"As long as it's a farm that doesn't hurt animals."

As many of you know, we have a working sheep and cattle ranch (Reata Ranch) in southwestern Colorado, where we raise thousands of sheep and hundreds of cattle for food and fiber.  Today, and throughout this week, we are pushing/driving/herding those sheep for 5 to 6 days in order to reach new pasture for the winter.  We will also be trucking our cows to new pasture for the winter.  I won’t go into transportation complexity at this point, but I do want to delve into an important matter regarding the existence of farms and ranches in the United States.  What is their purpose and why do they exist?

3 short days ago, I posted an ad in Craigslist for a sheepherder position we needed filled.  Our sheepherder, who has worked for us for nearly 20 years, is planning to retire this summer.  Sheepherders stay with the sheep 24/7, herding and caring for them daily without a break.  As one could imagine, it is an understatement that this is a very unique job position with relatively limited applicants.  In response to the ad, I received about 10 emails or texts within 24 hours of posting this job position.  One of the texts was from a male applicant who said, “My wife and I would like to take this job position as long as it’s on a farm that doesn’t hurt animals”.  This statement sparked my curiosity, and I responded by asking what he meant by this.  To make a long story short, he believes no animals should ever be harmed in any way, including being used for food.  He went so far as to claim that God Himself willed that no animal or animal product was to be used for human consumption.  The conversation could have gone on for hours, days, months, and even years to no avail.  Fundamentally, I simply completely disagree with this individual, not only out of practicality, but also when considering human existence and how we came to live on the earth at this moment in time.

It could be assumed that this individual trolls the internet looking for farmers and ranchers advertising their food products, and then proceeds to attempt to proselytize and convert these individuals to his belief system.  On the other hand, it could simply be an individual who would like a sheepherding or other farm/ranch job due to being able to connect with nature, be outside, etc., and who believes that there actually exist any significant farms or ranches who do not “hurt” their animals.

I do not claim to understand all the beliefs of a vegan or the vegan lifestyle, and to write about that is not the purpose of this blog.  My purpose is to bring to light the existence and purpose of most farms and ranches in the United States.

There are an estimated 2.1 million farms in the United States, with about 99% of them family-owned.  This is estimated to be about 2% of the U.S. population.  Each farm feeds an average of 165 people.  which totals nearly 350,000,000 million people fed worldwide by American farmers.  This is more people fed than the total U.S. population.

The majority of the meat produced in the U.S. consists of cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, chickens and turkeys. Total meat from these animals produced for consumption in 2013 was almost 94 billion pounds.  According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, an average of 75 pounds of meat is consumed by each person in the world, which means that the United States produces enough meat to feed 1.25 billion people in the world.  Therefore, the U.S., consisting of about 4.3% of the world’s population, grows enough meat to feed over 16% of the world’s population every year, or almost 4 times the U.S. population.   Our continued ability in the U.S. to produce affordable food for this great nation and for the world is vital.

There are 3 main reasons we farmers and ranchers do what we do.  1. We love what we do and are passionate about it.  2. We feel strongly the importance of providing food and fiber for this nation and the world.  We understand that being able to produce our own food is a matter of national security.  Being in a position to depend on other countries for our sustenance would put us in grave danger.   3. We make a living by doing it.  No farmer can survive without making money in exchange for what he/she provides.  Although there are innumerable challenges to farming and ranching, these 3 reasons inspire us to continue on.

So, when a person asks if a farm or ranch is one that doesn’t “hurt” animals, most of us take issue with such a question.

First of all, if we look at the vastness of human history as we understand it, human beings existed for possible hundreds of thousands of years to millions of years.  Whatever your belief system about how we came to exist here on Earth, for much of that time we have survived and evolved by hunting and eating meat.  Eventually, farming became a practice, and we began the process of GMO farming.  GMOs is a topic for another day, but suffice it to say, we have genetically modified crops for thousands of years.  That is a fact.  As farming became a practice, so did the practice of domesticating animals and raising them for fiber, milk, and meat, as well as for transportation.  This allowed us to improve our economic plight, enabling us to become more centrally located and less nomadic (following our food around the world).  If it were not for hunting and then farming, I would surmise we would not be the society we are today with the technology and advancements of the human race we have today.  I also mentioned transportation.  Horses and cattle have been used to transport humans and to establish farming practices that also enabled the human race to survive and advance.  One could argue that if it were not for horses, the United States would not exist.  This country was built on the backs of horses who carried pioneers across westward and helped us develop land and become more civilized.  Although this is a one-paragraph brief synopsis of hunting, farming and use of horses, it points to the fact that we humans exist primarily as a result of these practices.  It is confounding to hear those who would place raising animals for food to be against God’s will.  It is short-sighted and naive at best, and this ideology screams bloody murder to the very practices that have enabled our existence today, and that provide food for the majority of the world’s population.

Now, let’s speak to our current modern-day animal raising practices for food and fiber.  First of all, we must address the false premise that animals are being “hurt” who are used for food.  Yes.  In order to eat an animal, to ingest the meat and fat that is life-sustaining to billions of people on this planet, we must kill the animal.  This is no secret, and we who raise animals for food consumption fully understand the cycle of life for these animals that continues as nutrition and sustenance for humans.  For livestock used for food consumption, this is their purpose.  We, the humans, created these domesticated animals in order to provide life to ourselves, our families, and to others.  The argument we are “hurting” the animals is inherently flawed due to one common consensus among most of the U.S. and world farmers and ranchers – we raise cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, chickens, turkeys, etc., for food and fiber.  Period.  Although working on a farm or ranch gives us incalculable joy, we understand very clearly our purpose in the world.  Our purpose is not to raise animals to live out their days to their death without being more than something nice to look at.  Our purpose is to raise those animals to be able to clothe and feed the world.  There is great responsibility in raising and caring for these animals for this purpose, and we do not shun, nor are we ashamed, of the responsibility we have to ultimately take an animal’s life in order to provide food and fiber to sustain human life.

Along with using animals for food, they can also be used for milk (dairy cows, goats, and even sheep), which provides hundreds of millions, if not billions of people, life-sustaining drink.  Sheep can also be used for fiber production.  Wool is sheared off the sheep typically once per year (it’s literally like getting a haircut, although for these woolly critters, not shearing them would create a suffocating warm blanket during the hot summer months, leading to overheating).  Shearing is vital to their health and well-being, and this wool generates warm clothing and other fabrics and materials we all  utilize daily.

I imagine these same critics of farms and ranches that “hurt” animals also believe in not using a horse for riding or any work.  Many sheep and cattle ranches in the U.S. still use horses today, sometimes on a daily basis, to ride and perform necessary duties to care for the animals.  At Reata Ranch, we use horses almost daily.  I train horses professionally and can say that there is one sure way to abuse a horse – feed him too much, don’t exercise him, and let him be disrespectful and assume he is the dominant of the herd, including with humans.  This creates a dangerous horse that could hurt himself or his owners.  Having a well-trained horse takes consistent, specific and deliberate training, and it is vital to horse and human health and safety.  Utilizing horses for work as well as for pleasure and performance is an almost-daily enjoyment I get to partake in.  Assuming a horse who is being ridden or utilized for a purpose is “hurting” the horse is the equivalent of claiming my having to go to work every day to supply my family with food and sustenance is “hurting” me.  Since when did performing a job become a symbol of abuse?  We love our horses.  That’s why we train our horses and we ride our horses, both as our partners in our work on the ranch as well as our partners in performance and pleasure riding.

In summary, we ranchers own sheep and cattle in order to produce food and fiber for our fellow human beings in this great United States and in the world.  We own and ride horses because they provide a great service to our being able to produce this food, and we find great pleasure in riding for fun as well.  They are our partners.  We love and care for our animals with great effort and work ethic unsurpassed by any industry or career.  We arise before the sun does, and we go to bed long after dark.  This is our passion.  This is our love.  We make no apologies for doing what we love and helping to feed and clothe the world.  This is why we continue to fight to maintain the right to produce these products in the United States.  So, next time someone wants to claim that a farm or ranch shouldn’t be “hurting” their animals, consider the purpose of that farm or ranch, and you may find yourself defending the farmers and ranchers who work day and night and year round to help feed and clothe the world.  Thank a farmer or rancher today.