Pros and Cons of Emu Farming

The business of raising emu wasn't quite what we'd hoped for in our quest for financial independence. We learned some important lessons about emu farming, though.

Getting Started 

A couple of our friends were interested in raising ostrich. They invited us to join them at a seminar on raising big birds. After learning the basics about emu farming, we decided to invest in this fast-growing business.

Our house was still under construction out in North Texas. We both worked full-time office jobs. Weekends we tried to make progress on finishing construction on our house. With our limited experience, we added a new adventure, buying some birds and get started on our future.

This was the late nineties. The industry was booming with breeder pairs selling for $40,000 to $50,000 for mated pairs. Birds with a track record of egg production were in high demand with prices rising.

The end market was anticipated as a healthy source of red meat along with eggs, feathers, emu skin products like purses and belts and other uses from the versatile birds. It all sounded quite promising, but there were some drawbacks.

We were not farmers nor had we ever raised livestock. Hoping to learn more, we joined the Emu Association and met other farmers willing to mentor us.

Emu are soft feathered, flightless birds, second largest to the ostrich. Their origins date back to 1696 when spotted in Australia by Dutch merchants.

We visited an emu ranch that had paired breeders laying 11 to 20 eggs per season. We studied tracking methods for egg production, learn about incubators, hatching time, and how to assign bird identification numbers.

With the cost of a breeder pair out of our financial reach, we decided to buy six hatchlings. While we worked on building our pens, the breeders housed our young stock until they were nearly six months old.

How Much Space Does an Emu Require?

Emu require sufficient space to run as they are quite active birds. A minimum of thirty by one hundred-foot (30 x 100') pen is recommended per pair. The fencing needs to be six-feet tall so they can't jump over the top. They are energetic jumpers. They also need shade for their feed pens, around eight foot-square for the food shelter, although, they don't stay inside the shelters at night.

Building the Pens - Farm Work Is 24/7

We bought an auger to drill holes to set the fence posts in the ground around 18 inches deep, filling the base with pebbles, then, leveling the poles and setting them in quick-set concrete. We rented a trench-digger and dug two-hundred feet of water lines from the main line to the new pens to get water to the drinking troughs. Then, we started building the feed shelters. We soon discovered what farmers have known for years; farming is hard work.

Thankfully, we were used to hard work. After working our day jobs, we'd come home and drill holes in the clay-based soil to set fence poles and build the sheds. After that, we brought in truckloads of sandy loam and shoveled the dirt around the pens. Our office-worker muscles grew strong with the effort.

"The largest individuals can reach up to 150 to 190 cm (59 to 75 in) in height. Measured from the bill to the tail, emu range in length from 139 to 164 cm (55 to 65 in), with males averaging 148.5 cm (58.5 in) and females averaging 156.8 cm (61.7 in)." 

Little is wasted of the harvested bird with 95% of the end product being put to use.

• Emu skin is used in making leather products like boots, belts, wallets, and handbags.
• Feathers are used in the automotive paint process for dusting.
• The meat is lean and a healthy replacement for red meat, high in iron and protein and low in cholesterol.
• Medical uses include parts of the bird-like veins for arterial replacement and corneas for surgical replacement.
• Emu oil is used to treat arthritis, burns and stretch marks, eczema, and leg cramps.

Finally, the day arrived when we brought the birds to their new home. One thing became clear almost immediately. They need to eat every day whether it's Christmas or the Fourth of July, whether there's a winter blizzard howling and a layer of ice covers their water troughs or if it's blistering hot.

Every day, without fail they need food in their feed pens, clean water in their troughs, and a watchful eye to make sure they're healthy and safe.

Disaster in the Pens

One day shortly after I got to work, my neighbor called.

"The birds are fighting," he told me. Emus become aggressive during mating season as they compete for a partner. Hicks and Popeye were fighting over Olive Oyl. Once a bird is down, the rest of the birds jump in, kicking and plucking the injured bird. Hicks was badly injured and the neighbor was trying to keep the other birds off him. Without intervention, the birds would continue to attack a downed bird.

I had an hour's drive home over my boss's objections. When I arrived, Hicks was on the ground bleeding with the feathers plucked completely bare on one side of his torso. For the first time, Hicks let me guide him as he slowly made his way to the isolation pen. The vet gave me instructions on how to treat the wound.

That day changed my thoughts on staying in the emu business.

This taxing and constant job began to affect my animal sensibilities as the thought of harvesting the birds became a reality. I had become attached to the birds with their individual personalities and quirks. They had become pets.

The cost of veterinary bills, the rising cost of their food, and the energy we were expending was nothing compared to the ominous idea of the harvesting. Getting fond of the birds and giving them names is not a good thing when they're destined to become food. Raised in a city with supermarkets, we had no true concept of where animal products came from and how they ended up on the grocer's shelf. Dealing with this was just not for us.

The market for breeder pairs was beginning to decline. There were more breeders and a surplus of birds which lowered the price. Potential sales of red meat faltered without a viable marketplace. The price of breeder pairs plummeted to an all-time low.

When we'd finally had enough of the losses, we sold our birds at a fraction of what we originally paid and wrote off our expenses as a lesson in what not to do.

Our experience with emu - on YouTube.

 

Splash of Colors, The Self-Destruction of Braniff International - Book Review

John J. Nance, a former Braniff pilot and author of the documentary Splash of Colors, details a compelling story about the failure of a long-standing, multi-billion dollar airline that once held a position as the eighth largest carrier of the time.

Take trip back in time to 1928 when Braniff's first president, Tom Braniff, established this mail carrier. The 5-passenger single-engine prop aircraft flying out of Oklahoma City, Tulsa, and Wichita Falls would become a major passenger carrier with international routes and a fleet of jets.

The story reveals the tremendous effects unions have on business with demands that drove higher salaries for pilots, ground crews and in-flight personnel. This, added to the pressure of funds already stretched to the maximum, would eventually seal Braniff International's fate and crash the business into bankruptcy.

Harding Lawrence, President from 1965 through December 31, 1980, with the rapid expansion of the company found himself fraught with under-qualified executives of junior and senior rank." Referred to as "empty suits" he blamed his "calcified, uncommunicative senior officers in operational, sales and service areas". . . whom he believed "were at least two levels above their maximum level of competence." He attempted to infuse "new, more qualified executive management talent" into the company using headhunters and personnel agencies.

The inner workings of corporate America are exemplified in this story which serves as both an example and a warning of what can happen when power and greed take the reins. The story also details the importance of hiring and training qualified corporate management candidates who have the aptitude and skill level required.

At a time when air travel remained glamorous, Braniff excelled at providing extraordinary meals and flight service in the air. Extravagant paint schemes, designer uniforms, two-for one fares, non-profitable routes, overhead and service contracts in foreign countries, interest on collateral loans, and lack of communication, all played a role in the demise of the airline.

The multi-million dollar expansion of its worldwide headquarters added to the burden of debt and steep overhead. Combined with the number of successors in the role of President and CEO with guaranteed hiring packages and golden parachute deals, the soaring cost thwarted any return to profitability.

Nance writes a compelling account of conversations in board rooms, at interviews, and in management circles which lend the intimacy of practically being in the room. He explains the pitfalls of corporate decisions leading to diminished job enthusiasm and details how fierce competition for recognition led to disregard for employee initiative.

He shares insight into the deadly Jericho memorandums that dramatically tainted employee morale and inspired internal uprisings. He addresses the silos and isolated nature of organizational communication along with the size of the airline and its operation which had increased over 30 percent in a few short months as being key to failure.

He explains the effect of the deregulation of the airlines which brought fierce competition for the same routes spreading the passenger count between different carriers. Planes operating below capacity resulted in lowered profitability. During the same time, fuel costs rose exponentially with fares failing to keep up with the costs of operation. The bottom line suffered the red ink of diminishing revenue paired with inflationary costs of operation.

The book details the inner workings of a corporate board of directors and their role in debt restructuring of capital equipment, the expansion of Braniff into new unproven routes, the purchase of multi-million dollar jets, employee demands for competitive salaries and other factors like dirty tricks played by competitors and reservation agencies.

Traveling deep beyond the newspaper headlines into the realms of corporate sabotage, fierce competition with other airlines, dirty tricks and politics, of multi-million dollar deals gone sour, the story takes the reader on a voyage into the minds and workings of the people who both loved and hated the airline. This true story, in four-hundred plus pages travels into oxygen-thin altitudes, shares white knuckle take-offs and landings, and conveys the devastation that thousands of workers felt when learning their jobs and income vanished overnight.

Despite continued efforts of its dedicated employees and workaholic leaders, the company eventually spiraled out of control into a fatal tailspin in May 1982 after multiple attempts at restructuring failed.

The Braniff tradition of loyalty and family camaraderie continues with former employees posting on its many online social groups with memories, photos and experiences they had while working for this peerless and incomparable airline.

About the Author

Vietnam and Desert Storm Veteran, Dallas born John J. Nance is the author of multiple fiction and non-fiction books with 19 on the New York Times best seller's list. He is a professional speaker, licensed attorney, former pilot and a familiar face on ABC World News and Good Morning America.

This first edition copy of the book, published in 1984, was purchased on eBay with hard-back copies also available on Amazon through third-party vendors.

My personal experience as a Braniff employee: My Former Life as a Flight Attendant