Latest / Ranch Wives Unsupervised / Ranch Wives Supervised Episode Part 2: Why Farmers Keep Getting Blamed
Transcript
- Ranch Wives: Okay. Folic acid. Go. It has nothing to do with farmers It has nothing to do with farmers. So they say it's was sprayed on. Well, what they mean is it's added to the flour. Okay, everybody. Welcome to Ranch Wives Supervised. Part two. Part two. Jorim is back in the hot seat. He never left the hot seat. We just split that episode. Still here. He's still here. So burning questions that you probably asked whenever the first episode came out. we will not answer yet. Because we haven't left, so we're gonna have to do a part three for that side of things. Or a review. Probably winter time. Definitely winter time. Nothing before November. Yeah, this is like his Unless you want to get me on the Combine. Which live live from the Combine. Can you imagine trying to hook up the system in there? It took us an hour here to figure ourselves out. Okay, Jorim my burning question. No, I'm jumping into it. Yeah, go ahead. Do wanna go? Do you have something? Because I'll jump. I had nothing. Okay, so we talked about glyphosate last episode. Yes, we did. I want to talk to you about folic acid. Okay. Tell me everything acid. So I know nothing. What what what what conceptions do I have about folic acid? What are your conceptions about folic acid? they're more from like the health side of things, about how a lot of people don't break down folic acid and how it can be on some cereals. Like there's certain things it's in. And added to whether it's sprayed on, that kind of thing. I don't know a ton. I just mainly know a lot of people don't break it down, but it's actually in a lot of food items. So and I've seen the health side of it. People. The crunchy side of it. Crunchies saying they clump it together with glyphosate. Yep. Well, no. What happens is they say glyphosate and folic acid. Yes. So Glyphosate. We already talked about that. We don't need to talk about that more. Folic acid is n has nothing to do with farmers. If you did not see our episode on glyphosate, go back to part one and we'll fill you in on the hot topics of that. Okay. Folic acid. Go. It has nothing to do with farmers It has nothing to do with farmers. So they say it's was sprayed on. Well, what they mean is it's added to the flour. So typically Commercial farmers, they grow the grain, they sell it to an elevator. That is the last they see of it. Mm-hmm. Then from the elevator, the grain companies sell it to wherever they sell it to. Like Kellogg's or like stuff like that. Yeah, Kellogg's. Yeah. Yeah, wherever. Yeah. I mean Kellogg's is just like a brand. I don't actually know who owns Kellogg's. Yeah, like whatever. They it gets sold to like it gets sold to people that are gonna process it into food or flour like red flour mill in Saskatoon like your uncle was talking about would be one example of that. and so those are your processing companies. In Canada and this is Iff anyways, in Canada it is illegal to sell unenriched flour. no, I think it No, could be wrong about this. Maybe if it's organic, it can be unenriched. No, I'm pretty sure even organic flour has to be enriched. Okay, let's look. So I'm gonna look it up. It has to be enriched. It has to be enriched. Get into that. I don't know what that means. So that's where the folic acid comes in. And that is where folic acid comes in. Folic acid, from what I know, and I am not an expert. Disclaimer. Disclaimer. Disclaimer, yeah. He's our resident farmer, but not an expert. Okay, guys. He's our expert, but he is not the expert. Clarification. so folic acid is a synthetic version of folate, which is a very important mineral. Mm-hmm. I don't know exactly what it does. I just know it's important. But the the the the problem with folic acid is like you were saying, Brianna. supposedly only I think it's fifty percent of people you were right cannot process the synthetic versions of folic acid. You were right. No, you cannot legally sell unenriched white flour for regular consumers use in Canada. Mm-hmm. White flour though, can you sell whole wheat? No no I think it it all has to be so even I think any flour, right? Yeah, like even the unbleached whole wheat flour that you buy in the grocery store is still enriched. So why this is because this so and I'm I can't remember when this came into effect. Basically, back in the day, people were low on I think vitamin C. What? Is that part of part of it? Okay, go ahead, Brianna. this is the Google AI This is the Google version of this. Yeah. Under Canadian regulations, mandatory enrichment laws apply s just to white flour. just to white flour? Not whole wheat flour. There's the loophole. Whole wheat flour is not required to be artificially enriched or fortified with added vitamins, iron, blah blah blah. Selling unriched whole wheat flour is completely legal. Really? Okay. So it's just a white flour issue. Hmm. So yes. But that doesn't mean your whole wheat flour isn't enriched. Uh-huh. If you buy whole wheat, like say Robin Hood whole wheat flour, I'm It's probably I'm pretty sure it's enriched. Yeah, yeah. So but there are like there's some farmers that are selling like they have a small flour mill and they sell flour. Yeah. technically that would be whole wheat though. Yep, that would be whole wheat. So I mean we've th we we we we've we've definitely talked about getting a flour mill and selling flour because I have my own little mill. Yeah. Yeah, like I have a little mill as well. Yeah, lots of people have their own. And we we'll we'll sell wheat to people. It's it's like it's so cheap to buy like wheat from a farmer. Mm-hmm. Cause like you can pay us like quadruple what we typically get paid. Yeah, and you're still not paying that much for your flour. Yeah. We've done the math and it's like this is so crazy. But it's like, and it's not like we're gonna charge you an arm and a l like it's not like we're gonna charge you that much more like there's no point charging more. It's just the only ha hassle is that it's small volumes, but I do not have time to deal with customers. Yeah. if you want to buy a whole bunch, a mini bulk bag. Yeah, if you guys if somebody wants to buy a mini bulk bag of wheat. Hit us up. Yeah. For sure. But then we'll buy a grain mill. But this is where some of those misconceptions are though. Because a lot of people believe that folic acid is in all wheat. And that it comes from the farm. That it comes from the farmer. That the farmer is spraying it. We have nothing to do with it. It's getting sprayed at the processing end of things. Yeah. And this is what so and this is for me this is like a pet peeve. And it's like with meat, it's with everything, is when, you know, these studies come out that this food is not healthy or there's these side effects, blah blah blah blah blah. And then for some reason, lots of times it gets pinned on the farmer. Everybody blames the farmer. Farmer does it. Which is totally bonkers because There's a whole processing process in between when we sell our product and when it gets to the grocery store. yeah. it's just like your beef or your chicken or there's a bunch of things. And typically the you can follow the money and figure out, you know, who's making the most money on it and where probably they're the ones cutting corners and trying to Yeah. That's I did not know that. It was a white flour versus whole wheat flour though. That's an interesting fact I didn't know. Okay, so why are they enriching? You were gonna get into it. Yeah, sorry, I cut you off. So what's the point of enriching? what? I think basically people were malnourished. I don't know. And so the government said, Okay, let's add add this stuff in, make it mandatory for all flour. So if you buy a loaf of bread, you're getting at least these minimal or your your minimum requirement. Like and that's like with iron enriching. Every single thing. Yeah. Whereas like yeah, I mean iron is a whole nother topic you can get into. But it's the same idea, right? So they're they're enriching these foods and maybe it fixes some problems, but it also probably is causing some problems, right? And you're better off to get those minerals that you need in a natural form from something else. Yeah. Yes. You know, if you're eating Mm. Wheat, that's your carbohydrates. Well if you have a balanced diet and you you know, you have some carbs, you have some protein, you have fruit and veggies, right? Like this is my thoughts on it anyways. But but if if all you're eating is if if all your kids are eating is cereal is cereal and toast. Yeah. Well they're gonna be locking in samaria. Yeah. And so then that's where I think they were like, Okay, we need to put Well it's also because our society has become such a consumer based And so as a if hypothetically I'm not a farmer, I'm not this, I'm just a mom who lives in town and wants to give my kids toast all the time. Am I like, yes, enriched sounds great? Like is that what people there are there like two sides to this? No, I think a lot of people don't know. I don't think it's I don't think people even know about it. I don't think people realize it. People aren't reading the fine print on those things. Because to me in my mind it's like, enrich, that it must be great. Or what, right? Like Yeah. I don't even think it has to say enriched though. That's the thing. It just says white. I think it flourishes. But it's just what it It just says white flour. But if you were to read the ingredients, that's what it would say. But who when yeah, when you read the ingredients then it says enriched white wheat or whatever it is. Yeah, but that's what I mean though, is like it doesn't have to s the way our labelling is No, In Canada, it doesn't have to say On the main label. On the main label, enriched white flour. It just says white flour. Right. If you're gonna read the fine print, which I recommend you do if you're gonna whatever. Yeah. Then yeah, you're gonna notice it. But I also just think it comes down to like people So and and okay, so here's the thing that's interesting about this. Because people go to Europe, they can eat bread, whatever, and everybody's like always the glyphosate. Actually There's a likelier chance that it's the folic ac acid because they do not add folic acid in most it's very North America that I know of. Yeah. I I I'm I'm I'm sure there is some other countries. I know for fact they do not add it in Germany. No. And I don't I don't think it's in most of Europe. Like it I don't think it's maybe it could be it on an import side of things, like if something is right. But even then I think it's bam, though it's they don't they don't import a ton. Typically most countries don't import flour. They import wheat. But like a buy bright by product of flour. So like I was thinking breads or grains or well they so they would just they would only import. They would probably just buy the grain and then do all that processing. Typically that's the case, yeah. But that's way cheaper to Yeah. Buy a bunch of grain. Yeah, it would be and then no different than us buying a mini book bag of wheat berries to make your own flour. I mean that's a l that's a lifetime of flour, but literally. It's so much flour. But this there but that's the thing, glyphosate does get wrapped up in with the folic acid or with the enrichment side of things. Yeah. Like the farmer's side of things. The far I get yeah. But it's glyphosate is from the farm because that's what has to be sprayed. But folic acid is a totally different issue. It has nothing to do with the farmer. It has to do with the middleman at the processing side of things. Yeah. Yeah. And which is crazy is that w it is l like legally a thing. Required. Yeah. Required in Canada. Yeah, that's or I it says Canada, maybe it's North America. Canada. Yeah, I'm not sure they put that. So folic acid, what like what is why is it bad? Why what does it do? I don't know anything about it. It's the bit the bit that I know is like your body requires folate, which I believe is like a B I think it's like a B nine vitamin. Okay. Folate is its natural Folate is the natural form of it. For it. So folic acid is the the synthetic synthetic form of it. And a lot of people can't break it down. Right. Like your body so your body everybody can process Folate. Folate, the natural form. Yeah. But folic acid. They say roughly fifty percent of people cannot process full. Folic acid. Yeah. And that is in all of our wheat. white. That's crazy. All the white flour. And lots of whole wheat flour as well. oh so no wonder everyone is gluten free probably the folic acid. Well, that's where he was going with the Yeah. Yeah. So also it you'd be amazed, like it's in a lot of rices, like in a lot of it's in a lot of foods. It probably doesn't need to be. I don't know enough about it though, in that regard, or why. Yeah. But it is interesting that the farmer gets well, the farmer gets blamed for a lot of things, don't we, though? Yes. Isn't that interesting? It's also crazy too, in some sense, I guess this is maybe a very like blanket statement. But I think it's only like two one to two percent of the population is farmers. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And feeds the other ninety eight percent. That's crazy. So like part of it is also some of the things, for example, like you guys have to spray for weeds because otherwise you wouldn't be able to fill a quota that is needed. Yeah, I mean it's not like a quota, but yeah. what did you Tell my mom the other you were telling somebody about this, like the a backlog. Only th there's only three months food supply in the world. Yep. At any given point. Yeah. Yeah. So like hypothetically if all the crops were wiped out worldwide. We'd be we would have three months. There'd be three months and then everybody would be starving. That's crazy. Yeah. And not even a whole winter for us. No. The other interesting too thing the other interesting thing is too, like when we were talking about like, when you think of enriched flower, like, is it good? I think there is a big disconnect and this might be a hot statement. I don't know. But we our generation is probably the first generation that potentially has no connection to a farm, whether it be a parent, a grandparent. Yeah, I've heard that too before, yeah. Right. So There's lots of generations that literally do not have the connection of where their food comes from or what goes into XYZ to produce the food that ends up on your table or in your food or whatever. And and the other thing too that like most people don't get into farming to become rich. If they do, they don't stay farmers very long. No. if they do like also all the rich farmers aren't even full time farmers. No. Well, yeah, like the landowners. Yeah, they're all like just oil field yeah, yeah. Yeah, that too. Well, Jack's a part of I can get into that topic. Something hot. So but anyways, farmers actually Majority of farmers actually do care about growing food for people and growing good food for people. It's not like farmers like, let's poison this food for and also let's make billions of dollars. Like, no. No. Not we're not making much people. Well, that was like there was the statistic and it's probably outdated by now, but well, especially with cattle prices sitting where they are. But at one point when Keith and I were first married, I can remember my father law father in law saying the average rancher made five cents on a dollar what you were paying in store for that meat. Yeah, I I mean I don't know if that's really changed that much. It it probably hasn't because prices have jacked up everywhere. Even with that's like So yeah. Go ahead. So like what's what's a loaf of bread in the store worth nowadays? Like what do you pay for a loaf of bread in the store? Probably What is it, like six bucks? Yeah. Five, six bucks? Sure. Something like that. So a so a bushel of wheat right now I think is let's just say right around eight dollars. For one bushel. Yep. And one bushel would make how much bread? So a one pound loaf of bread, you get sixty one pound loaves of bread out of one bushel. So if you go sixty times six or sixty times five bucks. How many dollars is that? That's Or you might have three hundred. Three hundred. So three hundred bucks, and the farmer gets eight bucks. Yep. That's crazy. And all the risk. That's the thing. That's the other thing. No, you're not you're not guaranteed. Okay, but how much does that loaf weigh? okay, so it's fifty cents per one hundred grams. And then this other one that we get sixty five cents per one hundred grams. But there is something to that. Like, and I even had a conversation at a a girl's thing not that long ago. They're like, it's so expensive to buy beef right now. Mm-hmm. I'm like, okay. We like similar to you guys, you sell a couple cows for direct market. Yeah. Like sell directly to our customer. And the prices range. That's the other thing. It depends where you're buying what you're buying. And it also depends like the weight. Yep. But what I was going with is sh is we have to be able to if I'm selling directly to you, I still have to make what I would have made at market to break even. Yeah. To have raised that animal. Yes. I need to cut it. To get it to direct market. Yes. Yeah. So like typically like for us, we don't really we don't really charge that much more, like you know, if we make the same as we would selling it. Yep. Direct we we charge a little more maybe. Yeah. It really depends on the weight of the animal. But basically all our time to you know, 'cause we we do feed them extra and all that stuff. So at what age are you guys selling yours? Ideally under thirty months. Yeah. Okay. Like right around that two year Yeah, so so same with us. Because you have to Well, it's not that much, but you have to pay extra right after. No, yeah, sorry. I was more so going like some people are like eighteen months, that's it. Like they grain heavy, get out the door, fatten up, go at eight. Yeah, so what we do, what our program is, we keep open heifers. Yeah. Us two. 'Cause you're keeping them that long anyways. They come up open. Mm-hmm. Fatten up. They've never had a calf. It's like super good meat still. Yeah. We also we do the same, like for example, we had three was it three come up this year open. You don't feed grain though, do you? We don't feed grain. yeah, just grass them. And we're a grain finish. Okay. So yeah, we're just but we're also not grain farmers. We don't there's no point. We've no point to go out and spend money. Yeah, we don't we'd have to go to find the And then jack up your prices even more. Yeah. So we're just and we don't like we don't heavily grain finish them. Like not like some people have a supplement. You scoop up a little bit of grain and just kind of here and there. 'Cause it doesn't take much. I guess it depends what your outputs are or what you're looking for, but yeah, it doesn't take much. How much grain we have left over. Yeah. Yeah. That needs to get used. Yeah, that's true. But yeah, so I got into this like kind of conversation, like, well, it's just so expensive. And I was like, You wanna know something crazy? 'Cause Keith and I did the math on this. It's nuts. You can buy a whole freezer. Plus the half animal. And you're still paying less than what you're paying in store. yeah. Yeah. Especially so 'cause I don't know how you guys do it, but we sell like you order a quarter or a half. And it's six fifty per pound. And we charge you per pound on the hanging weight. And then you cut it however you want to cut. So you get your steaks, your roasts, burger, whatever you want. If you go to butcher block and look at Yeah, so it's all one price per pound based on hanging weight. So you go Look at how many roasts, how many steaks you get out of that quarter or half. Go to Butcher Block. Mm-hmm. Take the same amount of roasts and steaks. Yep. Like it's not even like You can't compare You can't compare it. It's crazy. And that's Butcher Block's prices. Yeah. Yeah. That's not even grocery store prices. And that's like it's it's frustrating when people are like, well it's so expensive and it's like, yes, it's chunk. Because they see, this is a couple of grand. Mm-hmm. That I gotta spend all at once, but they don't see as that, okay, that's actually gonna last me all year. Yep. And so I said that. I said, Yeah, but if you like we literally did the math, they're like because we have a couple guys that if I haven't sold, say, a full animal, I'll do freezer boxes for a few. and 'cause like they don't want to buy a freezer, which fine. I'm still gonna charge you more for those little boxes to some degree, because I'm coming to town all the time for that. and I have to cover my time in preparing the box. So, anyways, what I was going with, I was like, Yeah, but if you were to equal out what you spend little by little and set that aside, yes, it is a lump sum. I'm not saying it's not an investment. I'm I'm not. But what you're buying at the store, we are not seeing. Yeah. Mm-hmm. But you also don't see it either because you're spending fifty bucks here, thirty bucks here, eighty bucks here on a row, whatever. yeah. yeah, like so you're not adding it up what it would actually cost you. No. Yeah. To To have all those cuts. Yeah. The one thing I will say is if you are strictly somebody who only eats ground beef. Only eats a steak. yeah. And a certain select type of steak. Yeah. The half a cow isn't for you. Yeah 100%. Because No, you need to But you gotta you g you gotta learn You also have to know what half a cow makes up. Well and you gotta learn how to cook. my gosh. Yeah. I agree. I couldn't agree more with that. That's true. It's very true. And the thing is too, I would say 'cause we are strictly grass fed, grass finished, it does cook differently than a grain finished steak. Totally. So if you've n only ever had grain finished, yeah, and you your cook is different. Yeah. And you do have to like I said, for a lot of the people that are first that I knew had never done grass anything. I was like, Hey, just so low and slow is a good way to do it and That kind of thing, because grass animals cook out differently. It's it's a different flavor profile. I quite like it, but some don't. Like we we will finish one animal this year that is well, it's Jaws' calf. Yeah. we'll finish him grain, but he'll be younger. He'll be like a year and a half. yeah. But I had to keep him on because I needed her in milk, but we had already sold our calves. So we'll grain him and just call it a day. The other thing we do, so we keep open heifers. But we'll also keep any like off colored animals that don't look super good as That aren't gonna get the best dollar or don't flesh out super good as cats. How many animals do you normally it depends on the year? So like last year, because we were so short the year before, I had two animals. That's all I had. Because none of our heifers came up. All of our heifers caught. No. Well that's good. Which is great. Like I mean. Grand scheme of things, it's what you're looking for, isn't it? Yeah. this year I had two kept back on purpose. And three come up open, I think. Or two come up and op or either two or three, I can't remember. Or like you'll keep for example, there's like one that we're gonna keep for our ourselves and she's got like some sort of hernia or something. okay, yeah. That she got like w it was weird, she didn't get it right off as a cow, she got it like later. Yeah. But anyways. We didn't sell her as a yearling because you're not gonna get my like you get docked for it. Yeah. But we'll flush her out and fill our freezer with her. Yeah. Cause you might as well. Yeah. I don't know. I just always find like I love selling our beef to people because it's like such good beef and I know. Everybody loves it. Absolutely. But I'm like, I don't have time for this. Yeah. See, and this is kind of where I struggle with the freezer box side of things is I like it because it gets to a customer that might not necessarily ever buy a half or a quarter. Yeah. So I'd love to be able to reach a customer that you might not necessarily reach otherwise. Having to keep a freezer full and having to keep stock and an inventory is a lot more work than it is to just say, hey, go pick up your half at wherever. Yeah. Yeah, totally. It's such a different mindset because like for us. We always got animals butchered. So it's you always had a freezer. Right. Full of beef. Like that's just Yeah. And for like I think Would you butcher a prime animal or would you butcher anything that had to go? yeah. it depended. Sometimes But you guys didn't have very many cows growing up. No, no, we had quite a few. really? Yeah. We had like two hundred. at one point in time. Like I came along and by then there was Yeah, yeah, because they had already sold. Jorim the the cattleman and the family. Jorim was dating me. Jorim not home to do cows. Yeah, we it it really depended. Dip yeah. Sometimes we'd have a nice steer that we would butcher, but lots of times it would Yeah. they used to do that. I feel like a lot of people used to do that. My my parents used to always like there was four or five people that we always butchered cows for. Yeah. so we used to take a trailer load to the butcher. Yeah. like I don't know, like six cows or something like that sometimes. Yeah. And then wouldn't they do it same day or no? No, no. It's not No, it was like two trips. It's like a trip there, and then a couple months later. Well, few weeks later you go and pick up. I feel like our rate times this year is gonna like anywhere bet I think they said four to six weeks is average right now for that was ours. Yeah, that was ours. I think. Yeah. I but they're also the only ones that do it. Currently close to us that do it. Yeah. And it's really nice. They're really they're like pretty Well, the Hutterites, you could Yeah, Hutterites are similar booking though, 'cause my parents don't know. Yeah. They're pretty okay though, like Okay. So We went to Honeyford's and Prince George. We just took some of our own we butchered a cow on farm. We took some of the meat down with friends that were that go and get their wild thing down done there. Those sausages, they were so good. And they're so cheap. Yes, but okay, you do have to count the fact that you're you're hauling them further. Yeah, yeah. yeah. If you're going down there anyways. If you're going down there with or you jump in with somebody and just pay the gas. Yeah. Whatever. worth it. We got smokies done up, sausages done up. smokies. I love smokies. one my brother got his was wild game too, but he got like summer summer sausage. Summer sausage. But what he paid in town for the same pepperoni. Right. A third of the price I think it was down there. And it's hard because you do want to support the local butcher. Yeah but they're expensive. Also their wait time is I mean th you are waiting there too. You were I think we wait a A few months. Or two months probably. Didn't you have to like didn't we look into it? yeah, the one like one of the butcheries in town, it was like so this was like I shot my deer last day of the season. Yeah. So he was already He was already booked, yeah. But he was like, Yeah, if you debone it I can butcher it. I was like, Well if I debone it I already butcher it. I've already done it. Yeah. I've already done it. Yeah. That's what I'm paying you to do. So anyways, yeah. But Jorim makes great sausage. we made our own sausage last year. Yeah, pork sausage, yeah. Pork sausage. And then we've done We did we did we we butchered a bull. Yeah, we butchered a bull a few years back. Both times great. Okay, so n do you guys do a lot of on farm butchers or slaughter slash butcher? Or do you send all of yours off at this point? Typically we send off. Yeah, we did we like we we did pigs. Yeah. pigs are easy. we did those ourselves. I don't know. Typically if we're selling meat anyways, it's Then we just take one. That makes sense. I I don't know. It's a lot of work. You it's like a it's like a full day of everybody butchering and depends on your setup too. Yeah. Nobody has little kids and it's just too much. Yeah. No, it's cute. Yeah, because we did that bull so that was like a he was big. I forget how much didn't we all share? Yeah, but that was like that's a lot of work. That's a lot of work. Especially if you're grinding and putting into sausage. My least favorite thing is a burger cow. So much cutting. Yeah. Yeah. Penn, do you guys have a good meat grinder? Mm. We we got a new one here, how big is it though? Wasn't it for the bull or what what? I think it's like a third horse power or something like that. Ours is probably close. I don't know what ours is. But it it's like it eats. Yeah. you can't keep up with that thing. Yeah. it was so when we did the pork sausage. I don't know if was was it half hour of grinding for five pigs Yeah, something like that. I don't know. it was just like fast. Yeah. Hm. Yeah. Anyways, it is interesting to root us back. However, we got diverted there a little bit. It is interesting though to see the disconnect in people not realizing where their food is coming from. But also what it costs to grow an animal. Because food has been made so cheap. Yeah. For so long. And all the additives is actually crazy that like the farmers have nothing to do with. No, nothing. It's all past us. Like we sell whatever and then that's it. That's it. Yeah. And I think what I seen this thing. probably on social media. And she was like, people are outraged at the price of beef or whatever. I'm gonna say I think it was beef, but whatever it was. But that farmer's actually finally being paid what they should have been paid. Yeah. All along. Yeah. Seriously, yeah. Well, and yeah, I mean, even still like the yeah, beef prices are like high compared to what they have been. Mm-hmm. But you look at what all our inputs have done. Yeah. Like your few prices are not even Also what we're selling at market like isn't even that much higher than what we it's like maybe a dollar more. than it was ten years ago. Per pound. Per pound. No, it's more than that. It's more than that. It's it's jumped. Yeah, but but everything else is But it's not like thirty dollars more like the snow is doing. No, it's not like we're making that much But but if yeah, if you look at what our inputs in. yeah. And so this is the other thing. I think this can also get a bad rep why some people are like you said farmers aren't making it rich. Yeah. We're both farmers our asset rich. yeah. Cash poor. Yeah. Yeah. And it and and it is a business. Like it is. It's not like we're out here throwing money away. Absolutely it is. But you know, it's not like the you know some people are like, well farmers are so rich. Well yeah, it's not like we can just go out and Yeah, farm credit is rich. You're welcome. Like it's not us. It's farm credit. But a lot of it though too, like if you look at it though, it is It is a lifestyle. And I've said this in other episodes. You have to love the life if you're doing it. Yeah. You have to enjoy it. You have to enjoy it. Because it takes a lot of time. There's a lot of really hard s like if you're getting, I don't know, like constantly rained on when it's harvest, you're gonna be a little stressed. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Because at the end of the day, that crop is your paycheck. Mm-hmm. yeah. Yeah, I mean there's there's a balance, right? 'Cause there's And this is this is I think an important thing is like the lifestyle and the business, right? Like and it's gotta I feel like there's farmers that are more to one side where it's all just business and they I think they sacrifice a lot of the good things about farming. And then there's the other side where it's it's just a lifestyle and all of a sudden they're making decisions because it's a lifestyle and not Because it's a business. So there's somewhere in the middle Yeah. There's a and I think Because your emotions should be running your business either. No. No. And that's a danger. But it's easy to do. Especially when you're running a farm with your family. Or it 'cause it's business with family. Yeah. So there is certain dynamics that are always going to be Tricky to manage and the middle ground it can be hard to find depending on the season you're in. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. There's no way around it, I don't think. Okay. On this topic though, I will say something. As farmers, I feel like you guys I think I've said this maybe before to you, Trin farmers are like gambling to next level. I know it's one thing to gamble with livestock. Because you're trying to keep those guys alive and they can just croak whenever they feel like it, it seems like. You guys are praying for rain, but not too much rain. Yeah. And you need a solid window to like get this crop up. That is some and your guys' inputs are something yeah. Else fierce. Yeah. It is gambling. Millions of dollars. But that's what I mean. Like Yeah. Yeah. Pardon me? What? Or like just the equipment. Like on the back on back to like what the inputs are going in. Yeah. Equipment is astronomical right now. Yeah. it's crazy. So so I was at a combine clinic. yeah. Your combine clinic. Combine clinic. We gotta know about it. So but anyways, how much do you think like a like so these are the big new combines? How much do you think? disgusting. Probably more than my house is worth. Okay, I think like just like just in my mind one point two mil. Okay. Brianna. I was gonna go I was gonna go yeah, I was kinda saying mark. Let's say one point five mil. I'll go high. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, you guys are right there. So one point three for the combine. One point three for new combine. Without the header. Without the header? Another two hundred fifty thousand for the header. Okay. Like roughly or when you're That's not including any of your taxes or your hauling. What are taxes? Don't pffs yeah. Like hauling and stuff like that? Yeah, okay. When you're talking about No. It's like hauling it is not that expensive. That's the Okay, but everything put together Yeah, but still Couple grand and one point three mil is chump change though, isn't it? Yeah. To haul at home. For one point three, your two grand to haul at home or even your five grand to haul at home is not that nothing. Pennies. But it but it's crazy. Not to mention what it costs to run said machine. yeah, I feel like we're really not selling farming right now, but I promise you there it is worth it in a lot of areas. It's just a lot. Well somebody's gotta feed the world, right? Yeah. That's like I was just discussing. I was actually at call or I went, I was in town yesterday doing book work and a friend from school had dropped she was also doing work anyways. We ended up working together. And we got on the conversation of cattle or whatever. And I was like, it's crazy to think that we could buy a bull of very similar genetics two years ago for five, six grand. Now you're spending ten to twelve for those for the exact same bull bull Yep. What's your take? This is totally off the grain for me. Brianna and her bull I love this conversation so much. no, what's your take on EPDs? Do you strictly look at EPDs or do you look at the pedigree and physique of said animal? Yeah, E P Ds are kind of a deceptive thing. they can be. Yep. I I forget who I was talking to. Anyways, they were like you look at a you look at a bull catalog. Mm-hmm. Realistically, there's less than a ten percent difference between any of those bulls. Yep. You look at the E P D's and it's like way over like just like all over the place. So that's what I mean by they can be deceptive. They it is good to look at but you gotta You gotta take it for what it is. No, no purebred breeder is gonna put a bull in their sale that's not gonna perform. That they're not confident is gonna perform. So his EPDs might look like garbage compared to the top seller. Mm-hmm. He's still a good bull. He's just his EPDs just aren't as good as the other one. So this is interesting, because I was really on an epd So okay. Okay. So There's we bought a bull from a place in Manitoba. Yeah. I wanted to ask about this. This is great, great. So their whole thing well the no they've got yeah. They've got a really cool program. But one of the things is that they really watch for is did is that bull from a cow that caught on the first cycle? Mm hmm. Is that bull a first cycle bull? And so like getting those genetics and then the other th so that's the first thing they look at. The next thing, how old is that cow? Mm-hmm. So if you're getting you're getting a bull that caught on the first cycle on a twelve year old cow, those are good genetics. I don't care Yep. Like Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like there's a lot of I mean there's is a lot of other important things. Yep. But an old cow that's catching on the first cycle, there's a lot of value in that. Yeah. Totally. because it takes a couple years for a cow to pay for its self by the time you get a raise a calf, get it bred, get a couple of calves out of it. It takes a few years before you're actually making money. So the longer you can get to Keep it. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So are you some people are in the ballpark and I I think I know the answer to this, but I will ask it. Of when a cow gets to six years old, she's gotta go. No. Yeah, neither. I I disagree with that. I've heard that and I think you make for some really bad cow herds if you're doing that. I think so. And I think you can see that you are seeing that in what's going through. Cause you're not breeding for Also, I just don't think it's smart because like you're always like you're you're always I don't know. If I could in a perfect world, if I could have third cavers and up and no first and second cavers. Yeah. That's all I would run. Forget about the first and second cavers, because those are the ones that are gonna cause you problems. Tell me why they cause you problems. Tell our tell our audience. Tell the people. Tell the people. First calvers, you you never know what you're gonna get. if you have a good herd, you I didn't pull a single heifer this year, so I can't complain about that. But you never know what you're gonna get. Typically they're your problems. second cavers. Well, then so this is if you get a second caver. to where she has a calf, typically you're good. The problem is usually I find a second caver is not gonna breed up. Yep. Or whatever. That's where they have the hardest time. What does breed up mean? They're gonna come up open. They're gonna come up open. They're gonna be bred. Yeah. Your second cavers are most likely your opens the year but the year after. Yeah. They don't come up. Cause because typically what happens is the first cavers, usually they have a smaller calf. So that's another thing. and then typically they get bred again, have a second calf. By the time they have their second calf, raise that calf. If they lots of times what happens is that cow is run down by this point. They don't breed. They don't breed back. So you don't so they don't have a third calf. They don't cycle back out. Yep. Okay. Interesting. Do you sell a second cow or if she's open? typically, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We sometimes give a second shot because of that issue. Yeah, because if they are run down, right? Like yeah. And it's a tricky one too though, because that Then you're gonna be the animal. Is it actually produced? Because you have the one beside her that was in the exact same situation. She was bred. Well, why wasn't this other one? Yeah. So is it actually just a genetic thing that you think? And then are you breeding that back into your herd? Yeah, exactly. This is a hot topic as well. yeah, we should table this because I could go on the cattle side for like quite some time. yeah. I do want to ask on the grain side of things, how does it work to sell your grain? Because there's something like you just go to any elevator and say, here's my grain, take my grain. How does this work? you can try to do that. Okay. that sounds not promising. So typically everything is contracted. Okay, and how do you go about getting said contracts? so Gambling again. Big Well, this is why I asked it. So a grain company will put out a bid, say, let's just say wheat at eight bucks. So they put out a bid at eight bucks. That doesn't necessarily mean you have to sell for eight bucks. Sometimes if they're really looking for grain, they'll pay you eight ten. Mm-hmm. Or eight fifteen or whatever. So what you can do is you put in a target. So say their bid is at eight bucks. You put in a target, say You don't really need to sell grain, but if price was good enough, say you put a target in at eight twenty. And so the target might last it depends on the contracts. It might last a week or two weeks. And then if they don't pick that bit up, it expires and then you didn't sell your grain. Say you really need to sell grain, you put a bit in at eight five. Typically they'll pick that up. So when when you put a bid in you say, Okay, I've got So many tons I wanna sell at this price. But aren't we doing before we even have Yeah, yeah. So we're already contracting like this next crop. Like for twenty twenty seven. We're already putting contracts in? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Even though we have nothing in the ground. No no no. no, not for twenty twenty seven. So if twenty twenty six harvest. Our twenty twenty six harvest. I mean you could the I don't know if they're no, they're not buying grain from twenty seventy six. But we also don't know how much grain we're gonna get. No, you don't. This is the gamble side that is wild to me. And this is where you gotta be careful. So we typically never like so we'll contract some now, a certain percentage. k explain that explain what you're talking about, what what she just asked. Explain everything that you're going into here. Okay, what did you ask? She's saying that you sell it you contract it before it's even harvested. So right now the date is August fourteenth. We have not yet combined any grain in twenty twenty six. But we've already We have already sold. We've already sold some of our grain. Some of our grain. For a preset price, preset quality, preset whatever. So So what happens if you don't make that? And what happens if Well, that's why you say you gotta be careful. So we only sell a small amount ahead of time. Yeah, yeah. And is it of all your varieties of grain that you sell that percent? Or is it depend it really depends on you're It really depends on the prices. Okay. So like 'cause right now if you're if the price is good, then we say, Okay, we're gonna and that's where you can gamble a little bit. You can say, Okay, price is really good. I'm gonna sell like seventy percent. Well, this would be crazy if you did this. Seventy percent of what I think I'm gonna get. Right. Because the price is really good. And then I mean you're at this point we're already making like calculations on how much our crop is gonna yield, but you never know till you harvest it, right? So you gotta be careful. And then w typically what happens is like sometimes we'll we'll do a contract in the middle of harvest. 'Cause it's like, okay, yeah, we got more or whatever, price is good. And then we also contract throughout the winter. Right. But it's It's always s even when it's crazy. Even when it's like say it's middle of winter, we want to sell grain, it's always a contract. You're not just I mean, basically you can do it where you like phone up the elevator and say, Okay, I got this much, what's your price? And you can just put in a target at that price for how much you have. Right. But everybody pre contracts. Typically you always pe pre contract. So like you see a lot Golly, you see like a lot of things right now. For example, like, cattle prices are high. How are those grain farmers? Like things like that. Yeah. Would you say grains in rough shape? Like it's not great. I mean it's it's come up a little bit here, the last couple of months. Probably not where it should be. Because they tend to go in waves and it follows. Yeah, and so and so also with grain, so with cattle there's a lot less. I mean, if you're buying all your hay, that's a big input cost. Huge, yeah. Other than that, your input costs are fairly stable. Yeah. Like they do fluctuate some. But with grain, like so fertilizer this spring. Yeah, it was really expensive. So everybody's input costs went up a lot, right? Yeah. did you guys have trouble getting fertilizer? no. So we typically put most of our fertiliz so so fertilizer is a whole nother thing. There's different types of fertilizers. That's part three. Okay, that's fine. We can look nitrogen is the big like that's your main one. Yes. typically we put all our nitrogen on in the fall. Or most of our nitrogen on in the fall. So we missed the the crazy springtime. Yeah, scramble, yeah. Everybody But everybody I know of got fertilizer. I don't know of anybody that didn't get fertilizer. It was just expensive. It was expensive, yeah. Yeah. So your inputs are really high, but right now your what you're selling that said grain for isn't great compared to what you had to put in to get that crop going. Is that correct? Yeah. Yeah, see that's so and I mean so this is the thing too. So there's there's the two things that affect your overall revenue is price and yield. Mm-hmm. So like I mean, that's where cattle is a little different too. You know, you have a hundred cows, you know, you're gonna have this many calves. Yeah. That doesn't change very much unless you for some reason all your calves are really skinny in the fall, which are you losing them to predators? Yeah. Th yeah, there is variables like that. That's what I'm saying. It's it's a different But you're not gonna lose like fifty percent of your animals to predators. No. Typically. Unless you're really not doing a good job, right? Yeah, like something crazy. Yeah. But that's what I mean. Like typically count on X amount. And then so but the price is variable always, right? So you're always playing that game. Whereas grain grain is both. Both. Everything is variable here. You can do everything right. Hundred percent do everything right. Doesn't rain, you get twenty percent of what you should have. Yeah. And the price is in the floor. Or whatever. Like yeah, you know, maybe our crops are really poor. Yeah. But the rest of the world or the rest I mean, so a lot of things are on the global market, so really depends what you know, what's happening in the world. Yeah, like we could have a poor crop but the global market's high, so then Or like the the the everybody else's crops are good, so then the market is lower, right? Yeah. Everybody uses garbage so that your prices are high because everything was garbage. Yeah. It's yeah we'll see what happens because Yeah. So for canola, Canada is a big a big player in the world market. so I I mean, yeah, there's different But like everybody's growing canola. Yeah, there's lots of canola, but there's but it sounds like maybe crops aren't very like the yield's not gonna be very good. Okay. So maybe the canola price will come up yet. And then, you know, that's a good thing in a way because then everybody who has canola can still make Yeah, yeah. So but on a good year, you have a good yielding crop and the price is high. Right? Like that's but that's I don't know. That's like a once in a while. Doesn't happen. it doesn't happen. Yeah. And on a bad year, you have poor crops and the price is low. And that's when it can be really bad, right? So yeah. Yeah, it's like a it's quite the game. It's something else, man. Like I look at some of ours, I'm like, my gosh, I don't know what we're doing. Yeah. And then I look at fireworks and I was like, No, we're doing just fine, actually. We're doing all Like because There's certain things, like you said. And it's crazy because you have to like Jorim's one brother is like in the office a lot because you're looking at all these bids. You're doing this, you're doing this, you're doing your research. there's a lot of back end. Mm-hmm. Yeah. That I don't know. Well and and one of our neighbors so they're they're full-time farm like well, he's been full-time farming now for I don't know how many years. But when he started out, when he first took over the farm from his dad, He was working in the oil patch to like kind of supplement it. Supplement, right? And they had they they've grown their acres now and different things. But the one winter he was trucking in the oil patch. And I mean this was before the days of smartphones and all the things. Of course. Now it's a little different. But he you know, he worked whatever, three months straight. He said if he would have been home, he could have made one phone call and been And he would have marketed his grain at the right time. Yeah. And he would have made more money than what he made in that three months. Sitting at home on his couch than he made three months working his butt off. Yeah. But So that's so I mean, so that's that's the crazy, you know, marketing side of it. That's the gamble of That's the gamble. But a lot of people But nowadays it's different too, 'cause you have it on your phone, it's like whatever. You can do a little bit. Yeah. Hope for the best. Yeah. Yeah. Anyways, it is interesting. I don't want to discourage any like young farmers. I think it is there is a lot of light to it, even though it does seem a little chaotic. Yeah. But there is there is a lot of light in it. We're still doing it. Yeah, we still enjoy it. We're still farming with family. Yeah. It's hard some days, but it has its moments. But I think one thing too with that, this I was I was actually just thinking about this today, is if it the multi generational aspect of it is pretty huge 'cause the legacy side of it. Yeah, the legacy side of it and also just the knowledge. Like yeah. You know, my dad farmed his whole life. If he if he didn't have anybody to hand that to, all his knowledge is basically lost. So he he's has an auction, sells the farm. Yeah. Whoever buys it. But if you know, so he's handing it off to us boys. Mm-hmm. with all that knowledge. Yeah. And we can build on his knowledge. Yep. And pass it learn more and more and more and pass that on to the next generation. yeah. like that's a huge that's a huge I can agree more. Like I've even said that to Keith. I said, you know, even though there's days where, you know, we're all hitting heads or whatever things have gotten pets. I said, I will never not say that your dad isn't a wealth of knowledge. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean you can't do it for fifty years and not And not learn some stuff. But that's just it, isn't it though? Because it is something that you are constantly learning, whether it's livestock or crops. Yeah. Things are always changing. There's certain things that are completely out of your control. Yeah. And some of it is just going to come by experience. Yeah. And until you've seen that, yeah. You're not gonna know what to do. And I think that's something, you know For the younger generation too, sometimes it's like, well, why didn't they do this? yeah. But the fact that they were able to keep on farming. Can we also talk about farming fifty years ago versus today? yeah, I'm I'm getting there. I'm getting there. Okay, okay. But you know, the fact that they were able to keep farming and now they can hand it off to their kids, like that's a huge accomplishment on its own. Yeah, maybe they didn't have the shiniest equipment, maybe they didn't have all the nice stuff that we wish they did. But actually we have the opportunity to farm. So that's way more valuable than having the perfect put together place and not having anybody to to take it over, right? Yeah. I can't agree more. Yeah, it's it is so different too, back onto what you were just saying, Trin What they were doing fifty years ago. Yeah. a heck of a lot different. Yeah. Than how we're doing it today. They didn't have calculators in their pockets. No, but even just like clearing land to get to site that like we have the land cleared. Yeah. Basically. Well, yeah. Because your dad put in so much work. Yeah, I mean now we're clearing a whole new set of land, but it's it's totally different. It's totally different. It's totally different. Yeah, and that's like there's all these things that we can rent or buy on an auction or do whatever to clear the land. Like back then, how were they clearing land? Yeah, yeah. a hundred percent. Yeah. Right. there's a lot of work into that. Yeah. Yeah. It's how Keith and Breanna do it. They just walk along and pick up their rocks. All of their little rocks. We do do a lot of rock picking. Well, a lot of it we've already done, but there's Well that's it though, because a lot of your fields are turned over year after year. They're when we when we were kids we used to pick a lot more rocks. Yeah. Part of it. We need to get the niece and nephews doing more of. Yeah, well we're clearing more land so there'll be more rocks to pick. There'll be more there's always more rocks to pick. the other thing I was going to mention with farming too is like being able to adapt and change I see there's a lot of farms that are struggling and it seems to me it's when the people running the farm are saying, Well, this is the way we've always done it And not you know, changing mm hmm changing the and something that like I mean me you and Lacey have been doing is like talking about farming with each other. Yep. And learning from each other and texting each other and even though you hay wrong. No, I'm just kidding. Hay in circles, that's a problem. Like that's like what you guys do and we do it differently and I love That we do it differently. Like it's and it's fun. And it's fun. And it's cool conversation. And it's good conversation. And like sometimes you learn stuff or we learn stuff in the What's the important part is to say, okay, this is why we do it this way. Mm-hmm. And can it be done? There's there's there's two sides to it. This is why we do it this way. And it's like, okay, yes, this is a good reason, or hey, should we do it differently, right? And that's I think somebody something everybody needs to be asking themselves is are we doing Like sometimes, you know, you wake up one day and you're like, Why are we doing it like this? Like this makes no sense. Like Brianna every day. Well, no, because that's the thing. I didn't grow up doing it though. So there's something like, so why are we Well and that's the why are we doing it? Ask. Yeah. Well, it's good. It is it can be good. But sometimes it is like, okay, well, it's fine. It's fine. Well, and no, what I was gonna say to that too is I think there is something, for example, I think Some of the things that say Keith's dad did or his granddad did, more so his granddad, but also his dad too, because I think the eighties were really rough for Yeah. For everybody. and that's kind of when he was getting into it. Yeah. If I remember correctly. But some of the things were done completely out of survival. And because they were done out of survival, totally, the wanting to branch out is Like that wasn't an option back then. It wasn't an option. So now because it has worked for X amount of years, even though there might be a more efficient way or something, the idea of doing something when you were stuck in survival for so long. For so long. Yeah, totally. And that's coming from somebody who's like, Hey, what do we Yeah, why do we do it like this? And I've realized sometimes I'm like, I'm not asking that out of a stir-the-pot kind of way. No. Yeah. But I've also not seen the side of like, we had to do it like that because there was we didn't have another yeah option that had to work that year or whatever, right? Like there is also that side of it too. And I think statistically speaking though, farmers are the biggest procrastinators in some sense, like in succession planning. Yeah. But also too just in like yeah, you get comfortable. You've done it one way for so long. Regardless if it was out of survival or necessity or whatever. Yeah. The idea why mess with a good thing? Because the idea changes terrifying sometimes. Yeah. And this is coming from a young farmer who will one day be an old farmer. But that's just it, isn't it? Like we'll look back and be like, okay, yes. Yeah, I know. I say to Keith all time, I said, I don't know whatever the conversation or some some hard conversations come up. I was like, You have to remember we'll we get we will get old one day too. And we might be set. We're gonna be like this young generation and all their ideas. We told our kids that yesterday of like we cannot be old and not be adaptable. Yeah. And I said that's new ideas. We need to learn these lessons. And I think it's also like we need to let our kids learn lessons too. Absolutely. I could go into a literally a whole topic on that meaning from a from a business standpoint. Yeah, yeah. There is something Like if this is the next generation that's gonna take this over, you need to let them take over. Figure it out a little bit. Yeah, within r yeah, absolutely. You can't because like obviously don't just like chuck the reins, but like let them make mistakes. Yeah. Anyways, I think it's a really good conversation and I think this was a really good conversation on all topics. I really enjoyed it and we'll have to do another one like this, I think. Yeah, we need to get Keith, we need to get David. Yes. We need to get Jorim back. And then hopefully we can do one with all the husbands. Just the three of them? Yeah, just the three of them. They can run the show. We're gonna go on a girls' trip and you guys can run the show for an episode. Be interesting. That be so great. We'll get into it about going in circles versus going back and forth. yeah. I would love to see it. yeah, okay. Well, thanks everybody. Okay, thanks guys.