#57 - SXSW, Better Beef

This was a live audio recording from last March at South by Southwest in Austin, TX.
SXSW is an annual festival that celebrates the convergence of various fields and genres. 
This panel consisted of host, Tyler Florence, world-renowned chef and Food Network Star, Dr. Temple Grandin, Animal Behaviorist from Colorado State University, Harris Heckelman, CEO of Chef's Warehouse and Matt Perrier, Eureka, KS.

www.sxsw.com

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Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone) 0:06

Thanks for joining us for episode 57 of practically ranching. I'm your host, Matt Perrier as always the podcast is sponsored by a Dalebanks Angus near Eureka, Kansas. This week's podcast had to take a back seat to the, uh, real ranch work. We're a few hours late releasing and instead of a guest, I have three. Actually, you're getting an audio recording of a panel discussion that I got to participate in last March. For you loyal listeners, you've already got wind of this event as Dr. Temple Grandin. And I referenced this in our discussion a few episodes back. This was a really fun opportunity to talk to a group of folks that I never thought I would be part of the very diverse crowd at south by Southwest. Many of you are likely familiar with south by it's an annual festival that celebrates the convergence of various fields and genres in Austin, each March. Music film, educational speakers, fashion, technology, comedy.... it truly is as diverse of a group of people and interests and languages and political perspectives. As I have ever witnessed. Ever witnessed. So to stick a cowboy in the midst of this was a little risky. But thanks to chef Tyler Florence, and you've likely seen his great food truck race, or the dozens of other shows and books that he's created and hosted on food network and discovery and all else. And also Harris Heckelman, chef's warehouse, and the folks at certified Angus beef. I got drug into the group as the token rancher. And I loved every minute of it was a little uncomfortable at times, but I really, really appreciated the opportunity. Now you can say what you want about the political leanings and preferences of the folks in attendance of south by Southwest. But they're curious consumers, they are intelligent, they're interested, and they are full of questions about everything that goes on around them... especially the food that they eat. And as you'll hear in the panel, the whole thing came about thanks to chef Tyler. And while he was our point guy. Having Dr. Temple Grandin on the panel truly brought a lot of the crowd that we had in this session. Now, a word of caution. There might be a few cringe-worthy moments in the next hour or so. For once, not all of them were mine, though. I'm sure several will be. But as you've noticed in past episodes, I don't mind having some discussions that some of you might oppose. You don't have to agree with everything that's said, but hopefully it will expose all of us to a discussion that's being held on the other end of our beef supply chain just about every day. There may be some points that might not sound like our typical beef narrative. I sure didn't agree with everything said by everyone. But the fact is this, we got in front of a group of folks whom I never drempt we'd have access to. And while it might not have been the exact narrative that our industry leaders would have written. I believe we built a lot of trust with folks in that room plus the many others who read articles about, or listen to this session online after the fact. And sometimes that's what we have to do. We can't wait for the safe place to deliver the perfect message. We have to be out there. We have to share our story and let others share theirs. And then work toward building bridges with consumers who are interested about our production practices, our management techniques, and basic overall reasons for being. So I'd like to thank south by Southwest for allowing me to use this audio. Tyler Florence, all of his colleagues for conceptualizing and spearheading this effort. Harris Heckelman and his team chef's warehouse for passionately delivering high quality beef to their food service customers. Even though sometimes it's not maybe my, or my customer's beef. Uh, I'd like to thank temple Grandin for all that she has done and continues to do for improving our animal welfare and handling, and finally certified Angus beef for inviting me to help share our ranchers story. And as always, I want to thank you. Thanks for tuning in. This thing keeps quietly growing thanks to your support. Uh, we appreciate your rating, us and dropping comments into your podcast platform. Sharing us with your friends. Uh, it, it helps. I don't know how, but it helps a lot keep us front and center on these podcast platform searches. This has been a fun ride so far, and I appreciate you for making it so. So here you go. The better beef panel recorded live last March at south by Southwest in Austin, Texas.

Tyler Florence 5:13

Good to see everybody. Good morning. Uh, I am absolutely thrilled. Uh, my name is Tyler Florence and I, uh, am very, very excited to be here at South by Southwest 2024, moderating a panel on better beef, revising the narrative on a changing industry. Now I have an amazing group of panelists up here today and together we hope to shed some light on why beef is back and better than ever from environmental considerations to humane treatment of animals. to better ranching and feeding practices and management techniques. There has never been a greater emphasis on doing things the right way, resulting in an increased demand and some of the highest quality production we have ever seen. In fact, the beef industry is producing more high quality beef than ever before. With more than 80 percent of beef grading at the highest available USDA quality grades of prime or choice. Consumers, and especially from my perspective, uh, owning restaurants with boots on the ground in the kitchen, consumers are realizing there is plenty of good in an industry that has long been touted as, well, not so good, but that's in thanks to a part of the, of people like these three who are helping to move the needle. and a positive direction in their respective fields. And truthfully, there may not even, I'm not even sure if there would be a narrative if not for people like Dr. Temple Grandin right here beside me today. Will you guys give a warm round of applause for Dr. Temple Grandin? Now if you have worked or passed through the industry at all, you know her name. She's an American academic. She's a faculty member of Animal Sciences and the College of Agricultural Sciences at Colorado State University. And she's an animal behaviorist and she has long been a prominent spokesperson for the humane treatment of livestock for slaughter and consults with the industry. She has written over 60 scientific papers on animal behavior, and she is the author of several books, including visual thinking. And we were just talking about that book this morning, and I'm very excited to hear more about that. Uh, and Dr. Grandin, uh, is also an. Autism spokesperson, and she's one of the first autistic people to document her personal experience. And she believes that because of her autism, she can see the animal's reality from their viewpoint, which allows her, uh, to design better systems for them. And Dr. Grandin has been, uh, such an influential presence in these two worlds that in 2010, uh, uh, in a 2010 biographical drama was released on HBO about her life. Storying Claire Danes. That's pretty exciting, right? And ranchers who have either worked with her directly or have, uh, reached, uh, uh, uh, or have researcher practices have said that, that her help is invaluable and she has helped turn the tides, uh, on, on how things are done. And we are so honored to be with her today. Please give one more round of applause for Dr. Temple Grandin. Now this very good looking gentleman in the cowboy hat. Uh, Matt Perrier is, is one rancher who has benefited from Dr. Grandin's wisdom, uh, nestled in the Southern, uh, Flint Hills of Kansas. Matt's family ranch, Delbanks Angus, grazes cattle on some of the last vestiges of native tall grass prairie in North America. If you can just imagine that, right? Some of the last vestiges of beautiful natural grazing land. It's land that can't really be used for anything else. And the grazing cattle harken back to the original American Buffalo. His family has been sustainably farming and ranching on this land since the late 1860s. Uh, farming and ranching practices have evolved since then. Uh, but each generation has been dedicated to raising the highest quality of cattle while always remaining dedicated to humane animal care and climate friendly practices. Uh, are true boots on the ground. Or rather boots in the grass guy. As a matter of fact, our first phone call, um, uh, when we were getting prepped up for this, uh, he took it on horseback in the middle of the grasslands and you could hear the cows moo around him. And I just knew this guy was the real deal. Uh, so please give a warm round of applause for Matt Perry. Now, cattle make several stops from gate to plate and, uh, and this is where, uh, a gentleman like Harris Haukman comes in, um, our third panelist today. Now, Harris's family founded, uh, two of the most successful independent meat and seafood companies in the country over the course of the last 30 years. So it's safe to say that he has spent much of his life in the industry and has seen changes firsthand. And, and Harris has built a reputation as the leader in the meat and seafood industry. And is now the executive vice president of the chef's warehouse overseeing all protein across the country. And in the beef world, this essentially means that he is the liaison between family ranches, processing plants, and discerning chefs like myself. Looking for the most high quality product. Um, he is entirely committed to connecting the best ranching partners with the best chefs in the country, and I'm looking forward to hear him talk about what he, what he looks for, uh, and to make sure that he's honoring the humane practices of Dr. Grandin and Matt look forward to the final stages of the process. So please give a warm round of applause for Harris Huckleman from Chess Warehouse. Hey guys. Now, guys, many of you may know me From television. This is my 17th season. I just wrapped up the great food truck race, which is the number one show on the Food Network every year, and I've hosted several of the shows along the way in the Food Network. This is my 27th year on the network, but the majority of my time is not spent behind the camera. It's actually spent behind the stoves. I'm a professional chef of nearly four decades, and all of my work through my career has really kind of led to led to me where we are right now, and that's the executive chef and owner of five restaurants in the city of San Francisco and six, including Miller and Lux Hualalai. We just opened up a beautiful restaurant on the Big Island in Hawaii, and our restaurant, Miller and Lux, just got named best steakhouse. And the San Francisco bay area by San Francisco magazine. And we just got included in the Michelin guide this year. Uh, so we're very, very excited about that. Now, along the way from the chef's journey, occasionally we'll have these light bulb moments that really kind of changed the direction and the outlook of our life. And about 10 years ago, uh, when Miller and Lux was just still a dream, uh, we're actually filming the great food truck race in Fort Worth, Texas. And my very good friend, chef Tim Love, uh, an amazing Texas chef, uh, was our guest judge for the day. And, uh, during the break. Um, he took me to, uh, the Fort Worth meat packers where they were in the middle of a processing session. And if you've ever been a chef and seen that side of the industry, it's, it's, it's, it's very, very important. It's very important to see that. And I've, I've taken chefs and sous chefs, uh, to processing facilities in Northern California. So they can see that and experience it for, for, for yourself firsthand. Because when you see that, um, your commitment. to, uh, managing the protein itself and being a steward of the protein is so incredibly important. And it just reiterates my commitment as a chef to make sure that we're following the absolute best practices that we Waste absolutely nothing. And then we honor our craft by making the protein and honoring the life of the animal by making sure the protein tastes as delicious as possible. So that's our commitment to being a chef. And I have loved beef. I've loved steak houses ever since I was a kid. It's my absolute favorite genre of restaurants. And we're super excited to be here today. And I'm looking forward discussing the world of better beef with my panelists. And, uh, we're going to be, uh, uh, taking a Q and a at about 1215. So if you guys have questions for our panelists, as we start to go through this, uh, where there's a live microphone set up, ready to go and, uh, and without further ado, I think we're going to jump right into this. You guys ready to go. South by Southwest, right? So please give one more round of applause for our panelists today. I'm super excited about this. So we've been, we've been working on this for about a year. Um, ever since we kind of wrapped out of South by Southwest last year, I got a chance to hear a bunch of really kind of interesting, fascinating conversations about, um, The food industry and, and, uh, you know, uh, the, the next food generation and the power of food and what's coming up next. And to me, like, I, I, I think the reverse engineering and that whole idea about thinking through the most holistic natural process possible. Um, w the, the app, maybe it's the opposite of engineered protein where you see, instead of seeing a box that has 25 ingredients on the backside of it, you see a product that has one word and that's beef. Right. And I think to me, that's as holistic as you could possibly get. And so I immediately walked out of last year's South by Southwest session, thinking through, we need to reverse this narrative. That that beef is necessarily bad for the environment, bad for people. I think the opposite is absolutely true. Um, being a restaurateur and a chef, especially opening up restaurants in San Francisco. Um, uh, taking a really big risk. Cause San Francisco is one of the most progressive thinking cities in the country that, that I've taken the last three years. And really educated myself on the beef world. And there are so many people like our panelists today that are doing things the absolute right way. And I'm so excited to jump in this conversation today. And Dr. Granite, I'm going to, I'm going to have the first question for you. There you go.

Temple Grandin 14:34

Is

Tyler Florence 14:34

that

Temple Grandin 14:34

working?

Tyler Florence 14:35

There you go. Okay. Fantastic. So, uh, so, uh, doctor, um, you have consulted for the last 50 years in the industry. She wrote her first scientific paper in 1980. Uh, you've consulted with many ranches and the processing plants to help them work on better practices for more humane treatment, including having developed equipment scoring systems for, uh, assessing animal welfare and visual guides, uh, in the form of construction plans. Can you talk a bit about some of the things that you used to see that you felt like needed changing and how those things in fact have changed over the years for the better and often because of some of the work that you have done?

Temple Grandin 15:14

Well, back in the eighties, uh, cattle handling was terrible, totally terrible. And in the seventies, I did some of my very first design work. Now I'm gonna admit that one of the mistakes I made in the seventies and even in the eighties, I thought it would be possible to build a self-managing cattle handling facility if I could just design it, right? The technology, which would be the layout and stuff of the handling facility, solve all the problems. Well, that's definitely not the case. A lot of people still handled cattle badly, even when they had state of the art facilities. And then I worked on developing a very simple assessment tool for evaluating a slaughterhouse. Very, very simple. You hang them up on the rail, they better be unconscious. First shot with a captive bolt stunner, got to be 95 percent effective. Uh, no more than three cattle out of 100 mooing and bellowing during handling. 1 percent falling. You got to get 75 percent of them through. With no electric prod, where before it was 500 percent got zapped with an electric prod, plus no acts of abuse. So in 1999, now this is a big turning point, I was hired by McDonald's, Burger King, and Wendy's to teach their food safety auditors how to do the slaughter plant audit. And in six months I saw more change than I'd seen in my whole career prior to that, because now they were forced to manage the equipment they had. We did it. I do lots and lots and lots of repairs on broken stuff. Lots of training, lots of supervision. And I'm very proud of the fact that out of 74 plants, only 3 had to buy expensive things. I had expensive things to sell them, but I'd been over backwards to do reverse conflict of interest, make whatever they had work and. What I learned from that is when big corporations inspect things, it can really work. It was also very, very interesting watching the reactions of high executives in these companies. When they first saw something bad, you got reactions just like that show undercover boss, they'd gotten out and they'd seen some things, but big corporations have the power to fix things. Now there was some other company in Europe that forced a chicken plant to put in a piece of equipment that did not work. That was very, very expensive. That's an expensive mess. I didn't make that mistake. I forced them to manage and repair the stuff they had most of the time. We've made some of the shabby old dumps work. I was kind of surprised. Cattle don't like the dark, so you put a light on their chute entrance, they'll go right in. And three plant managers were removed. Call that a managerectomy. And nothing changed until the plant managers were removed. But that's one of the most proudest things. I'm proud of my equipment. But the thing that probably made the biggest difference was the, uh, starting those audits from the major, um, major buyers.

Tyler Florence 18:10

Thank you, doctor. I appreciate that. Um, uh, it's absolutely fascinating to hear about the, uh, you know, what, what we perceive to know about the meat industry. And then to understand that a lot of that information is either 50, 20 or 10 years old, and it has very little to do with what's actually happening right now inside the industry. I think it's absolutely fascinating. And Matt, my next question for you, um, and your day to day, you've also seen a lot of changes growing up in a multi generational ranching family. So your father was a rancher. Your grandfather was a rancher dating back to the 1860s. You guys have been ranching the same, uh, beautiful piece of land in Kansas. Um, what, uh, what's different about your parents, grandparents and even great grandparents, ranching practices, um, that, um, you see have changed maybe coming full circle today.

Matt Perrier 18:58

Yeah, it has changed a lot and in a lot of ways it's almost the same and we've Practically returned back to some of the initial things we were doing, which is fascinating to me, not to go down the history lesson too much, but my triple great grandparents who settled our place in 1867 were encouraged by society and the federal government and everybody else to rip up these grasslands so they could tame mother nature and actually produce something because it was just this barren wasteland of grass for millennia with bison and everything else. And so they did just that. And here 150 years later, I and a lot of my neighbors and others are trying to reintroduce the biodiversity and the regenerative practices and put those fields back into grasslands because we realize how much more productive, at least in our area. Now, there are certain parts of the nation that are way more productive as farms and fields, but in our area. That grassland was it's perfect setting. And so we're trying to through regenerative ag and through rotational grazing to try to mimic mother nature, animal cattle handling things that we got away from, frankly, as we had technologies like the cattle prod and things like that in the seventies and eighties, we're returning to a way my. Triple great grandparents did it in a lot of ways. Um, and, and yes, we use technology. Yes. We have to stay current and efficient and we have to grow and all of these things that a business has to do. But those practices, those time tested practices that my great, great grandparents were, were using are actually coming back into vogue and almost deja vu all over again.

Tyler Florence 20:45

And, and, and Dr. Grandin, we were talking about this earlier, uh, in one of our initial conversations about some of the, um, uh, land in North America. The only thing it's really good for is grazing.

Temple Grandin 20:58

Well, that's right. I've got a paper I did on grazing. It's called Grazing Cattle, Sheep and Goats is an important part of a sustainable agricultural Future, it's a free access, open access paper. The reason why I wrote this paper is I spent 50 years of my career working with cattle that I worked with an animal we ought to get rid of. People say they just wrecked the environment. Well, the more I started learning about regenerative grazing and doing it right. Um, you can improve land. It'll take three to five years to improve the soil health. Also, grazing should be used with cover crops. You can cut down on the amount of artificial fertilizer. That's another thing that we ought to be doing. And we have lots and lots of land where the only way to raise food on that land is grazing. In fact, we're getting more and more land where we're draining aquifers. You won't be able to raise crops on that land, you're gonna have to graze it. And we have to do the grazing right. I think the grazing animals are part of the solution. Let's look at the methane issue. When the great herds of bison were all over the North America before Europeans came there, the methane levels were 85 percent of what they are now. And I've got to thank an anonymous journal article reviewer for that reference. Leaking oil field equipment and cattle are about the same. We haven't even measured. Landfills, dumps, and wastewater treatment plants as sources of methane that needs to be put in perspective. But the grazing animals is part of a sustainable future, but you got to use them right. You graze them fairly tightly bunched because you don't want them cherry picking and eating the strawberries and leaving the celery behind. 1, let it totally regenerate for you. Come back and graze it again. And then the other session I was just at looking way in the future. Um, maybe we'll have to build water pipelines, like, California's getting flooded, and you know what you can do? Oil field equipment works just fine for that. Two years ago, I got to see a pump jack that was pumping water. And when I found that out, I had to go up and commune with this pump jack, an ordinary pump jack. You know, we can repurpose that equipment. Uh, there's a lot of stuff we're gonna have to do in the, in the future. Right now, grazing animals, use right. Are definitely part of a very sustainable future. And you were talking about fire

Tyler Florence 23:19

prevention

Temple Grandin 23:20

as well. Well, yes. That's the other big thing is, um, if you get too much woody, uh, growth coming into the pastures, you're just got fire getting waiting to happen. Let's look what happened in Hawaii. I was over in Hawaii this past, um, fall dead grass, this tall, maybe if that had been grazed, that town wouldn't have burnt down. Okay. Now in Texas, they've had those horrible fires. They had a very, very green spring. I flew into Emeril twice, never seen it. So green on final approach, that's going to be tall, a lot of tall grass. Yes. They had cattle there and a lot of cattle died. Maybe they needed more cattle. Um, but fire mitigation is another really important reason for doing grazing. We lost a thousand houses in Denver two years ago. There was this big piece of land. They said, well, let's let it go wild. Well, they had a gigantic fire and we lost a thousand houses. So fire mitigation, fire control, that's another reason for using grazing. But I got to emphasize doing it right. I've seen pastures overgrazed and ruined. No, you've got to do it right.

Tyler Florence 24:25

Now, uh, we, uh, being in the beef industry, uh, we talk a lot about animal welfare. It's obviously a big concern on our end. Um, and, and the treatment of animals in a humane way. And in an ideal world, what exactly does that mean in the context of cattle ranching today? Uh, just really talking about the animal welfare and the treatment of animals in a humane way.

Temple Grandin 24:48

Well, you have to handle good handling, low stress handling. Uh, NCBA, the National Cattleman's Beef Association, we do a lot of workshops on low stress handling. Cattle handling has definitely improved. That's one of the, the definite, Bright spots. That's gotten better. Now we're going to have to be careful about not over selecting for things like marbling because we've been having some problems with leg confirmation issues. Heart failure. I like to look at genetic selection sort of like a national budget. If I put everything into the economy. I may shortchange infrastructure, bone, the heart, reproduction. I may also shortchange immune function. So we have to look at what is the optimal thing to do. And fortunately, the breed associations are trying to address some of these issues. But they're the kind of issues that can creep up very slowly and you don't realize it. Lameness, for example, like dairy cattle. Bad becoming normal on that. You get used to seeing it. You don't see it.

Tyler Florence 25:48

And I always think cattle are absolutely fascinating because they're unique digestive system. They are able to eat grass, which has very little value to people. And they convert that into high quality protein. It's rich in vitamins and nutrients that we need. And this means, uh, this means cattle can be used to grain. Uh, Grazeland, it's unsustainable for other types of farming and some of our earlier conversations, we talked about that and we also talked about the biodynamic relationship with the American buffalo going back a million years. And so, so our, our great grasslands and our plains and our grasslands, we're, I, I, I Just, just designed for grazing, uh, you know, uh, um, bovine animals. Right. And

Temple Grandin 26:27

we've got to stop the woody encroachment of cedars and junipers because, uh, you have a 10 foot high juniper patch. Uh, that's a fire waiting to happen and a really hot fire.

Matt Perrier 26:39

Yeah. And like you said, when, when we put. Ruminants, which are four compartment stomach animals like cattle and goats and sheep, bison, we mimic what mother nature was doing because just like you said, that forage isn't digestible by humans, that grass, we can't do anything with it, but that cow can turn it into protein, meat, milk, whatever the case may be and do it for us. And, um, so we'll, we'll. Re rotational grazing using fences to just, as Dr. Grand said, put cattle in a fairly tight group. And when I say tight group, I mean a hundred head on 250 acres or even maybe 50 acres for a short time. Very short time. Very short time. Take. Ranchers have a phrase that we like to use, and I don't know that there's any, um. Patent to it, but you take half and you leave half. So if the grass starts out this high, you graze it to here, and then you move those cattle to another pasture and you leave that pasture to get back up to its full height. It's a carbon sink. It does photosynthesis. It takes carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. And And in six months or a year or however long that process took, you come right back into that pasture with cattle. And that's what the bison did naturally. Through fires, and the Native Americans knew how to use fire and rotate those bison. We cattlemen are doing some of the same things. And, and so, using those management practices, using technology. A barbed wire fence or a virtual fence in some cases,

Temple Grandin 28:12

you doing any virtual fence? No, but

Matt Perrier 28:14

I want to, I cannot wait. I just can't really, really

Temple Grandin 28:17

closely. They're doing some experiments for service land to keep cattle riparian stream beds. And, uh, that technology is going to, uh, Cut fencing costs down a whole lot.

Matt Perrier 28:29

And I think it'll revolutionize the way we are able to use the natural resources that we have, grass, water, everything, because cattle want to be cool and be close to water. And so what do they do? They go right into the riparian areas and they overgraze. If we as cattlemen don't. Step in and make sure that we ask them, move them, put them in a fence, someplace where they can still get to water. They can still get to shade, but they will go ahead and graze the hillsides and things like that. So I think that virtual fencing, when we get that into a, when it's no longer cost prohibitive, I think it enables the ranching industry to better utilize the land to do things. Just like you said about mitigating fire, um, using those. Natural resources that we have in the best, most efficient way possible.

Temple Grandin 29:19

Well, in the virtual fencing, you have to take the time to train your cattle to it, too.

Matt Perrier 29:23

Yes.

Temple Grandin 29:23

Not just buy an app and move cattle around. No, you have to take the time to train them.

Tyler Florence 29:28

Well, that's a perfect leeway into my next question. Uh, because specifically here at South by Southwest, this is a very good question. Tech technology driven focus conference. And we're always talking about the positives and the negatives of technology. And Matt, when you think about, um, uh, we have the image of running a family farm and raising animals. You don't necessarily think about it being technology driven. Can you talk about why technology is actually essential to creating efficiencies and how it helps do things effectively and in a more humane way?

Matt Perrier 29:59

Yeah, it, there's no end to the way that we can use technology, even in something as tradition minded as, as agriculture and as cattle ranching. Um, we got away from the old farmers almanac a long time ago and we've replaced it. With one of these, my screen time is close to that of my kids, which I'm embarrassed to say, but instead of tick tock and Snapchat and everything else, I'm on a weather app or a geo, you know, a satellite imaging thing to see where we can use fencing and things to do better. I, you know, feed ration balancing programs, you name it, nearly everything I do in addition to communicating with customers and folks like you all on it. 24 7. It seems we use it. And I think that sometimes technology gets a bad name, especially for whatever reason, especially in food production. It seems like folks have said, if you're using technology, if you're growing and being as efficient as you can be, then it's not like it used to be. And I just, it can't be farther from the truth. We use technology as we are doing the things that are going to provide food and effectively and efficiently preserving the resources and everything else and and those technologies are often enabling us to do a better job.

Temple Grandin 31:23

I want to make a comment on technology is you need to make it easy to use. One of the things that's a problem right now is technology from different vendors does not talk to each other like in a dairy for example you have all this data you get off the milking machine then you might have data you get off an accelerometer you And none of the interfaces, uh, talk to each other. And this again gets back to the different kinds of minds. One of the reasons why the iPhone took over is, you didn't have to learn how to use it. Steve Jobs was an artist. He was not a programmer, an artist. And then the mathematical programmers had to make that phone work, you see, there needs to be a lot more emphasis off to say right now I'm not registered for the meetings, I couldn't figure out how to make the tech for registering for the meeting work. And so that's an example of a really terrible interface, I shouldn't have to learn how to use it. And so you need the visual thinker for the interface. And you need the mathematician to make the programming work, you need to have both.

Matt Perrier 32:25

So one piece of technology that I am having to learn to use because it's brand new and we're still working the bugs out, um, is a machine called the green feed machine and this is cutting edge. There's not a ton of research that is fleshed out on it, but I am excited about this because we put this little trailer. With a little bit of feed in it and a bunch of fans on it out in a pasture, half section to 300 acre pasture and it has a buzzer on it and when cattle walk past it, it'll buzz and drop a little bit of feed into a trough and those cattle walk in, they have a Radio frequency ID, which just tells us what number they are. They walk in and while they're eating this little tiny bit of feet, they're breathing and they're expelling methane and carbon dioxide like they naturally do, and they're intaking oxygen. This machine is measuring how much methane and how much carbon dioxide they're excreting and how much oxygen they're taking in while they're standing there just eating away. And it is saving all this data and it is telling us. Just how big of a carbon footprint these cattle have. And it's telling us, are there some cows that emit less methane and still gain the same or even gain more? We have

Temple Grandin 33:47

those machines in the feed yard at the ag next project at CSU. And this is not published yet, but they're finding some cattle put out more methane than other cattle. And the other thing they've had a lot of problems with the machines mechanically.

Matt Perrier 34:03

Well, that's why I brought it up.

Temple Grandin 34:05

One of the things that. That Keith Stack, uh, Kim Stackhouse told me is that they're not ready for the general consumer yet. They're very fiddly, finicky devices.

Matt Perrier 34:14

They are.

Temple Grandin 34:15

And, uh, you know, for that to become an everyday thing, they got to get easier to use. And recently I just went by a storeroom that had some broken parts from, in it. Yep. Um, they're complicated to use. And I'm very excited about the different methane coming out of Angus cattle in the same pen, but we've got to make sure it's not an artifact of measurement.

Matt Perrier 34:35

Right.

Temple Grandin 34:36

To make sure.

Matt Perrier 34:37

And I think with enough data, with enough time, we'll get that. We will. It's exciting for me to see that we can select for those genetics that are emitting a little less and still effectively and efficiently produce. Make

Temple Grandin 34:49

sure we don't over select for that genetics because traits are linked. And I, okay, we're selecting for all this marbling. And now I got. Heart failure that used to just happen at high altitude. Um, we've got leg confirmation issues. Traits are linked. We have to start looking at what's the optimal.

Tyler Florence 35:07

Right. Exactly. So science and technology is starting to mimic mother nature in this collective way through technology and started to think through, you know, a hundred, you know, 200 year old practices. Um, just the way mother nature designed them to be are the best way to ranch and preserve a heritage format when it comes to ranching, but also the technology is starting to kind of lead the way when it comes to identifying what the problems are and how to plan for the future. Yeah. Which is absolutely fascinating. It's fascinating. So like, so where we were 50 years ago in the beef world is not where we are today. And I think that's so incredibly interesting. So we're producing literally the highest, purest form of protein. Three ounces of, of protein, uh, produces 27 grams of, you know, three ounces of, of protein. of lean beef produces 27 grams of protein, and you just can't get that connection anywhere else. It's good for your mind. It's good for your body. And then the way that we're ranching this, uh, and, and developing better practices, um, the beef industry is only getting more interesting, only getting better all the time. And, and, and now it comes full circle. Um, so Harris, um, if Dr. Grandin is developing, is devoting her time to making sure the industry is changing for the better. to ensure humane treatment for animals. And Matt is living that on the daily boots on the ground. You're really the last piece of the puzzle. Making sure that, uh, the best beef, uh, possible gets to the processing plants and then into the hands of the chefs. What are the things that you look for when working with farmers and processing facilities to make sure that these are being done at the highest standards?

Harris Heckelman 36:41

Yeah, uh, Can you hear me? Yeah. So, uh, I mean, for us, it's all about finding the small niche, uh, processing facilities, right? So, for us, uh, there are small, small ones in South Dakota, Greater Omaha, Greater Omaha, and Omaha, Nebraska, and that's really where we focus to grab the product from, right? Because the small, the small packers that are doing a thousand, Head a day compared to 5, 000 head a day. They've got more time to run those, run through those animals, the overall care of the product, and ultimately it's for what, what you want in your restaurant. Right. So, you know, what we've learned is those smaller producers, you know, that are, that are dealing with small family farmers and ranchers. Ultimately, um, they're, they're within a couple of hundred miles, so there's less stress on the animal and it produces a higher quality product. Cause you know, we have, we have you and Miller Lux. We've got, we've got chef Samir at Nick and Sam's in Dallas. We've got Mark Stern at Shanahan's. They want the highest quality product every single day in their, in their And

Tyler Florence 37:40

so your family has been in the meat business for the last 30 years. Can you talk a little bit about some of the changes, uh, from then and to now? And what are the standard practices that weren't even on the radar then?

Harris Heckelman 37:51

So the overall quality of beef is better, right? So when, when, when my family got into the business third, I mean, 50 years ago, but then really last 30 years, you saw a shift of, uh, You know, USDA prime. So when I first started in 2007, the USDA prime grade was about 2%. And when you get into the summertime, it could be less than 1%. Now, just last week, we're, we're almost 10%, which is incredible. That comes down to everything that Dr. Temple Grandin has done, Matt and all the other. family ranchers that the overall quality of beef is just better. And, uh, that's, I think has been the major shift is that you've got a lot more better quality coming into the, into our facility, which lets us be able to sell better quality to your restaurants and restaurants across the country.

Temple Grandin 38:33

And, and we just want to mention about the animal welfare to keep the standards high on animal handling, you have to keep measuring it. It's just like traffic out on the highway. The police weren't out there with the speed cameras and the breathalyzers. You'd have a drunken racetrack out there. You have to keep measuring it. Otherwise, you can slip into some bad practices and you don't realize it. So the big companies have got auditing programs. There are now third party professional auditor companies that do a welfare audit along with food safety audit. And there's been huge improvements in that over the years. And then they, um, Because then the plant does internal audits, you know, compared to 20 years ago, they're light years ahead, but you always have to keep monitoring to keep standardized just like traffic.

Matt Perrier 39:24

I think one thing that we recognized after we started doing those audits through the last two or three decades, as we improved our handling and as we improved the docility and disposition of these cattle, it wasn't just the right thing to do for animal care. It actually produced cattle that were grading prime and gaining better because quiet, calm cattle that have been, had been handled correctly by cowboys like us also do better in the feed yard, also do better at the packing plant. And guess what? They make everybody a little bit more money in the, in the way. So it's a win win situation when you handle those and those are going through facilities like that.

Temple Grandin 40:04

Genetic selection for temperament. My very first graduate student back in the early 90s did the very first study on temperament of cattle and weight gain. And basic hypothesis was very simple. cattle that go crazy and jump around and squeeze you when you handle them, have lower weight gain. That was radical stuff over 25 years ago. Now it's common and accepted.

Tyler Florence 40:26

Uh, okay. So, um, the, the modern practices, uh, are getting better in the United States and they're also getting better, uh, Around the world, uh, at Miller and Lux, we love Japanese A5 Wagyu. We're also getting some fantastic steaks out of, out of Australia. Um, Harris, is there anything that's happening overseas in the cattle industry that American ranchers can learn and benefit from?

Harris Heckelman 40:46

Um, I think the, the, the, the pure difference is the land, right? So I was in Australia two years ago, uh, with, with our partner who we do a lot of business with. And, uh, The sheer landmass. So I've never been to Australia in my life. I go, I find out that Australia is the same landmass of the United States, right? But when you think about the population, it's just such a big difference. And this company owns 1 percent of the landmass. It's 17 million acres. And we flew on a plane to and then five hours to this little place called Brunette Downs. And there was about 150, 000 animals on, it was basically the size of Rhode Island.

Temple Grandin 41:22

You got more land in Australia that can only be grazed than you have in the US. I've been out to the heart of the outback. You take, go up to Darwin in the middle of Australia, go two hours South. On a small airplane and I look out over that and I go grazing is the only thing you can do with that land,

Tyler Florence 41:37

especially with the, with the wildfires too. Right. And Australia,

Temple Grandin 41:41

it's a bigger, a bland mass that can only be grazed than the U S has got.

Harris Heckelman 41:45

Yeah, no, it's, it was unbelievable. It was unbelievable. See, like we would drive for five miles and see two animals, four animals, six, I mean, like one single digit numbers. And, but they had 150, 000, it's just so much land. And then, you know, we were talking about earlier about in our conversation earlier about how you have to move, how you move. Move cattle, right? So that you, so the land's perfect and what they've, in all that land, they still have figured out with the troughs to be able to move them on the water to ensure that they got what they need and, and they continue to graze. So I, I would just say the pure land mass is what's different between Australia to, to the US

Tyler Florence 42:21

and doctor. Uh, we were talking about ranching specifically in Colorado, that some of the land is only only accessible for ranching. You can't really grow anything. Well,

Temple Grandin 42:30

you take Eastern Colorado. Okay, if you go into the Denver airport and then you get on I 70s, you go out maybe 75 or 100 miles, the houses stop, as of the commuting, and then you get into another 100 miles of planes that can only be grazed. There's not enough water in the ground. There's not enough rain. They tried to grow corn on it last fall. It was this high at harvest. Little useless corn. I drove by that just, you know, a few months ago. Saddle of corn. Yep. No, you can graze that land and that's about all you can do with it. Another thing we've got to be careful about is cow size. Okay, the animal you may want in the meat locker, that great big gigantic steer, has a gigantic sister that doesn't do very well on, uh, on sparse grazing land in the winter time when you got to feed her. You need a much, you need a more moderate sized cow on some of this land.

Tyler Florence 43:28

Um, and so I'd like to address some of the issues that feel like common knowledge that people talk about, um, with a level, level of detail that I think is kind of interesting, even like defining, you know, You know, what we consider what, what better beef really is even like 50, 20, and even 10 years ago to where we are now, beef standards have never been higher. New generations of ranchers are using efficiencies that result are resulting in, in better and fewer animals, right? So we're actually, there's less carbon emissions. We're, we're raising. Producing more beef by using fewer animals and producing less carbon emissions through that process, which I think is absolutely fascinating. As

Temple Grandin 44:10

you took your marketing at a younger age, you're getting an animal as a two year old rather than a three year old. Now that's really, really a good thing. But again, don't overdo it.

Tyler Florence 44:21

And greenhouse gas emissions, um, uh, from beef production in the United States are decreasing. Uh, compared to 50 years ago, we're now producing 20 percent more meat by using, uh, 50, 15 percent fewer cattle. And U. S. beef's carbon footprint is, and depending on where you're looking, either 10 to 50 times more. lower than other regions in the world, uh, due to improved practices, uh, and scientific and vet and advancements, um, from better cattle genetics and also better nutrition. Can you guys talk about nutrition for a little bit?

Matt Perrier 44:52

Well, nutrition in different stages of that animal's life is going to be different. Most of the time, even conventional cattle that are fed at a feed yard where they're eating a little bit. Better feed ration and a little bit higher plane of nutrition than they would if they were just grazing grass out there. Most of those cattle are spending the bulk of their time eating what Mother Nature put there. Those grazing lands, whether it be in eastern Colorado or throughout Kansas or wherever the case may be, that's what they're doing until they're Eight to 12 or 13 months of age. And then for the last little bit is when they actually get the really good nutrition. And that's what gives that prime marbling and that certified Angus B flavor is feeding them a little better diet than they can find even out there on their own in the, in the, uh, grazing lands.

Temple Grandin 45:42

Some statistics in here. Of course, one of that better feeds corn for a big part of it. We're putting about 44 percent of our corn crop right now into ethanol and about an equal amount into animal feed. Now that's also includes pigs, which would be a very big part of that. And only about 10 percent into things like Fritos and, and corn, corn tortillas and corn chips. But you take the whole biofuel thing, that's only sustainable up to a point. And then it gets unsustainable when you start exporting ethanol. That's no longer sustainable.

Matt Perrier 46:16

There's your optimum again, exactly.

Temple Grandin 46:20

And then of that 40 other 44 percent goes to animal feed. They haven't split it off into what's cattle feed pig feed. The pig feeds probably a greater percentage.

Matt Perrier 46:29

I think, I think it's close to 50, 50 close to

Temple Grandin 46:31

50 video. Okay. But the ethanol then would be the biggest thing. If you were to split the pigs and the cattle

Tyler Florence 46:37

apart. And when it comes to cattle finishing and, and from a chef's perspective, that's where you're going to get the intramuscular fat development. You're going to get the marbling, you're going to get the flavor. Let's talk about that finishing process when it goes from a grass fed animal into a grain fed practice. What are some of the advancements in that last stage of the, of the process?

Matt Perrier 46:57

Well, there've been a lot of them and I think we've learned as we go. I mean, that's one thing about farmers and ranchers. Uh, we, we have to, Adapt and flow and and and be ready to make changes as we see changes in consumer demand and what it is you all want in terms of product as we see changes in climate and and market dynamics and things like that. And one of those changes that we've seen is that that U. S. Grain fed beef flavor. Is what people want, not just in the U S but worldwide. That's why you grain fed us beef is so valuable. And so, yeah, we have figured out ways to adapt that animal and we'd have to do it slowly and gradually as they come from drinking mother's milk as a calf and eating a little bit of grass off of the, the grazing lands, and then move into that. Like I said, getting the good diet in a, in a feed yard for a brief time. Um, we start them on a slow transition of that from the ranch through what we call stalker operations until we get to that, that pasture generally are, or they're mimicking pasture through a ground haylage and things like that. And, and there are. All kinds of technologies. In fact, I was just talking about this with a veterinarian and new technologies where we can use natural yeast cultures to put into as a feed additive into that animal's diet, to allow them to make that transition even better and even easier. I mean, even, even gut health, you can't listen to a podcast anymore today without hearing some kind of gut health that. Humans can use to do a better job of, of digesting things and, and keeping, making sure that our immune system and everything else is right. We do the same thing with cattle, and those are technologies that again, we have developed. Why? Because we need to be able to make that animal healthy. Never have a bad day. That is the goal of every rancher, every feed yard, every even processing facility. If that animal is having a good day, every day of its life, then it is going to be more productive and produce better beef for Allen brothers and anybody else that's buying it.

Tyler Florence 49:07

And it, Oh yeah, we're, it's, it's a 1215. So if anybody wants to stand up in line, uh, for our Q and a session, fantastic. Love this. Um, uh, we'll, we'll, we'll take Q and a, uh, for the last like 15 minutes of this. Are you guys having a good time? This is fascinating, right? It's, it's amazing. Um, I, I, I love beef. I love, uh, um, uh, it's steakhouse restaurants. It's always been my absolute favorite genre. And once we start diving into the process of where we are today, um, when I, when I built Miller and Lux restaurant in San Francisco, I really taken the last three years of my life and. begin to educate myself on the process of raising cattle, making really great connections with not only the distribution companies, but the ranchers and the science side behind this to, to really kind of feel like there's a whole new world and a whole new generation of ranchers that I can, I think are making a big difference in this. And it's just not as bad for the environment or even as bad for you as once previously thought. And I think this is the world of better beef. I think it's great. I'm happy to take questions if anybody's ready. How are you?

50:08

Hi, if I haven't forgotten my question. Yeah, go ahead. Hi, I'm Sue Beckwith. I work for the Texas Center for Local Food. We work on helping farmers develop and ranchers develop new markets for their products. And my question is about 100 percent grass fed. I hear a lot of changes and positive changes around the humane treatment of cattle. And yet, I'm also hearing that we have to feed them in a way to feed them out because the consumer's demanding corn fed, which is typically GMO corn fed corn, grain, and we have to help them adjust to that because they're not meant to eat it, right? I mean, to my understanding, they're Uh, the way that ruminants work is if you, if you have to gradually switch them to this diet that's not, they're not meant to eat so they don't get sick. So that doesn't turn into whiskey in their belly. And so I'm just confused about why we haven't focused on the humane treatment of an animal. In the, in this feed out process, you know, I get it that we're trying to have them not get belly aches, but what's the demand for 100 percent grass fed? Why can't we plant sweeter grasses and feed them out, for example, on sweet alfalfa for their last 30, 60 days? I'm, Just curious about that whole situation.

Temple Grandin 51:33

Well, of course, alfalfa is a gigantic water pig too.

51:36

Yeah.

Matt Perrier 51:38

And, and corn actually is a grass, believe it or not. It is a much sweeter grass than what I have in my native pastures. Um, but we have to remember that that is food that cattle like to eat as well. Um, does it. Get processed a little differently than what a forage without that big seed, which is the corn or the corn grain that we feed them. Uh, yeah, it is, but it's not insurmountable. The question about why are we doing this? Because consumers, um, want grass fed beef as well. There are a, there is a lot of diversity. In our consuming public and what it is that they want. And we have products within the beef industry that will meet nearly all of those demands. There is grass fed. There is a forage developed. I mean, there's all these different names that we'll let them. The consumer decide what is it that I like and what is it that I want to buy and what can I afford to buy. And that's one thing we have to remember as we talk about trying to produce better beef and enough better beef that everybody gets what they can afford and what they can buy. If we go to 100 percent grass fed beef. We immediately dropped the production of what we can afford to graze and what we can graze period because of urban sprawl and fewer acres in grasslands and things like this. Um, Allen Brothers quantity that they get to sell will drop and I don't know if it's a half, if it's 80%, how much, but, uh, without, uh, These modern, uh, abilities to harvest a forage, harvest a grain, a concentrate, and feed those cattle for the last hundred and some days of their life, uh, we don't make as much beef. And we certainly don't make certified Angus beef in prime. So, I, I think the take home is, if there's demand for, and there is demand for grass fed beef.

53:43

And 100 percent grass fed. And 100%. Not just a single gra blade of grass when they were a little bit bigger. Right,

Matt Perrier 53:48

right. We can make that, um, but it will be more expensive and it'll definitely have a different flavor profile.

Harris Heckelman 53:55

Yeah, I mean, we have partners that are 100 percent grass fed beef, um, and we do business with them. The big challenge is the sizing, right? So, when you go to a restaurant, You know, even if you feed them on grass, you know, you still want that steak to look on the plate. You don't want to be paper thin. So the people that want grass fed beef, we have it. It's a great piece of business, but a lot of restauranteurs might be using one steak to Matt's point. It's about the consumer demand. So we definitely have it. And we're And we love grass fed beef as well. We love all of our children.

Tyler Florence 54:26

And for sure, I think there's a lot of people that from an ethical environmental standpoint really make a decision on grass fed beef from a commercially competitive standpoint of serving that in a restaurant. I remember when we opened up Wayfair Tavern, one of our restaurants in San Francisco, in 2010. I was committed to fully California. California grass fed beef, and we just got the steaks sent back every single day. Uh, and so it was just kind of one of those things. So then we started to kind of develop, like, new processes of, of, like, new partnerships. And also the, the, the, the feed has started to evolve in a way. Um, it's not 100 percent corn, it's corn mixed with other things like barley. which has a lower glycemic index, um, so it's healthier for the cows, produces less admissions and also produces a really fabulous mushroom flavor marbling, which I think is really great. So I think there's a lot of advancements and techniques in that. And I think ultimately the, you know, the, the, the consumer decides kind of like what the old ultimate output is, but there's lots of choices out there, which, which is, I

Temple Grandin 55:25

think another thing is on the grain feeding. You've still got to feed them some roughages. You've still got to feed them some hay mixed in with that. And hay, maybe with fiber that long, not ground up like pig feed. And they're not pigs. So they shouldn't be fed 100 percent corn. Some people have done that. I think that's totally bad. You've got to put some roughage in that feed and then that helps their digestion.

Tyler Florence 55:51

Thank you for that. Thank you for that question. I appreciate it. Thanks. Thanks. All

55:54

right. Mine dovetails a little bit into what what she was asking because there really isn't scalability with grass fed or at least the scale that we're needing. The same goes with regenerative. Uh, but it seems like this is the next Buzzword in the industry CPG clinging onto it. I just I'd like to hear from you What would you think the definition of regenerative truly means in what we as the industry really should? Understand it to be because I know there's a lot of governing bodies that are auditing this lay in the market What is it? Regenerative, certified, organic, regenified. It seems like there's these governing bodies that are coming out to say that, Hey, we're going to dictate what this truly means, but I'm hearing terms like this is regeneratively packaged or just, you know, regeneratively made, uh, and it just becomes this greenwashing. Exactly. That's what I was going to say.

Matt Perrier 56:54

That, that's the, that's the term is greenwashing and, um, you know, sustainability was the First buzzword that I heard 15 years ago, and that got hijacked. And now I don't think we could anybody in here agree. What does sustainability really mean? Uh, regenerative is, is a similar term. And to me, and you asked what it means to me, to me, it is working in concert with mother nature. And the resources that we have, natural resources, land, grass, water, cattle, or whatever the case may be, people, um, and making sure that those are able to generate themselves again, regenerate for eternity and for perpetuity. That doesn't necessarily mean we stand back and do nothing and let it all go. All go back to the way it was before any humans got to see it, but it also doesn't mean the other extreme. And that is run this land into the ground just to make a profit the next two or three years. And so I think we can do that. I think we can do that. Um, with What we know today and the knowledge and wisdom that we've gained through the years and keeping our eyes open to seeing how we can do it even better in the future. And, and to me, that's a, that's a part of what we call sustainability or regenerative agriculture. That is taking the land as we found it and leaving it to our next generation and even better shape. That's regenerative to me. And I think we can do that with a concert of whether it be grain finishing and grass fed. I don't think it has to just be one or the other.

Tyler Florence 58:30

Thank you for that question. That's great. Thank you. Hey

audience member 2 58:33

everyone. Awesome panel. Super insightful. Um, Uh, I'm a digital marketer and communications guy. Um, to speak to the reversing the narrative, I'm super curious as to, you know, what do you, how, not everyone can be in this room right now, like hearing this interesting stuff and like, Changing minds. How do you think we're gonna better tell this story and actually, like, reverse the narrative in terms of, like, marketing or or storytelling or and where do you like brands and, uh, and, um, or, you know, NGOs, what role can they play in that? I'm super, super curious.

Tyler Florence 59:06

Um, from my perspective, this is one of the most fascinating parts of my journey as a chef and being a restaurateur is educating myself in the last three and a half years opening restaurants, specifically in the beef and the steak space about how fascinating the story is, right? I mean, on so many levels, uh, the, the, the small American family farm. First and foremost, and how important that is to keep that heritage alive, the, the, the technology, because I, I, I love animals, I really do, I, but, and, and so I also understand the, the nutritional sustenance purpose of, of what they provide as well. And I, and I've seen, I've seen the life cycle, seen the full life cycle. And, and I, I think it's important to start telling these stories on, on a really kind of beautiful, almost poetic level that, that, um, that, that, you know, has a common value with a lot of people in America. Right. So I think if it doesn't really matter kind of where you stand in the world, I think everybody wants other people to succeed. And I think other, other families to thrive and, you know, And we all love our children the same way and kind of what we do to support, uh, uh, the, you know, feeding this large diverse nation. And obviously beef is a big part of that. Uh, and so I, I think it's amazing. I think it starts here. It starts here. It starts having a really great conversation like this. Developing, uh, you know, really great, um, fabulous panelists like we have today. And then take this out onto other areas like the, uh, you know, Aspen ideas summit and, and, uh, you know, take this to Ted, Ted talks or whatever it is. So we can really start to kind of push the, change the narrative that, that beef is not the same industry. It was 10 years ago, 20 years ago, certainly not 50 years ago. And, and we're in a whole different world now. I think it starts now with a great questions like yourself. And whoever you're blogging to, this is where it's going to go.

Matt Perrier 1:00:51

Yeah, I think it's, it's great that you're even asking that question of us because until the last, I'm going to say 10 years, 15 years, ranchers like myself didn't realize that there was a narrative. We, we, we didn't know we needed to reverse anything because we thought everybody knew what we did. And we made that assumption and people who didn't, necessarily want us to continue being in the business that we're in of trying to use ruminants to harvest this vast wasteland that I live in and turn it into something meaningful and good for you. Um, they told a different narrative. We weren't where we needed to be. We weren't here at South by Southwest 15 years ago to realize that there was a narrative different than the truth. And so I'd ask the question back to you. How can we tell that story better? Because there aren't very many. My wife, Amy back here spends countless hours on, uh, social media and things made up of volunteer ranchers and ranch wives to try to tell that story. But most of the time we're feeding the cows. We're caring for the cows. We're caring for the land. We're not good at this stuff. We're not in Austin and we're not in San Francisco and the places that ranchers probably need to be to tell that narrative. So however you all can help us. We're all ears. Fantastic. Thank you.

audience member 1 1:02:17

Um, so you guys have spent a lot of time just talking about kind of your ideal visions for what the right way to do farming is the right way to have well raised beef and things like that. Um, you know, but I get the sense that it's not the mainstream today. If you were to kind of go 25 30 years out and say this way of farming has become the mainstream, the 95 percent of how we all Do beef in America, what would have to be true from consumer demand and economics to shift in order to enable you guys to be able to do that?

Matt Perrier 1:02:47

Well, first of all, I am pretty mainstream, believe it or not. Um, what we are told, let the hat fool you. Yeah, well, this is mainstream and it's, it's, it's one of many tools that farmers and ranchers use that have been time tested through the generations. I mean, I guess the hat looks great, but the hat has a purpose. Um, just like the ration balancing and the management that we do every day has a purpose and, and yeah, the things that we're talking about. Caring for the cattle correctly. Making sure that the land regenerates itself and is productive as it can be, not just this year, but in 10 years,

Temple Grandin 1:03:27

I want to bring a lot of people

Matt Perrier 1:03:28

doing it is

Temple Grandin 1:03:30

the amount of grazing land. We have is not going to get less. If anything, it's going to get more because we're depleting aquifers right now. They've got land in Colorado. They're probably going to take out of farming. What are you going to do with it? Graze it. The grazing land is not going to go away. And we need to be good stewards of it, improve the soil health. That can be measured. I like measurements. We can measure soil health. And it takes three to five years if the pasture has been overgrazed and ruined to really start to see it. The grazing land is not going away. And we need to be raising food off of that land in a responsible, sustainable way. I'm going to try to avoid the buzzwords because if anything, 50 years in the future, there'll be more grazing land, not less because we're using up our aquifers or draining our aquifers.

Tyler Florence 1:04:17

Thank you so much. I appreciate it. And I think we got time. And maybe

Temple Grandin 1:04:19

we'll have to pipe some water from, use the oil field equipment, pipe some water from California. I

Tyler Florence 1:04:23

love that. I think we have time for one last question. I just got the five, five minute heads up. So we'll see if we, maybe if we can make it short, maybe we get to. Okay. Yeah.

1:04:30

You guys are all leaders. Thank you so, so much. I really appreciated this. I'm Angela Thayer. I'm a physician from Seattle, Washington. So what I see in patients is, um, A lot of them, you know, shun, no, no red meat. That's like been cut out of their diet completely. They're only eating chicken and a lot of chicken. Like, and I'm like, I don't know that that's better. You know, um, what I heard from you on some of the earlier questions, I'm obviously really vested in individual health, health of my patients, health of humanity. Um, and I know that raising more humane cattle is going to lead to a higher quality with more nutrients. People need the protein. What I heard from Tyler is that the grass fed. 100 percent you can't make it taste good, right? Can you make, I mean, cause that would be, even though you, it would be way more expensive, it would be maybe better for health is what I've read. If you could do grass the whole way, but if you can't make it taste good, it's not going to have a consumer appeal.

Tyler Florence 1:05:28

I think it does to a certain, to a certain group of folks, right? I, there's definitely like really amazing ranchers specifically in Northern California that are dedicated to raising, you know, grass. 100 percent grass fed beef and it is super nutritious, lean beef. And, and, and I, I, I get it. And, and yes, I, I can totally make that delicious. Is it, is it, of course I could, of course I could, but I can cook on a car hood. Yeah. I can do anything that tastes good, but, but is, but is it, is it the, the, the, is the difference between this being delicious? And it being sort of commercially competitive and sort of the beef space, it's sort of two different things. Like, like I could totally consume like grass with beef at home and have that sort of health perspective. But if you're going to come to a restaurant expecting that and you cut into it and you, it has a sort of a, you know, like it's a very chewy. You know, uh, it's, it's, it's, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, wet, right? There's like different things that kind of come along with grass fed beef that aren't the same thing as well marbled dry age, you know, like, like exquisite beef. So I think there's room for everything, um, specifically from a health perspective. Um, and I, I, I think even just the people having the understanding of, cause I, I'm a hunter. Right. So I have, I have a deer full of, uh, I have a freezer full of, you know, uh, venison and, and like, so an elk is like really super lean as well. And very, very nutritious and really good for you. And those are the things that I would consume at home. Yeah. Right. And I wouldn't necessarily, but I don't know if I could serve that in a restaurant. It just wouldn't, I don't think people would, they would buy it cause it would sound really interesting on a menu and then they would, they wouldn't love it. They

1:06:58

wouldn't

Tyler Florence 1:06:58

love it.

1:06:59

So just one more quick question then tailing on that is if you're going to give advice for general consumers going into a grocery store, How could a consumer look for packaging? What package would tell my patient, my school teacher, who's going in that this is better beef, like what's she going to look for on the package labeling

Matt Perrier 1:07:19

certified Angus beef.

1:07:21

I mean, how does it, it's all us produced and it's regenerative. I mean, what are these like to know it's been handled all these best practices?

Matt Perrier 1:07:30

Yeah, there are a lot of choices and it depends on the region and where you do your shopping and what choices you have in. Small town Eureka, Kansas, population 2, 100 people. You have one choice. It's on a white tray with a cellophane wrap around it and buy it. Um, but I think, do your, do your research and ask trusted sources. From a humane handling standpoint, and I think Dr. Grandin would agree with me, nearly every Every ounce of beef that you're going to buy, regardless of whose brand is on it, regardless of choice or prime or certified Angus beef or what branded beef program you're buying, it has been handled in the absolute best interest of that animal the entire time. And the reason for that is, number one, We want these cattle to, again, I just said it before, we want these cattle to be as content and quiet and calm and safe and well cared for as possible because that's how we get paid as a business. It's also why I'm a sixth generation rancher because that's my life is to take care of that cow. And so that she raises that calf and he goes on and does his job as well. And so, yeah, from the, from the handling standpoint and humane standpoint, that product is all basically the same. Couldn't I say that Dr. Grandin? Pretty much so,

Temple Grandin 1:08:54

especially the larger plants. And you're talking about Omaha beef. You know, I'd call that a medium sized plant. That's all in the same kind of system. Creekstone to be another example. Um, you know, the Creekstone, I designed their system. They, they, thing is you got to have the management to go with it. But the USDA is also doing a whole bunch more oversight. Now, when it comes to little small local processors, you know, for maybe the rancher that wants to just sell beef, uh, there's a real need for more decent, real small processors, you know, that might be doing 10 head a week or 20 head a week. Very, very small processors. And I found the ones that still left there, some are really nice, some are not so nice. And you also have state inspected on the very small. I'm not talking about a thousand cattle a day, I'm talking about ten cattle a day. Very, very

Tyler Florence 1:09:47

small. Which might be the wave of the future, actually. Like, almost like microprocessing facilities to produce real small farm animals, right? So, for example, we have a steakhouse, Miller Lux, at the Four Seasons Koala in Hawaii, and we're in conversations with the hotel owners about developing and, and, uh, opening a USDA processing facility in the state of Hawaii, right? Where we can actually start to process that beef there on property and create a whole new thing that's like actually macadamia nut finished beef, which I think that sounds really delicious to me. So, uh, so guys, that's our time today. Will you please put a warm round of applause together for our panelists, Dr. Temple Grandin...

Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone)-1 1:10:25

thanks again for listening to practically ranching brought to you by Dalebanks Angus. We are essentially sold out of our private treaty bulls and females offered this spring. We appreciate all the calls and interest. Be sure to put Saturday, November 23rd on your calendar. This will be our annual bull sale held here at the ranch Northwest of Eureka. The Saturday before Thanksgiving. And if you're ever through the Flint Hills, give us a call. We'd love to host you. Thanks again for listening. God bless. We'll be back again in two weeks.