AR-News: 2 countries, one herd

[jim robertson]

Two countries, one herd


01/18/04

MICHELLE COLE

PICTURE BUTTE, Alberta -- Rick Paskal runs a trio of feedlots situated just 
85 miles north of the U.S.-Canada border.


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It is here that he takes truckloads of cattle for fattening up on grain and 
then, when they're ready for slaughter, ships them out. It's a revolving 
door of the hoofed that has long blended cattle from Canada and the nearby 
United States -- and routinely sold them back to processors in both 
countries.

Mad cow disease makes that painfully clear, with U.S. officials persistent 
in blaming the Washington state mad cow incident on a Canadian cow, and 
Paskal is sharp on the point.

"It isn't a Canadian problem. It isn't Washington state's problem," Paskal 
says, pulling his pickup to a stop alongside a feeding pen. "It's a North 
American problem because of the integration of our herds."

In the pen were about 200 head, standing at troughs munching grain or 
clustering on manure mounds for warmth against frigid prairie winds. And 
just as surely as mad cow disease has hit his business hard, Paskal said 
that among those 200 cattle were an uncertain number of U.S.-born heifers.

For years the U.S.-Canada border hadn't really existed. The U.S. herds and 
Canadian herds were one. Trade statistics prove that out. In Alberta, that 
fact is popularly assumed. Alberta newspapers, radio announcers and 
government officials all referred last week to the two cases of mad cow 
disease "in North America."

full story:
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/front_page/1074344808182640.xml

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