Riding Herd Saying things that need to be said. February 15, 2022 • www.aaalivestock.com
Volume 64 • No. 2
Taking the Bull by the Horns BY LEE PITTS
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s the announcer for Western Video Market for 20 years I was on the auction block when we sold 400,000 plus cattle yearly. During that time I got to observe first-hand the demand for different breeds of cattle, how much more buyers would pay for long-weaned calves and the premium buyers were willing to pay for what we called “program cattle.” One thing that sticks out most in my memory is the demand we saw for Red Angus sired calves, especially heifers. Every time we had a good consignment of Red Angus heifer calves a bidding war ensued. This observation was confirmed by data collected by the Red Angus Association that showed over a ten year period Red Angus sired heifers commanded $66 a head more than females of other breeds. Why am I telling you all this? My purpose is to show that the Red Angus breed is currently doing very well and they’d be one of the last breed associations I’d expect to take what some might perceive to be a risky gamble with their bright future.
The Peril and The Promise
NEWSPAPER PRIORITY HANDLING
It seemed last Fall that the cattle business barely yawned when the Red Angus Association became the first, and only, beef breed to accept gene-edited animals into their registry. Gene- edited animals ARE NOT genetically modified organisms, or GMOs. The difference between GMO’s and gene-edited animals is that with a GMO, genetic material from other species or plants is introduced into an animal’s DNA. The result is a plant or animal that could never be found in nature. Think of it
as a dachshund trying to breed a Siamese cat. It’s just naturally not going to happen. Gene-editing is something entirely different. It enables the use of genes already native to the plant or animal that could
only without the steroids. And the meat and dairy products from an animal developed using gene-editing are no different from their non-edited equivalents. The problem is your aver-
Timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a Rain Dance.
be introduced via conventional crossbreeding. Imagine replacing the gene for hair length in a Scotch Highland cow with a gene from a short haired Senepol. The short haired Scotch Highland could occur naturally through traditional reproduction processes but it would take years and many generations. Gene-editing could do it with just one “edit.” Gene-editing can also take the horns off an animal with one gene edit by using the cell’s natural DNA repair functions to replace the horned gene with a naturally occurring polled gene. Gene-editing just speeds up the crossbreeding that occurs. I think of it as crossbreeding on steroids...
age consumer doesn’t know the difference and tends to lump GMO’s and gene-edited animals together. This is the risk that the Red Angus breed is taking. So why are they taking such a gamble? According to Tom Brink, CEO of the Red Angus Association, and a man with lots of credibility and experience in all phases of the cattle business, “It’s foundational thinking. The Red Angus breed has been pro-science since 1954 when it all started. One of the seven core principles of the Red Angus breed is crossbreeding and basically, gene-editing is crossbreeding. Paraphrasing our partner in this venture Tad
It’s Not Just Illegal Aliens Our Southern Border Guards Against BY D. PARKER / AMERICAN THINKER
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ill Biden finally secure the border amid threats from China, Russia, Islamic terror, and drugs? Back when he assumed office, President Biden essentially implemented an open borders policy. It’s been a disaster on top of his other disasters, with millions of illegal invaders flooding into the country from around the world in the middle of a pandemic. Day by day, additional threats are emerging that illustrate that he needs to change course before it’s too late. In the words of former acting ICE director Tom Homan, Biden’s border policies are “killing people.” Under President Trump last year, there was a total of 254 migrants (that) who died crossing that border — the first year under President Biden, that is more than doubled to 557. That’s a 119 percent increase[.] ... Add to that over 100,000 overdose deaths, most of it from fentanyl that the DEA says, “come across the border.” Add to that 59 CBP officers who die from COVID because Joe continued on page 4
Sonstegard, Ph.D., ‘We’ve been gene-editing for hundreds and hundreds of years only now we call it crossbreeding.’” Brink continues, “In considering the future, we see an opportunity to accelerate the Red Angus breed’s genetic progress by selectively allowing gene-edited animals into our population. The technology has been proven to be both safe and effective, and for traits such as the slick hair coat and black to red, there is a chance to speed up the introduction of useful, naturally-occurring genes and genetic combinations that would take many generations to accomplish through traditional breeding efforts.”
High Noon When I asked Brink if there was much disagreement on the Red Angus Board when the subject of gene-editing was raised he replied, “Not really. Our Board did a really good job. We’re going slow and being very careful with it. So far there have only been two ‘edits.. One known as SLICK isolated the gene from Senepol cattle for hair and the other gene that has been edited turns black Angus cattle into Red Angus. Both edits,” says Brink, “were natural edits that could occur with continued on page 2
Just What is a ‘Resilient’ Forest, Anyway? Study Finds Resilient, Frequent-Fire Forests Have Far Fewer Trees BY KAT KERLIN / UC DAVIS NEWS
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ore than a century ago, Sierra Nevada forests faced almost no competition from neighboring trees for resources. The tree densities of the late 1800s would astonish most Californians today. Because of fire suppression, trees in current forests live alongside six to seven times as many trees as their ancestors did — competing for less water amid drier and hotter conditions. The study, published in the journal Forest Ecology and Management, suggests that low-density stands that largely eliminate tree competition are key to creating forests resilient to the multiple stressors of severe wildfire, drought, bark beetles and climate change. This approach would be a significant departure from current management strategies, which use competition among trees to direct forest development.
Defining ‘resilience’ But first, the study asks: Just what does “resilience” even mean? Increasingly appearing in continued on page 4
by LEE PITTS
A Prisoner of Circumstance
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tanley is a computer nerd who inherited a paidfor ranch and 450 good cows. For some people, like me, this would be a dream come true but for Stanley, who hates cows, horses and the outdoors, he became a prisoner of circumstance. One man’s dream really is another man’s nightmare. Stanley’s goal in life was to design video games and he was three years into getting a degree in electronic engineering when his folks died and he had to come home to run the ranch. You might say we shouldn’t feel sorry for Stanley; he could simply sell the ranch and cows, never get out of his pajamas and play computer games for the rest of his life. But it’s not that easy. Even thinking about selling the ranch that’s been in his family for 125 years made Stanley feel like a traitor to his ancestors. Plus, he’s got a young son and daughter who are both interested in cows and love everything about ranch life. So Stanley feels a responsibility to keep the ranch going for his kids who would be the sixth generation on the place. Just because Stanley has been reduced to being a placeholder doesn’t mean that he’s no longer interested in everything electronic. He’s heavy into social media, maintains a homepage for his cat and got PTSD from playing Mortal Combat on his MacBook six hours a day. And Stanley is no slouch when it comes to cyberspace. His home office is overgrown with cable spaghetti, he gobbles up computer cookies and you’ll never catch him plugging a power strip into itself. Stanley has spent a fortune turning the dirt road that leads to his place into an information superhighway and I’ve often thought that Stanley might operate in some gray areas by hacking into other people’s databases. I wouldn’t put it past him. Stanley is so into computers he named his daughter Alexa, after the Wi-Fi network tool that performs tasks for you. (I see a BIG problem ahead for daughter Alexa. She’s going to be run ragged with Stanley saying things all day like, “Alexa dim the lights” and “Alexa lock the doors.” Or, “Alexa, turn up the thermostat.”) Of course, all of Stanley’s cows now have radio fre-
continued on page 4