Sometimes when I surf the internet for column ideas, I uncover a nugget of information about agriculture that makes me feel as lucky as the blind sow that found the acorn while randomly rooting around in the forest.
For this column, my blindly rooting around on the web uncovered this aggie news nugget — perhaps the Beef Industry is entering it’s “Gall”den Age.
What’s that, you ask? Well, it’s the fact that gallstones found in beef carcasses during processing can be worth as much as the entire rest of the critter.
How can that be true? Well, according to the news item I read, the answer is that some Chinese believe in traditional medicines more than they believe in modern medicine — and they’ll willingly pay dearly for them. In fact, the article said the Chinese spend $60-billion annually on traditional medicines.
It turns out that ground up beef gallstones is one of the traditional medicines the Chinese prize the most. Get this — the article said ground up beef gallstones can fetch up to $5,800 an ounce. That’s significantly more than the current price of an ounce of gold, which less than $3,000 an ounce.
Chinese and some other Asians believe that gallstones can cure a lengthy list of human maladies. At the top of that list in high blood pressure, heart disease, and strokes. It reported China’s government and state media encouraged gallstone use as a source of national pride, especially during the recent Covid-19 pandemic.
One theory that has emerged about the current extraordinary prices for gallstones is that their appeal has transcended their primary use in traditional Asian medicine. Gallstones have become a form of currency, it seems. The Chinese economy is in a bad state, and wealthy Chinese have been buying gallstones and storing them like they would gold, according to Australian broker cited in the article. Or, some folks may re-export the stones and park the cash in offshore accounts to circumvent China’s stringent currency laws.
But, this new beef bonanza does have a downside. That downside is that most cattle don’t have gallstones. And, unless harvested and handled correctly, beef gallstones can mold or otherwise lose quality.
The article cited Brazilian or Australian slaughterhouses are where most gallstones are harvested. It didn’t mention that it happens in the U.S., but I’d bet it does. The story said Australia’s entire annual harvest of gallstones is around 200 kilograms. It takes 30,000 head of cattle to yield one kilo of gallstones.
So, clearly to me, the big opportunity for the beef industry is to use science to either produce a strain of cattle that produces more gallstones, or alternately, find a feedstuff that makes current breeds of cattle produce more gallstones.
I’m kidding, sort of. Anything that can double the value of a beef carcass can’t be summarily dismissed. Perhaps in the future, we’ll see new breeds of cattle such as Angalls, Wangalls and Simmengalls. I read the U.S. is entering its Golden Age. So, why not beef’s “Gall”den Age?
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While I’m on the subject of weird stuff from animals, I might as well discuss another item I read about recently.
When I wuz reading my most recent issue of National Geographic magazine, I came across a picture of a huge screen wire cage filled to blackness with tens of thousands of blackflies.
It wuz part of a research project in Europe to find what it called “a new sustainable source of protein for animal feed.”
The object of the research wuz pretty simple. The researchers hoped they could economically raise, kill, dry, and grind up blackflies for cattle feed.
The researchers didn’t say they hoped the high-protein dried flies could also be eaten by humans, but I’d bet a pretty penny that it wuz also a goal.
My suggestion for sustainable bovine protein is better grasses and grains. Just skip the dried flies.
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From northeast Oklahoma, I heard about a couple of young farmers, both with kindergarten-age children, who agreed to spend a Saturday caring for their children, while their wives went shopping in Tulsa.
The dad’s told their wives in advance they’d take the kids to the zoo in Tulsa, while the women shopped.
The kids mothers then more or less coached their children about the wide assortment of animals they’d see at the zoo.
The big day came and the women took an SUV to Tulsa and the men loaded the children up in a two-seater pickup truck.
About 6 p.m. they all got together in Claremore (the home of Will Rogers Downs horse track) to eat together at a nice restaurant.
As the kids excitedly unloaded and ran to their mothers, one of the mothers asked her son, “So, did you enjoy seeing all the animals at the zoo?”
The kid spit out in reply, “It was great, Mommy. And, Daddy liked it too, especially when one a nice horsey paid 30 to 1.”
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This column is another milestone for longevity. With it’s publication, I’ve now completed 51 years of columns. That’s 2,652 columns. That’s a lot of words and a lot of wear and tear on my ancient fingers, which will have been in operation for 82 years on January 30.
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Words of wisdom for the week: “Now that gambling is legal, everyone should have a go at farming or ranching.” Have a good ‘un.
