Alright. I think I am finally ready to sit down and write about it. When I first saw it, I will admit, it fired me up. I was horrified and disgusted. What am I referring to…? Well I am referring to these headlines:

14 cattle trucks burned in arson at Harris Ranch

Which was posted all over my Facebook a couple days ago by numerous Ag friends of mine. You can find the rest of the article HERE I’m not here to report it, I am here to discuss it. Now if this first article isn’t scary enough.. Check this out.

Working in the meat industry, I am bombarded with stories upon stories of animal rights “activists” going about their activities to try and shut down my industry and what it is my family has done for 45 years. However, this is beyond “activism”. Some out there are calling it terrorism, which it may be. But plain and simple fact is that this is in NO way, shape, or form acceptable. Granted these extremists make up less than 1% of the field, however, their actions have progressively gotten more and more violent. And this is a scary fact. Who’s to say that the next target won’t be their local butcher shop..? That could be us. Our livelihood could be lost due to people who think they know what it is that we do. Which brings me to my other point, the majority of the people who jump on this “activism” bandwagon OFTEN TIMES have little knowledge about what it is they are fighting against. My point in case here is the video posted at the bottom of the second link. In the video, the man calls what is a feed lot, A “FEEDING FARM”. He isn’t even using proper terminology and I will venture to guess that he more than likely has no idea that cattle are not raised on a feed lots but in fact only spend 150-240 days there. If you didn’t know that and want to know more about feed lots, there is a good first hand experience WRITTEN BY A VEGETARIAN: RIGHT HERE. Fact is that feed lots aren’t anything like what the media and other sources write them up to be. But that’s a whole other topic and blogpost better left to someone who is actually an expert in the field!

The man in the video also spews out a lot of facts like the fact that Harris Ranch runs 150,00 heads of cattle through their operation. Claiming that more than likely, you’ve gotten your beef from Harris Ranch. Hmmm. Let’s take a look into this, according to USDA, in 2010 beef consumption was 26.4 billion pounds. Now no matter how many head of cattle that Harris Ranch runs through it’s operation, it does not equal out to 26.4 billion pounds, I can tell you that. So the probability that you got your beef from Harris Ranch is very small. In the spectrum of large scale meat production, Harris Ranch is one small spec in the spectrum. Many people living outside of California, until this incident, had never even heard of Harris Ranch. And if in fact you happened to get your meat from Harris Ranch, you would know it! Harris Ranch proudly markets its beef. They take pride in their operations.

“For over 40 years, Harris Ranch Beef Company, the processing and marketing component of the beef division, has continually strived to produce the highest quality beef in the world. Over the years we have built a uniquely integrated beef production system where cattle are sourced, fed and humanely processed exclusively by Harris Ranch. Few if any beef companies – other than Harris Ranch – can claim they control all aspects of production. Still family owned and operated, the Harris family has always taken great pride in raising its beef to be as pure and great tasting as nature intended. This tradition of quality is evident in all of our beef products—you can truly taste the difference.” – Harris Ranch

Harris ranch remains family owned and operated, they give plenty of information about their operations, in fact, they allow tours through their feed lot operation AS WELL AS their slaughterhouse operation, they post a VIRTUAL tour! In other words, they are TRANSPARENT. Isn’t that what everyone is asking for these days!? What more could you ask for in a company!? And this is what they get, act of arson from people who more than likely have no idea what it is that Harris Ranch does.

THIS is why I chose to start this blog. It wasn’t to promote Chico Locker & Sausage Co. Inc. or our products, it wasn’t to promote my family and our history, it was to EDUCATE people on my industry. Give people the REAL FACTS about what they hear from the media, documentaries, etc. Knowledge is indeed power, not fire and guns. So do me a favor and before you criticize someone on their food choices, take a serious look into their industry, dig deep for the TRUE facts. Or if you don’t want to do the research, TALK TO A RANCHER or FARMER! They will usually share with you ALL you want to know. You will come to find out that indeed, they like transparency! And in fact do their best to provide you and other consumers with the highest quality product they can.