by Leeann Minogue
Sweeping prairie vistas. ranchers on horseback, rounding up cattle on rolling hills. This probably sounds like a Western movie, but it’s not. It’s going on in southern Saskatchewan right now, and you can watch it all on YouTube.
For more than three years, Erika Stewart has been sharing videos of the real-life work on Pine Ranch, her family’s cattle business near Morse, Saskatchewan. These videos give beef consumers a chance to meet one of the families involved in the industry and to see how cattle are really raised. . By posting throughout the year, it lets lets viewers see the whole cycle of caring for cattle, including some practices that you might not expect to see.
Stewart’s videos show all of the ways ranchers typically keep their cattle healthy. This includes practices like vaccinations, which consumers may not initially understand. “I want to show them that there’s a good reason,” she says. “People can trust producers and trust the beef industry. They can feel good about choosing beef as an option for their family.”
One of Erika’s videos shows the family giving calves ear tags. “Yes, we give ear tags, and it looks like it may hurt them, but their skin is so much thicker than ours, and we get our ears pierced.” Erika is glad to have a chance to explain this process to an audience that might not be familiar with this process, which is designed to ensure that there is always data attached to the calves that can link the animals back to Pine Ranch.
As well as a rancher, Erika is the Provincial Coordinator for Verified Beef Production Plus (VBP+) program. This is a voluntary program that provides ranchers with training in standard operating procedures in four aspects of the beef industry: food safety, animal care, environmental stewardship and biosecurity. One area the program focuses on is to meet consumer demands for accountable, sustainable beef production. In the videos, consumers can watch Erika practice what she teaches.
Meet the family
Erika opens each of her videos with a shot of herself explaining that she’s a third-generation rancher. Erika and her husband Cyle and Erika’s parents are long-time ranchers, but they’re not your typical Saskatchewan ranchers. The whole family, along with their cattle, moved from Merritt, BC, to Saskatchewan in 2017. With urban pressure in BC, the family found it hard to expand their operation.
How different is ranch life in Saskatchewan? “We’re doing the same thing—raising beef—but it’s done very differently,” Erika says. In BC, the family ranched in the mountains where, at times, she says, “you could ride right past a cow because the brush is so thick.” Since they’ve moved to the prairies, “the cows have done a pretty good job of adapting.” Though she laughs that they are getting lazy, not having to walk up any mountains. And of course, the cattle are a lot easier to find, without all of the trees getting in the way.
Becoming an agvocate
Erika didn’t start filming and posting these videos in a quest to become famous. “At first, I didn’t want to be in the videos,” she says. But she did want to be an advocate for the beef industry. “If we don’t share our story, somebody else is going to. Somebody, possibly, without all the facts.”
Stewart’s family members were automatically cast in the video series, and they’ve all been very supportive. Her mother can’t be in many of the videos because if Erika’s out working, her mother is usually watching Erika and Cyle’s girls. “I feel very lucky to have my mom. We all just work together.”
Although Stewart usually has her camera with her, she doesn’t manage to capture everything that goes on. “Unfortunately, some of my subjects aren’t always cooperative.” After she’d taken videos for a summer episode that features the family tarping their silage pit, she realized she didn’t have the video on for some of the best parts of the evening, the times when their daughter was having a great time rolling tires around and doing her best to help. ‘It was a fun night,” Erika says. “That’s the great part of ranching with family and kids.”
Showing a realistic picture of ranch life is very important to Stewart, even down to the details of how she dresses for the videos. When she first started filming, Erika wondered if she should take extra time to put on makeup, but in the end, she decided to be her authentic self. “I would never put on makeup to go to work,” she says. “So, it is what it is.”
Like many farmers, Erika is modest about the work that she and her family do. It’s hard to square this trait with the family’s willingness to show themselves to the world on YouTube. “Farmers being modest often makes it harder to tell our story,” Erika says. She believes this has created a gap between what farmers do and what consumers understand about agriculture. “Years ago, we didn’t have to do this kind of thing. Now, so many people are removed from the farm.”
To get her story out to consumers, Erika has worked hard to overcome her modesty and her fears about what other ranchers might think of her decision to show her family’s work to the world. “I’m sharing what we do.
As she’s become more comfortable with her role in making these videos, Erika has also become more willing to promote these videos and make her work known. “Finally, I told myself to buck up. If I’m going to do this, the point is to get it to consumers. If I’m not getting it out there, it’s not meeting its purpose.”
