The Rural Voice, 1992-05, Page 29Jerry Wilder feeds his yearling emus.
Despite winter cold, they require
litttle special care.
chinchilla farming that turned into
busts. Emu (and ostrich and rhea)
skins can be tanned for fine leather
and currently tanneries just can't get
enough of the skin to meet demand.
Emu also yields an oil, rendered from
the thick layer of subcutaneous fat on
the bird's back. The oil is under
development for use in cosmetics and
medical products.
Ostrich and emu feathers are used
in the fashion industry for feather
capes, earrings and other fashion
items and can be dyed and washed.
And emu meat is a red meat
similar to beef in taste but with lower
cholesterol and fat.
Even infertile eggs, when blown
out and carved or painted, can be
used for unusual ornaments. Wilder
estimates each bird should bring
$500-$800 from the sale of its
product.
There is development to be done
in the area of marketing emu for
product, however, especially in
Canada. In the U.S. the industry has
been established long enough that
universities are doing research into
emu and ostrich raising and there are
start-up loans for those wanting to get
into the business, but Canada lags
behind. Currently there is only one
facility for slaughtering the big birds
and that's in the U.S. That's partly
because the birds are just too precious
to slaughter, bringing so much on the
breeding market. Only a bird that had
to be put down would be slaughtered.
Wilder has shipped birds as far
away as Calgary and this year could
see birds he has raised shipped to
breeders as far away as Prince Ed-
ward Island and 200 miles north of
Vancouver.
He sees the future of the industry
in the small operator, not in major
breeders with 50 breeding pairs. He
foresees hobby farmers who want to
keep some livestock but like the idea
of making some money, keeping a
couple of breeding pairs.
Strange as it may seem, ostriches
and emus, native to the desert areas
of African and Australia, have no
trouble adapting to the cold climate
of Canada. Wilder pens his breeding
flock inside in the winter because of
snow problems in their outside runs,
but the yearling flock, which can be
inside or in the outside run, chooses
to be outside every day, even in -20
degree weather. It's not entirely
surprising, Wilder says, because in
the desert it can get down to below
freezing at night.
In farms in North Dakota and
northern Alberta birds arc housed in
8x10 -foot sheds with outside runs.
The important thing is that the birds
have a good straw cover to keep their
feet from freezing, Wilder says.
Inside the converted'barn he uses for
his breeders, Wilder has 10x16 -foot
pens but a pen of 8x10 feet will do,
he says. In addition an outside run of
20x100 feet is ideal (because the
wire comes in 100 -foot rolls). Special
2x4 inch mesh wire is used to keep
the birds from climbing the fence but
because the birds don't put the kind
of pressure on the fence cattle would,
steel posts can be used for everything
but the corner -posts. Because the
birds can't fly, only standard height i
needed. Wilder recommends that
people interested in getting into the
business convert an existing building
before getting into too much of an
investment.
The birds may be expensive to buy
but they're cheap to keep. He feeds a
ration of 22 per cent protein for
breeding birds and 18 per cent for
MAY 1992 25