I hate to admit it, but I am not an avid reader.  As the husband of an elementary media specialist (the new fancy term for librarian) and the son of career educators you would think I have shelves of books covering a wide variety of genres.  Not the case.  Maybe it’s my self-diagnosed ADD, growing up in the TV/video game world, or Cliff notes.  Who knows?  Books and I never jived.  I realize you’re asking yourselves, “but this guy seems so intelligent, he must be a well-read fellow.”  I know…it’s unexplainable how I have amassed such a wealth of knowledge.  I have to remind my wife how smart I am all the time.

Our trade magazines and of course the Cattle Call blog are all that seem to peek my interest.  On the annual Booth family vacay last year though, I felt an urge to become more hip, more in tune with my soul - so I decided to read a book.  I remembered that years before my meats professor from the University of Florida, Dr. Dwain Johnson, had briefly discussed a famous literary work called The Jungle.  He mentioned a quote attributed to its author, Upton Sinclair, “I aimed at the public’s heart [with The Jungle] and by accident I hit them in the stomach.”  As many teachings from my time in Gainesville did not, this quote stuck with me, deep in the back of my mind.  Finally, ten years after a college professor suggested we read this book, I picked it up longing to know what profound discoveries Sinclair could have penned concerning the meat industry.  How could this novel be credited with the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906? 

So, as the waves crashed on to the beach of Florida’s Gulf Coast in mid-July, I buried my head into The Jungle.  As I turned through the pages (reading, not just looking for the pictures!) it was easy to see why a meat science professor would suggest reading it.  All folks in the cattle industry need to add it to their library.  However, I couldn’t help but thinking that destiny had somehow brought this book and I together in the summer of 2009.  For it was not meat industry part of the story that struck me the hardest, it was those chapters where Mr. Sinclair was aiming at the public’s heart and the parallels that exist in today’s America.  It shook my political bone.  You see the main characters struggle with horrors of the meat packing industry in 1904 Chicago – abhorrent working conditions, distribution of unsafe food products, and on and on – most of us in the cattle business know about this stuff.  What surprised me were the issues of housing, healthcare, union corruption, Chicago corruption, immigration, and socialism.  Sound familiar?  I guess I’m reaching.  Come on, it’s almost like I trying to say there are corrupt Chicago politicians at the highest level of our government…and they are making decisions about housing, healthcare, immigration…and they might just be making back room deals with unions…and maybe they are propagating a socialist agenda?  I know it may be a stretch.  The Jungle takes a deep look into many topics, I had no idea it was more than meat!

Further discussion of the book would spoil all the fun.  I strongly encourage you to give it a read if you haven’t already done so.  Just don’t wait ten years to do it.  The message is pertinent to the times we are living in right now.  Besides all the meat industry topics, The Jungle helps you understand why socialism can become a popular cry.  And while Upton Sinclair was one America’s most famous socialist, don’t let that stop you.  We know socialism is as American as soccer and vodka.  However, knowledge is power – that’s why this great American novel changed the meat packing world.  Let it expand your understanding of more than just dirty packing plants.  

We’ve all heard, “don’t put all your eggs in one basket.”  Pretty straight-forward thinking, spread the risk, diversify.  It’s a basic principle of financial investing and the key theme of a risk management workshop.  There is, however, an alternative.  As the American literary genius (this blogger’s opinion) Mark Twain put it in his book Puddn’head Wilson, “put all your eggs in one basket and WATCH THAT BASKET.”  I guess if you think about it, it’s the only other alternative to not putting all your eggs in one basket.

Now I’m not talking about the business of your farms or ranches.  If you’re a fulltime rancher you probably have other sources of income besides cattle.  Speaking for my family we generate revenue from timber, sod, hay, citrus groves, etc.  If you’re a part-timer you obviously have another job.  Or maybe you're involved in the cattle industry in some other way; sales, research, teaching, etc.  What if the “basket” I’m talking about is our way of life, our industry?  All my eggs are in that basket and I intend to keep it safe!  Keep it safe from media snakes and government varmints.  Keep it safe from rabid extremists like HSUS and PETA.  Some of them want to pluck an egg right from you, scramble it up and have you watch them eat it.  Others are waiting for you to take a little siesta.  And some will clumsily step into our basket.  Nonetheless, without watchful eyes our bounty will diminish.

Are you watching the basket?  Would you like to raise your brood where you were raised?  Do you want to continue to roost each night right where you are now?  Are you a free-range chicken???  Now I’m getting carried away, but seriously, do your part – WATCH THAT BASKET! 

Watch CBS Evening News with Katie Couric tonight.  They will be running a story on the livestock industry’s use of antibiotics.

The preview of the story (Farming Super Bugs) is on now at their website and it doesn’t look to animal agriculture friendly to me.  I am putting my MBA skills to work by posting a comment to the preview, I urge you to do the same.  My posted comment is below –

"Remember that American farmers produce the safest and most affordable food supply in the world.  Antibiotics are a tool used by farmers to keep it that way.  Farmers would not care if the government banned antibiotics if Americans were willing to pay substantially more for their food.  And right now reputable research shows no adverse effect to consumers.  If that was not the case the government would not have to ban antibiotics, farmers simply wouldn't use them.  The only way livestock producers can be profitable is if we consume their products.  If the product is unsafe we wouldn't consume it! 

 I sure hope CBS Evening News, in an effort to preserve their journalistic integrity, reached out to the livestock producing community.  I'll be watching and waiting to see!

 I suggest that tonight you watch the news while enjoying a safe, wholesome, nutritious, and delicious steak.  I'll have mine medium rare thank you." 

Yes, I tried to go a little “P.C.”   So tell me what you think.  Also they will be discussing this topic tonight on the live Cattlemen to Cattlemen (http://www.cattlementocattlemen.org/), airing on RFD-TV at 8:30 p.m. EST.

Last week I attended a workshop titled Just Add Water.  The objective, as stated in the agenda, was to “identify and explore promising strategies to promote landowner participation in Everglades and costal ecosystems restoration.”  Also on the agenda were code words like “Lake Okeechobee Watershed” and “conservation.”  Generally these terms mean you’re fixin’ to get screwed to Florida cattle ranchers.  With great skepticism, other cattle ranchers and I listened to speakers from the Ocean Research & Conservation Association (ORCA), a representative from the 10 County Coalition for Responsible Management of Lake Okeechobee, a field researcher from Resources for the Future (RFF), and others.  To my surprise these folks were looking for partners in conservation projects instead of condemning our cattle operations.I suppose a little background about the state of Florida’s plumbing is necessary.  In a nutshell - just north of Orlando, in the center of the peninsula, begins a system of lakes and creeks flowing south that eventually end up in Lake Okeechobee.  From there water travels out of the lake into either the Everglades or the Atlantic Ocean off the southeast coast via a few rivers, estuaries, etc.  (Two sentences, not to shabby!).  Over the last hundred years or so an intricate system of canals and dykes has been built to swiftly drain excess water away making it suitable for agriculture and urban development.  This was necessary due to the fact that Florida receives an average of 50 inches of rain per year, most of it coming in the 3 summer months, and the terrain is flat.  So what made it possible for all these folks to move to Florida – drained land or the invention of air conditioning?  That’s another topic. More...

I needed some help getting started on my introduction blog so I solicited some assistance from an old friend, Crash Davis.  You may have heard of him, a journeyman minor league baseball player who once played for the Durham Bulls.  We came up with the following.
     
Well, I believe in the ranch, the bull, the cow, the smell of fresh morning air, a good horse, red meat, good whiskey, that Texas is overrated. I believe New York City’s naked singing cowboy isn’t a cowboy at all. I believe there ought to be a constitutional amendment outlawing the Humane Society and PETA. I believe in pickup trucks, long hot summer days, that cattle should be worked horseback and not by ATVs and I believe artificially inseminating a cow is taking away what a bull really lives for.

And for those of you who don’t know Crash Davis please run to your local video rental store and pick up Bull Durham.  You’ll thank me. More...