States than rabid dogs. Outdoor cats, such as farm cats, often interact with potentially infected wildlife, and should be vaccinated.

Pieracci adds that PEP treatments, which include a series of vaccinations and injection of immunoglobulin, effectively provide both short-term and long-range immunity for someone who’s been exposed to rabies. About 55,000 Americans receive PEP treatments in emergency departments each year, and other than rare cases of extreme exposure to the virus, timely treatment almost always succeeds. The combined effects of vaccination and PEP have reduced global rabies deaths among humans by 95%.

In the United States, most human exposure to rabies now results from bites and scratches from infected wildlife. Schuchat says any mammal can catch rabies, but among rabid animals detected in the United States, 32% are bats, 28% are raccoons, 21% are skunks, 7% are foxes and 6% are cats. And while bats account for about 1/3 of rabid animals, they are responsible for more than 2/3 of rabies deaths among people.

Vaccination in wildlife populations has had a positive impact and shows future promise. Pieracci notes that the USDA has effectively used an oral vaccine to reduce rabies infections in raccoons, foxes and coyotes. Several research institutions are working to develop a rabies vaccine for use in bats, but this will require a different delivery system. Bats feed on live insects, unlike raccoons that scavenge a wide variety of foods and will consume the vaccine in a bait.

The take-home message from the CDC: While vaccination has dramatically reduced rabies infections among humans and dogs, the disease still poses a threat around farms and ranches.

Veterinarians and livestock producers should remain vigilant, and respond quickly to any suspected exposure. Cattle with “furious” rabies can be dangerous, attacking and pursuing humans and other animals. Cattle with “dumb” or paralytic rabies have minimal behavior changes, but progress into paralysis. Common clinical signs of rabies in cattle include:
Sudden change in behavior
Progressive paralysis
Ataxia
Abrupt cessation of lactation in dairy animals
Hypersensitivity/alertness
Abnormal bellowing
Paralysis of the throat
Drooling
Head extension
Bloat
Choking behavior

For more on rabies in cattle, see these articles from BovineVetOnline:

Watch for Rabies in Cattle

USDA Deploys Vaccine Baits to Combat Rabies

How the Rabies Virus Makes Animals “Mad”

Fake Meat, Real Men, Happy July 4th

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:49:43 GMT

I love the 4th of July. The food and family time are great, and I still have all my fingers.

I also love the 4th of July because it’s an annual reminder of the sacrifices made by the founding fathers – and all our past and current service men and women – that we may live free, eat bacon, and sue our neighbors.

Veterans, please don’t take offense to that last part. I mean that as a tribute to my late father-in-law, who spent World War II in some horrific conditions in the Philippines and other Pacific hellholes. He would be the first to acknowledge he fought for the freedoms of all Americans, even those he didn’t much care for, and there were quite a few Americans who did stuff he didn’t much care for. I can still hear him now, “Those rotten bastards.”

To say that my father-in-law was opinionated would be an understatement. But, like many of the Greatest Generation, he did not talk about his time in the war. In fact, it was only after my mother-in-law died a few years ago that the family found his army footlocker, tucked far into the attic. Inside were his two Purple Hearts, which his children knew nothing about.

Given the fact my father-in-law was opinionated and given that he loved to eat meat of all kinds, I’m pretty sure I know what he would think about the new stuff we call fake meat. I’m also certain he would think the lawsuit announced by the Plant Based Foods Association (PBFA) against Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant is frivolous, while supporting their right to sue.

PBFA and Illinois-based Upton’s Naturals filed the suit against Gov. Bryant and the state’s agriculture commissioner, Andy Gipson, alleging the state’s law banning producers of plant-based foods from using terms like “vegan bacon” and “meatless steaks” violates the First Amendment.

As you might expect, the lawsuit is causing a lot of folks to exercise their First Amendment rights, including Ag Commissioner Andy Gipson, who says he looks forward to defending the state’s law in court.

“A food product made of insect-protein should not be deceptively labeled as beef,” Gipson said in a statement. “Someone looking to purchase tofu should not be tricked into buying lab grown protein. Words mean something. We look forward to defending the law to make sure Mississippi consumers have clear information on the meat and non-meat products they purchase.”

PBFA sees labeling terms differently. “In order to describe the foods in the clearest possible manner, Upton’s Naturals uses meat and meat product terms as part of the descriptions on its labels,” the suit said.

Hmmmm. While Upton’s seeks to give consumers the “clearest possible” descriptions, one might see deception in the company name – Upton’s Naturals. As in, here are the ingredients in Upton’s product they are calling “Classic Burger”: Water, vital wheat gluten, eggplant, tofu (water, soybeans, calcium sulfate), canola oil, whole wheat flour, soy sauce (water, wheat, soybeans, salt), nutritional yeast, sugar, apple cider vinegar, onion, garlic, sea salt, natural hickory smoke concentrate, black pepper, oregano, paprika, parsley, marjoram. Contains: Wheat, Soy.

Here’s a reminder to PBFA and Upton’s that real classic burgers – the ones with one ingredient – remain one of America’s top food choices on the Fourth of July.

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Stupid Celebrity Food Quotes

Beef: ‘A Destructive And Unnecessary Technology’

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:48:11 GMT

“Animal agriculture is finally being recognized for what it is: a destructive and unnecessary technology.” Those are the words of Pat Brown, CEO and founder of Impossible Foods.

One might forgive professor Brown for making such an outrageous statement . After all, he’s peddling his concoction of plant-based ingredients he calls a burger.

But my objection is not with Brown or his products. I admire the entrepreneurial spirit that led Brown to leave his post as a professor of biochemistry at Stanford to launch Impossible Foods in 2011. The company is now reportedly worth $2 billion.

As a fake meat huckster, however, Brown has crossed a line. Oh, his product is not snake oil. His plant burger is what he says it is – processed plants and other ingredients. Let’s see, Impossible Foods lists water, soy protein concentrate, coconut oil, sunflower oil, natural flavors, 2% or less of: potato protein, methylcellulose, yeast extract, cultured dextrose, food starch modified, soy leghemoglobin, salt, soy protein isolate, mixed tocopherols (Vitamin E), zinc gluconate, thiamine hydrochloride (Vitamin B1), sodium.

That list is certainly one that would require the talents of a biochemist. Is it just me, or does the fact that “natural flavors” is listed as an ingredient draw a red flag for you? Seriously, it either has a flavor or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t, and you have to add flavor, how the hell is that natural?

But I digress. My anger centers on professor Brown’s arrogance and defamation of beef – specifically Impossible Foods’ reliance on misrepresentation of beef’s carbon footprint to sell plant-based burgers.

“We have a simple mission,” Brown states in the company’s Impact Report 2019, “to replace the use of animals as a food-production technology, globally, by 2035.”

Wow. An aggressive, if unrealistic goal. Even by Brown’s estimates, “we still need to scale up more than 100,000-fold. That means that on average, we need to double our production, sales and impact every year for the next 16 years.”

While Impossible Foods and other alternative protein manufacturers may be able to ramp up production fast enough to reach those goals, their business model still depends on creating demand by convincing consumers beef is killing the planet.

“Cows aren’t getting any better at making meat. We are,” Brown claims.

An arrogant statement proving Brown needs to do more research on his competition.

Indeed, cows are getting much better at turning sunshine and green grass into steaks. In fact, the efficiency of the U.S. beef industry has improved rapidly over the last generation. You’re producing the same amount of beef in 2019 as you did in 1977, with one-third fewer cows. Those improvements were made via better animal genetics, better animal nutrition and better animal health and welfare.

Environmental footprint? Significant gains there, too.

Several researchers have looked at beef’s carbon footprint, and one of the first was Jude Capper, a sustainability consultant. Her work found that between 1977 and 2007 , improvements in beef production reduced feed consumption by 19%, land use by 33%, water use by 12% and GHG emissions by 16% per pound of beef produced in America.

More recently, Frank Mitloehner, professor and air quality specialist at UC Davis , says that livestock production in the U.S. accounts for about 3% of all greenhouse gas emissions. Transportation? 26%.

“The developed world’s efforts should focus not on reducing meat and milk consumption,” says Mitloehner, “but rather on increasing efficient meat production in developing countries, where growing populations need more nutritious food.”

Mitloehner says the facts about methane and livestock production are “the cornerstone of debunking all of this hype around why we should eat less animal-based protein. The people who are selling plant-based alternatives are using hype, particularly around methane, and they need to stop.”

Related stories:

Beyond Meat Gets Downgraded

Yes, it’s Wet Out There

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:25:47 GMT

If you think it’s been wet lately, NASA and the National Weather Service (NWS) agree. In fact, the past 12 months, through April 30, were the wettest ever for the continental United States in 124 years of NWS data. From May 1, 2018, to April 30, 2019, the lower 48 states collectively averaged 36.2 inches of precipitation, more than six inches above average for the period.

The U.S. Drought Monitor shows that just 2.72 percent of the contiguous U.S. is in drought, among the lowest levels in two decades. California is free of drought for the first time since 2011, and as recently as February 2018, one-third of the United States was in drought.

According to scientists at NASA , several events have contributed to the overall trend of higher precipitation levels. These include two category 5 hurricanes last year and a generally wet fall across the East and Midwest. A mild El Niño condition, along with “atmospheric river” events have soaked much of California. And this spring, of course, a series of strong low-pressure systems have brought heavy snowfall, “bomb cyclones,” soaking rain and, as of May 29, 14 consecutive days of tornadoes across the central United States.

So, while drought probably won’t limit agricultural production in most areas this year, many saturated fields remain unplanted headed into June. And while local conditions will vary as always, higher precipitation appears to be a long-term trend in the United States. According to the U.S. Global Change Research Program’s Fourth National Climate Assessment , the national average precipitation has increased an average of 4% per year since 1901, and “the frequency and intensity of heavy precipitation events are projected to continue to increase over the 21st century.”

Read more about climate trends in these articles from BovineVetOnline:

Research Suggests Climate Change Could Favor Zoonotic Diseases

Lyons-Blythe Testifies On Beef Cattle Emissions

Receding Flood Waters Pose Hazards to Livestock

Short-Selling Beyond Meat Was a Bad Bet

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:25:47 GMT

Traders who short-sold Beyond Meat’s initial public offering (IPO) have lost more than $150 million since the company began trading on Wall Street May 2, according to data-analytics firm S3 Partners.

That would be enough cash to buy all the cattle in a 100,000-head feedyard. And, given the outlook for Beyond Meat by some of Wall Street’s biggest investment firms, holding those short positions is likely to produce even bigger losses.

Beyond Meat’s stock opened at $103.25 on Thursday, May 30, 2019, a 313% gain from the initial listing price, inflicting a $158.2 million loss on short-sellers, according to Business Insider . Additionally, the price to borrow stock rose to 100%, meaning that it is just as expensive to short the stock as it is to own it.

Obviously, short-selling Beyond Meat was beyond bad, but, more importantly, what is the market telling us about faux meats? First, Beyond Meat’s fantastic IPO suggests many people believe it’s a viable business model, not just a fad.

Sure, Beyond Meat could hit a road bump next week causing the stock price to tumble. But the same could be said for Apple or Amazon.

More likely, however, is news of a partnership that could take the stock even higher. Business Insider also reports McDonald’s is rumored to seek such a partnership, a move one Wall Street firm says would boost Beyond Meat’s stock price another 30%.

Jeffries Financial Group, a New York-based investment bank and financial services company, sent a note to investors saying “Beyond Meat is well positioned to partner with McDonald’s,” adding a deal “makes sense for both parties.”

Jeffries bases its analysis on the fact McDonald’s recently launched a vegan burger in Germany, and said it was paying close attention to the plant-based protein trend in its latest earnings call. Donald Thompson, McDonald’s former CEO and COO, sits on Beyond Meat’s board.

The investment bank also noted archrival Impossible Foods is struggling to meet demand, and it might be unable to meet McDonald’s supply needs.

Should Beyond Meat land a deal with McDonald’s, Jeffries calculates capturing 1% of annual U.S. burger sales under the Golden Arches would generate about $48 million in revenue and lift Beyond Meat’s shares by $4.50.

Analysts at JPMorgan seems to agree with Jeffries. “At least one major quick-service restaurant chain likely will become a customer by the end of the year,” they wrote.

While a 1% share of America’s burger market remains a distant goal for the plant-based variety, the market suggests that hurdle will soon be cleared.

Related stories:

Fake Meat, Real Money

A Vegan Clash With The Queen?

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:25:03 GMT

New royal baby Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor may have been born with a silver spoon in his mouth, but his parents won’t use it to feed him animal-derived foods.

Yep, Prince Harry and Meghan Markel plan to raise their son a vegan. And the Queen is not happy.

According to a story published by Woman’s Day , “Meghan wants her baby to be raised a vegan,” reveals a palace insider. But, “the Queen won’t have it.”

I suspect that, if you’re like me, you have plenty of other things to warrant your attention than gossip about the British Royal Family. And whether a baby born into a family with a $500 million fortune will be raised vegan is, frankly, inconsequential.

But, with media coverage of the Royal’s every move, it’s hard to ignore. Which is why you should be concerned for baby Archie.

Oh, don’t worry about the baby’s health. I’m sure that with a stable of maids, nannies and chefs, baby Archie’s nutritional needs will be more than adequate on a vegan diet. Your concern should be for what message that sends to other young parents.

Reality is, it’s difficult to provide an infant adequate nutrition with a vegan diet. Not impossible, but difficult. And, it’s generally more expensive.

Look, if Harry and Meghan choose to live a vegan lifestyle, I’m fine with that. But they also have a responsibility – given their lofty perch at the peak of the socio-economic ladder – to set an example for their admirers.

We shouldn’t be skeptical about the influence of the Royal’s. Fox Business News reported there are a number of ways the birth of a royal baby impacts the economy over the short-term. John Quelch, dean of University of Miami Business School, said it can provide a bump for restaurants and bars around the U.K., as citizens hold parties – boosting confidence in the face of “Brexit malaise.”

“There’s nothing better than a royal baby arriving on a Friday because that is surely good for party business on Saturday and Sunday,” Quelch told FOX Business.

Brushing aside the economic boost, the danger a Royal vegan baby presents is that many young parents may be enticed to follow Harry and Meghan’s lead and raise their children as vegans. Some can afford the luxury, many can’t. And even if they can afford the vegan lifestyle, many won’t understand how to ensure adequate nutrition under such a lifestyle.

Maybe the Queen’s influence will cause the couple to reconsider. One report says Her Majesty, 92, has made her objections known, and, “It’s created tense discussions between Meghan and Harry, who doesn’t want to upset his grandmother,” Woman’s Day reported.

Related stories:

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One-health Approach Helps Address Zoonotic Disease

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:24:31 GMT

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 75% of emerging infectious diseases of people are zoonotic, or originated with animals. Environment also affects the distribution of pathogens and their vectors, making the One-Health approach the ideal basis for addressing these diseases.

In late 2017, the USDA, CDC and the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) organized a One Health Zoonotic Disease Prioritization (OHZDP) workshop involving experts from the human-, animal- and environmental-health sectors. This week, the CDC issued its U.S. One Health Zoonotic Disease Prioritization Report , summarizing the group’s efforts to assess relative risks and develop an objective system for prioritizing and addressing zoonotic diseases.

Workshop participants identified these zoonotic diseases as top priorities for the United States:

Zoonotic influenza – Influenza A viruses primarily affect poultry and pigs
Salmonellosis -- This is one of the most important foodborne diseases in the United States, potentially infecting virtually all livestock including ruminants, pigs and poultry.
West Nile virus – Wild birds serve as the primary reservoir for this mosquito-borne virus. Among livestock species, West Nile virus primarily affects equids.
Plague – The Yersinia pestis bacteria rarely affects humans in the United States, but has epidemic potential and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) classifies it as a tier 1 biological agent on its Select Agents and Toxins list. Wildlife such as ground squirrels and prairie dogs carry the bacteria, with fleas serving as vectors for human infection.
Emerging coronaviruses – These include severe acute respiratory syndrome-associated coronavirus (SARS-CoV) and Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV). Animals such as camels (MERS) and cats (SARS) are known carriers, but these do not appear to affect U.S. livestock.
Rabies – According to the report, rabies affects about 40,000 to 50,000 people in the United States annually, at a cost of about $510 million. Wildlife species such as raccoons and bats, and the disease can affect cattle and horses as well as pets.
Brucellosis -- Brucella abortus, the most important Brucella species in the United States, mainly infects ruminants. Wildlife species, primarily elk and bison, serve as reservoirs for potential transmission to cattle. While national herd prevalence in cattle is less than 0.0001%, the number of affected herds has been increasing since 2005.
Lyme disease – This tick-borne bacteria (Borrelia burgdorferi) is the most common vector-borne pathogen in the United States. Cattle appear to resist the disease, with wild animals serving as the primary hosts.

The team used the following criteria ranking U.S. zoonotic diseases in order of importance.

Pandemic/Epidemic Potential.
Severity of Disease in Humans, Domestic Animals and Wildlife, including disease mortality or population impact in humans, domestic animals or wildlife, and the incidence of the disease in humans or animals in the United States.
Economic Impact to the United States.
National Security.

Over the next three years, the report’s authors recommend developing a U.S. One-Health Security National Action Plan, establishing a One-Health Coordinating Mechanism for the United States, publishing a National One Health Framework and continuing collaboration to advance One Health in the United States.

Find the full report online from the CDC .

For more on One Health and zoonotic diseases, see these articles from BovineVetOnline:
Resistance Grows Among Zoonotic Pathogens

One stop shop for ‘One Health’ approach to zoonotic threats

Taxonomy Could Predict Virulence of Multi-host Pathogens

AMR Issue Exemplifies “One-Health” Approach

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:23:33 GMT

The complex challenges of addressing antimicrobial resistance (AMR) make it a prototypical “One-Health” issue, according to five new papers published in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences .

The One-Health concept is a worldwide strategy for expanding interdisciplinary collaborations and communications in all aspects of health care for humans, animals and the environment. The researchers note that the AMR problem and its solutions involve complex interrelationships between antimicrobial use in humans and animals, pathogens affecting multiple species, persistence of antimicrobials in soil and water and environmental influences on the prevalence and transmission of pathogens.

Addressing the AMR issue from a One-Health perspective involves decisions at all levels of society.

Physicians decide when and why to prescribe antibiotics to their patients, while also considering recommendations for non-drug interventions or preventive strategies including vaccines, nutrition and lifestyle changes.

Patients decide whether to follow prescription instructions and their physician’s advice on lifestyle, vaccines or other preventive measures.

Farmers and veterinarians decide when and how to use antimicrobials, along with designing waste-management systems to minimize environmental contamination and management systems impacting animal immunity and levels of exposure to pathogens.

Food processors, wholesalers and retailers all make decisions that affect customer exposure to potentially drug-resistant pathogens.

Consumer education is entwined throughout the AMR issue, involving personal hygiene, food-safety practices and following advice from medical professionals, along with better understanding of the AMR issue overall.

The authors note complexities associated with addressing AMR, including:

Considerations of the criticality of different classes of antimicrobials used for human and animal health; and of the divergences between international, national and other agencies in the classes of antimicrobials across specific industries.
The recognized importance of the environment as a reservoir of resistant bacteria and resistance genes, as well as a pathway for the dissemination of AMR between human and animal host populations.
Established and novel solutions for measuring and containing the AMR problem that range from animal husbandry and herd management changes, to technological innovations such as vaccines and bacteriophage therapy.
Effective strategies for communicating to consumers the risks of AMR spreading from food production.

Animal agriculture can and should embrace the One-Health approach for addressing the AMR problem. The agricultural community, often with good reason, feels singled out as the primary scapegoat in perpetrating the problem. The One-Health approach acknowledges the complexity of the AMR issue and addresses the interrelationships between all the factors involved. Farmers and veterinarians certainly play a role, and should strive for continuous improvements in antibiotic stewardship, disease prevention and environmental management. But those efforts can only succeed in cooperation with human-health professionals, all food-system sectors, pharmaceutical manufacturers, policy makers, research scientists and consumers.

See the full report in the special issue of the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences titled Antimicrobial Resistance from Food Animal Production.

Find related information on One Health and antimicrobial resistance in these articles from BovineVetOnline:

Global Report Finds Progress, Gaps in Antimicrobial Resistance Fight

World Animal Health Leaders Take a “One Health” Approach

OIE Report Shows Global Progress on Use of Antibiotics in Animals

Residues Becoming More Elusive

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:23:13 GMT

While antibiotic or other drug residues in meat or milk remain a concern for some consumers, surveillance and survey studies from the FDA and USDA show the industry has made considerable progress.

The latest report, from USDA’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS), regards pork in Midwestern retail cases. In this survey, the ARS researchers purchased over 1,000 pork kidneys from four different retailers. Residues, if present, tend to concentrate in the kidneys, making them a logical tissue to sample.

In the initial testing, six of 1,040 samples, or 0.58 % tested positive when screened for antibiotics. The researchers then screened a 278-sample subset of the pork kidney samples with a more specific ELISA test for residues of four veterinary drugs:

Flunixin, a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory agent.
Ractopamine, an agent that enhances leanness in meat
Sulfamethazine, a class of antibiotics.
Tetracycline, a class of antibiotics.

The researchers note that the Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assays (ELISAs) can measure residues at far lower concentrations than those called for by regulatory tolerances. In this testing, regardless of method, residue levels of all veterinary compounds were always well below U.S. regulatory tolerances. For example, of the samples assessed by the highly sensitive ELISA and other methods, only 4 % were positive for minute amounts of sulfamethazine, 10 % for trace quantities of tetracycline, and 22 % positive for detectable quantities of the commonly used feed additive ractopamine. The study results are published in the journal Food Additives & Contaminants .

Other studies in recent years have found very low incidence of violative residues in beef and in milk .

The record is not perfect of course, and the industry must continue to focus on judicious use of antibiotics and other drugs, comply with all label requirements for use and always observe withdraw times.

Also, as advancements in analytic technology continue, the threshold for measurable residues becomes increasingly lower. As long as the industry uses antibiotics or other animal-health products, residues will be detectable at some level. We can work to educate consumers about the sensitivity of testing and the difference between detectable and unsafe residue concentrations, but we also can expect their preferences to continuously move the bar toward lower and lower acceptable thresholds.

Access the report in Food Additives and Contaminants .

For more on recent research into antibiotic use and residues, see these articles on BovineVetOnline:

Tetracycline Pilot Project Finds Six Positives in 2018 Fiscal Year

OIE Report Shows Global Progress on Use of Antibiotics in Animals

Antibiotic Stewardship: FDA Cites Progress

No Such Thing as a Free Lunch

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:21:52 GMT

I don’t remember a lot of my college chemistry classes, but I do recall the professor stressing that you can’t make something out of nothing. Or as he put it, “there is no such thing as a free lunch.”

Proponents, and their allies in the media, seem to assume that lab-grown meats will inherently come with less environmental impact than meat from animals. These assumptions, however, lack any data to back them up, in part because no one has yet developed a commercial-scale process for evaluation. Also, they are not anxious to share the details of their processes, including raw-material inputs, energy inputs and waste products such as greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

In conventional beef production, sunlight represents a primary input, allowing forage plants to create biomass, which cattle use to grow and produce beef. Cattle, of course, also produce waste products such as manure and urine, which are recycled into plant nutrients. Cattle also produce GHGs such as methane and CO2, but at lower levels than typically cited in the media. ( See a summary of the latest life-cycle analysis of beef production .)

Cultured muscle cells also require raw materials or feedstock to provide the carbohydrates, amino acids and other nutrients cells need to grow and reproduce (Remember: No free lunch). They’ll also require energy and water, and will create their own GHG emissions. So far, we don’t really know how much feedstock or what commodities will be used in these processes, but it probably will not be native hay. We also do not know what level of energy inputs these processes will require, or what waste products will result.

However, results of a new study from the LEAP (Livestock, Environment and People) program at the Oxford Martin School at the University of Oxford suggest that CO2 emissions from lab-grown meat cultures could exceed those from conventional livestock production. Cattle probably produce more methane, which is considered a powerful GHG, but CO2 persists much longer in the atmosphere, and thus, cultured meat cells could over the long-term, contribute more to global warming than conventional meat production.

Published in Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems , the Oxford findings highlight that the climate impact of cultured meat production will depend on its energy demands and the availability of low-carbon energy sources.

“There has been a great deal of public interest in cultured meat recently, and many articles highlight the potential for substituting cattle beef with cultured meat to provide an important climate benefit,” explains lead author Dr John Lynch. “We show that it is not yet clear whether this is the case, partly because of uncertainties about how cultured meat would be produced at scale.” Lynch concludes, “The climate impacts of cultured meat production will depend on what level of sustainable energy generation can be achieved, as well as the efficiency of future culture processes.”

Someday, production of cultured muscle tissue might become more efficient and more environmentally friendly than animal-based meat production. The processes likely will involve some tradeoffs, sacrificing some efficiencies to gain others. Cattle production capitalizes on several efficiencies that require consideration as we weight those tradeoffs. Forage plants capture sunlight to produce biomass, which cattle convert to beef, milk and numerous useful byproducts. Forages often grow on land unsuitable for production of crops for human foods, and cattle also convert by-products such as distillers’ grains, corn stubble, wheat straw, oilseed meal and others into beef.

So when people tell you cultured muscle tissue will be “greener” or produce lower GHG emissions than conventional meat production, ask for proof. They base their opinions on a series of unproven assumptions, and typically forget those cultures require inputs. Cells don’t grow out of thin air. There is no such thing as a free lunch.

PGF Injection Site Could Enhance BQA

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:20:22 GMT

The following commentary does not necessarily reflect the views of AgWeb or Farm Journal. The opinions expressed below are the author’s own.

Through the history of the beef quality assurance (BQA) initiative, we’ve known the effort would never be “finished,” but instead would require continuous improvement and discovery of new methods or practices. And while the industry accomplished some major leaps forward in areas such as antibiotic residues and injection sites for treatments and vaccines, ongoing efforts, including small steps that add up, will help protect consumer confidence in beef quality and safety.

Case in point: Researchers from Virginia Tech recently reported on a study suggesting a more BQA-friendly injection site for prostaglandin used in AI programs.

Almost all breeding cows and heifers eventually end up in the beef-production chain, some sooner than others, and a shift away from intramuscular injections could help protect carcass value and quality.

The researchers recently published their report, titled “ Comparison of luteolysis and timed artificial insemination pregnancy rates after administration of PGF2α in the muscle or the ischiorectal fossa in cattle ,” in the journal Animal Reproduction Science.

In this study, the team set out to determine whether subcutaneous (SQ) administration of PGF2α in the ischiorectal fossa (IRF) results in a similar physiological response to an intramuscular injection. The IRF is the wedge-shaped space located lateral to the anal canal and inferior to the pelvic diaphragm.

The researchers randomly blocked 112 yearling Angus-cross heifers, and injected them with 5 mL PGF_2α either IM in the neck or in the IRF. They collected blood samples at 0, 8, 16, 24, 36, and 48 hours post-injection, analyzed serum progesterone concentration and plotted progesterone concentration curves for each heifer to determine luteolysis. In this test, the median times to luteolysis were 18.1 hours for the IM neck injections and 20 hours for the IRF injections.

In a larger test, the group blocked and randomized 1,471 Angus-cross commercial beef cows at least 30 days post-partum. They injected the cows with 5 mL PGF_2α either IM in the neck muscle or in IRF as part of a 7-Day CO-Synch + CIDR synchronization protocol. In this trial, the researchers measured pregnancy rates at 52.6% for cows injected in the neck and 57.2% for cows injected in the IRF.

The researchers concluded that:

Administration of PGF2a in the ischiorectal fossa did not alter time to luteolysis compared to intramuscular administration.
Administration of PGF2a in the IRF can be utilized in synchronization protocols.
The ischiorectal fossa can be considered a viable alternative injection site for PGF2a that meets BQA standards.

For years, the industry has recognized that breeding cattle offer their own sets of challenges and opportunities for beef quality assurance. Initially though, the BQA program correctly focused on steers and heifers moving through the beef-production cycle. Meat scientist Gary Smith, PhD, in his introduction to the most recent (2016) Market Cow and Bull National Beef Quality Audit , wrote: “When we started this journey of beef quality discovery for market cows and bulls in 1994, there was no set of instructions and few research guidelines. The focus on cows and bulls had historically been on production of milk and baby animals, not beef production.”

Producers and scientists realized though, that beef and dairy cows, largely due to their longer life spans, faced multiple risks for quality defects, including more lifetime injections compared with feeder cattle. As use of estrus synchronization and artificial insemination becomes more common in beef cows as well as heifers, an opportunity to move injections from intramuscular to SQ in a non-edible tissue could help us to continue moving forward in beef quality assurance.

See the research report from Animal Reproduction Science

Veterinary Groups Issue Statement on Antimicrobial Use

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:19:13 GMT

The following commentary does not necessarily reflect the views of AgWeb or Farm Journal. The opinions expressed below are the author’s own.

Noting the importance of keeping the use of antimicrobials in all sectors as low as possible without compromising animal, human, environmental and public health, three international veterinary organizations have issued an updated statement regarding judicious use in food animals.

The new statement comes from the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association (CVMA) and the Federation of Veterinarians of Europe (FVE), which together represent over 330,000 veterinarians in all disciplines of the veterinary profession.

In their statement, the groups note that any increase in antimicrobial resistance and spread of resistant bacteria poses a global threat to human and animal health. They stress that an international “One-Health” approach to the problem will promote and ensure the availability of effective antimicrobial treatments while minimizing resistance.

The groups also point out that data from the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) in 2015 indicate that more than 110 countries do not have relevant legislation regarding the authorization, manufacture, distribution, sales and use of veterinary antimicrobials, meaning sale of antimicrobials without authorization from a licensed health professional is widespread in many countries. Potential for overuse is high, and few countries reported a system for monitoring use of antimicrobials.

Key recommendations include:

All countries should strictly regulate manufacture, distribution and sales of antimicrobials and prosecute illegal manufacture, distribution or sales.
Medically or critically important antimicrobials should only be administered to animals with the oversight, in accordance with national legislation, of a licensed veterinarian.
Establish a global network of surveillance and monitoring systems for antimicrobial use and resistance development in people, animals, food products and the environment.
Develop and employ effective, rapid and standardized diagnostic tests to carry out susceptibility testing. Use test results to facilitate evidence-based decisions and to develop national or regional databases to collect and share susceptibility data.
Veterinarians must retain access to effective antimicrobials for therapeutic purposes for animals suffering from a bacterial disease in order to safeguard animal health and welfare and public health; therefore, antimicrobials must not be unilaterally limited for use in humans only.
Veterinarians must keep appropriate medical records of all antimicrobial use and participate in official jurisdictional surveillance programs of antimicrobial resistance development and use as required.
The AVMA, CVMA and FVE shall collaborate in promoting responsible use of antimicrobials in animal production and animal care in all countries, and in particular, in the developing world.

Reasonable, realistic standards for judicious use of antimicrobials, applied globally, represent our best opportunity for slowing the emergence of resistant pathogens and also protecting animal health. Pathogens know no borders, and neither do the resistance genes they potentially carry. The efforts of these groups to standardize practices internationally will be critical for long-term success.

Read the full statement from the AVMA .

Read more on this topic from BovineVetOnline:

Antimicrobial Stewardship: A Need for International Standards

Researchers Bust Antimicrobial-Resistance Myth

FDA Plan Previews the Future of Antimicrobial Stewardship

USAHA Resolution Supports Limited Expansion of ADT Program

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:18:02 GMT

The following commentary does not necessarily reflect the views of AgWeb or Farm Journal. The opinions expressed below are the author’s own.

During its recent annual conference, the U.S. Animal Health Association (USAHA) discussed the need for improved traceability across the U.S. cattle marketing chain. The USAHA, whose membership includes state and federal animal-health officials responsible for managing the federal Animal Disease Traceability (ADT) program, favors a combination of mandatory and voluntary programs for addressing disease intervention and traceability goals.

The specific purpose of the ADT program, USAHA notes, is to allow rapid and accurate traceability of diseased cattle allowing identification, containment and removal of these animals for control purposes or to achieve or maintain disease eradication. Compliance with the mandatory ADT rules for eligible animals remains critical for achieving that goal, USAHA says, but the current ADT program’s limited nature creates a need for continued efforts on voluntary programs, both public and private, for more comprehensive traceability.

The mandatory ADT program for example, excludes feeder cattle, which comprise the largest population of cattle transported and comingled around the country, and potentially the greatest risk for spreading disease. Voluntary programs such as the USDA’s Process Verified Programs (PVP) and Quality System Assessment (QSA) can add value to beef production chains and thus provide economic incentives for participants to ensure traceability.

In 2017, the USDA formed a “State and Federal Working Group” with substantial experience and knowledge of animal disease traceability. Based on stakeholder feedback collected during 2017, the group issued a list of 14 recommendations for the advancement of animal disease traceability. Those recommendations included:

Maintain policy that interstate movements to a custom slaughter facility do not apply to traceability regulation.
Maintain the current population covered by official ID requirements, including all dairy cattle, beef cattle greater than 18 months of age and all rodeo and exhibition cattle.
Instead of limiting official ID to interstate movements, consider triggers to require official ID such as change of ownership or first point of comingling.
Move toward standardized electronic identification (EID) systems for all official identification by 2023.
Create a secure online database for electronic data entry and access.
Strategic enforcement of ADT regulations to ensure a high level of compliance.
Improve the rates of ID collection and correlation at slaughter.
Enable private information systems to be utilized for disease surveillance and response events when needed.
Clarify exemptions to official ID requirements, including removing exemptions allowing states to agree on alternative ID methods and for cattle moving to slaughter through one approved livestock facility.
Clarify requirements for Interstate Certificates of. Veterinary Inspection (ICVI), with emphasis on use of electronic ICVIs.
Improve uniformity of state import regulations.
Consider standardizing official ID tags nationally.
Develop an option for an official EID tag for imported cattle.
Retain, for now, the exemption for feeder cattle, with plans to address the issue at a later date.

USAHA notes that feedback from stakeholders has supported moving the current mandatory ADT program forward with enhancements to make it more efficient, while keeping feeder cattle traceability voluntary.

Based on public feedback and the working group recommendations, the USAHA passed a 2018 Resolution to prioritize enhancing the existing mandatory ADT program based upon the fourteen recommendations, asking USDA to maintain support for voluntary value-added programs and augment opportunities for the feeding sector to enhance trade and marketing.

Read more resolutions from the USAHA conference .

For more about traceability and the ADT program, read these articles on BovineVetOnline.

Get Ahead of ADT

One Step Closer to a National Traceability System

Disease Traceability: Better Late than Never

The Indispensable Veterinarian

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:16:34 GMT

The following commentary does not necessarily reflect the views of AgWeb or Farm Journal. The opinions expressed below are the author’s own.

These days, long-term viability in animal agriculture requires identifying and capitalizing on available efficiencies, while also conserving resources, protecting animal welfare and ensuring food safety and public health.

As livestock production becomes more complex, veterinarians are learning ways to go beyond traditional clinical services to provide more comprehensive, integrated consultation intended to improve profitability and long-term viability of client operations.

This year’s American Association of Bovine Practitioners (AABP) conference followed a theme of “Become Indispensable,” with many of the presentations exploring ways practitioners can build their business by expanding services and helping clients become more successful.

That process requires the veterinarian to learn and practice new skills, but most importantly, it involves high-level communication between the producer and veterinarian, and in many cases, the most valuable service the veterinarian can provide involves solving problems or identifying opportunities about which the producer is unaware.

In a presentation titled “ Flying Solo ,” veterinarian Em Mowrer outlined how she built a solo practice in Southeastern Ohio, an area comprised mainly of small farmers who traditionally only called on a veterinarian when they had an animal-health emergency.

Starting “from scratch,” Mowrer says her first steps involved an honest assessment of her own abilities, strengths, weaknesses and professional goals, needs of local producers, services she wanted to provide and what she would need to effectively serve producers in the area. She quickly recognized a need for education regarding animal-health practices and particularly for prevention of disease or production problems, and area farmers were hungry for information. Her first client meeting attracted about 75 producers, many of whom had never attended such a meeting before, because they never had the opportunity.

She stressed a need for veterinarians to be available, follow up on farm calls, ask about the progress of animals you’ve treated and show interest in a client’s family. “They don’t care how much you know,” Mowrer says, “until they know how much you care.”

Colorado State University Extension Veterinarian Frank Garry encouraged veterinarians to “ Focus on What Really Matters .” Veterinarians, he says, need to spend more time addressing clients’ big-picture goals. Simply treating sick or injured animals, while important, falls short in terms of meeting larger goals for animal health, performance and welfare. Those require an emphasis on prevention and monitoring. Veterinarians can build their practice while helping clients succeed by offering assistance with culling decisions, mortality diagnostics, proactive health monitoring, worker training and education, detailed protocols for vaccine and antibiotic use, herd additions and genetic selection, reproduction, animal welfare and more. “We create demand through education,” he says.

Long-time Purdue veterinarian Mark Hilton, now with Elanco Animal Health, led a presentation on how to “ Keep Clients Asking for More .” Rather than just perfecting skills learned years ago, driving further and working longer hours to reach new clients, Hilton encourages veterinarians to do more with the clients they have. Often, he says, clients accustomed to limiting their veterinarian contact to emergencies do not realize how more in-depth veterinary consultations could benefit their businesses. “The most important step in developing a new service,” Hilton says, “is to offer it.”

Hilton advises veterinarians and clients to arrange a consultation visit that is separate from clinical visits. The veterinarian should ask clients about their business goals and dive deeply into the barriers preventing them from achieving those goals. “Listen to understand, not to respond,” he says.

Farmers and ranchers develop a natural affinity toward “ Systems Thinking in Bovine Practice ,” says John Groves, DVM, with Livestock Vet Services in Eldon, Missouri. They understand that agricultural production is a complex system, involving interactions between plants, animals, sunlight, soil, water, microbes and many other factors influencing outcomes. Systems thinking, as a means of problem solving, involves big-picture consideration of all those factors, instead of linear cause-and-effect thinking. Veterinarians, he says, can use systems thinking to engage client in long-term problem solving rather than simply reacting when problems arise.

For example, Groves cites a stocker operator experiencing a high morbidity rate, which the veterinarian attributes to poor preconditioning and weaning practices on the operations supplying the calves. Linear thinking might suggest paying lower prices for those calves in the future, but that approach does not truly solve the problem. Systems thinking would involve going back to the cow-calf herds, identifying weaknesses and instituting changes to improve calf health and immunity.

These and other discussions during the conference illustrated how, by working as partners, veterinarians and producers can position livestock operations for the future, with comprehensive programs for protecting animal health, welfare, safety and overall profitability.

For more on “becoming indispensable” from the AABP conference, see these articles on BovineVetOnline.com:

Focus on What Really Matters

Flying Solo

Keep Clients Asking for More

Systems Thinking in Bovine Practice

The Indispensable Power of Relationships

Contented Crew, Contented Animals

Bovine Practice: Well Positioned for the Future

The Indispensable Power of Relationships

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:16:12 GMT

The following commentary does not necessarily reflect the views of AgWeb or Farm Journal. The opinions expressed below are the author’s own.

In March 2017, the Starbuck Fire burned more than 800,000 acres across western Kansas, killing around 10,000 cattle, destroying hundreds of miles of fencing and leveling around 30 homes and uncounted agricultural buildings. It could not, however, harm the spirit, generosity and resilience of the agricultural and rural community.

Stories of the fire have been told before, but during the recent American Association of Bovine Practitioners (AABP) Conference, rancher Mark Gardiner, from Gardiner Angus Ranch , and veterinarian Randall Spare, with the Ashland Veterinary Center , retold the story with an emphasis not on the losses, but on the power of relationships and community in responding to tragedy and uniting to work toward recovery.

The presentations dovetailed with the conference theme of “Become Indispensable,” focusing on how veterinarians can collaborate with clients, identifying services and information beyond diagnosing and treating sick animals – services that help ensure long-term success of the operation and sustainability of the veterinary practice.

Gardiner, whose family operates a large and well-known seedstock operation, and Spare, who provides veterinary services to the Gardiners and other area ranches and feedlots, were at “ground zero” when the fire exploded on that dry spring day. On the Gardiner ranch alone, the fire burned more than 43,000 acres of rangeland and 200 miles of fencing.

They talked about treating burned cattle and euthanizing those beyond treatment, about finding temporary housing in feedlots and calf ranches for orphaned calves, about organizing hay deliveries and cattle donations to area ranchers and coordinating an army of volunteers from the community, the region and around the country who came to offer help.

Photos and descriptions during the presentations illuminated numerous images of community: Truck drivers delivering (donated) hay from distant states asking how to donate their own money to ranchers; a rancher herding a neighbor’s cows to safety while his own house burned; a Kansas State University veterinarian operating a skid-steer forklift to unload donated hay; and many others.

While the physical, emotional and financial toll was devastating for all involved, Gardiner and Spare stressed they all found inspiration from the way the community rallied in response to tragedy and heartbreak. Through the aftermath of the fire, Spare recalls not one producer said “I quit.” To him, he adds, “indispensable” is synonymous with relationships – between producers, veterinarians, neighbors, bankers, ag suppliers and the rural community overall.

The stories remind us that while market trends, politics, regulatory issues and the latest production technologies play important roles in the health of American agriculture, our future depends largely on what got us here in the first place: hard work, community and generosity.

For more on “becoming indispensable” from the AABP conference, see these articles on BovineVetOnline.com:

Focus on What Really Matters

Flying Solo

Keep Clients Asking for More

Systems Thinking in Bovine Practice

One Step Closer to National Traceability System

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:15:55 GMT

Depending on how you perceive it, animal disease traceability is either an idea that’s too important to abandon in spite of all the complications, or a nuisance that just refuses to die. The federal Animal Disease Traceability (ADT) system, with its limited scope, has operated for five years. From the start, many believed the system would need to expand to become truly effective, but the UDSA has taken a cautious and deliberate approach toward expanding the program to cover more producers and more classes of cattle.

The time might finally be right for the U.S. livestock industry to support and implement a comprehensive system for rapidly tracking emerging animal diseases and containing them before they cause serious damage. We’ve seen the consequences of international outbreaks of foot and mouth disease, avian influenza, African swine fever and others, and here in the United States, porcine epidemic diarrhea virus. We’ve also come to increasingly depend on exports to support our markets for meat and dairy products. At the same time, radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology has advanced over the past 15 years to new levels of convenience and affordability.

This week, the USDA announced its goals for updating and expanding the ADT system, including plans for cost-sharing for electronic ID and birth-to-slaughter traceability for cattle.

USDA’s four overarching goals for increasing traceability are:

Advance the electronic sharing of data among federal and state animal health officials, veterinarians and industry; including sharing basic animal disease traceability data with the federal animal health events repository (AHER).
Use electronic ID tags for animals requiring individual identification in order to make the transmission of data more efficient;
Enhance the ability to track animals from birth to slaughter through a system that allows tracking data points to be connected; and
Elevate the discussion with States and industry to work toward a system where animal health certificates are electronically transmitted from private veterinarians to state animal health officials.

These discussions began in earnest back in 2003, when the USDA formed a national working group with representatives from across the livestock industry to hammer out a preliminary plan for a traceability system. That working group developed the U.S. Animal Identification Plan (USAIP), which evolved into USDA’s National Animal Identification System (NAIS) in 2004. Grass-roots resistance to NAIS grew, and the program never gained traction.

Nearly a decade later, in 2013, USDA launched its Animal Disease Traceability (ADT) system, a useful but extremely limited program that remains in place today. The current ADT program focuses on interstate movement of breeding–age cattle, 18 months of age or older, and dairy cattle. The program exempts beef calves and feeder cattle, which travel in the greatest numbers and pose the greatest risk for spreading disease as they move through marketing channels and co-mingle with cattle from multiple sources.

Over the spring and summer of 2017, the USDA hosted a series of public meetings to solicit stakeholder feedback on the existing program and the next steps. In September, USDA officials discussed the results of those meetings during a strategy forum hosted by the National Institute for Animal Agriculture and the U.S. Animal Health Association.

Based on public feedback, a state and federal ADT working group has developed a list of preliminary recommendations on key issues, including a shift toward exclusive use of radio-frequency identification (RFID) devices for official animal ID and eventually, inclusion of feeder-cattle movements. USDA used that feedback to develop their current goals for the system.

The state of Kansas, meanwhile, is moving forward with its “CattleTrace” pilot program, a public-private collaboration focused on ranch-to-slaughter traceability for disease surveillance and intervention. In December 2017, the Kansas Livestock Association (KLA) voted for policy supporting mandatory cattle disease traceability for all ages of cattle, which provided momentum for the program. In addition to the KLA, CattleTrace partners include Kansas State University, the Kansas Department of Agriculture, USDA, and individual producer stakeholders. It is being jointly funded by public and private resources.

Participants plan to enroll and track about 55,000 cattle over the next two years, using ultra-high-frequency (UHF) tags and readers, which allow users to quickly capture individual ID numbers from groups of cattle. The program’s planners designed the system to collect the minimum of necessary information for tracking in a disease outbreak – just an individual animal ID number, a GPS location, date and time.

The CattleTrace system has good potential to serve as a model for expansion of the national ADT program. The KLA policy demonstrates growing recognition of the need for traceability among cattle producers, and today’s technology can enable full traceability with more speed, accuracy, efficiency and security compared with anything we discussed back in 2003.

Moving forward, USDA wants to continue to build on the current momentum around animal disease traceability, and will begin implementing their new ADT goals starting in fiscal year 2019. USDA plans to work with state partners and industry to establish appropriate benchmarks to measure progress toward the program’s goals.

Read more about the Kansas CattleTrace system in “ Disease Traceability: Better Late than Never .

FDA Plan Previews the Future of Antimicrobial Stewardship

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:15:35 GMT

The following commentary does not necessarily reflect the views of AgWeb or Farm Journal. The opinions expressed below are the author’s own.

Veterinarians will, over the next five years, become more involved in overseeing the use of all forms of medically important antimicrobials used in livestock.

A new five-year plan from FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM), title “ Supporting Antimicrobial Stewardship in Veterinary Settings: Goals for Fiscal Years 2019-2023 ,” also specifies that labels for medically important antimicrobials will eventually need to specify duration of use for all food-animal applications.

The plan sets goals, but does not unveil any new regulations, and FDA will seek public comments on several proposals included in the plan. Many of the proposed actions build on the existing FDA Guidance for Industry 213, which removed production or performance uses from product labels, and the updated VFD rule, which places the use of medically important antimicrobials in in feed and water under the oversight of veterinarians.

Significantly, the plan states that CVM supports the judicious use of antimicrobials in food-producing animals and “is driven by the concept that medically important antimicrobial drugs should only be used in animals when necessary for the treatment, control or prevention of specific diseases.”

For the fiscal years 2019 through 2023, CVM plans activities organized under three goals:

Align antimicrobial drug product use with the principles of antimicrobial stewardship.

Foster stewardship of antimicrobials in veterinary settings.

Enhance monitoring of antimicrobial resistance and antimicrobial drug use in animals.

In the plan, CVM notes that about 40% of approved medically important antimicrobial drug applications include at least one indication of use that does not have a defined duration of use. The authors also note that, according to sales data, about 95% of antimicrobials used in food animals are administered through feed or water, and thus fall under the VFD rule. That leaves though, another 5% administered through other routes, such as injectable products. Many of those products remain available for over-the-counter (OTC) sales.

Under their first goal, CVM plans several actions to address those issues by 2021:

Publish a list of medically important antimicrobial drugs administered in the feed or drinking water of food-producing animals that are approved for indications that lack a defined duration of use.
Issue a draft strategy to ensure that all medically important antimicrobial drugs used in the feed or drinking water of food-producing animals have an appropriately targeted duration of use. Issue a draft strategy, followed by a final strategy, to bring all dosage forms (including, injectable, intramammary, etc.) of medically important antimicrobial drugs approved for use in food-producing animals under the oversight of a licensed veterinarian.
Engage with stakeholders on how antimicrobial product label information could better support antimicrobial stewardship.

During Phase 2 of the plan, in 2022 through 2023, CVM intends to issue a final strategy for specifying duration of use.

In the plan, also under Goal 1, CVM acknowledges that potential development of antimicrobial-resistant bacteria in companion animals, which could lead to transfer of antimicrobial resistant bacteria from companion animals to humans through direct or indirect contact.

CVM intends to seek public input regarding antimicrobial use in companion animals and their impact on the development of resistance and ultimately implement a strategy for promoting antimicrobial stewardship in companion animals. This will include steps to ensure that all dosage forms of medically important antimicrobials for use in companion animals are under the oversight of a licensed veterinarian.

Since the new VFD rules took effect in 2016, FDA has focused on education, but the plan indicates a shift toward more compliance enforcement. Planned actions include:

In conjunction with ongoing inspection activities, publish a summary assessment of the VFD pilot inspections conducted in fiscal years 2016 through 2018.
Expand the comprehensive VFD compliance strategy to integrate a VFD component into inspections associated with the Drug Residue Inspection Program.
Initiate steps to identify and address the inappropriate marketing of antimicrobial drugs.

Read the full plan from FDA/CVM .

Sustainability Can Be a Win-Win

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:14:43 GMT

What if we could not only reduce carbon emissions from cattle production, but also redirect that carbon toward animal growth, and more beef production per unit of input?

During this summer’s Beef Improvement Federation (BIF) conference , where much of the discussion centered on genetic components of production efficiency, Sara Place, PhD, senior director of sustainable beef production research for the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA), outlined how beef production is more sustainable than many realize and how continued efforts could benefit producers.

Genetic selection for feed efficiency redirects more energy to growth, thus reducing the ratio greenhouse gas emissions per unit of beef produced, and breeders continue to make progress on that front. Existing technologies such as ionophores and implants also help achieve that goal. Place also points out that several feed additives – some available and others in development – have potential for altering ruminant metabolism to produce lower methane emissions.

Place points out that the U.N. FAO’s latest estimate using life cycle assessment indicates global livestock production accounts for 14.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

In the United States, direct emissions from beef cattle enteric fermentation and manure represent 2% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and just 0.27% of global emissions, with all direct emissions from livestock, including beef, representing 3.9% of U.S. emissions in 2016.

She also notes that in the United States, carbon sequestration from land use, land use change, and forestry completely offset agricultural emissions of greenhouse gases. U.S. agriculture and forestry combined in 2016 represented a net sink of carbon emissions.

Place outlined several factors important to a sustainable food system that are not captured in typical estimates of environmental footprints.

Cattle can convert human-inedible feedstuff s into high quality human-edible protein. From a full life-cycle perspective, 1 kg of beef carcass weight produced in the United States requires 13.2 kg dry matter of grazed forage, 5.1 kg dry matter of harvested forage, 2.6 kg dry matter of grain concentrate and 5 kg dry matter of other feeds that mostly include human-inedible byproducts. Thus, 89% of the dry matter feed required per kg of grain-finished beef carcass weight produced in the United States is human inedible plant matter. Because the majority of the feed resources used to generate grain-finished beef in the United States are not in competition with the human food supply, and the protein value of beef to humans is 2.63 times greater than corn grain, our current grain-finished beef system is generating more high-quality protein for the human populace than it is using. She notes though, that any reduction in corn grain required per kg of beef carcass weight can further enhance the protein upcycling value of U.S. beef production.
Cattle consume forages/roughages that are grown on lands unsuitable for cultivation, thereby expanding the land base available for food production. In the United States, approximately 800 million acres of land are considered range and pasture lands. Currently, the only way to generate human food from this land area that represents 35% of the United States is to convert the biomass to human edible products with ruminant livestock.
Cattle consume byproduct feeds from the food, fiber, and biofuels industries.
Integrating cattle into row-crop plant agriculture systems can have environmental and socioeconomic sustainability benefits. Examples include crop residue grazing and grazing winter wheat with stocker cattle in the Southern Great Plains. Approximately, 2 million cattle graze winter wheat pasture each year (USDA-NASS, 2018), which can be subsequently harvested for human-use.
Beef cattle operations represent over one third of the farms in the United States, and thus beef cattle producers play an important role in the agricultural economy and the social fabric of rural America.
Cattle produce more than edible beef – they are also a source of a variety of ancillary products from leather to pharmaceuticals.

In her conclusions, Place offers this concept as food for thought: “The beef community uses a technology that produces high-quality protein from solar energy locked within human inedible plants. The technology produces a natural organic fertilizer, and is mobile without using fossil fuels. The technology self-replicates. The technology is cattle. Beef is the original, sustainable plant-based meat.”

Chronic Wasting Disease: Don’t Panic, but Remain Vigilant

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:12:50 GMT

The following commentary does not necessarily reflect the views of AgWeb or Farm Journal. The opinions expressed below are the author’s own.

The issue of chronic wasting disease (CWD) in deer and other cervids continues to worry stakeholders including hunters, deer farmers and businesses that generate revenue from deer hunting and related activities. And because of its similarity to Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE), concerns have lingered that CWD could eventually could spread to cattle.

Scientists have studied and monitored CWD since its discovery in Colorado in the 1960s, and although the disease has continued to spread and cause significant death loss in wild and captive cervid herds, some studies indicate it will remain relatively rate and is unlikely to affect humans or livestock. Nevertheless, ranchers and veterinarians should watch for signs of CWD in deer and quickly investigate any unknown neurological disease in cattle.

A new report from the American Cervid Alliance (ACA), titled “ Current Scientific Knowledge about CWD ,” compiles research results and CWD trends, and the authors suggest the problem might be less severe than commonly believed. It is important to note that the American Cervid Alliance primarily represents deer farmers and related businesses.

The authors maintain that some of the high estimates of CWD prevalence in affected states, some as high as 40%, have been based on modeling, rather than actual field data. They say CWD is a fairly rare disease with a prevalence less than 1% in over one million deer tested nationally over the last 20 years, and a prevalence of 11% in the 196 CWD-positive counties in the 23 CWD positive States.

So far, there has been no strong evidence that CWD can cross species barriers to affect cattle through typical environmental exposure, or for that matter, humans who consume meat from infected cervids.

The ACA report cites the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) noting that the CWD prion has been shown to experimentally infect squirrel monkeys and also laboratory mice that carry some human genes. Canadian and German researchers have reported transmission to macaque monkeys consuming infected meat or brain tissue from infected cervids. They also have infected macaques by injecting infectious material into their brains. In other studies, however, scientists have not successfully transmitted the disease to macaques.

As for cattle, recent results from a long-term exposure trial now support the belief that the lethal prion disease is highly unlikely to cross the species barrier. In this 10-year trial , researchers from the University of Wyoming’s Wyoming State Veterinary Laboratory (WSVL), the Colorado Division of Parks and Wildlife and the Wyoming Game and Fish Department (WGFD) collaborated to expose groups of cattle to high levels of CWD prions. The researchers exposed cattle to CWD using two methods and in different locations in Colorado, Wyoming and at the USDA’s National Animal Disease Center in Ames, Iowa. One group of 12 calves received an initial oral dose of brain material from CWD-infected mule deer, with five un-inoculated cattle serving controls.

Two other groups of cattle spent 10 years housed in outdoor pens with CWD-infected mule deer or elk, with continuous exposure through feed, water and direct contact.

At the end of the trial, the researchers euthanized and examined all the surviving cattle. None of the cattle showed any sign of CWD or any neurological pathology during the trial period or at necropsy.Read more about that study in “ Cattle Resist CWD in Long-Term Trial .”

In contrast, an earlier study at Colorado State University documented how even mild exposure can result in infection among deer. The researchers confined three groups of three CWD-naïve mule deer in pens either occupied by CWD-infected animals two years earlier, pens with CWD carcass and pes with a CWD infected animal. A total of 16% of the CWD-naïve deer in the three experimental conditions in nine pens became infected.

According to the ACA report, a review of the literature based on actual data shows that that “any past combination of quarantines, containment zones, surveillance zones, depopulation, elective harvest, increased harvest limits, supplemental feeding bans, baiting bans, bans on the importation of live cervid species, bans on the importation, of carcasses, bans on the importation of trophies, and bans on urine based lures, have not been effective in preventing, controlling, or eradicating CWD in any State.”

While that might be true, research, surveillance and control efforts, including preventive regulations and biosecurity for captive cervid herds should continue. While the damage so far has remained limited, the disease has potential to negatively impact rural economies even if it remains only in cervids. If the disease ever does cross the species barrier to other ruminants such as cattle, economic losses could be substantial.

Kids Busted For Selling Lemonade, “Legal-Aid” To The Rescue

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:12:46 GMT

Lemonade hustlers across America should take heed, Big Brother is watching. No permit, no lemonade stand.

Most of the players in America’s fledgling lemonade stand industry operate under-the-radar of local authorities, with stands popping up on residential streets one day, only to disappear the next. Prices for lemonade also vary by locale, and authorities have mostly given up trying to collect sales taxes.

Maybe that’s why some local governments are cracking down – ordering the stands to close unless the operators have obtained the required permits. Those permits generally cost tens of dollars – or several gallons of lemonade sold at 10 cents a glass.

Scrutiny on the illegal lemonade trade came to a head when, as reported by the Washington Examiner, Jennifer Knowles helped her three sons set up shop near Coors Field in Denver. It was a spot with high foot traffic, but they unintentionally picked a spot near another beverage vendor – who was selling lemonade for $7 a bottle! The police were called and the boys were forced to close shop.

But the Coors Field watering hole bust is not an isolated incident. Police in Georgia shut down a lemonade stand run by three girls who didn’t have a business license or the required permits. Even on residential property, the girls were told, you need a business license, peddler’s permit and food permit to operate. The permits cost $50 a day or $180 per year.

Overton, Texas, (near Houston) police and code enforcement officers shut down a stand opened by two sisters hoping to raise money to take their father to a waterpark on Father’s Day. (The water park has since donated tickets to the family.)

Last year, Jerry and Jessica Seinfeld (yes, that Jerry Seinfeld) said they encountered the lemonade Nazi at their summer home in the Hamptons. (“No lemonade for you!”)

Police confirmed to The East Hampton Press that they received a complaint last August about illegally parked vehicles near the stand and had to put a stop to it because the Seinfelds were violating a village code that prohibits “peddling.”

Apparently, Jerry and his 12-year-old son were having fun raising money for the nonprofit Baby Buggy. Jerry’s wife posted on social media, “Lemonade dreams crushed by local neighbor but not before raising lots of money for @loverecycled. Thanks to all of our customers and big tippers!”

But what is one child’s crushed dream is a corporation’s public relations bonanza. CountryTime Lemonade says it will be distributing “refreshing justice” with a team it calls “Legal-Ade.”

Country Time’s parent company, Kraft Heinz, wrote in a press release:

“But this summer will be different. The CountryTime brand is taking a stand by introducing Legal-Ade: a crack team ready to straighten out lemonade stand-related permits and fines. Legal-Ade will defend kids’ right to a lemonade stand and all the benefits they bestow.

… Go ahead, kids. Run your lemonade stands. CountryTime Legal-Ade is on your side and will protect you. When life hands you outdated laws, make lemonade, and get Legal-Ade.”

CountryTime is offering parents the chance to apply for reimbursement of up to $300 for either permit fees to run their children’s lemonade stands—or the cost of fines associated with those penalized. Applicants must include their children’s descriptions of what the stands mean to them.

You can apply through www.countrytimelegalade.com .

So, kudos to CountryTime for taking a stand and offering to help kids. It’s good PR and the right thing to do.

Tyson Sued Over Gluten-Free Drilling Mud

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:12:06 GMT

You want natural, or gluten-free? You can’t have both.

An Illinois woman apparently doesn’t understand that choice, so she’s filed a lawsuit against Tyson Foods – and seeks an order certifying the case as a class action and an award for compensatory damages.

Here’s the problem. The woman bought a package of Tyson’s “100% All Natural Batter Dipped Chicken Tenders” at Wal-Mart in O’Fallon, Ill., but discovered the product contains xanthan gum, a synthetic substance, thereby disqualifying the product as “all natural.” Or, maybe not.

Was the woman deceived by false advertising? Tyson is likely to argue the chicken was “all natural,” and had the woman read the ingredient label before she bought the package she would have known the batter contained xanthan gum.

So what the heck is xanthan gum? Ahh, yes, the complexities of the modern food industry. Xanthan gum provides elasticity and stickiness in doughs and batters – in gluten-free baking. Yep, it replaces gluten. Take out the gluten and you need a binding agent to help hold the batter to the chicken in order to make the chicken...err...well, taste better.

Xanthan gum is one of those ingredients many consumers find mysterious, and therefore they may believe it to be dangerous. It’s likely on the Food Babe’s list of no-no ingredients for her loyal followers who only consume healthy products such as raw water.

Xanthan gum is a polysaccharide, made when glucose, sucrose or lactose is fermented by the bacteria Xanthomonas campestris. Then it is turned into a solid by isopropyl alcohol, dried and ground into a fine powder.

Food companies have many uses for xanthan gum, such as salad dressings and sauces, ice cream, and others. The FDA declared it safe for human foods in the 1960s. Food Babe, however, is likely to notice that the oil industry can also use xanthan gum – in large quantities – to thicken drilling mud.

Which suggests how Tyson might need to label its product to avoid future silly lawsuits: “99.9% All Natural Chicken Tenders Batter Dipped In Gluten-Free Drilling Mud.”