A day in the life

This morning I woke up before the roosters. I know this because I couldn’t hear them in the bathroom where my father has plugged in a tiny baby monitor transmitting to the “adolescent” chicken coop. This morning could have been a fatal blow to the future of one bull-calf’s lineage- but more on that later. I went outside in the tall wet grass and climbed up into the passenger side of my dad’s great big pick-up truck. He already had the trailer hitched up and Alex, the 6-week-old bullRJH, pacing inside. We had to drive far to the vet’s and I could only imagine the gas mileage with this load. None of the vets in or around town treat large (AKA farm) animals, my dad told me. He rubbed his fingers together, “there’s no money in treating large animals. Farmers don’t have any money.” The Vet finally came out to see Alex, chuckling as he did at my father who listened to his wife and decided against castrating the little guy today. My mother convinced him that Alex, unrelated to the female heifer calf back home, would be more valuable as a stud than as a series of steaks. My dad was worried that nobody would want to buy him as a stud, and for good reason. Farmers across the country are slashing their herds. The reason? A 50% increase in grain costs. Ironically, last year’s grain harvest was the largest in the planet’s history. Explanations for the spike in grain prices abound and most of the big reasons- increased fuel costs, bad weather, ethanol- help to explain the current spike in food prices, but they also expose an enormous liability within our current food system. Ultimately, if grain prices are increasing this year, the price of meat is bound to follow suit by next year. And who knows, maybe the nescient food economy will begin to offer farmers a real living wage that reflects the good work farmers do! I am hopeful that change to our fundamental way of life, down to the very food we produce and eat, is possible.