Extension Report

Baldwin County Extension Office

302A Byrne Street

Bay Minette, AL  36507

Ken Kelley

Regional Extension Agent

Animal Science

December 16, 2008

Feeling Good About the Food We Eat

There are many different questions that we receive within the Extension system dealing with animal science. We do, of course, get a lot of general production questions from folks who are in “the business” of raising livestock. Most of these folks are not full time livestock producers per say…in other words they have full time jobs doing something else, with livestock production as a sideline type job…albeit one that they love. Like I said, a lot of my calls personally are from these types of folks. Then there are other calls that I take ranging from questions like will a hog eat cucumbers (I found out after a lengthy explanation about the lack of energy and essential amino acids found in cucumbers that the gentlemen was just trying to substantiate the claim that his father made when he was a child that even a hog won’t eat cucumbers and that was the reason he didn’t….by the way a hog will eat cucumbers), why is my goat eating the bark off of my pine trees, what should I do with the rabbit that I bought my child for Easter now that it is two days later and they are tired of it (usually in this case both the parent and the child are tired of it), and many other such questions. One line of questions that have increased in the last couple of years is the one concerning raising home grown food sources. So, I thought that I would try to address that in the best general way that I can.

First, realize that every situation is different. Everybody has a little different set up and circumstances. First, we should address the financial side of things. A lot of folks who are interested in raising some of their own protein food sources generally assume that they will save money by doing so. This is usually not the case. There was an article that ran on the front page of the ACES website for several weeks entitled “Backyard chickens may bring happiness but not cost savings”. In this article Dr. Ken Macklin did an excellent job of explaining many of the costs associated with raising backyard chickens for eggs or for meat. In the article Dr. Macklin goes through a detailed list of items that will be required for production. The telling factor though is that when you consider only the feed needed to produce either eggs or meat, it will cost you more than it would to buy the same or more product at the grocery store.  Dr. Macklin also points out that folks who have never eaten home grown free range chickens might be caught off guard by the fact that the taste of homegrown meat will be different than that of chicken bought at the grocery store. I am not stating that it will be bad, worse, gamey or anything else. I am simply agreeing with him that it will be different.  There are a lot of folks who have grown up eating free range and homegrown foods and they have done well. I grew up on a small farm in south central Alabama where we had chickens who produced eggs and meat for us. We also had an old milk cow that my grandmother milked and we had fresh whole milk and my grandmother made butter and buttermilk. I remember fondly how good it was. Twenty five years later would I milk a cow and make butter.  Probably not.  Would I fault anyone else who wanted to…absolutely not. However, I would caution that many times if you have not actually been involved with this type of thing you can easily underestimate what is involved.

In order to be good stewards of the animals that we produce, we should provide them with adequate clean living space.  Do you have this type of space? In order to grow livestock they must be fed every day. Is your financial situation one where you can afford to spend the money every week to pay for this type of investment? Do you have a plan for what you will do with the product when it is ready to be processed? I take a lot of questions from folks who want to feed their own steer out to put in the freezer. There’s nothing wrong with that, but besides the financial consideration that we just talked about you also have to think about how much space it takes to handle the volume of meat that will be there when you process a 1300 pound steer.  Again, I am not discouraging any of this or saying it is a bad idea. I am just encouraging folks to consider the investment that is involved both financially and otherwise (by the way, animals must be fed and taken care of no matter if it is raining, snowing, a hurricane is coming, or you are going to Disney Land).

Finally, I would say that there is a lot of talk about the health benefits associated with a variety of these foods that are considered home grown, all natural, grass fed, organic, etc., etc..  I advise you to research the benefits associated with these types of products….and by investigate I mean to check literature from scientific sources not just anybody who has a website. There are scientific studies that do show some health advantages to certain things like the type and ratios of omega fatty acids contained in grass fed as compared to grain fed beef. However, you should take into consideration all aspects of a complete nutritional game plan. When looked at in a “big picture” scenario a lot of stuff you read may be somewhat true, but just by choosing a certain product you may not make that big of a difference. I do acknowledge that a lot of folks, me included, would like to make healthy choices concerning what their family will consume. That being said, I want to stress that in no way am I saying that producing your own food is a bad thing. In contrast, I think a lot of folks would benefit from the farming experience and could gain lifelong lessons that would be of benefit. What I am saying is that animal production, even on a small scale is not an easy or cheap thing. There are stores that offer many of these types of products (again, they are not cheap) that will fit the niche that folks are looking for. There are also local producers who are trying to produce the types of products that folks are looking for (for example we have producers who are growing grass-fed and all natural beef).  I will conclude by saying that if you want to further investigate growing some of your own food, whether that is freezer beef or whatever, I will be glad to help.

Email address: kellewi@aces.edu

Phone number: 937-7176 or 943-5611, 928-0860, ext. 2222

The Alabama Cooperative Extension System (Alabama A&M and Auburn Universities) in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Agriculture is an equal opportunity educator and employer.

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