Logan Duvall:
All right, Weston, really excited to be visiting with you. Heard you on my buddy Jared Luman's Herdquitter podcast and thought, hey, this guy is an educator, just four hours north of me. I want to learn more about the agriculture, the regenerative. I love how you threw in the science behind the fescue and the genetics on the cattle. And so, brother, I just wanted to sit down and visit and see what kind of wisdom we can share. with you know up-and-coming farmers or maybe farmers that want to Shift a little bit as well as all kinds of life lessons. So thanks for joining
Weston Walker:
Well thank you Logan, I think it's really, I've got to watch some of your podcasts since then and I really appreciate that, that you're trying to put forth and that you're trying to do holistic systems and trying to do things a more natural way or sure something that's been near and dear to my heart for several years.
Logan Duvall:
I love that. Now, I can't wait to jump into your perspective. So to start, if you don't care, can you tell me a little bit about Kit Faro, the Faro Cattle Company, and how you're connected and all that? Because I think that's going to be, in your world, everybody knows, right? But in mine, maybe very few do.
Weston Walker:
Well, yeah, Fairo Cattle Company was started by Kit Fairo about mid-1980s and he was doing just like a lot of us in agriculture. Going with the mantra that's been taught since probably World War II that bigger is better and more production is more maximizing production is what you need to do to be profitable. When in reality, he was seeing, because he's a smart individual, he really started seeing that he was going to go broke doing that. And profitability was not tied to maximum production. I recall the very first ag economics course I took when they talked about the law of diminishing returns and they really promoted the concept that you should put one more unit of it in just to get that extra bushel of corn as long as that extra bushel of corn covered the price of that nitrogen. Well, there's a lot of hidden cost and I was trying to think of things as we talked about or as I was thinking about this interview and I thought, you know, the more, and I found that it's an Albert Einstein quote, the more I learn, the more I realize I don't know, and too many times we're listening to talking heads, if you will, and having been through the university system and whatnot, I understand that research is only gonna get funded if there's something to sell at the end, and so. If we kind of are trying to go nature's way and the way the good Lord made it, we're probably not gonna have to put ourselves in the middle of this operation as much as we like to think we do. And that's where man's pride kind of comes into it. But back to Kitt, finding profitability was not tied to maximum production. And so started looking for what really matters on the ranch. and that's a moderate cow that can do it. And when I say do it, she can produce a calf every year, that wean maybe 50% of her body weight is a goal, and do it every year for a lot of years, and try to do it on a low-input process. Now, if everything was free range like it used to be, back when God made this country and we were settling it, or we could just... Cows could go wherever they wanted to get their mineral and water and shade, whatever. They could go where the good groceries were. But unfortunately we lock them into a certain area and so we may have to provide some inputs because the land that we have management of, stewardship of, may not have all the necessary nutrients that we need for those animals. So I'm not opposed to bringing in whatever we need. But just remember that you're going to make more money if you have more trucks hauling stuff off of your property than if you have trucks hauling inputs onto your property. Fertilizer, feed, you know, whatever that may be in your vegetable.
Logan Duvall:
I love the simplicity of how you put that.
Weston Walker:
Yeah. So Kit's whole mantra is low input grass-based genetics that can perform profitably and let the cows work for you rather than you having to work for the cows. That's a pretty good summation, I think, of his feral cattle cut.
Logan Duvall:
So, Pharaoh, in your involvement, it's more about the genetics that fit that criteria. And my understanding is it's bulls. It's kind of like the biggest impact for getting genetics is going to be in the bull that you use. So, how are y'all meeting that demand? And how is that demand going? Is it growing on the grass-fed side?
Weston Walker:
Yeah, and so I've always kind of tried to share the idea that the bulls we produce, and there's about 25 cooperating producers across the United States from South Alabama to I guess the farthest B-Sum up in Montana, and from I guess some Minnesota down to Texas. So we're scattered all across the nation and... The philosophies apply wherever you're at. But what I've always tried to say is we are in the mama cow making business. I mean, the bulls we produce are going to be the kind of bulls that will make you, give you the opportunity to retain females that will be the kind of long-lived, easy-doing type cows. So that then, if you want to hit a terminal market with a, you know, put a big growthy type of a conventional or continental breed of cattle on that, then go to it. But you need cows that can survive on low input and produce more than with those big growthy bulls. Whereas if you were to have these big growthy cows, well, then it's costing you so much money. You're not really profitable. So trying to make the factory, if you will, low input. and have a high output. And that's what we're, in the genetics, we're doing. So yet the market is in grass-fed type cattle. I mean, our cattle will do it on grass, but they'll also do it in feedlot. Problem is they're much more efficient converting the grain because they're good at converting the feed, or the forage, and they don't have to stay in the feedlot very long. And that segment of the market, you know, is really getting paid for. Like a bed and breakfast. I mean they're getting paid for the amount of feed they sell and the number of days that they're housing them, you know, so They would prefer bigger animals and there's some economy of scale there in processing too. I mean I've been in the grass-fed direct marketing realm myself and you know when you've got a smaller carcass well, then You still got the processing fees some flat rate processing fees and so that that causes you some grief when you're trying to spread that out over a bigger carcass. You know, it's a consideration. A person just has to know, be aware of all the costs and be educated in what you're trying to accomplish.
Logan Duvall:
So Weston, one of the aspects of all this that, you know, trying to bring back in for everybody is through the sowing prosperity platform mission. It's like I cannot break up health and agriculture because the food that we have is so connected to the optimization of health and how we feel. And that how it's produced matters as much based on nutrient density and all the, you know, the downstream effects of how it's raised. So, going to what you do specifically on the specifics of the animal, right? Like utilizing the cattle. Where is the advantage on the land for this a little smaller, more tolerant conversion cattle versus, say, you know, a lot of the bigger breeds, I think you use the term continental. That's going to be the very large frame cattle, right? Where... Where is the benefit of going this route long term, say for the land and for food?
Weston Walker:
Point of clarification, when I said continental breeds, those would be those that came from France and Switzerland and so on. Those would be like your Charolais, your Simmental, some of those breeds. The British breeds, I forget where was an article at some point in the past said that the, you know, even the red angus and angus national herds of the United States have been selected bigger and bigger. It's within every breed. There's some good but partly the reason they do a continental crossing was for hybrid bigger because they're a little farther apart on the Genetic spectrum so you get a little more heterosis in the cross. That's what I was referencing there but they're big cattle in all breeds and right Good or bad whichever way you want to fall on it the purpose of a smaller a smaller framed animal You know, really if you want to be the most efficient, like Joel Salatin, I listened to a talk he did one time, the most efficient animal that can use forage on a per acre basis is probably going to be a rabbit or a chicken. So the smaller the package animal, the more you can actually produce on a per acre basis. Sheep are more efficient. You could get more pounds of lamb off of an acre than you can pounds of beef. And so it's all because of smaller packages you can produce more. So with that thought line, and you can just kind of relate it, that a cow will eat basically 3% of her body weight in a dry matter per day. So now how are you going to feed that 3% of her body weight? And you could argue and look at the feeds and feeding books and say, well, it's 2.5% at this stage of the life cycle. And, you know, if she's a heavy milker, she'd be 3.5%. Okay, but let's just hit three for easy math. And a thousand pound cow, which is, my herd's gonna average 1,100 probably on my cows, 1,150. And, but let's just use a thousand pound for easy math because I've got a lot of younger animals that'll be there compared to a 1,500 pound cow. 30 pounds of dry matter per day compared to 45 pounds of dry matter intake per day. Well. I can run three 1,000 pound cows for the same groceries, if you will, as two 1,500 pound cows. Lot of people are running 1,500 pound cows. Some are running much larger than that. Those cows require a lot more groceries throughout their life and they're not really, the research shows those bigger cows do not produce more pounds of beef necessarily. We got to look at in, or. production per acre rather than, so pounds of beef per acre rather than pounds of beef per cow. Bigger cow might take four acres to produce that pound of, or that beef, that offspring, or the smaller cow might get by with two, two and a half acres, you know. So it just depends on what you're looking at, but it's all about that smaller package. more efficient, the engine, you can get into the fact of all the difference between a, I think of it as a single-phase power compared to three-phase, you know, it takes a lot more energy bringing in for bigger lines, a bigger power, for a bigger engine to operate more equi- well, that bigger animal has a bigger engine basically. So she's got to have more energy intake just to maintain herself. not only that, but then I'll add on to the production.
Logan Duvall:
One thing that I'm really trying to get across is the community building side of agriculture, depending on how it's done. I feel like, so we went down to Bluffton, Georgia and filmed with White Oak Pastures and Will Harris, a documentary, and in that it showed how what Will and his family and crew are doing are creating, is sowing prosperity, right, in Bluffton, Georgia. And through through the regenerative agriculture, through utilizing the multi-species raising, Will put his own processing facility in there, put his own general store in there, put his own restaurant in there, and provided jobs and housing. And things are growing there, whereas when we travel across Arkansas, we've seen the exact opposite. Like my hometown, it's... agriculture left, it's not doing real good. Eastern Arkansas, the river valleys, southern Arkansas, they're not doing good. How in your experience do we build out this local food system kind of to support itself? So there in South Central Missouri where you are, how do you see strengthening your home area with the food system.
Weston Walker:
So I guess it was probably 2012, maybe 2000, maybe even 2006, 2008 actually. There was a thousand gardens project going in Springfield that we were, I wouldn't say I was in any of the ground laying works of that, but was at some meetings and some things like that and they really talked about a food desert. you know, that we're in a food desert. We, too many counties do not, cannot produce, do not currently, let's say it that way, do not currently produce enough food to feed their populace. And so there was kind of a push even that far back to try and make it to where you could. So on our own, in our own operation, we kind of look at being able to be more sustainable. And I've had multi-species operation, goats and sheep and pasture-raised, non-GMO Berkshire pork. And we're direct marketed and just family chickens and garden and all those things. So I've seen all the realms of that. And I believe that the biggest thing is knowledge, trying to acquire the skill sets and the knowledge and the resources. I don't think we need to worry about doom and gloom and be thinking about, oh, well, we're going to survive some apocalypse here or something like that. And, well, just because we just... So what if you had all this stuff stored back and so on? If they want it, they're going to come take it. So you better put your trust in a higher power that's going to protect you a lot better than you're going to be able to protect yourself. So... But I do believe the good Lord gave us a mind to reason with and to think through some things. And I don't think he intends on us just to be sticking our head in the sand and not being prepared for an ice storm that occurred back in, what was that, 2011, or a tornado that's gonna knock out power for sure. You need to have some things in place. And there's a skill set that... great grandparents did every day from cannon and putting up their own food and all these things and so I think if we can And that's something I've worked a lot with the Plain community when I was doing soil consulting and seed sales and some different things like that in years past and I got a lot of respect for them to try and try and be self-reliant and not dependent on the outside world and you know when we had that ice storm in 11 I don't know if they had it down your far south or not, but wow, you know 11 days with no power and middle of the winter and ice and all that and so But I went and saw some of the Plain community. They didn't even phase them hardly, you know. And there were people in Springfield that were out of food. They didn't have anything in the cupboards. I mean, they were going to neighbors begging for food. And that's just silly that you're not any more prepared thinking ahead any better than that. But that's the instant gratification society we're in. So I do think that this knowledge, gaining knowledge, skill sets, how to keep a garden, how to... keep your soil balanced and natural composting and running some small livestock, just for your own sustainability. And I mean, there's no way that all the cattle we've got are able to, that we'd ever be able to eat them. We've got to have an outlet source. And so that's not, it's not just for food production, but it's food production for others. So you kind of need to. Think about the networking side of things. How are you gonna sustain a community? You need to be, you're gonna need your neighbors if things fall down and so you need to be working with them and being, and not everyone's gonna agree with you on the way you wanna operate, but you still, if you're trying to do what's right, they'll come around, just keep spreading the good word. That's all I know.
Logan Duvall:
I love it. With the food desert and stuff, one of the things that I have become increasingly frustrated with is the conflict on what healthy is and what food is, and kind of almost like the war on meat and the war on cattle. And one thing that, where I come from, Weston, on this is the cancer world. Cancer is my... absolute passion with my baby having cancer. And so I tend to disagree with mainstream on just about everything when it comes to that. And recently interviewed, who I believe to be the foremost expert on cancer metabolism, Dr. Thomas Seyfried out of Boston College. And Seyfried has been a proponent of the ketogenic meat heavy diet, along with some other things that, probably not the... talk for that. But my point of saying is we've got to have this quality meat that builds our local food system. And we need to eat more meat. So the food deserts, part of that food desert issue is that they're eating trash. They're eating absolute processed junk filled with toxins that's causing them to be sick. So not only are they living in somewhere that doesn't have access to the production of food, they're eating trash and now we are having to bring in from other places. So like people like you are absolute heroes and I'm hoping that the takeaway here is like we've got to support y'all because if you don't raise the food and we don't have the local processors to package
Weston Walker:
Right,
Logan Duvall:
it and distribute
Weston Walker:
right,
Logan Duvall:
it,
Weston Walker:
right.
Logan Duvall:
we're gonna be in a bad place and we've got to eat meat and the whole demonization of it is nonsense.
Weston Walker:
Right. Oh, we could have all kinds of conversations about different realms of this, because I've studied out several different things. And one of the most recent, eating for your blood type is something we kind of looked at and thought about. You know, it's hard, had to do a special test to just figure that out. But my wife is an A blood type, and I'm an O, well O's supposed to have been the hunter-gatherers and you know, from scotch and. Wales, Germany, you know, and all up in France. And so, I get along a lot better on the no carb, high protein diet. But my wife, she's an A, and that's more the Mediterranean. You know, she got a little Italian blood and some stuff. Well, she gets along a little better with less meat, you know, chicken and so on. She's not really supposed to eat a lot of beef. So, but she feels a lot better when she's kind of following those things, you know what I mean? She loves tomatoes. I grew a bunch of them this year, but I love them and I get to eat them and she's not really supposed to because of inflammation. So everybody's bodies, it makes a lot of sense that we're all, well none of us are exactly the same. So I wouldn't say that there's a only going to be one way for everybody. I don't think that's probably a fair assessment. But I do think that everything we know, well we know from the word that it's... was perfect in the garden and then things got screwed up whenever they didn't do what they're supposed to. Well I believe that the battle right there from the beginning what the enemy had been working on is pride. Well man gets to thinking he's got a better way, a simpler way, an easier way through the lies and so that's what has come about since, well I mean I don't know how far you've ever gone into some of this but William Albrecht is soiled. scientist from University of Missouri back here before the World War II if I remember right and I followed a lot of his natural balance and stuff at times and I you know my understanding is that World War II we didn't have ammonium nitrate until after World War II whenever they were spreading it on the land to try and get rid of it and they noticed they saw an increasing green up of plants well hey we've got a lot of got all this system in place for making this as a by-product of the ammunition manufacturing. Well, what are we going to do now? And so that's where that came from. And I think if I'm not mistaken that you could probably say a lot of the chemicals that we use, you know, herbicides and so on were because of war. And so these, but it's always this law of unintended consequences. That's the, I know that there's a lot of people in agriculture and say that I believed that mantra too when I was young and you know we're trying to feed the world you know and whatever we can do to make that's a noble thing and it is but if we're not careful we'll that law of unintended consequences we'll end up with something bad going on and what do they say the United States has got the cheapest food system in the world but we've also got the highest medical expenses in the world. So You can lay
Logan Duvall:
There's
Weston Walker:
those.
Logan Duvall:
a cost
Weston Walker:
Yeah,
Logan Duvall:
somewhere. There's a,
Weston Walker:
yeah.
Logan Duvall:
you know, Weston, that goes back to what I was getting at with the whole the feed the world mentality. That's kind of what got us into this issue, this health crisis that we are absolutely in. It's bigger, better, faster, more efficient, factory style linear thinking. Whereas if we all focused on feeding our communities, right, and teaching that, and replicating it and having these localized regenerative food systems.
Weston Walker:
Yes.
Logan Duvall:
We do feed the world, right, by proxy, by just everybody doing it themselves instead of one person trying to feed the world. It's not
Weston Walker:
Right.
Logan Duvall:
going to work.
Weston Walker:
No.
Logan Duvall:
Brother, thank you. I think there's a lot of, you know, things that we could go on and on with. But supporting our local farmers, supporting our local processors, our local markets. I think
Weston Walker:
Yeah.
Logan Duvall:
is going to have the positive unintended consequences long term.
Weston Walker:
Yeah, and I think whether it's looking at soil fertility, you know, in a pasture scenario or in your gardens or whatever, but trying to figure out how to do things more like they used to be before we could go buy it out of a bottle or a bag and trying to do things sometimes less is more. And if we can try and study, and that's when I was talking about the knowledge thing. Study out those old what the old path if you will you know and neglect not Those things and I really believe that we should be trying to Well I've said it like this Whether it's Gabe Brown and Joel Salatin and Kit Feyro Ian Mitchell Inas Greg Judy What other names you want to throw into all this that you've probably had some podcast or heard these names? I Related kind of like this. They're all singing from the same hymnal Church reference here But some of them are on different songs Some of them are on the same song in different verses of the same song And if you're not careful, you'll hear whatever what everybody's saying and it sounds like noise and confusion. So well, that's not what's meant to be, but if you can drill down and listen to the message of each of them, find the common thread, well, our Lord and Savior's the message in all those, and when you get to that point, then you can say, ah, yeah, there's a piece of this, there's a tool over here I can use, and there's a tool over here, and whenever I start looking in my toolbox for what's going on right now, then I've got the tool to apply. Just don't... think that you can only go one way or the other. And it's the same thing. I use old Doug Peterson's methodology for stockpile grazing in the winter. And then I'll go do Jim Garish's quick, kind of take half, leave half deal. And then I'll start, but as the grass keeps growing, I start slowing down. I think Kit Pfeiffer will probably summates grazing as good as anything. And that's to put the most numbers of animals possible. on the smallest area possible for the shortest period of time possible. And that will replicate your, you know, herds, the wild ungulate herds, grazing and moving on and then give lots of rest period. Because the Lord made this whole thing where it works without man's intervention. So let's get back, try and take self out of it, quit trying to manage for what we don't want and manage for what we do want. And uh... I think we can simplify our lives a lot. You know, I mean the salt program that we're using. Man, Gerald Fry is a name you might be familiar with, you know, different ones, and minerals, and I've studied out books and this, and tried to, and I've tried every gamut of it, and some good programs, but just nothing ever really fit. And this one we're using Steve Campbell's, the one that's got some videos on it. and that's really not, he wasn't the one originally come up with, but just sea salt, baking, natural baking soda, you know, and Redman's conditioner and some molasses to entice him. Lord willing, I mean, knock on wood, we've been having the best health for now 18 months, two years almost, on our cattle, just going simple, and it's, they're better off. And so, I know that. trying to get self out of the way, manage, learn, study, and be a good observer is the way to produce. And that's locally, in whatever facet you're in. And then like you're saying, share the word with your neighbors. I mean, look at those markets and ultimately, we're still a consumer driven market in the US for a little while, I don't know how long. But. But I do think that we can vote with our dollars. And yeah, it'll cost us more probably locally, but we may spend less on our medical bills and going to the doctor if we're eating more healthy.
Logan Duvall:
Absolutely. Man, thank you. Thank you so much. Before we wrap up, tell us where we can find you and how we can support, you know, what y'all are doing, especially for farmers looking for maybe some of those stud genetics y'all got going on.
Weston Walker:
Well, ferrocattle.com is the website you can find. And under the Cooperate producers, I'd be listed under that. I've actually been working on setting up a speaking tour down into the southeast. Kit, Ferro, and I, during the week of Labor Day, is going to be in Waynesboro, Georgia, Dothan, Alabama, and then over to Cameron, Texas on the Saturdays, September 9th to evaluate our heat tolerant bulls that we've been producing down to have a sale in November in Leetahatchee, Alabama. And so, you know, you can sign up for kits, news, thought-provoking newsletters, emails and such. And, you know, I think just trying to... that. Try and educate yourself and think outside the box. And just don't listen to necessarily everybody, what's that old saying about following the money? You can usually figure out, well, somebody's got a product to sell and win. And granted, we do, we've got a product to sell of an animal that I think though is gonna help the person's bottom line and make more efficient cows. And that's why. That's why we're doing it. I feel like the Lord's been a blessing on it. We're thankful for His guidance on the matter.
Logan Duvall:
Thank you my friend. I appreciate your time. Appreciate you sharing your wisdom and look forward to. Getting Arkansas added on that tour. I didn't I didn't hear it in there. We're going to have to get you to stop on y'alls way through.
Weston Walker:
Well, Arkansas, we hit pretty hard. North Arkansas and the Ozarks portion of it, we've got a lot of customers. We've kind of been in there and done quite a bit. It's down in that Delta region that I'm hoping, I've talked to some people that'll probably go to that Vidalia. That'd be about a three hour drive for some of them. But yeah, we can only get Kit away from the office so long. He's ready to go to the cabin and go fishing, I think.
Logan Duvall:
I love it. Thank you, Weston.
Weston Walker:
Thank you, Logan. Appreciate it. Keep up the good work. God bless.
Logan Duvall:
Alright. Don't close that out just yet. It'll do a little upload thing and then... Yeah.
Weston Walker:
On my end, it says 17% of-
