Asks Andrew Van Dam, in "The great American llama (and ostrich and emu) collapse" (WaPo).
Did any of you "invest" in wacky animals?
As in any investment strategy shaped like a pyramid, exotic livestock schemes rely not on selling animal products like milk, eggs, wool, meat or leather, but on selling the animals themselves to a new sucker.... [T]he classic mark for these dubious investments probably would have been a couple who had just retired or moved to the country and had a few extra acres burning a hole in their pockets.... During the boom years... every month as cadres of savvy bird brokers would spot new money the instant they walked in and bid up prices accordingly.... More dumb money flowed in as friends and neighbors worried about missing out on the ostrich-and-emu game.... [F]resh rounds of new rural residents [would] convince themselves it made sense to pay $40,000 for an emu....
ADDED: Is it true that the stress was on selling the animals and not on the products that could be made from them? I seem to remember the touting of emu meat. Here, there's this from 1992 in the NYT: "Emus and Ostriches Studied as Future Food":
"There is a huge market for ostrich hides, feathers and meat," said Dr. Kenneth Page, an avian venterinarian who has been working with Georgia's rapidly growing ostrich and emu industry for more than a year. It is $100 million to $200 million-a-year industry.
"The meat is red and it tastes just like steak, but it doesn't have any cholesterol," Dr. Page said. "In California, especially, it is becoming the new yuppie food." Ostrich and emu meat is also higher in protein and lower in fat than beef, he said....
And it wasn't just the seemingly amazing meat:
Ostrich feathers are used in the clothing industry and their hides are used for everything from billfolds to belts. "I like cowboy boots," Dr. Page said, "so I picked up a pair of those darn ostrich boots in October, for $695, and I understand that was a cheap pair."
Oil extracted from the emu, which is slightly smaller than an ostrich, standing close to six feet tall and weighing 110 to 115 pounds, can also be used as a pain reliever, its proponents say. Besides, said Charles F. Powell, the president of the Georgia Emu Association: "It's one of the best moisturizers on the market. When you put it on, it goes right down into your muscles without a greasy film or anything."
But there was still the worrisome news that the business had mostly to do with selling the birds (to suckers?):
[It] is essentially still a breeder's market. Because of the lucrative potential of the birds, nearly all are sold to people eager to raise ostriches or emus for themselves. A pair of mature breeding emus sell for $15,000 to $20,000, while an ostrich couple are close to $50,000....
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88 comments:
can we PLEASE have a flame war, on the benefits of Ostriches vs Emus?
I'll start: Emu's ain't SHIT, compared to Rheas.. You'd HAVE to be An IDIOT to not know that
As I’m sure someone has already mentioned, Liberty Mutual poached all the emus.
Sad.
If I had a million dollars
Well, I'd buy you an exotic pet
Yep, like a llama or an emu
I was in vet school during the ostrich craze. Ostriches were not just expensive to buy, but expensive to care for. Ostriches eat ANYTHING shiny and then require surgery to remove the foreign body, or step in a hole and break a leg which requires surgical fixation. A steady stream of ostriches were brought to the teaching hospital for care while I was in school. These birds are crazy, but maybe not as crazy as the people spending big buck to buy them.
I thought all the emus worked for Liberty Mutual now.
Where have all the emus gone?
They are in Ypsilanti.
Tulip bulbs on a minor scale.
Ignorance of both farmings and economics.
Pro tip: Do some advance scouting in the real world. The last time you went to Kroger were there signs, "Emu meat, $45.99 per pound" sitting beside the, "Sorry, sold out" sign? No? Then don't buy Emus to raise.
I laugh at all the people that, absent any actual experience in farming and raising animals for food, decide to retire to a small, working farm.
Throw in grossly overprices stock without a market and bwhahahahahahaha.
My father and brother were third generation sheep farmers, so they knew what they were doing. My stepbrother, on the other hand, was always looking for a get-rich-quick scheme without doing any hard work. He invested in emus in a big way in the 1990s and lost it all quickly. The emu/ostrich/llama bust happened many years ago in the ag world. It was apparent from the beginning that it was a pyramid scheme. I'm curious why it's just now making news at WaPo.
I recall the Emu era. We manufactured some cosmetic products with Emu oil. It was actually a really good oil for use, but it was part of the grasping for straws of Emu farmers looking for some way to monetize their crazy investment in Emus. The meat was quite good, but there were issues in processing the meat for interstate sale. Scaling the meat production to compete cost wise wasn't ever going to happen.
Where has all the cable TV advertising gone? Back in the 1990s, "I love alpacas" was a thing you couldn't escape. That generation of rural / semi-rural hobby investors is likely dead now. It's a lot easier to get people focused on specific new music, movies, or animal investments when there are only a handful of media outlets.
From 17 years ago "Raising alpacas gave me the resources to walk away from a 30-year corporate career":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-_1xM9zucM
One born every minute, according to Mr. Barnum.
Crypto increasingly crowds out other scams.
How many people ate an Emu burger and then invested in Emus? Probably not many.
I wonder what the media coverage was like during the growth of this scam. Was it skeptical or complicit?
I have general recollection of mostly positive articles on the trend. I'd like to think people were warned as the pyramid shape became apparent.
The best way to ensure an animal’s survival is to make it a food source.
Not since that bad experience with the chinchilla farm.
one of those taranto questions, no one was asking
So now I have "Where have all the emus gone" in some female folk singers voice playing nonstop in my head.
I'm old enough to remember when Chinchillas were the hot exotic animal to raise for fun and profit.
I recall dining on an emu burger at the North Carolina State Fair about 16 years ago in the pavilion occupied by the American Emu Association. They sold a quarter-pound emu burger dressed all the way for a dollar. I had to drown mine with A1 Sauce just to make the sandwich moist enough to swallow. Turkey burger is far superior to ground emu, and I despise turkey burger.
"How'd you like your emu burger?" cooed the AEA hostess wearing a chef's hat with an emu embroidered on the band. "Wasn't it delicious? Less fat and cholesterol than beef or even chicken!"
And less palatability than anything else more meat-like than modeling clay, was my successfully resisted reply. I think I just pretended to be a wandering inarticulate moron, a rather plausible charade one must admit.
Now, there's nothing objectively wrong with emu or ostrich meat. They both contain lots of protein and other vital nutrients. But if I were cast away on a liferaft with an emu and it came down to eating the bird or my own left foot, the choice might be resolved with a coin flip.
Emus were brought down by a hen MeToo movement.
Joe Biden on "shrinkflation"
Used to be, you'd get an emu for a hundred bucks.
Now, you open the box, and it's a kiwi.
Narr writes, "Not since that bad experience with the chinchilla farm."
Wasn't there an I Love Lucy episode about chinchillas? It's Lucy and Ethel. The chinchillas come down the conveyor belt. Mrs. Mertz applies the whipped cream topping, then Mrs. Richardo places a maraschino cherry on top and moves the finished chinchilla to the shipping area.
I think it ended in a whipped cream and cherry fight between Ethel and Lucy with the chinchillas piling up higher and higher at the end of the conveyor belt.
I haven't seen a shmoo in ages.
Long time passing.
According to the commercials they went into law enforcement. Defund the Police?
Didn’t The Hudson Brothers Razzle Dazzle Show have that guy what carried around a sassy emu? That one’s waay dead I’d imagine unless emus have a parrot’s life expectancy.
Did any of you "invest" in wacky animals?
The in-laws were into the fancy mongrel dogs. Their ‘friends’ were the breeders and arranged for a male puppy for some agreed stud service. The long con started the day they brought the pup home. I think the whole thing folded when we didn’t write the hefty four figure check for one. Kind of flattering to think we were the only marks.
As a young child we used to drive by buffalo farm in western Massachusetts. That was way before beefalo.
Liberty Mutual is obviously doing in emus for the sake of their hundreds of commercials. So who would have humorously thought that LiMu would become Bebu and LiMu Jr would disappear?
Liberty Mutual is obviously doing in emus for the sake of their hundreds of commercials. So who would have humorously thought that LiMu would become Bebu and LiMu Jr would disappear?
So the answer to "Where have all the emus gone?" is "We ate them".
JAORE said...
I laugh at all the people that, absent any actual experience in farming and raising animals for food, decide to retire to a small, working farm.
y'all Know how to retire on a farm worth a Million Dollars.. Start with Several Million dollars
Biden on shrinkflation:
Those greedy Breeders promise an ostrich. But when the package arrives you only get an Emu.
I hear Uma Thurman got in on the ground floor...
Where are and I live we frequently drive past a small (about an acre) llama farm (or alpaca or some similar beast that resembles half-sized camels but with big ears and no hump) with two animals that are frequently out sunning themselves. If they’re pets then why a separate barn and enclosure? If they’re raised for meat then why are the same animals there year after year? We assume that the owners sell the animals’ wool, especially since one animal is white and the other just slightly off-white. Any knitters out there and can opine on llama or alpaca wool versus wool from sheep?
Pity. The ostrich is a tasty bird.
Where have all the emus gone?
Long time passing
Where have all the emus gone?
Long time ago.
Where have all the emus gone?
Teh yuppies have ate them every one.
Oh, they made good tacos too
Oh, they made good tacos too
Birkenstock farmers
I met one person with alpacas who has a going concern using them.
She was a knitter who step by step just kept trying to get the best fibers. They now have alpaca and run a custom small batch fiber mill processing the wool from their animals and renting time on the mill to others.
This made sense to me. Vertical integration and providing a service (at a cost) to those other suckers who got alpacas and llamas.
It's possible Wokeism killed this trend.
We went to an ostrich farm in the Caribbean. The guy at the hotel was very enthusiastic; he said that the sky would look like a black cloud, with all those big birds circling overhead. Unfortunately, when we got there, the tour leader told me that the ostriches were all tired.
I also did not get a ride.
For the record, Mattel invented the See 'n Say in '64. In '91, Mattel bought Fisher-Price and rebranded it. Great toy.
There were a few folks who got into raising ostriches in my county. Don't see them anymore. One place I drive past occasionally still has their ostrich corral. It's a large rectangle of high, wire mesh fence, but it doesn't have square corners. All the corners are bobbed off at a 45 degree angle. I was told that was necessary because ostriches are so stupid they will go into a corner and not be able to find their way back out. I don't know if it's true, but that's the way they built the fence.
Follow up on my previous comment: Wokeism is an elite thing, and looking at those prices, so was buying certain exotic animals.
My brother used to raise exotic birds for sale- macaws, cockatoos, Amazon and African gray parrots- that sort of thing. At one point, he got a couple of emus. I don't think they ever had any chicks, after a number of years the emus were gone. Where they went, I don't know. I'll have to ask him about it some time.
Where have you gone, Llamas Emus
A nation turns its lonely eyes to you
Woo, woo, woo
Once Joust was no longer in arcades, I really didn't see the interest in Ostriches and Emus.
Emu burger sucks, but I've had a few emu and ostrich steaks some years ago that were decent. The key is something like a porcini cream sauce to put back the fat and flavor, and remove the health benefits, in which case you might as well get a New York strip steak.
I suppose I'd still order it occasionally for variety, but I haven't seen it on a menu in quite a while.
I don't think they ever had any chicks, after a number of years the emus were gone. Where they went, I don't know. I'll have to ask him about it some time.
@Mason G., they star in TV commercials .
I once knew a guy who had llamas. He claimed they were great for hiking and backpacking. They can carry a couple of lawn chairs and an ice chest full of beer miles into the backcountry, and feed on whatever greenery they find there. It sounded like more trouble than it was worth, but I never got a chance to go out with him.
Here in Oregon, the whole point of emus and llamas was that if you wanted to build a house on your rural property, you had to have a business plan with an estimated income over some ridiculous amount. So, the fact that the income estimates were massively inflated was a feature, not a bug. Once the house was built, it really didn't matter what happened to the emus. After that, you built a "mother-in-law" house. So, like almost everything else in America in the last 60 years, it was a means for people to evade the government's attempts to seize their property.
Kudu steaks are the best. Stupid me, a couple drinks in, wondering if it's possible to raise them in captivity, inquire about the source of the meat. They shoot it.
Yep.
Confirmation: "Emus were brought down by a hen MeToo movement."
MeToo is a parent company of Wokeism Inc.
Our son came home from school one day and told us that some of the teachers were talking about ostriches, and one of them had to be convinced that they--like all known birds--had two legs and not four.
Public school, of course. Probably a biology teacher.
After our chinchilla experience (the hothouses were expensive, let me tell you) we had no money left for the invisible glass venture.
Fuddruckers use to have ostrich burgers on the menu. I thought they were alright, however I preferred the buffalo burgers instead.
As for llama, the last time I tried that was when I was in Chile 35 years ago. I thought it tasted a little odd, but I could get use to it. I remember that if you didn't tell the waiter you wanted beef steak or hamburger they would usually serve you llama instead.
The last time I was house hunting, a few properties in North Georgia were being sold with the emus included. I was interested in one such house, but they wouldn't sell it without the massive flock of emus (also known as a mob of emus). I was interested in the house but not the aggressive, multiplying, enormous birds, and they wouldn't kill them or take them away.
At some point during the Georgia emu craze, coyotes up here figured out how to bite off the emus' heads and just eat the head. I don't know why. Maybe the emus were on the other side of a fence, pecking at the coyotes, and the coyotes could only reach the heads?
Now it's goats. Everyone has to have goats. People think they're going to make a ton of money training goats to clear brush off other people's yards. Pretty soon they have a couple of acres stripped clear to the clay, with hungry goats standing around in mud puddles, which they hate. They eat the bark off trees and kill the trees. Then when the tree falls, they all stand on it. That seems to be the dead end of goat metaphysics. They do have devil eyes. And they're always watching you.
I wouldn't even own a chicken. I know my personal limitations.
Where have all the emus gone? LOL I thought I was so original - but others beat me to the "Where have all the flowers gone?" tie in.
Totally unscientific data but a relevant story. I used to be into fiber arts. Processing wool and other fibers, spinning yarn. Have gone to many fiber festivals, where I chatted up many people raising alpacas, goats, rabbits and other fiber producing animals. When I asked people how they got into it, what made them buy llamas or alpacas, the answer was frequently: "My wife said this is what we are going to do and all of a sudden - we had a herd of alpacas."
So - the emus have gone as the wives of the owners decided to move onto the next big livestock thing.
Two thumbs up on ostrich meat. It's so lean you need to oil non-stick pans to prevent the meat from sticking during cooking.
Tina, how much would it cost to shoot them yourself and donate the meat to a homeless shelter?
I have just been informed of the location of the emus. They are a common feature at popular upscale barn weddings around here. Again, I don't know why. But it sounds like a reasonable solution for part of the emu pyramid scheme that blighted the region years ago.
My husband won't be deposing the emus in this case. That's a shame.
I still can't get over the support wolf in the Walmart.
A pair of mature breeding emus sell for $15,000 to $20,000, while an ostrich couple are close to $50,000....
13 ... the ostrich?
14 Which leaveth her eggs in the earth, and warmeth them in dust,
15 And forgetteth that the foot may crush them, or that the wild beast may break them.
16 She is hardened against her young ones, as though they were not her's: her labour is in vain without fear;
Job 39:13-16 KJV
It's a good thing that The New York Times was on to the scheme and published strong warnings about the how difficult it was to raise the birds and how the claimed market was a fiction.
"All the news that's fit to print" ... and then some.
> just eat the head
I knew a rancher who said the coyotes went through a group of sheep and just eviscerated them. Didn't eat them, just tore them open. Coyotes must have an almost human sense of fun.
It's hard to anticipate trends in society. 30 years ago, who would have thought we'd have hundreds of options for water. In a bottle.
I have no expertise in emu ranching, but it generally sounds like a fad that got out of hand, as fads often do. There is probably a basic demand for emu products but it got hyped beyond all sanity. The hype can be self-sustaining for a while, as the hype produces more hype and everyone wants a piece of the emu train. More restaurants offer emu meat! Designers want emu feathers! You get the idea. Investors just assumed it would go up forever. Then the market adjusted and a lot of emu ranchers were caught in the lurch with birds worth a lot less than they were months earlier. There's several of these sort of bubbles every generation.
I suspect there is still demand for emus, just not anything that would have justified the boom period, which explains why the number of emus has dropped greatly. The only question is whether the current population makes sense with the demand or if further culling is to be expected.
Once people started wondering where all the Cowboys have gone it was only a matter of time before it happened to the Emus too.
Eland porterhouse steaks are better than Kudu. Kudu win the antler contest.
As God is my witness, I thought emus could fly.
Where have all the emus gone?
Lets ask Pete Seeger since he knew where all the flowers had gone. Though we'll have to do it via seance. Maybe Marianne Williamson can help us with the arrangements,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Where_Have_All_the_Flowers_Gone%3F
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PS3-lyqCl80
@gilbar
Go ahead, yuk it up and laugh. But remember this, only one non-human species has defeated a human military force in open battle. Emus, Australia in 1932.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emu_War
We exist on this planet at their sufferance. One day, when the Emus awake, nations shall tumble, planets shall burn, and the whole galaxy shall tremble…
Mad Anthony Wayne said...
only one non-human species has defeated a human military force in open battle..
Don't Count Your Rhea's, before they hatch! Emu's might have won battles in the past; but the Rhea Empire is slowly and SURELY growing ALL OVER THE WORLD!!
Feral populations in Europe
A population of rheas has emerged in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, northeastern Germany, after several couples escaped from an exotic meat farm near Lübeck in the late 1990s. Contrary to expectations, the large birds adapted well to conditions in the German countryside. By 2014, there was already a population of well over 100 birds in an area of 150 square kilometres (58 sq mi) between the river Wakenitz and the A20 motorway, slowly expanding eastward.
The population grew steadily for several years. By autumn 2018 their numbers had greatly increased to about 600. As such, local farmers claim increasing damage to their fields, and some biologists say the rheas pose a growing risk to local wildlife.
Still protected by German natural conservation law, a local discussion has begun regarding how to handle the situation.
Eventually, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania's government allowed limited hunting of the birds, explicitly to just reduce the population. By spring 2021, just 247 rheas were counted; this development was attributed to the increased caution of the animals. Several had begun to avoid humans more than previously, and retreated into the woods.
Some members of this rhea population have also expanded into other areas; at least twice individual rheas who probably originated in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania were sighted in Brandenburg's High Fläming Nature Park, over 200 kilometres (120 mi) from their usual range.
There also appears to be a small population of wild rheas in the United Kingdom. In March 2021, a group of about 20 rheas were reported to be running free on a residential estate in Hertfordshire. Local police were unable to identify any owner
Rheas Today!!
Rheas TOMORROW!
Rheas FOREVER!!
LONG LIVE THE RHEAS!
I've had ostrich burgers before. Not bad,but beef and bison burgers are better.
Was at Fuddruckers just the other week and they had a limited time offering of camel burgers. Large group down for a wedding. I bought one and cut it up for anyone who wanted to give it a go. My son who served in the sandbox declined. He didn't have fond memories of camel meat. IMHO ostrich burgers were much better. My 7 year old granddaughter was the only one with no negative comments. She liked it.
There's always a market for exotics of any kind. It's never as big as proponents say it is or will be.
I wouldn't mind having a llama or alpaca, both of which are currently raised in my county. Along with bison. Wouldn't want bison- they need stronger fences than I would want to build. I could go to a livestock auction and get a calf or some goats for a lot less. Or sheep. We have farms with goat and sheep also. And pigs. A lot of roads in the area named Hogback...
Don't think anyone in this county raises red deer, but there are red deer farms in NY.
I have friends who raise a wide variety of chickens. At a holiday work party one of them brought in deviled eggs that were much smaller than the smalls you get at a grocery store. They were excellent. And she said a pain to make... I would like to sample scrambled ostrich egg someday.
As long as crossword puzzles exist, there will be emus.
In 2002 we bought a house from a guy who raised llamas. He asked us if we'd be interested in keeping them on and hahahaha not on your life.
So he had to rehome them.
The llama shit piles made great flower beds.
The presumption seems to be that people only buy exotic animals to make a profit. I raised an "exotic" breed of sheep for several years and not once did I sell any of the lambs to buyers who thought it was going to be a money making proposition. None of them were going to butcher them; they were going to be pets. You know, like cats and dogs and horses. I was amazed, but didn't tell them that particular breed doesn't really like humans.
@gilbar, do you garner rheas?
That was inspiring, Big Mike. 😁
Where have all the Emus gone?
Long time passes.
Where have all the Emus gone?
Long time ago.
Where have all the Emus gone?
Gone to suckers everyone.
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?
A story I found on the internet so it must be true:
“One of the most interesting ostrich-attack stories involved the American musician Johnny Cash, who kept an exotic animal park with ostriches on his property. Cash encountered an aggressive male ostrich several times during his walks in the woods in 1981. On one occasion, Cash brandished a 6-foot stick and swung it at the bird, who dodged the swipe and slashed at Cash with its foot. Cash noted that the blow struck him in the stomach, and if it weren’t for a strong belt buckle, he said that the ostrich’s toe claw would have cut his abdomen open and killed him.”
One of my father’s cousins in Iowa raised Big Birds. He was a Seventh Day Adventist, and raised them for the healthy properties of the eggs. He lived to age 80, a few years longer than average.
Ozzieman has a video of 'Gary The Emu' running around. It's on YouTube.
That's all I got.
Tim, I have never shot an animal. Not that I'm opposed to doing it. I let people hunt on my land if they sign a liability form. But if people are that foolish with their livestock, it makes you wonder how they treated their house.
Moving is hard enough without having to slaughter the current inhabitants, too.
I never got back here yesterday to comments.
Why is piece quoting a veternarian, about a marketing problem. Vets are just like MD's. Excellent ability to recall material. But that kind of focus means their smarts are limited to their field.
I don't care enough to dig into it. But Beef, pork and chicken are widespread because of things like feed conversion, and dress out percentages. Beef is good BECAUSE of the fat. Restaurants with Stars, Buy a different pork, than is available today. Breeding hogs to day has drastically reduced the fat in the final product. Those restaurants with stars source their pork from producers using different breeds with a body type from the 1950's
A vet telling me how lean Emu meat is, motivates me, to avoid Emu meat.
Do you know what is in HIGH demand? Wagyu Beef. Why? Because the Marbling is OFF the CHARTS. Marbling is the fine lines of fat in the muscle of the animal. That fat is were the flavor comes from.
Flavor is the market to chase. Not flavor challenged lean emu.
I recently watched an episode of Northern Exposure in which Maurice, the mayor of Cicely, Alaska, attempts to convince Marilyn to take her hobby ostrich farm to the next level. Hilarity ensues.
Had a friend who got in early. Stuck with emus and rheas. Managed to just about make his money back, because he realized quickly that the cost to raise them up was going to make the meat from them way too expensive to compete. At which point he got out while the birds were still worth enough that counting the chicks, he was able to not lose his shirt. It was a fad because the underlying economics were just not there.
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