It's time for a new era of communication in the swine industry one that you can get the latest updates while commuting for driving to Farms here. You will have the brightest minds of the global swine industry in your pocket. One of the workers come out with a dead cow in the bucket when you gently laid the cow down he got out of the tractor. He moved her head around, you know, kind of just make her look like she's gently sleeping and got back in the tractor and left and that That's the type of culture we need to have on our Farms that were being have so much respect for these animals, but even after death, we're still treating them with that dignity in that respect because if that would have been videotaped there's no one could have argued that person didn't respect that animal and so it goes all the way down to even you know, even our debt stock, you know swine it podcast is only possible with the support of forward-looking and Innovative sponsors, like along Coast previs sent A, New Perspective. Visit previs sent prrs dot U s-- to learn more Newt request experts serving producers and delivering breakthrough Solutions Genesis. The first Power in genetics Xin Pro essential trace minerals, exceptional performance every Pig a simple yet powerful Pig health and production management tool just stall always one step ahead in swine feeding. Welcome to Finding podcast, my name is Marsha room Salvage your host for today's episode this episode sponsor highlight is about just all celebrating its 25th anniversary. Just all manufactures the original Wireless Standalone swine feeding system designed by pork producers for pork producers. They are simple reliable and provide Peace of Mind 24 hours a day 7 days a week 365 days a year. Just stall is not just manufactured by an equipment company, but by a family pork production business with a slat level understanding just all always one step ahead in swine feeding. Hello everyone today. We have dr. Marisa hake and shoot chat with us about food production and misconceptions and social media experiences. How are you Maria? A I'm doing great. How about you doing great doing great. Once again appreciate your time. And if you can start telling us about yourself you are the first gas that is not focused on pigs. So so that's cool because we like we like to get different type of input and announcer experience with different areas. So yeah, if you can just tell us you know, how How you got involved in livestock and in your career so far? Yeah. Well, I appreciate being the first man Pig person on but so I'm originally from Michigan I grew up on the west side of the state and we I grew up on just a cash crop farm. So it was always involved with agriculture. I knew that's kind of what I wanted to do is always one of those people that wanted to be a veterinarian and then I went to Michigan State. I did my undergrad in animal science. And that's really when I knew I wanted to be in food animal and because I was from Michigan, you know, we're a very Dairy strong state. So I was really interested in Dairy medicine. So then I got into Michigan State vet school and I did a dual degree. I got my masters in public health as well as my dbm. And so I was really interested. You know, I love Dairy. I loved who them production I did it. I did a couple swine externships very and so just I really liked food animal aspect as a whole and when I was graduating I was really looking for Mission with a company or as a staff at nari for veterinarian for a farm could just liked that that aspect of veterinary medicine where you could you know be on Farm all the time train, you know follow out projects and stuff like that really the people side of it as well. I liked a lot of so that was what I was really looking for and when I was graduating I found a job with Midwest deal here in Has the words based out of and you know, I didn't I had like some concerns with veal. You know, I didn't have much exposure to it. But I was always I always liked the young stock side of the dairy business. And so that just fit really well for me and you know what I was interested in. So I've been with them for almost five years now as their Veterinary support, so we have more based out of Indiana we have most of our calves are Deanna what we have calves and Michigan and Ohio as well. So I spend a lot of time on the road going between those farms and I always tell people where kind of like a Hog operation because we own the Cavs. We own the feed I'm and and all the medicine and provide service but we have contract Growers that provide the Barnes and labor. We're just like smiling. Yeah, we get to provide people with that kind of that. They want to be, you know some small. Ali farms and this is a way for them to be in agriculture and take on so much with very interesting. No appreciate that and you interact a lot with consumers and very cool. I found you on Instagram. So that's that's so cool to see that and actually I want you to share the or Instagram to the folks as well if you want and then what is the biggest food production misconception in your opinion? You know I can talk about so I got started on social media because of the misconceptions and and kind of what happened is we had bloggers come into our facilities and then went back and kind of shared with their you know, they're following and people had a lot of questions. And so that's kind of how I got started was just making a platform to answer those questions, but I think the biggest misconception is what Are doing on farm for animal welfare and how much you know, we do that to improve how they're raised and cared board and that's kind of the story that I'm trying to get out. There is, you know, farmers and ranchers and producers that is their number one goal. Every single day is to keep their, you know, their animals healthy and well cared for and I think that's lost on a lot of consumers as well as that, you know, big is always bad. So in the consumers mind big farm is always a bad farm. Right? Right, you know being an agriculture that some of our larger scale Farms have the best animal welfare. They had the best production, you know, and so getting that story out there that these large often Family Farms are some of our best production practices the very very cool. So so so far what what would you say has been your biggest accomplishment? Is there any stories there for the social media interaction or? Oh, you know I think honestly just getting information out about veal because there was you want to talk about misconceptions and issues with consumer perception. We can talk about veal because we knew we definitely have a comeback story but being such a small industry. We've never been able to tell that story to our consumers, you know, everybody pictures 1970-1980. He's veal barn and you know the activist really ran with that Imaging and so getting getting this information out there. Honestly to Dairy Farmers or two other people in agriculture has been our biggest accomplishment because it's we're just too smart ass all the marketing dollars to get there, you know. So social media is free, which is great and that's really helped us get some information out there. Very cool very cool. And I know I have some experience on managing the relationship with activists and also some on-farm experiences any tips. You can share on that regard. Yes. Well being on social media and sharing, you know, your agriculture story your farm can be very very scary and activist online are ruthless. And they have no boundaries whatsoever. But in the end so that can be a little off-putting for Farms. But we have to remember that we are focusing on what we call the movable metal. And so the group of consumers that can actually be influenced by what they learn about our Farms, right? So the activist the 2% that are, you know, never you're never going to change their mind and so that shouldn't be focusing our efforts there and try to fight them. You know what I mean? Mean we should sing on that mom who's at the grocery store and is trying to choose between almond and regular milk or pork or tofu, you know, and so that's where we need to focus our efforts. So on social media. Yes, I get activist activity. Honestly, I just block and delete and there's no use in engaging with those people and they will kind of suck the life out of you if you do I don't I don't recommend it. But as far as you know on the flip side of our farm experiences, we've definitely had issues with activists and what we've learned is a we'll all find your weakest point, you know, they'll find your worst Brian. They will take everything out of context they will you know in everything on you. So definitely we need to have our Farms ready and have protocols in place, but we also have to have this culture and this is kind of what we learned through our Is this what would this look like to the consumer? So I always use this great example of my husband. He was chopping for a dairy farm and he was you know going to The Silo child a dump and one of the workers come out with a dead cow in the bucket and you know that got that cow is dead. There's nothing more we can do for her but that guy could have just dumped her in the you know, the rendering pile and moved on with this day, but he didn't so he gently laid the couch. Down he got out of the tractor. He moved her head around, you know, kind of just make her look like she's gently sleeping and go back to the Tractor and laughed and that's the type of culture. We need to have on our Farms that works. We have so much respect for these animals, but even after death, we're still treating them with that dignity in that respect because if that would have been videotape, there's no one could have argued that person didn't respect that animal right? And so it goes all the way down to even you know, even our Stock me, you know, so I think having that type of culture on our Farms will really help us with activist activity. I love that. That's that's profound very very cool. Very nice. Anything else on misconceptions or social media experiences. Dr. Hecht. I'd like to cover before we jump into our three questions that we ask every guest, you know, so I just appreciate you having me. Me and as someone else in agriculture because I've always taken this we're kind of all in this together, right and agriculture tends to try to get a little bit siloed. We're we're like we're swine and we're beef or dairy and we're you know, we're poultry whereas our consumers don't see it that way. They see it as production animal agriculture, right? And when one of us gets thrown under the bus all of us get thrown beneath the bus so, you know with these videos and stuff that come out it's going to Really easy for the swine industry to say. Oh, that's Dairy. That's not us. Whereas you need to be understanding each other and supporting each other as a whole because we all face the same issues in this I think the same misconceptions. Yes. Yes make that makes total sense. Yeah. It's it's one bolt and some of those videos have all stitches in it as well. So actually very nice since in 71 Zoom Pro Corporation has focused on one thing Trace mineral nutrition as the most research proven organic feed Trace mineral products in the industry Xin Pro performance minerals deliver performance and profitability to swine operations around the globe to know more go to Xin Pro.com. It is time to our fails. Yes, so jumping to the three questions. What is your favorite livestock related book or resource? So I this isn't really like a Veterinary book, but I love Bernays Browns books. I don't know if you've ever heard of them. Yeah TED talks. Yeah, because I think we know we sometimes we forget we're in the livestock business, but we're really in the people business and I manage a lot of people and a lot of the guys that Under mirror, I work with every single day are you know their men and their older men and so having understand how to manage people and different aspects I think is actually more important for my my job than actual, you know, veterinary medicine very interesting friends. Remember, she's big on like vulnerability and that kind of stuff right? Exactly. Yeah, very cool. Very nice. Any other resource that do consume a lot. Well, my my just favorite is I'm on the road a lot. So I listen to a lot of audiobooks and podcasts. And so I really like the Mind Hunter series. Have you heard of this book? I've heard I never read it. Yeah, it's so it's like how they form the FBI like serial killer unit and how they profiling serial killer. Oh, yeah, I think there is there a Netflix series. Yeah, I think so. Okay. Cool. Yeah. So I really like that those books and then my favorite murder podcast talks about a lot of these very very so that kind of keeps me entertained while driving. That's cool. Yeah, just love audio books as well. It's you can multitask exactly cool in your opinion what separates successful livestock professionals from those who are not, you know, I think that being able to balance we We tend to sometimes get really focused on just welfare or just production or just profitability but the good ones can continually, you know kind of Juggle all of those different things and going forward. We're definitely going to have to do that because our consumers are demanding it. So if we can continue to, you know balance all of those big important things, that's how we're going to move forward very interesting and the best people talk a lot about is, you know, being a specialist, but I think To some degree. There's still a lot of added to be somewhat generalist. Yeah, right. Very cool. Awesome. Dr. Marissa. Hey can appreciate your time. And yeah, we are happy to have our first known known pig expert here. Thank you for having me. Thank you. Have a good one. You too. Hey guys and girls. Thank you so much for being part of our community as well as thanks for all the great guy. Gasps that we have had. I hope you enjoyed this podcast as much as I do to be part of our email list and get some exclusive materials go to our website www.3playmedia.com. That's wine. I t.com And subscribe to our e-mail list. I'll so we love feedback. So if you use the Apple podcasts app, please leave us a review. It is much appreciated. We'll talk soon.
Today’s episode will cover “Food production misconceptions and social media experiences”. “[…] He gently laid her head down… he got out of the tractor, moved her head around like if she was gently sleeping. That is the type of culture we need to have on our farms. We have so much respect for these animals even after death, that we are still treating them with that dignity and that respect. If that had been videotaped, there was no one that could have argued that that person didn’t respect that animal. So, it goes all the way down to even our dead stock.” – Dr. Marissa Hake. Our guest is Dr. Marissa Hake, another bright mind of the Global Livestock Industry. Dr. Hake is a graduate of Michigan State University where she received her Bachelor’s degree in Animal Science, a Doctorate in Veterinary Medicine and a Masters in Public Health. She is currently the staff veterinarian for Midwest Veal and is responsible for the welfare and health of over 30,000 veal calves. Dr. Hake spends most of her day working with small, family-owned veal farms throughout Indiana, Michigan and Ohio. What you will learn:   How she got involved in livestock and her career so far;  The biggest food production misconceptions;   Tips on managing the relationship with activists as well as on-farm experiences;   The role on social media on tackling food production misconceptions;   What separates successful livestock professionals from those that are not. Marissa’s favorite book or resource in general: Bréne Brown’s books, Mindhunter and audiobooks/podcasts Edited by Lauro Faccin 