According to the Canadian Tourism Co­mmission an estimated 4.4 million Canadians are Soft Outdoor Adventure Enthusiasts — that is, they enjoy outdoor activities oriented around hiking and backpacking, mountain biking, wildlife and bird viewing, canoeing and kayaking, and fishing. Given Canada’s aging population, it’s also a demographic likely to grow as more Canadians find themselves too old for more strenuous activities like rock climbing, skiing, and white-water rafting. Canadian ranchlands are ideal places for the activities these tourists enjoy.

Nature tourism could be a good opportunity for making extra money from your land and creating a more regular cash flow between cattle sales. It’s not for everyone, though; any business diversification needs to be entered into carefully and after asking some important questions. To help you out we’ve put together four tips for deciding whether nature tourism is right for you.

1. Decide whether you are a people person

The most fundamental question you must answer before you consider diversifying into nature tourism is whether or not you are a “people person.” This isn’t just making sure you’re not an antisocial grouch or a loner but asking yourself honestly whether you would enjoy meeting lots of new people and sharing your enthusiasm for your land and the natural world with them. You may have a big family and a wide circle of friends but dealing with strangers constantly throughout your open months can be wearing on even very gregarious people.

2. Catalogue your natural assets

Ask yourself what features make your ranch unique. It might be a spectacular view of a local mountain or a stream full of trout that any fisherman would love. It may be fields full of wildflowers or populations of wild game that city dwellers rarely see like elk or bighorn sheep. Consider that you may be a bit jaded to the natural beauty of your land; after all, you see it every day of your life. Ask visitors, both family and professionals like vets, what they like about your land and what they think are noteworthy features that other people would enjoy seeing.

3. Consider your resources

When considering diversifying into natural tourism you need to be realistic about your management abilities and whether the new venture can integrate into your existing business. You’ll need to consider things like how much of the year you’ll allow access to your ranch, and whether that could interfere with your breeding or calving seasons. In addition you’ll want to think about what to charge for admission and how many people would have to attend in a year to make it viable. Consider not just your own time but the time of family members and employees who work on the ranch as well.

You’ll also need to know about and comply with all the health and safety restrictions for your province. This means making sure that trails are properly marked and can be safely traversed, and that you have first aid and other safety equipment on site to deal with any emergencies. If someone has a heart attack on your land and calls for help you want to make sure that search and rescue personnel don’t have to search every acre but can know in what areas the afflicted person will be.

4. Consider partnering with another business

By now you’re probably starting to realize that diversifying into nature tourism requires a lot of different skills and capabilities, and can occupy a lot of time. While you may still like the idea you may not be willing or prepared to handle every aspect of the business yourself. In that case you may want to consider partnering with a nature tourism company, one that offers package tours to outdoor enthusiasts. They can handle marketing as well as leading tours of your land to see its natural beauty in exchange for a cut of the admission fees. Internet searches will enable you to find companies specializing in nature tourism. Get in touch with them and invite them to check out your property to see if they’d be interested in a partnership.

Nature tourism is not a cure-all that will “save the ranch” but instead should be looked at as a means to diversify your income and provide ready cash during lean times. However, if you’re proud of your land, like meeting people, and love the idea of sharing the beauties of nature with tourists then it just may be a venture you’ll want to undertake.

The post Tips for diversifying your ranch with nature tourism appeared first on Canadian Cattlemen.

One major benefit they enjoy is being able to get a consistent price for their meat: unlike live cattle sales, where the price can fluctuate in response to supply and demand as well as the animal’s condition, direct-marketed freezer beef can be sold for a consistent price that covers the cost of production and includes a healthy profit. Ranchers can also charge a premium on their beef by being able to certify that it is grass fed, organic, free of artificial hormones, and the like.

Direct marketing beef can be a productive form of business diversification for ranchers but be warned: it takes a lot of time and commitment. Ranchers who choose to direct market have to develop many more skills than just those necessary to succeed at raising cattle: they have to understand food safety regulations, how to market their beef, how to build and sustain positive customer relationships, and how to manage the new line of business to keep it profitable.

If you’re curious about direct marketing, or are looking for a new way to diversify your ranch income, we’ve assembled the following questions to ask to see whether selling to consumers is right for you:

1. Do I have the time?

One thing ranchers learn quickly when they start a direct-marketing operation: it always takes more time than they had thought it would. Tending a cattle herd is already a full-time occupation, and running a direct-marketing business is likely adding another full-time job on top of that. There’s not only a lot to learn and keep up to date on, there are also relationships to be managed, inventories to be tracked, and financials to be kept in order. If you have family involved in your business, it may be possible to assign one of them to develop this end of the business while you devote yourself primarily to the cattle-raising and -breeding end of your operation.

Chances are there is probably at least one ranch that direct markets in your area. Getting in touch with them to find out about their experience getting started and how it changed their working life can be very helpful to making your own decision.

2. Do I know where I can find customers?

Direct marketing beef is more complicated than selling to a feedlot but also presents a lot of opportunities. You can sell your beef from a store on your ranch (where you can also sell a range of other products like spice rubs and barbecue sauces), through a local farmers’ market, or direct to restaurants and supermarkets. You can also sell to municipal buying groups, where consumers band together to buy meat in bulk at a good price for their members.

Start by reaching out through your personal networks — family and friends, your local church group, and a local farmers market. Make up flyers to distribute with price lists. Also contact owners and head chefs at restaurants and find out what kinds of cuts they are looking for. This can give you an initial base of customers to whom you can sell your first direct-marketed beef.

Labelling your meat products is a must, and it is also helpful to have a website to advertise both the quality of your beef and provide consumers with prices. Website hosting is not a great expense but it is important to pay attention to site design and product branding: after all, it’s the image people will have of your product and what they will remember when they want to seek it out again. It’s worth spending money on a good web and graphic designer to get the job done right.

3. Do I know where to find a good processor?

Any beef sold to consumers has to be processed at a federally inspected and licensed slaughterhouse. Processing beef is the second-highest cost in direct marketing after the raising of the cows themselves. You’re going to need a good personal relationship with a processor to make a profit, and for that to happen you’ll both have to find a win/win solution.

When considering a processor ask them what they need to succeed economically — how many carcasses they have to process, how much advance warning they need before delivery of live animals, and what their minimum order size is. Be up front with them about your needs as well, and how much you can pay and still generate a profit. That way you can find your way to a mutually satisfactory price that pleases you both.

4. Am I prepared to handle delivery?

While your customers can pick up your meat from the processor directly this complicates their lives and can make purchasing from you unattractive. Offering to deliver the meat yourself can be a great boost. You’ll need to acquire a Food Establishment Permit from your regional health authority and a vehicle capable of delivering meat in a still-frozen condition. Alternatively, you can contract this service to a business that specializes in supplying freezer trucks.

Like many kinds of diversification direct marketing your beef is unlikely to replace your main business of selling to feedlots, but it can provide a valuable source of extra income and, with pre-sales, give you more cash to work with between sales of your herd.

For more info you can check out the Government of Alberta’s informative page on direct marketing beef.

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The primary concern with regard to antibiotics is that they may be contributing to the growth of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. This is not only a public health hazard; it’s also a serious image problem for the beef industry. Environmental and consumer health advocacy groups have been drawing attention to this problem for years, and it is becoming a serious sticking point for claiming that beef is an environmentally sustainable food.

As a result of this, many cattle producers have begun transitioning to probiotics, which are also known as direct feed microbials (DFM). Unlike antibiotics, which are drugs which kill bacteria (both harmful and health-promoting ones) probiotics are live cultures of beneficial bacteria. By introducing them into an animal’s diet a cattle producer can, in theory at least, promote greater animal health and resistance to infection by replenishing the healthful bacteria in their cow’s gut.

Animal product manufacturers have been swift to provide a range of probiotics to ranchers and feedlot operators, claiming that they can be used to replace antibiotics. Companies like SCD Probiotics, Life Products Inc., and others offer a range of live culture products and make strong claims for their efficacy in promoting animal health and growth. The probiotics have three main claimed potentials: promoting cattle health, reducing foodborne illness occurrences, and improving the public perception of the cattle industry.

It’s important to distinguish probiotics from “prebiotics,” which are digestible sugars that promote the growth of healthy bacteria. These substances, like chicory root fibre (inulin) and turmeric have been shown in recent studies to produce noticeable (i.e. greater than expected by random chance) positive effects on nutrient digestion and immune system responses in a broad range of animals. Their results in ruminants are less certain and remains an area for investigation.

Given that they are just additional supplements of the healthy bacteria that already naturally live in cow stomachs and intestines, probiotics are unlikely to be harmful. But will they be beneficial enough to justify the cost to cattle producers?

This is still an uncertain issue. There have been a number of promising independent studies conducted but not enough that there can be said to be a scientific consensus about their effectiveness. Part of the problem is the complexity of the ruminant digestive tract, which makes the effects of probiotics harder to trace than in monogastrics like pigs, sheep, and chickens.

French researchers, publishing in the journal Beneficial Microbes, analyzed data from studies in Europe and North America and found probiotics, in particular live yeast, showed a strong ability to reduce acidosis in cattle, a common digestive disorder that is linked to bloating, laminitis, and liver abscesses. It is believed that the probiotics contribute to animal health by outcompeting harmful bacteria in the cow’s gut. They also showed a notable ability to reduce methane gas emissions, an important factor for reducing cattle’s contributions to climate change.

In research published by the University of Guelph probiotics had a notable effect on preventing the shedding of E. coli O157 bacteria in feedlot cattle. This would be a notable advance because that strain of E. coli is one of the primary contributors to a foodborne illness in humans. Similar effects have been shown in chickens as well, leading scientists to believe that the effects are general across different animal populations.

Through the Beef Science Cluster, the Beef Cattle Research Council is funding a major Canadian research study into these and other potential benefits of probiotics. Under Dr. Wade Abbot of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada the scientists are working to develop the passage of probiotics and prebiotics through the digestive tracts of cattle, enabling them to isolate the effects of them from other environmental and nutritional conditions. They expect to publish their research next year.

Once the data is in from that trial and others we will still need to wait to find out how much economic impact the probiotics can have. Assuming their effects and costs are similar to the currently used antibiotics then there is a case to be made for substitutions. Agricultural economists will need to study just how much benefit they produce to determine whether they make sense to a rancher’s bottom line.

Regardless of just how much benefit the probiotics produce they will give ranchers and feedlot operators a new talking point with consumers. They are naturally occurring, are not a product of genetic engineering, and contain no synthetic chemicals, and thus fit all definitions of an organic product. If they are shown to be beneficial in an economically justifiable way they will have an added benefit in improving public perception as an “all-natural” product.

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