“Coach ‘Em Up, Coach!”
by Chris Reinhardt, feedlot specialist
With the growing trend, almost a ground swell, in concern by beef producers for training in animal welfare and general husbandry, there is both an opportunity and a challenge for managers and for extension personnel.
There’s nothing more “invigorating” than standing in front of 50 lifetime career ranchers, each one with more experience handling livestock than me, and telling them, “We can do better.” But that is sometimes exactly what we need to do.
It’s been said, “The good old days never were.” We all, at some age that seems to correlate with achy, creaky joints in the morning, become nostalgic about the way things used to be. But the reality is that if we could go back and honestly examine how we did things, we’d be disappointed at best, and at worst, appalled.
The quality of available livestock handling facilities is greater than it ever has been in our lifetime. But the reason for that very same evolutionary or even revolutionary improvement in technology and facilities is that our collective industry attitude in favor of low stress cattle handling has never been stronger.
Cattle handlers have always cared for the animals in their charge, but we are all prisoners of our experience, our perspective, and our culture. By coming to a meeting, and listening to and critically examining new ideas, and welcoming and embracing the possibility that some changes are both good and necessary, we can effectively unshackle ourselves from our past experience and move into the new world of better.
Now go challenge your family, neighbors, and industry colleagues to get better, because we can only become as good as the weakest link in the industry will allow.