HFC - Meating In the Middle

Ben Rice - Prairie Land Dairy 

I realize this is two days late, nonetheless, here is the recap. Husker Food Connection, is actually a registered student organization on campus, but we just had our big event of the year. Meating in the Middle - was a way to connect students with where their food comes from. People are four generations removed from the farm today, so it is more important than ever to educate consumers with the correct information. HFC partnered with several companies to help sponsor the food and information packets that were handed out. We had a chicken, two baby pigs, a dairy cow and calf, a steer, and a tractor, along with a free meal!
One of the highlight attractions was the dairy cow and baby calf that Prairie Land Dairy brought. In addition to being a sponsor for the lunch, they were also there to represent the dairy industry.

12 week old piglet 

In addition to the dairy cow and calf, there we a couple baby pigs there as well. I'll admit, that I'm not much of a pig person, but I do love me some bacon! 

Milking Cow

One of the neat resources we had available to us, (HFC planning committee) was the "Milking Cow". This is a station where participants could learn how to milk a cow. When her udder gets empty, you can recycle the water back in through a port in the top. It was fun getting to teach students, even some Husker Football players, how to milk a cow. 

John Deere prototype tractor 

It wouldn't be a proper "Ag Day" without a tractor there! This is one from the tractor test lab here on campus! 

My favorite part of #HFC14 was getting to talk to students on campus about agriculture and why we do what we do. I was surprised by how open students were willing to be with the mis-conceptions about ag. This gave us the opportunity to help guide them in the right direction. Here are some of my favorite facts that I got to share with students: 

-Nebraska is the Beef State, meaning we have more cattle on feed than Texas, despite how much bigger they are than us. 

-In Nebraska, cattle out number people 4 to 1.

-It would take 7 cups of raw broccoli to equal the calcium found in one glass of milk!

-A dairy cow can produce 120 cups of milk a day!

-White eggs and brown eggs have the exact same nutritional value. 

Feel free to share these with all your friends too! 

*Little side note, the posters that you see displayed in these pictures were designed by me!