Saturday, August 17, 2013

Pigs Waterslide and an Awesome Farmer

A Dutch farmer set up a pig waterslide, took some pictures, and posted it to social media. The result is that I am now getting well meaning questions and suggestions for my farm. And more than one copy of the original post.

Here is the link








People find this idea hilarious, funny, and entertaining. And it is. What a great way to help pigs play!

I was curious about the details of this farm so I asked some social media friends to help me track down more information. Given the unknowns of culture and language the best thing I found was this link to the farm's web page. Pig Palace


Please click the Pig Palace link above to get an idea of how sophisticated this farmer's approach to farming is. It is quite impressive. It shows a person looking forward to the challenges that he faces.

With all this as background, I would like to make a few observations from my viewpoint as a U.S. producer who is also deeply involved in looking forward for solutions to challenges.

I am unsure a pig would volunteer to go down this slide. My experience is that a pig will hesitate and test out a new surface/material pretty well before stepping on it. If they are afraid of losing their footing they will refuse to advance. Getting pigs to step off the wooden ramp (pictured below) onto the cement floor and vice versa often requires patience and neither is a slick waterslide.

In any event it is pretty dangerous for an animal with hooves (cartilage for feet) to be sliding around. This is one reason we put shoes on horses and the internationally recognized animal behaviorist Temple Grandin has argued against slick floors in facilities her entire career. As a point of reference, this loading ramp on my farm would be written up by the National Pork Board's Sight Assessment Auditor because there are missing treads/cleats.




I will simply point out that the key issues with hog wallows (mud holes) are odor, flies, environmental degradation, and diseases (both human and porcine) and move on. Who could argue with the obvious fun of a mud hole?

So I am not particularly enamored with this waterslide as a production strategy, ........ but as a marketing investment I think it is awesome.

The Netherlands/Holland/the Dutch are members of the EU (European Union) and are struggling to find ways to produce food affordably under some very stringent animal welfare and environmental regulations. Many of the EU nations just simply are not going to be able to comply. Compliance takes money and that means debt, and parts of Europe are in a terrible bind in that regard.

This forward thinking farmer appears to be running a very transparent and public friendly enterprise utilizing the latest and greatest technology to meet these challenges. In the back pasture he is showing how much he loves his animals by giving them a water slide! What an awesome farmer. You only need to read a few comments to realize how much good favor he has bought with the public. I can only stand in admiration of the strategy. Well done.

Maybe someone should open a large scale commercial farm that is accessible to the public in the U.S.......and add a waterslide? I will have to suggest it to my friends at the Fair Oaks Pig Adventure.  The future of farming may lie in this kind of forward thinking marketing and public transparency.

Monday, August 12, 2013

George Washington and the Federalist Papers


 "The blessed Religion revealed in the word of God will remain an eternal and awful monument to prove that the best Institutions may be abused by human depravity; and that they may even, in... some instances be made subservient to the vilest purposes.

"Should, hereafter, those who are entrusted with the management of this government, incited by the lust of power and prompted by the Supineness or venality of their Constituents, overleap the known barriers of this Constitution and violate the unalienable rights of humanity: it will only serve to shew, that no compact among men (however provident in its construction and sacred in its ratification) can be pronounced everlasting and inviolable, and if I may so express myself, that no Wall of words, that no mound of parchm[en]t can be so formed as to stand against the sweeping torrent of boundless ambition on the one side, aided by the sapping current of corrupted morals on the other."

George Washington, Excerpts from Drafts of the First Inaugural Address (April 1789)