An afternnon with Nebraska cattle and corn
Tonight I sit in a warm Nebraska house thinking back on my interesting day. I spent the morning in a bridal shop with my sister-in-law and the afternoon in a combine picking corn. That is not typical for a city diva like me! Normally I spend my days making Web sites for physicians and hospitals so this is a deviation from the norm to say the least. Despite the number of times I visit Nebraska I always find myself in awe of life here.
What interests me most if the tie between farmers, their yield and the land. Farmers work so hard … every day 6-7 days a week. Yet as some of us know the commercial food production industry in America is so fricken’ messed up that farmers don’t even eat the fruits of their labor any more. I was so lucky to spend the afternoon with my in-laws learning about cattle and corn. They farm over 5,000 acres of corn and soybeans and they have about 200 head of cattle.
Their cows live in the pasture during summer months and are transported from field to field to pick up after the combine in the corn fields during winter months. As far as many cow’s lives go in this country, I think this is a fairly good life for them. They get to roam and eat grass and corn. They are never confined to a feed lot. AND … the females are never slaughtered. I almost couldn’t believe it when they said that. The females are used, of course, to reproduce and birth more cattle.
The little boys, on the other hand, live this life of “freedom” for about a year and then they’re sold to feed lots. It seems that either in the dairy industry or the beef industry, male cows get the short end of the stick. Their odds of having a long, free, happy live are little to none. At least these little boys get to live the first year of their life at pasture and in the corn fields. Imaging their disappointment when they are sold to a feed lot and forced to live in confined conditions with mud up to their knees and terrible food? What a sad day that must be for them. And even sadder when they near two years of age and are transported again but this time to their final destination – the slaughter house.
So about the corn … they grow field corn which is not used for eating. This is a bit shocking to me but not totally because I saw the moving King Corn not too long ago. I highly recommend it for those of you that have not seen it. The corn is harvested to make high-fructose corn syrup, ethanol, and whiskey. Did I mention they have 5,000 acres of this corn? That is a massive amount. The entire state of Nebraska is covered in corn. But none of it is edible.
What has happened to our food production process? Why are these farmers that work so hard each and every day unable to eat the food that they grow? Because of a long history of government intervention that has converted farmers from independent self-sustaining business owners into wards of government subsidy.
It’s such an interesting dynamic here in Nebraska … so very different than my suburban life in the Phoenix metro area. More interesting experiences to come as I continue to experience life in Nebraska.
