Joe Rogan Experience #2062 - Will & Jenni Harris

Jenni Harris 0:00 (drumming music plays) Joe Rogan podcast. Check it out.

Will Harris 0:04 The Joe Rogan Experience.

Joe Rogan 0:06 Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (rock music plays) There we go. Welcome back, Will. How are you, sir?

Will Harris 0:14 Good. Thank you for having me.

Joe Rogan 0:14 Good. Hey, please introduce the world to your daughter.

Will Harris 0:17 Good. My middle daughter, uh, Jenny Harris, who is, uh, used to work for me but now I work for her.

Joe Rogan 0:25 (laughs)

Jenni Harris 0:27 Get used to it. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 0:27 That's gotta be interesting.

Jenni Harris 0:28 Well, we'll tell you about it.

Joe Rogan 0:30 Please do. And you guys are the first people to ever bring dirt to the studio, so I wanna thank you for that. So-

Will Harris 0:35 You're more than welcome.

Joe Rogan 0:36 (laughs) So here is, uh, your soil (door knocks) and, uh, compared to industrial, uh, commodity... What does this say?

Will Harris 0:46 Dirt.

Joe Rogan 0:47 Row crop. So you can see the difference in the d- I mean, I don't know if you guys can see it very clearly in the photogra- in the video, but one of 'em is very light colored and the other one looks rich and dark and it's filled with twigs and all sorts of biological material-

Jenni Harris 1:04 There's probably some worms in there.

Joe Rogan 1:05 Yeah. Probably. And this looks like what I'd like to grow something on, whereas this looks like, uh, some stuff that, uh, blows in the wind when it gets dry out.

Jenni Harris 1:15 I'm gonna show you that.

Joe Rogan 1:16 Yeah, please do.

Will Harris 1:17 And, and they came from side by side, one side of the fence versus the other side of the fence.

Joe Rogan 1:21 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 1:21 And there's no difference other than the way they've been managed over the last 20 years.

Joe Rogan 1:27 Yeah. And, uh, we've showed many times that video of the... Was it a creek or a river near your house?

Will Harris 1:35 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:35 Where the runoff from their farm is just polluting the water. I mean, a very clear line. I mean, the difference-

Jenni Harris 1:45 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:45 ... is so stark. It's so stark. And how is that legal, by the way?

Will Harris 1:49 So let me tell you what you see in there. So the, uh, the brown water is coming off my farm. The red water is coming under the road. There's a culvert there.

Joe Rogan 2:02 Mm-hmm.

Jenni Harris 2:02 There's, there's a video of that.

Will Harris 2:04 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 2:04 We can look at it next.

Joe Rogan 2:04 Yeah. Yeah. We played that video many, many times, uh, just to show people the difference between a regenerative farm and an industrial farm.

Will Harris 2:12 Is that, is that me or my daddy? Damn, he looks old.

Joe Rogan 2:15 (laughs)

Jenni Harris 2:16 Look at those arms.

Will Harris 2:18 Wow. (whistles) Scale. Look at me scale, scaling like a fish.

Joe Rogan 2:23 (laughs) So, you know, this is... I- it's just, it's just strange that it's legal to just have the runoff pollute the rivers. That it seems like someone would see that and say, "Well, the downstream effects of this have to be pretty substantial and pretty detrimental to the fish, to every other piece of land that's downriver that's gonna encounter all this fertici- fer- fertilizer, and pesticide, and herbicides. And this has to be terrible."

Will Harris 2:55 Well, (clears throat) if it was a construction site, it would have to be under what they call SWIT. That's an acronym for something, storm water, something, something.

Joe Rogan 3:03 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 3:04 And, and you- they wouldn't allow that.

Joe Rogan 3:07 Hmm.

Will Harris 3:07 But agricultural land is not under SWIT.

Joe Rogan 3:11 Hmm2. Well, that's-

Jenni Harris 3:13 In fact, it's, it's not even under SWIT. That's a subsidized production system-

Will Harris 3:19 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 3:19 ... by the government. So it's not only okay or, uh, acceptable, you know, it's, it's, it's the status quo.

Joe Rogan 3:27 So they've just accepted a certain amount of pollution?

Will Harris 3:30 Well, I, I guess it would be a nearly unlimited amount of solution because nobody checks it.

Joe Rogan 3:36 Nobody checks the water? Nobody checks to see what the results are?

Will Harris 3:40 No.

Joe Rogan 3:40 Which is insane. I mean, what is it like downstream? What, what is downstream of that?

Will Harris 3:45 Well, it used to be the Apalachicola Bay, which was a thriving oystering grounds. But they don't oyster there anymore.

Joe Rogan 3:54 Because of the runoff from the farms?

Will Harris 3:56 Because of the decline in oyster population, which is because of r- runoff, correct.

Joe Rogan 4:02 Wow! It's-

Jenni Harris 4:04 There's, there's like a whole town, Apalachicola, that's, you know, used to be a real thriving community because of the oystering, you know, business and industry. And the, the whole town has suffered, which is one thing we'll talk about, you know, with regards to rural America. But, uh, you know, there, there's like a whole city that's suffering because they can no longer do what they've done for generations.

Joe Rogan 4:25 How come no one's filed a lawsuit?

Will Harris 4:28 (smacks lips) Well, I'm not in the lawsuit filing business.

Joe Rogan 4:32 But it... Not you.

Will Harris 4:32 So, yeah.

Joe Rogan 4:32 But someone from that town. I mean, and someone from the oystering community, 'cause it seems like that, that's a no-brainer. I mean, if you were running a, a tire company and the tire company was, uh, upstream of something and i- the water went down and started polluting it and r- ruining people's livelihoods, you would think that someone would have the grounds for a lawsuit.

Jenni Harris 4:56 We had RFK on.

Joe Rogan 4:57 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 4:58 And he talked a lot about, you know, in New York, the, you know, the, the river and the pollution and how he led-

Joe Rogan 5:04 Mm-hmm.

Jenni Harris 5:04 ... the charge. Uh, you know, s- people like that need to look at Apalachicola Bay.

Will Harris 5:09 (clears throat) And (clears throat) if you had a, a runoff from a tire manufacturing company, you could trace it back to that one entity-

Joe Rogan 5:19 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 5:19 ... and one location. You know, that water comes from all over South Georgia. And, and it's from everybody's fields. And most of it is treated the same way. So, you know, I'm not, I'm not answering a litigation question 'cause I don't know. But it would be a, a, a hell of a complex situation to jump on.

Joe Rogan 5:40 So you would have to sue a large number of farms?

Will Harris 5:44 You know, I don't know how that works, but yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:46 Right.

Will Harris 5:46 But yeah, there's a large number of people contributing to it. The... Virtually everyone who farms corn, cotton, peanuts, uh, uses the same cultivation and the same pesticides. So, I mean, you would...... it just seems like it'd be a very, very complex litigation to me.

Joe Rogan 6:08 It seems like s- it's at least worth a study. Have they done a study on the bay and the levels of pesticides and various chemicals?

Jenni Harris 6:18 Dea- dead zones in the Gulf have been studied, and Jamie can probably pull that up. Uh ...

Joe Rogan 6:23 Could you do me a favor and just pull that microphone just a little closer to your face? Just ... Yeah. Just try to keep it, like, a fist away from your face, like that.

Will Harris 6:29 Okay. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 6:30 Um, so i- it seems like that they would want to study that, though. I mean, that seems ... It's insane to me that they just allow that to continue and it's happening every day, day by day, just constantly dumping toxic chemicals into the water.

Will Harris 6:44 Okay. So I think, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm certainly not answering for that whole, uh, kind of, politically motivated question, but you gotta remember that the politicians who control the bureaucrats are controlled by pesticide companies and-

Joe Rogan 7:04 Right.

Will Harris 7:04 ... and ƒ- agricultural companies, and there's just a lot of money involved.

Joe Rogan 7:09 Yeah.

Will Harris 7:09 And, you know, if I were, uh, a politician running for office and begging for funding, I probably wouldn't wanna be the guy that opened that can of worms.

Joe Rogan 7:21 D- it seems like it all boils down to that, money and politics. If we could take money out of politics, we could make it so that no one can donate, other than individuals in a very limited amount of money, we could change everything.

Will Harris 7:36 I th- I, I think so.

Joe Rogan 7:38 We could change everything. It's such a dirty system, and it allows things like this to happen. But then the question is, you explained how you changed your farm from an industrial farm to a regenerative farm, and that it took apro- it was approximately 20 years. Is that what you said?

Will Harris 7:56 We've ... Yes. Well, I mean, the, uh, we- when you start that process, moving from an industrial, uh, farm to, to what we're the regenerative farm that we run today, coming out of the chute, you see a decline in production, and it lasts for a period of time, three years, four years or something. Then you see a very gradual increase until it gets back to where ours is today. And where ours is today is, is not as high yielding as if we used all the crop inputs.

Joe Rogan 8:31 Right.

Will Harris 8:31 But it's approaching that because we don't have to buy the crop inputs, so I think it's a better, it's better for us. And we really need it.

Jenni Harris 8:39 Certainly, a more r- resilient system.

Will Harris 8:41 Yes.

Joe Rogan 8:42 And if there was legal, or at least some sort of financial repercussions that were enacted on the farm itself for the pollution, it would seem like that would balance itself out. Like, if someone did the correct thing and said, "Hey, you guys are ruining the Earth itself with this just so you can make a little more money," which is so crazy that that's allowed, and not just allowed, but subsidized.

Will Harris 9:10 Well, uh, you know, the farmers are making a little more money. You're right. The big multinational corporations are making a hell of a lot more money 'cause they're pr- they're manufacturing these products.

Joe Rogan 9:23 Right.

Will Harris 9:23 And they're handling these huge quantities of agricultural production-

Joe Rogan 9:27 Right.

Will Harris 9:27 ... and turning out this industrial food that we all eat. So the, the amount of money is incredible. And, don't forget, I, I, I think I might have mentioned to you when I spoke to you before, that it's a way of life that senior bureaucrats go to work for the big ag companies.

Joe Rogan 9:46 Yeah.

Will Harris 9:47 So if you're a, a, a very senior person in DC in, uh, Department of Ag, and probably other dep- departments, and you're getting close to retirement, you can get, you can ... If you've been a good boy, you can retire and get a job making twice what you were making with the government.

Joe Rogan 10:07 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 10:07 If you're not a good boy, just retired.

Joe Rogan 10:10 Right. Just like the FDA and the pharmaceutical drug companies.

Will Harris 10:13 Pr- Probably.

Joe Rogan 10:14 It's the same deal. It's, it should be illegal.

Jenni Harris 10:17 Well, and farmers aren't ... I, I, I'll say this. Farmers are less and less raising food and raising foodlike products. You know, there is ... A statistic said that farmers only get 14 cents of every food dollar that's spent. And you think about, wow, the, the person who, you know, cultivates the land, plants the seed, harvests the crops, you know, they get 14 cents of every dollar? And the truth is, the food production system has become s- such a long way from a farmer and a consumer, there's gotta be room for, you know, distribution and manufacturing and logistics and whatever else. A dollar, you know, the food dollar is still there. It's just the farmer's getting less and less of it, because food, more and more, looks less and less like food.

Joe Rogan 11:04 Yeah.

Will Harris 11:04 She, she's, she's right. But in our case, we get 100 cents of every dollar, but we still don't have much money. We still don't make a lot of money. We get 100 cents, not 14, but then we cover all these costs that, in the industrial system, is just ... The farm is just the production arm.

Joe Rogan 11:25 Hmm.

Jenni Harris 11:25 Well, and ours is different because we took 100% responsibility of that food product. You know, so we raise, we slaughter, we butcher, we package, and we distribute. So we take, we take account for all of those parts in the food production system, so that we can keep that whole dollar. Now, it's not profit, because we have to pay for those things, but, uh, the whole dollar stays in Bluffton.

Will Harris 11:48 And that's, and that's what's the impo- important part. You know, Clay County, Georgia, where Bluffton is, was the poorest county in the United States of America in 2020. Number one. Not just Georgia, in the whole country. And when that whole dollar stays in Clay County, Georgia-... uh, it- it- it's- it's the- it's beginning to correct that. That- that results because only 14 cents stays there.

Joe Rogan 12:14 Mm. That's the result. And it seems like the problem is so complicated now because of fast food chains and because of big cities that absolutely don't grow anything.

Will Harris 12:27 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 12:27 That w- when you're getting food, you have to get food at scale. You have to get massive amounts of food. Like, say if you're living in, um, California, if you're living in Los Angeles, which is just an insanely overpopulated place, and you wanna get beef, especially if you wanna get a cheeseburger from Jack in the Box or something like that, I don't mean to pick on Jack in the Box, Burger King, whatever, wh- where's that meat coming from? It's not, it's not grown from local cows. There are no local cows.

Will Harris 12:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 12:55 And you have to go pretty far out of town to find a farm that raises cows. I mean, you can go, like, an hour and a half out of town and find some cows.

Will Harris 13:01 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 13:01 But that's not gonna feed everybody.

Will Harris 13:02 It won't.

Joe Rogan 13:02 They'll all be gone. There's not enough cows.

Will Harris 13:04 A lot of it comes from Australia and New Zealand-

Joe Rogan 13:07 Mm.

Will Harris 13:07 ... and, uh, Uruguay, and-

Joe Rogan 13:09 Yeah.

Will Harris 13:09 A lot of- a lot of- a lot of beef's imported.

Joe Rogan 13:12 Yeah, and a lot of elk. A lot of elk ... Oft- if you buy elk at a restaurant, most likely, you're getting it from New Zealand.

Jenni Harris 13:17 I got a story about- about imports that I wanna say. This is really important. So 25 years ago, when Dad, uh, decided to change the way we farmed, he knew that in order to put all the cost that it was gonna take to raise animals differently, he had to find a consumer that would pay for that. And so, he went, you know, looking for customers, and Publix Super Market was, you know, one of the first ones, Whole Foods very quickly after. Um, and, you know, that- that worked out, uh, really well, but the- the- the- the- the point I wanna get to is that when Dad started selling beef, grass-fed beef, to those two grocers, the first pound of American grass-fed beef to be marketed as American grass-fed beef came from White Oak Pastures, and that was not a sustainable option. We- we can't feed the world. We don't wanna feed the world. But fast-forward 20 years, and over 85% of the grass-fed beef in, uh, you know, the American market is imported product, not raised in America.

Joe Rogan 14:23 Mm.

Jenni Harris 14:23 Isn't that nuts?

Joe Rogan 14:24 Totally nuts.

Jenni Harris 14:24 To, in 20 years, we've- we've gone from being a very early innovator to, you know, uh, just a mere meager portion of- of 15%.

Will Harris 14:33 Well, that- that's- that's true, but it's not the worst part. The worst part is that imported beef is legally labeled Product of the USA.

Joe Rogan 14:44 How's that?

Will Harris 14:44 If value is added in this country, it's a product of the USA.

Joe Rogan 14:49 What? (laughs)

Jenni Harris 14:50 (laughs)

Will Harris 14:50 And we- and we compete with, we compete with it every day.

Joe Rogan 14:54 How do they add value?

Jenni Harris 14:55 Ooh. Ooh. Go ahead. No, you go. This is good.

Will Harris 14:58 Uh, you know, if you, if they grind it, slice it, cut it, package it, label it-

Jenni Harris 15:04 Re-box it.

Will Harris 15:05 ... transport it, but the animal, make- make no mistake, the animal was born, raised, and slaughtered in Uruguay, uh, Australia, New Zealand, or tw- or 20 other countries.

Jenni Harris 15:21 Lithuania.

Will Harris 15:22 (laughs) Lithuania.

Jenni Harris 15:23 Croatia.

Joe Rogan 15:24 The United States imports beef from places like Australia, Canada, and much of Latin America. It then runs that beef through USDA inspection, and if it passes, sticks a label on it that reads, "Product of the USA." How dare you?

Jenni Harris 15:38 But honestly-

Joe Rogan 15:39 That's so dirty.

Jenni Harris 15:40 ... the erosion of this type of farming in America, you know, is- is completely being exported to another country, because we're importing all of this product, and then due to loop- loopholes in labeling, intentionally fraudulent labeling even, uh, selling it as product of the USA.

Joe Rogan 15:59 Then we have to consider, if everybody's really concerned about climate change and CO2 output, think about the amount of freight-

Jenni Harris 16:04 Mm.

Joe Rogan 16:05 ... just these massive boats that are making their way across the st- Did you- did you see this thing they did recently? I was, uh, reading this, uh, uh, article, and I was actually listening to a podcast, that's what it was initially, but the podcast was, um, about how they changed, I guess it wa- I don't know what governing body changed the emission standards for these, uh, gigantic freight ship- ships, and when they changed the emission standards, what they found was when they were releasing less pollution into the air, it was doing less of a job of blocking the sun, so the ocean water was getting warmer quicker than they anticipated. So, it is having the opposite effect. So, they're trying to come up with different methods to mitigate that now, and some of the methods are spraying chemicals in the sky.

Jenni Harris 16:57 Oh.

Joe Rogan 16:58 Some of the methods are spraying ocean water in the sky, which sounds much more natural, you know, just taking some sort of machine, but then again, what's powering that machine? How is that gonna work? What is- what are we doing? Instead of just growing it here.

Jenni Harris 17:11 (laughs) I mean, should we really be spraying sea water into the atmosphere? Do we really have to do that?

Joe Rogan 17:16 No, but I mean, it's just water. That- that doesn't bother me. That seems like the most organic solution. You're gonna take sea water, blow it in, but who knows? I mean, think about all the pollution that's in the sea now and microplastics in the sea. Does that spray into the atmosphere and that get into people's lungs now and cause a host of new autoimmune issues and cardiovascular issue- Who- who knows? It's so crazy that we're doing it this way.

Will Harris 17:41 So that- that label change, Product of the USA, even though it was imported, occurred in 2015, I think, '15 or '16, and it was a reaction to the fact that some of us had gone into the grass-fed beef business and were doing pretty good with it. We had some really good years in the early 2000s, and then of course, when they were allowed to bring the imported beef in as product of the USA, the- the margin structure fell dramatically.

Joe Rogan 18:10 Of course.... dirty.

Jenni Harris 18:12 Dirty.

Joe Rogan 18:13 Everything is dirty.

Jenni Harris 18:14 Well-

Joe Rogan 18:14 When you get money involved and stuff like that, and decisions that affect everybody, someone always does something slimy.

Jenni Harris 18:20 Well, here, and here's the thing. I don't think either of us wanna debate product quality or the fact that it is from another country. You know, the issue that we have is that it's being sold under the guise of product of the USA.

Joe Rogan 18:32 Right. So if you're a person who wants to buy all American-made stuff and American-raised beef, and you're like, "Oh great, product of the USA. I feel like I'm doing a good thing."

Jenni Harris 18:39 Well, it's like the textile industry.

Joe Rogan 18:41 Helping out farmers.

Jenni Harris 18:41 The textile industry has been exported. The automotive industry has been exported.

Joe Rogan 18:44 Yes.

Jenni Harris 18:45 But at least in those situations, it's pretty clear what you're getting. You look in the back of your shirt-

Joe Rogan 18:49 Right.

Jenni Harris 18:49 ... and it's a product of not America.

Joe Rogan 18:52 I started working recently with a company called Origin that's in Maine, and they make-

Jenni Harris 18:56 I'm crazy about them.

Joe Rogan 18:57 They make everything.

Jenni Harris 18:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:58 Everything American-made.

Jenni Harris 18:59 They're great.

Joe Rogan 19:00 Every thread, all the cloth. There's one part of their boots that they have not been able to source in America, and it's, it's sourced in Latin America.

Jenni Harris 19:07 Mm.

Joe Rogan 19:07 That's the only piece.

Jenni Harris 19:08 But I bet they talk about it.

Joe Rogan 19:09 They do.

Jenni Harris 19:10 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 19:10 Very openly. But they make hunting gear, they make outdoor stuff, they make jujitsu gis. They make fantastic handmade boots. And if you wanna support an American-made company, Origin is great. But, you know, they have a limited amount of... They can only make so much of it. You know, they have one f- major factory that's doing it in Maine, and it's all people working on it by hand. And it's pretty cool, but it's, you know, it's limited.

Will Harris 19:34 Yeah. We're not saying that, uh, beef from Australia is bad.

Joe Rogan 19:37 Most definitely not.

Will Harris 19:37 I'm not saying that. There's, uh, uh, there's some great beef from Australia, I'm sure, and Uruguay and everywhere else.

Joe Rogan 19:42 Yes.

Will Harris 19:43 Just tell the damn truth about it.

Joe Rogan 19:44 Tell the damn truth.

Will Harris 19:44 We, we, we had, uh, a really awkward situation that occurred last week. A company who is owned by friends of ours that we care about, uh, was buying some, uh, grinds from us, some trim actually, that... Making gra- ground beef out of. And, and Jenny was renegotiating the deal with them last week, and, uh, it came out that, you know, they were importing some beef. Uh, what, what happened is they showed her the projections of how much more they were selling, and it was just way up, and they told her how much that they were gonna buy from her, and it was way, when it was flat. It was flat. And she said, "How, how you doing that? Because we're a pretty big supplier. We... Oh, they always advertise three people as being suppliers, and we're one of them." And they said, "It came out." She went, "Are you importing beef?" And, and there was a long silence, and they finally said they are. And I told her, I was not on that call, "Uh, we're not gonna sell them. I mean, I, I don't wanna sell them anything."

Joe Rogan 20:49 Because then they can attach your name to it-

Will Harris 20:50 I don't... Yeah. I don't-

Joe Rogan 20:50 ... and, and that's fraudulent.

Will Harris 20:51 Yeah, I don't wanna be part of a scam.

Joe Rogan 20:53 That's a scam. Yeah. And it's not even a scam in terms of quality. That's wha- wha- what you're saying, it's important, that it's not that there's a... it's bad beef.

Will Harris 21:01 No.

Jenni Harris 21:02 No.

Joe Rogan 21:02 It's just you're lying. You're just-

Will Harris 21:03 This is a household brand that you've probably eaten. And, you know, it's headquartered here. (laughs) But, you know, we've... I don't wanna do that.

Joe Rogan 21:14 Yeah. And, uh, thank you for that. What, what led to this decision, the initial decision to change your farm from an industrial farm to a regenerative farm? And what... I mean, it had to, there had to be a lot of soul-searching involved in that kind of a decision because it's not an easy one, and it probably cost a lot of money, and it was probably quite a headache.

Will Harris 21:35 Oh, oh, it, it was all those things. And to be real honest with you, I, I went into it with a little bit of naivety. I th- I didn't think it was going to be as big a deal as it was, but it was. Uh, you know, I was a very industrial cattleman for 20 years, graduated from the University of Georgia with a degree in animal science and came home and put it to work. My dad had been a very industrial producer using all the tools. I was... And I had a lot of pride in my knowledge and understanding of how to raise cattle industrially, monoculture of cattle at that time. And I, uh, I, I think probably because I was, uh, an ab- an abuser. I, I, I used... If it said use a little bit, I used it a lot. And I just came to see the unintended consequences of that industrial system more clearly probably than people that were playing closer to the rules.

Jenni Harris 22:33 Mm.

Will Harris 22:33 And I just thought I didn't wanna do it anymore. And I did a... I, I did not do a good job planning an alternative production program. I just quit using stuff, you know. I quit using hormone implants and subtherapeutic antibiotics and bad feed stuffs like chicken manure. I quit, uh, using chemical fertilizer. I quit using pesticides. And it was, it was very expensive for a while and hurt... It was pain- eh- eh- economically painful, but we survived it. And, uh, from day one, I enjoyed it better, but from day one, I made less money till I lost money. But then thank goodness, you know, grass-fed beef became a thing, and it wasn't being imported, so we became profitable again.

Joe Rogan 23:24 Since you've gone public with... I found, uh, about you from Fox.

Will Harris 23:28 Mm.

Joe Rogan 23:28 I was watching television, and you were doing this interview, and we talked about the last time you were here, and this guy was rushing you. I enjoy the way you talk, but you have a way of talking that's very deliberate and clear, and it takes a little time. And this guy was just rushing you along and rushing you along. And, uh, I immediately reached out to my booking guy and said, "Let's get that guy. I wanna, I wanna hear him talk." Just like lay it out, like give him all the time in the world to lay it out. And I'm really glad you did. But, uh, from the time that you went public, have you seen more of a demand for your product and for what you're doing?

Will Harris 24:03 I have, but it's been filled by imported product.

Joe Rogan 24:07 Hmm.

Jenni Harris 24:07 Mm.

Will Harris 24:07 The, the...

Joe Rogan 24:09 This, this whole thing that we're talking about.

Will Harris 24:11 Grass-fed, yes.

Joe Rogan 24:12 Yeah.

Will Harris 24:12 Grass-fed beef, pastured poultry, all these, uh, more naturally grown, uh-... uh, meats and other poultry and, and vegeta- all of it, is, is, is, is catching traction. But big food has figured out a way to, to take, cash in on it.

Jenni Harris 24:32 I can give a good example of that.

Will Harris 24:33 Mm.

Jenni Harris 24:34 So, uh, the word free-range. So free-range, by definition, so, you know, you would see a, a brand with a, a grassy knoll and a red barn and a white fence and, you know, it would say, "Free-range." So free-range by definition is just access to the outdoors via a concrete pad or whatever. It's not actually pasture-raised poultry, it's just maybe a little different than commodity in-the-house poultry. But it's at a fraction of the price. You know, true pastured poultry might cost 200% or 300% more than commodity poultry. And so you have these consumers who are very busy, you know, they don't have time to, to learn the nuances and read and research like, you know, you have done and we obviously do. And so they see pastured poultry for $6 a pound or free-range poultry for $3 or $4 a pound. W- you know, h- how, how could you expect for them to pay 50% more, 75% or, or 100% more for something that is, is so loosely defined, and due to labeling pretty, pretty, uh, pretty misrepresentative of the way it's actually raised.

Joe Rogan 25:48 Yeah, free-range sounds like you just let them out of the chicken coop and they wander around.

Jenni Harris 25:52 Like your wife-

Joe Rogan 25:53 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 25:53 ... holding a bird.

Joe Rogan 25:54 Right, like my yard.

Jenni Harris 25:55 That's it.

Joe Rogan 25:55 Yeah, yeah. There's free-range chickens in my yard right now, that's why Marshall's here. (laughs)

Jenni Harris 26:02 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 26:02 Marshall doesn't get along with chickens.

Jenni Harris 26:03 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 26:03 We talked about that earlier. But it, this, this is deceptive. I mean, and it's, it's unfortunate that they're allowed to use those loopholes and that should be, that should be more clearly defined. I mean, if you would rather save money, and I understand that, if someone's on a budget, you wanna save money, get, I get it 100%. But I've gotten eggs from the grocery store that say free-range and I get it and I crack it open and it is that, that light yellow bullshit yolk that I know, I know that chicken has just been s- eating feed-

Jenni Harris 26:34 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 26:34 ... it's not eating grass, it's not eating bugs, it's not doing things that chickens do. And when you get a chicken that is doing things that chickens do, you get that dark orange yolk.

Jenni Harris 26:44 Blood yolk.

Joe Rogan 26:45 It's so dark and it tastes so much better. It's so much better for you, so much more nutrient-dense, and it's what a chicken egg is supposed to be.

Will Harris 26:54 And sadly, I don't think the consumers will ever really get what they're looking for unless they know exactly who they're buying it from.

Joe Rogan 27:03 Right.

Will Harris 27:04 It, it's, it's just so easy to copy these, uh, embrace these new... I mean, right now we're talking about regenerative. Well, I mean, everybody, now everybody's got regenerative. You know, it's, it's, it's too easy to label it and it's too hard for really big companies to produce it, so it puts the onus on the consumer-

Joe Rogan 27:27 Right.

Will Harris 27:27 ... to know who they're buying from.

Joe Rogan 27:28 But that, that bring me, brings me back to the initial question, is it even possible to use regenerative farming the way you folks have your farm and feed everybody? I mean, can you, can you feed, can you s- sell to McDonald's? I mean, is it even possible? I mean, how much beef do they use in a day? It has to be insane.

Will Harris 27:52 Well, the answer is no, we can't, we can't sell to McDonald's. We couldn't start to scratch the surface. And I don't know the answer, but I'll say this, when you say, uh, "C- can we produce enough food like that?" Can the industry produce enough food like that without doing such extraordinary damage? Uh, you know, we're gonna pay for this.

Joe Rogan 28:17 Right.

Will Harris 28:18 You know, the, the, this stuff is so cheap not because it's really being produced that cheap, it's because expenses are thrown off and not borne by the producer or the company buying it.

Jenni Harris 28:30 Like what? Give- give- give great...

Will Harris 28:32 The Dead-

Jenni Harris 28:33 ... great example.

Will Harris 28:33 The Dead Zone in the, in the Gulf would be a, a great example.

Joe Rogan 28:36 That's a great example, because, I mean, think about the extraordinary amount of money it would take to take the Gulf and bring it back to pristine condition.

Jenni Harris 28:44 Or wildfires. How, how much do we pay every year to put out wildfires out west?

Will Harris 28:50 Fire, f- f- fires. That soil right there, you know, the, the experts tell us that there's, like, how many years left?

Jenni Harris 28:57 60, but that was like three years ago, so 57.

Will Harris 29:00 You know, who, who, who knows, but there, even the experts tell us there's a finite life left in that degraded soil. This beautiful organic soil is perpetual.

Joe Rogan 29:14 Mm.

Will Harris 29:14 It'll last forever.

Joe Rogan 29:15 Right.

Will Harris 29:16 Now, that's a cost and it has a finite, uh, period of time, and I'm just not sure how this is all gonna work out. The water in the ground, you know, so much of these crops irrigated. So you, I told you that, uh, uh, one item, the degraded soil is a half percent organic matter, the, the beautiful soil is over 5% organic matter. 1% organic matter will absorb a one-inch rainfall. So the degraded soil will only absorb half an inch of rainfall, the beautiful organic soil will absorb a five-inch rainfall. So it requires a tremendous amount of irrigation for the degraded soil to make it. Well, we got problems with water in the ground even in the Southeast, and certainly in the West. So this, all of these resources we're just using up and using up and u- it's pissing in your britches to stay warm.

Joe Rogan 30:13 Mm. Pissing in your britches to stay warm is-

Jenni Harris 30:16 It's a good short-term strategy-

Joe Rogan 30:17 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 30:17 ... but long term?

Joe Rogan 30:19 It's- (laughs)

Jenni Harris 30:19 Not what you want to do.

Joe Rogan 30:21 That's a great way to put it. I love it. I'm gonna use that one. Pissing in your britches to stay warm. (laughs) ... yeah, it's, uh, it's really sad. And it's, it's weird how we, uh, haven't addressed this, and how this is just something that just keeps going, and going primarily because of the amount of money that's involved, and the amount of money these companies are making by doing things the way they're doing it right now, and the fact that it's subsidized.

Will Harris 30:48 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 30:49 Yeah, it's, it's dirty business. And it's, uh ... There, um, there's an ancient soil in the Amazon called terra preta. Have you guys heard about this?

Jenni Harris 30:59 Well, I watched the Graham Hancock episode.

Joe Rogan 31:01 Yes, fascinating. So, uh, thousands and thousands of years ago, the, the indigenous people of the Amazon figured out a way to create this regenerative soil. And it i- it's, uh, it, it, it's composed of biological material, carbon, all sorts of different things. They don't exactly know how they made it, and they don't know how to recreate it, but this is a self-sustaining soil. And when you grow in it, it, it acts like this soil that you folks have. And these people that lived thousands of years ago figured out how to way, to make this sustainable soil. It just seems like that is something, if there's so much money involved in all this, that's something that someone would be able to figure out how to recreate today. This is the terra preta. This is the stuff that exists. So on the left, you see the actual soil, what it looks like before it's, before it's treated. That terra preta on the right is entirely manmade, and entirely manmade from an unknown origin. I mean, we know the folks, the people that live there, they're the ones who did it, but we don't know how they did it. And wh- what we do know is that you can grow on that indefinitely. You could just keep going. They, they're calling it biochar, terra preta, but it's a phenomenal soil for growing crops on and for growing things on. And it seems like that should be something that someone should invest in, some sort of research. I mean, look, if they figured out how to do it thousands of years ago, and we assume that they didn't have computers and AI and oh, all the different advantages that we have in terms of technology and knowledge, figure it out. Someone ... I mean, there should be some sort of a large-scale project if we're really 57 years left of topsoil in the American farmlands due to monocrop agriculture and industrial farming. It seems like they should be able to figure out a way to do that.

Will Harris 32:55 Actually, that's our farm.

Joe Rogan 32:57 Yeah.

Will Harris 32:57 And then, uh, you can see there, but the subsoil with below that guy's hand, which is like the degraded soil.

Joe Rogan 33:04 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 33:06 And the good soil, which is above it, which is w- uh, soil that we ha- we have built up.

Joe Rogan 33:12 Yes.

Will Harris 33:12 And, and it's, and it, and it was built up by using the natural systems. You know, we emulate the buffalo ranging over the, the, the, the continent. It's not as good. You know, we don't, we don't have from Canada to Mexico to play with.

Joe Rogan 33:28 Right.

Will Harris 33:29 And we don't have hundreds of thousands of head. But it's a microcosm example of that.

Joe Rogan 33:34 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 33:35 And it works.

Joe Rogan 33:35 Yes.

Jenni Harris 33:36 Denny, what was the story that you used to tell that scientists figured out exactly what seawater was, you know, like what, what made seawater, and they, they meticulously made it in a lab, but then somehow it wasn't, after they did everything that, that they, science told them that seawater was, when they made it, it wasn't seawater.

Will Harris 33:58 That makes me question my ... You're right, that makes me question my, uh, reliance upon reductive science. The, uh, the, the project that she's talking about, I don't remember where it was done.

Joe Rogan 34:10 Jamie, Jamie could probably find out.

Will Harris 34:11 They took seawater and, and broke it down as well as they could with, uh, qualitative, quantitative chemistry, and decided if they could determine exactly what was in it. Then when they put it back together, a fish wouldn't live in it.

Jenni Harris 34:28 Oh, that was it?

Joe Rogan 34:29 Mm.

Will Harris 34:30 But yeah, what, uh, what happened was not so much it had too much sodium or too much whatever. It was the, the, the life was not there.

Joe Rogan 34:38 Hm. There's something else.

Will Harris 34:41 So it, it was the life, it was the, the-

Jenni Harris 34:43 The fact that they evolved together.

Will Harris 34:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 34:45 And then there's some organic compounds that's in the water or something.

Will Harris 34:48 Well, I'm, I'm talking about the life, the, the actual living microbes-

Joe Rogan 34:51 Yes.

Will Harris 34:52 ... that, that they couldn't put back in there, 'cause they weren't there anymore. You know, you took it apart, put it back together.

Joe Rogan 34:57 Right. So you just have sterile seawater.

Will Harris 34:59 Sterile water.

Jenni Harris 34:59 Sterile ingredients that made seawater.

Joe Rogan 35:02 Yeah. Probably like a fish tank.

Jenni Harris 35:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 35:05 But not even.

Will Harris 35:06 Right.

Joe Rogan 35:07 Because fish tank has fish poop and all sorts of other things that also ...

Jenni Harris 35:11 Have life.

Joe Rogan 35:12 Yeah, has life and leads to the microbes. Hoo! You know, people listening to this probably feel very helpless.

Jenni Harris 35:21 Hm.

Joe Rogan 35:21 You know, because it seems like it's one of those situations like, oh my God, this is a problem that it's almost like you don't realize there's an avalanche coming 'cause you're, you're, you're sitting in the town and you're like, "Oh, this is a good place. This is a, this is a safe place." But meanwhile, there's an avalanche coming and it's just a matter of time before it reaches the town.

Will Harris 35:40 No, not exactly, because-

Joe Rogan 35:42 Maybe that was a bad analogy.

Jenni Harris 35:44 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 35:44 (laughing) Just, but I'm saying

Will Harris 35:45 Well, no, I mean, I, I, I get, I get it, the, the, the d- and I agree, except for the fact that those people sitting in that town, there's not a damn thing they can do about that avalanche. It's coming.

Joe Rogan 35:56 Right.

Will Harris 35:59 When it comes to the way we treat our land and water and air, consumers have power. They, they can do something about it. You, you can't depend on the government because of the lobbyist thing, the dark money. We discussed that earlier. It won't be, sadly, the land grant university system, because so much of that funding comes from the huge multinational companies that are profiting from industrial production. I, I can list a whole, a lot of things it won't come from.But if it- i- if it's- if it happens, it'll be by consumers, consumers making the choice, "This is what I'm going to support. This is not wha- what I'm, uh, going to not support." That's the on- on- on- that's the only way it's going to happen, and I- I don't know that it's going to happen.

Joe Rogan 36:51 Well, it seems like it would take a massive reeducation of the American public in order for that to take place, and then people would have to- they would have to be willing to be financially impacted by their decisions, because it's- it's not gonna be- you're not gonna be able to get a 99 cent cheap cheeseburger.

Will Harris 37:08 Correct. C- correct. And- and to that point, nothing really brings about change except pain.

Joe Rogan 37:17 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 37:18 And I don't think you can educate fat, satiated, full people and- and get them to spend more money for their food.

Joe Rogan 37:30 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 37:31 But if there's enough pain, whether it comes from health or polluted areas or weather or fire or- th- then maybe so.

Joe Rogan 37:44 And it's also a problem people aren't aware of the issues. For most people, food is food. They just go and get their food, and then they don't understand the consequences of eating bad food until it's kinda too late.

Jenni Harris 37:58 But they're not really supposed to.

Joe Rogan 37:59 Right.

Jenni Harris 37:59 Who's educating them?

Joe Rogan 38:00 Right.

Jenni Harris 38:00 You know, I mean, i- if- if they go to the doctor, there's a pill.

Joe Rogan 38:03 Mm-hmm.

Jenni Harris 38:04 You know, I mean, it- there- there's- there's no- there- there's a lot of, like, anti-correlation that's happening where it's like, here's a problem, here's a solution, and we bypass all the hard work. We want the easy solution.

Joe Rogan 38:16 Right.

Jenni Harris 38:16 You know, so it's- it's not just that consumers are making arguably, uh, wrong choices, but uninformed choices for the food that they eat, but additionally, you know, we're big cycles of nature people. We believe that in order to be good stewards of land, all of nature's cycles need to be functioning, and when they do, they create an abundance, and that abundance is enjoyed, uh, by you and I, uh, in the form of meat and vegetables and, you know, whatever else. And there's been so much intense focus on the carbon cycle, you think about what you hear from the media, it's carbon, carbon, carbon, carbon, that in reality all of nature's cycles are broken. You know, what about the- the water cycle or the mineral cycle or the grazing cycle? These are- you know, you can't just work on one cycle, and so there's just so much misinformation and so much, uh, so much of a spotlight on certain things, when in reality it's so much broader than that, and it's not- it's not hard, it's just they're not telling the complete story.

Will Harris 39:24 I- I- I agree with that fully, and I th- I don't think that's an accident. I think that the carbon cycle gets all the press because that's the one that somebody can make some money fixing.

Joe Rogan 39:35 Mm-hmm. I- I agree with you. Yeah, and that's unfortunate that this whole green thing has become a political movement, and it's been a political movement that's hijacked by industry, and they are trying to enforce mandates that will allow them to make extreme amounts of profit and also to control people and to control their choices.

Will Harris 39:55 Yeah, yeah, the- all you read is that, uh, uh, cattle are- are great contributors to global warming, greenhouse gases, and all that, and we talked about it before, there's a- a- a s- scientific study, very expensive scientific study, they call it a lifecycle analysis, on our website that shows that we're actually sequestering more carbon in our cattle side of our business than we're putting up. So, you know, it's-

Joe Rogan 40:22 Which makes sense.

Will Harris 40:24 Yeah, that's the way it- uh- so-

Joe Rogan 40:25 It's the way it's supposed to be.

Will Harris 40:26 So one of the differences in those two soils, in the ones you showed and the one that you talked about in South America, there's carbon and- and micro- microscopic life in that soil.

Jenni Harris 40:36 Which is what makes it dark versus the other one.

Joe Rogan 40:40 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 40:42 So, uh, you know, I- and the way you build those carbon-rich soils is through proper livestock interaction. That's the way the eight-foot deep soils in the, uh, Great Plains came about was those huge herds of buffalo going across.

Joe Rogan 41:01 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 41:02 And it's the reason that those two soils look so much different and the one that you showed- Jamey showed on the board there. So, you know, we- I think we know a lot more about how to fix the problem than we acknowledge, but it's just going to be so expensive, especially for big food, big ag, big take.

Joe Rogan 41:22 And then ultimately also for the consumer-

Will Harris 41:25 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 41:25 ... 'cause if McDonald's went purely to regenerative agriculture, if they had a large scale effort to eliminate industrial farming and get all of their food through regenerative agriculture, there's not a chance in hell they're gonna charge 99 cents for a cheeseburger.

Will Harris 41:38 You know, and I'm not opposed to- to there being chains like McDonald's, but I just don't know how they work with any sort of local food movement. I just don't know how you make that work.

Joe Rogan 41:52 Right. And then how do you make it so- I mean, there's a large amount of people in this country that primarily eat fast food, unfortunately. That's- that's where they get their calories from, and you see it because of the health consequences. I mean, it's- it's a gigantic issue in this country that we- if you look at the human beings... I'm sure you've seen these, uh, photographs of people on the beach in the- the 1950s and '60s versus 2023. 2023 is like- it's- it's- it's insane how obese everybody is, and that's not an accident.

Will Harris 42:25 No.

Joe Rogan 42:25 That's a direct result of the- the way we eat and what we eat and where it comes from.

Will Harris 42:31 It's the same with our animals. You know, we-

Joe Rogan 42:33 Yeah.

Will Harris 42:33 ... uh, uh, you know, the- the goal in a feed lot animal is to-... blow 'em up fast and quick with cheap food. That's what we do to our people too.

Joe Rogan 42:42 Yeah. Yeah, that is what we do to 'em. Yeah.

Jenni Harris 42:44 Well, and in, in marketing, you know, we create our own customers. You know, those people who suffer from obesity, and sedentary lifestyles that have diseases and whatever else, then we get to sell them medicine.

Joe Rogan 42:56 Yes.

Jenni Harris 42:56 And then the medicine's called s- side effects, which then we treat with more medicine.

Joe Rogan 43:01 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 43:01 So, it's, uh... so I'm the director of marketing, and one thing that I love is, you know, is just good old-fashioned marketing, and reoccurring business, and returning orders, and, you know, a-all those things. I see how that works. You know, the very idea that these lifestyles create a certain, you know, a certain issue, which are then prescribed with certain medicines that then create more issues, that we treat with more medicines. What a genius plan.

Joe Rogan 43:30 Yeah. (laughs)

Jenni Harris 43:30 That's great. That is (laughs) ... I mean, it's terrible-

Joe Rogan 43:32 If you wanna buy a yacht. (laughs)

Jenni Harris 43:33 It's, well, it's terrible for the people-

Joe Rogan 43:35 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 43:35 ... and for the environment, and, you know, for w- but, I mean, hell, it's great.

Joe Rogan 43:39 Very profitable.

Jenni Harris 43:40 Very.

Will Harris 43:40 I'll gi- I'll give you another slant on that. We talked about the changes I made from what I used to do, to what I do now. And one of the primary changes is, f-f-f-from, from the gl- from the 30,000-foot level, is I used to go in my pastures every day looking for something to kill. I was looking for a f- a fun- a fungus on the grass to put a fungicide on, looking for an insect to put insecticide on. Looking for another competing, uh, uh, weed that I put, uh, herbicide on. Looking for parasites in my cattle. On and on. Insects. On and on. I was looking every day for something to kill. I was a successful commercial cattleman, in terms of profitability. And I was successful because I killed stuff every day. Spent money to high-tech companies to kill stuff. Uh, now, since I made the change, I'm trying to keep things alive. You know, I believe that all these species have a role out there, and, and I wanna keep things in balance, but we're trying to keep things alive. We're not trying to kill any of it. So-

Joe Rogan 44:53 You're trying to create a- a- like, a contained natural environment.

Will Harris 44:57 Symbiotic, symbiotic relationships between the animals.

Joe Rogan 45:00 Yeah.

Will Harris 45:01 But I th- I, I, I... I'm, I'm... that's analogous with the food situation, I think.

Joe Rogan 45:05 And that's what the whole Earth should be.

Jenni Harris 45:07 That's how it evolved.

Joe Rogan 45:08 Yeah.

Will Harris 45:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:09 And it's just recently, within the last, like, how many years that we've done it this way?

Will Harris 45:14 Since World War II. I, I, I b- I belie- I've thought about that a lot, read about it a lot. And I think World War II is kinda when we started the change.

Joe Rogan 45:22 Because we needed food.

Will Harris 45:24 Well, I, actually I should say the end of World War II. But, but yeah, we needed the food, so there was a demand to produce it. And then World War II's war effort gave us so many tools. You know, the, the munitions manufacturing became fertilizer manufacturing. The, uh, nerve gas became pesticides. On and on.

Joe Rogan 45:46 Mm. Phew. How do you unwind all that? That's what's crazy, you know? When you're dealing with 80-plus years of this going on, like, how do you unwind that, and how do you... I guess you do it through conversations like this initially, to get enough people aware of how big of a problem this is, and how bad it is for everybody.

Will Harris 46:09 You know, th- three generations and trillions and trillions of dollars. There are just so many people making so much money on this.

Jenni Harris 46:15 Well, you think about it, you'll, you probably won't be here in 80 years. I know you're the specimen of health, and you're-

Will Harris 46:21 Yes.

Jenni Harris 46:21 ... uh, you know, may- maybe so. But your kids will be.

Joe Rogan 46:25 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 46:25 And so, you know, I, I didn't really focus on it until I became a mother. And you have a son and a daughter, and, you know, my, my sister has kids. And it's like, all right, we can probably keep it in between the ditches. I'm 37. Maybe I'll, you know, make it to 75. So, we can, we can probably keep it in, in between the ditches until then. But, you know, what type of world are we leaving our kids? I mean, do you-

Joe Rogan 46:50 Right.

Jenni Harris 46:51 ... y- your kids, you know what I mean-

Joe Rogan 46:52 Right.

Jenni Harris 46:52 ... are, they're, they're gonna inherit something way the hell worse than you did.

Joe Rogan 46:56 Right. It's gonna get worse.

Jenni Harris 46:57 It's gonna-

Joe Rogan 46:57 It's not gonna get better.

Jenni Harris 46:58 Way worse.

Joe Rogan 46:58 Right. Unless enough people make this decision that you made. Unless enough people take control of their health and start changing the way they eat and where, and where they source their food from, and caring. And, you know, the, the title of your book, A Bold Return to Giving a Damn, which is a great title, One Farm, Six Generations, and the Future of Food. Um, when you set out to write this book, I know that this is an important message to you, but how, how has this been received so far?

Will Harris 47:33 You know, we don't get too much, uh, feedback on how many people are buying the book. That's... it's out there, but we don't get it. Jenny, you, you can answer that question better than me. She-

Jenni Harris 47:43 Uh, so, you know, when, when Dad started talking about writing a book, we were like, "Ugh. There's no way." You know, hi- his brain is, is truly cyclical, just like the farm. There's, you know, birth, growth, death, decay, birth, growth, death, decay. Where do you start? The chicken or the egg? Who came first? And for him, uh, you know, we had talked about him writing a book for a very long time. And honestly, nobody knew where to start. Um, and so he was approached by, um, you know, some folks who said, "Hey, we think, you know, you'd be a, a great book writer." Um, and Dad quickly told them, "There's no way I can write a book. No way in hell. I don't know where to start and where to end." And they said, "Well, let us help you." So, they found a ghostwriter named Emily Greeven, who is great. And she and Dad had phone dates every Friday for probably a year that lasted anywhere from two to four hours. And...In listening to the book, Dad nar- Dad narrated it, and it is like a glimpse inside of his brain. It is such a... Uh, all of his thoughts are there. And, you know, I think it's so important because, you know, Dad started a, a business and a mission that is gonna last a lot longer than him. You know, he's 69 this year and, you know, the food system is not going to be fixed, uh, you know, by the time he is gone. And so, to be part of that and to be part of a business that's, you know, bigger than one person, bigger than one person's life that lasts, you know, lasts so much longer, I think is so important. And, and people like him have got to focus on that. You know, he can't fix the food system. He has to set the groundwork for people like you and I to fix the food system, and then to instill it in our children to fix the food system.

Joe Rogan 49:33 What was the motivation to write this?

Will Harris 49:36 (clears throat) You know, I felt like people needed to know what I spent the last 25 years learning. I'm not the only one that knows it, but I'm the only one that has this particular slant on it. Uh, I knew I couldn't write a book. You know, I, I went to the University of Georgia and majored in agriculture. We didn't read many books. We certainly didn't write a book. Uh, when they approached us about, about writing it, uh, it, it just seemed like the thing to do, and I give so much credit to this Amy Le Craven that Jenny referenced, who wrote it, who actually wrote my thoughts down on the paper.

Joe Rogan 50:19 And do you think this is a one-time deal? Are you gonna write more books?

Will Harris 50:24 I know damn... I know damn well this.

Joe Rogan 50:26 (laughs)

Jenni Harris 50:26 (laughs)

Will Harris 50:26 It took me 69 years to come up with enough shit to put in that book.

Joe Rogan 50:30 (laughs)

Jenni Harris 50:31 (laughs)

Will Harris 50:31 I'm not gonna have time for... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 50:34 It seems like, uh, another book, though, someone should write is, uh, how this can be fixed and, uh, what steps need to be taken. And I think it did... It needs to be taken in... Uh, f- for sure, it needs to be taken at a governmental level.

Will Harris 50:48 Th- there's a bunch of books out there-

Joe Rogan 50:50 Yeah.

Will Harris 50:50 ... that I've seen that p- farmers have written that I, I didn't agree with. There's one, Dirt to Soil by Gabe Brown that's great. So, you know, there, there are others.

Joe Rogan 51:02 So, there's... If someone is out there that does run an industrial farm and is, uh, sort of tortured by it, i- i- that they're aware of the consequences of what they're doing and they would like to maybe... And they maybe admire what you've done and would like to move in that direction.

Will Harris 51:18 Well, not... Since you mentioned it, uh, Gabe and I are both... We're both in... About the same age. We're both industrial farmers that, that went this route and, uh, there's some great regenerative farmers out there. But there aren't a tremendous number of them that used to be, uh, an industrial farmer. There's just, there's just not a lot of that.

Joe Rogan 51:43 How many industrial farms are there in this country?

Will Harris 51:46 Oh, I have no idea. A lot. I mean, a lot less than it used to be because they've consolidated and gotten so much bigger. But I don't know that number. That, that's, that's-

Joe Rogan 51:55 Well, you were originally brought, uh, onto that Fox News show because they were, they were trying to figure out what a farmer thinks about Bill Gates buying up farmland.

Will Harris 52:04 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 52:04 You know, Bill Gat- Gates, who's, uh, famously said that everyone's gotta stop eating meat and eat these bullshit fake meat versions, these plant-based meats. So, there's 25,000 factory farms. Factory farms continue to take over the agricultural landscape of the United States. There are currently 1.6 billion animals on our nation's 25,000 factory farms, which makes sense. I mean, if you, you just, you know, go to Arby's. Where's that food coming from?

Jenni Harris 52:32 Well, and you know, the... And even... So, Jamie, you should google this, but when we talk about that, um, the centralization of the meat industry is even more stark. So, what is it? Four, four, um, maybe four meat processors in... At least with beef, occupy over 80% of the nation's beef supply.

Will Harris 52:56 Phew. Yeah.

Jenni Harris 52:56 Four.

Will Harris 52:56 J- Jenny just gave me this before we came in here, but it's, uh... This is in 2023. United... The United States has imported 956 million pounds of beef so far in 2023.

Jenni Harris 53:13 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 53:13 Wow.

Will Harris 53:13 That's imported beef.

Joe Rogan 53:15 Wow.

Jenni Harris 53:15 That's crazy. Jamie, will you pull up that, um... I think I named it, like, Food Consolidation or something.

Joe Rogan 53:23 I bet most people have no idea. I bet most people listening to this are blown away by that number. That most people would... If you asked the average person on the street, "How much meat do you think is imported from other countries? Beef?" They would probably say, "N- none." (laughs) No, they wouldn't even think of it.

Jenni Harris 53:41 No.

Will Harris 53:42 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 53:42 Especially if you get to label it a product of the USA.

Will Harris 53:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 53:45 Which is so dirty.

Jenni Harris 53:48 Yeah. You... And, and that's... You know, consumers believe... They have the impression of choice. They don't actually have choice. The, the image that Jamie's gonna show us-

Joe Rogan 53:58 I'm just trying to find a cleaner one. It's just a little blurry, but...

Jenni Harris 54:00 Oh, good. Yep.

Joe Rogan 54:01 Okay. Here it is.

Jenni Harris 54:02 Uh, s- So, look at all these brands that are owned by this, you know, ten or so parent companies.

Joe Rogan 54:11 That's crazy.

Jenni Harris 54:12 So, you know, consumers have the im- im- uh, you know, the impression that there is choice, but truly there is no choice. The same is true with, with meat. I think on Tyson's website, it has... Uh, and I gave it to Jamie, but one in every five pounds of meat that's consumed in America is a Tyson product.

Joe Rogan 54:32 Wow.

Jenni Harris 54:33 Whoa.

Joe Rogan 54:34 Wow.

Jenni Harris 54:34 You know, so we talk about centralized food, we talk about food security. Do we really want a global food supply? And the answer is yes or no, but with regards to f- uh, fragility in food, think about COVID, uh, and the effects of, of what it did to the grocery store. There we go.

Joe Rogan 54:52 One in five pounds of chicken, beef, and pork in the US is produced by Tyson Foods. (whistles) Wow.

Will Harris 54:58 And- and- and the other four-

Joe Rogan 54:59 That's proudly registered on their website.

Jenni Harris 55:02 Yeah. There's another one that talks about how many animals they slaughter in a week, and that's another-

Joe Rogan 55:06 Oh.

Jenni Harris 55:06 ... just in- incredible number.

Will Harris 55:09 The- the- and the sa- same as, the- the other four pounds are produced by two or three other companies.

Joe Rogan 55:14 Hmm.

Will Harris 55:14 It's not like it was Tyson and everybody else.

Joe Rogan 55:17 Right, right, right.

Jenni Harris 55:18 Will you pull up that- that other one, Jamie? 'Cause I wanna draw a correlation between the s- the scale of this versus the scale of what farms like us do.

Jamie Vernon 55:29 Uh, you meant this? This thing?

Jenni Harris 55:32 No, there's one that says, like, 177,000 cattle are processed, um... Anyways, I'll tell you a little bit about- about our model and then we can compare it to that. But... So, when dad decided to build the- the, uh, processing plant in 2007, he built it to process 50 head of cattle a week, and we got to that number and we were still hemorrhaging money. There was no way that was gonna work. And so we made a few modifications, primarily around refrigeration. Uh, we dropped the chill time.

Jamie Vernon 56:03 This one?

Jenni Harris 56:03 Yep, that's it. So, our processing plant, own farm processing plant will process 25 head of cattle a day, five days a week. So, it's 125 head a week. Compared to systems like this, which is also on Tyson's website, 155,000 head of cattle are processed per week in only 14 facilities.

Joe Rogan 56:29 Wow. That's crazy.

Jenni Harris 56:32 And, you know, the further to the right you go, so, you know, pork, 471,000 pigs are slaughtered in a week, at only seven facilities.

Joe Rogan 56:42 Hmm.

Jenni Harris 56:43 47 million chickens.

Joe Rogan 56:45 47 million chickens per week.

Will Harris 56:47 And I've been in the-

Joe Rogan 56:48 Wow.

Will Harris 56:48 I've been in those facilities, and it's not pretty.

Jenni Harris 56:50 But that- that is the scale of food.

Joe Rogan 56:53 They must smell horrible. We've, uh, we've shown the footage of, um... Someone got drone footage where they fly a drone over a pig farm-

Jenni Harris 57:00 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 57:00 ... an industrialized pig farm, and you see these lakes of pig waste, and it's so disgusting. It's just- just toxic waste.

Jenni Harris 57:10 Which is sad, because that waste is what created that topsoil-

Joe Rogan 57:14 Right.

Jenni Harris 57:14 ... at Wydoak Pastures. It's just-

Joe Rogan 57:15 Right.

Jenni Harris 57:16 We took the livestock off of the land. We decoupled what had been coupled for millions of years.

Joe Rogan 57:22 So, these are these lakes. Now, here's the question. Why can't they take that waste and redistribute it into the land and use it for fertilizer?

Will Harris 57:32 And- and there's some of that done, but it's expensive.

Joe Rogan 57:35 That's the problem. That it's expensive. Is that what they're doing right here?

Will Harris 57:39 Yeah, I think so. I...

Jamie Vernon 57:41 Yeah, I remember them talking about the- the waste was getting spread on the people's, like, houses down at the other end.

Joe Rogan 57:46 Oh.

Jamie Vernon 57:46 'Cause the wi- it would be in the air and then it would-

Joe Rogan 57:48 Right, of course.

Jamie Vernon 57:49 ... spray over whatever.

Joe Rogan 57:50 Yeah. Well, yeah, indiscriminate because they wanna do it cheaply.

Will Harris 57:54 Yeah, and- and there's a difference between, uh, a cow or pig or chicken defecating here and there and there-

Joe Rogan 58:01 Right.

Will Harris 58:02 ... and spreading something-

Joe Rogan 58:02 In a natural way.

Will Harris 58:03 ... you know, that thick across there.

Joe Rogan 58:05 Yes. Right.

Jenni Harris 58:06 Well, and just- just to sort of tie all that together, Jamie, you have one more thing and then I swear I'm gonna quit asking you to pull shit up. But-

Joe Rogan 58:12 That's what he does. It's okay. He likes it.

Jenni Harris 58:14 ... I have to apologize. He's probably like, "Who invited her?"

Joe Rogan 58:16 No, no, no, no, no, no.

Jenni Harris 58:17 (laughs) But there's- there's, uh, one more that's like, our brands... So, one in five, uh, pounds of meat, we just read that-

Joe Rogan 58:27 Mm-hmm.

Jenni Harris 58:27 ... was produced- pres- produced by Tyson. But consumers have no idea that it was a Tyson product.

Joe Rogan 58:33 Right.

Jenni Harris 58:33 So, if you look at the amount of brands that, you know, these big multinational meat corporations own, there's no- there's no, uh, no way for a consumer to know that that's one of those products.

Joe Rogan 58:48 Hmm.

Jenni Harris 58:48 So, it's just- it's just a really incredible system, when you start pulling the layers back on it.

Joe Rogan 58:57 And there's demand, that's the other problem. It's like, you're not gonna get them to stop doing that. There's a massive demand for all this food.

Jenni Harris 59:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:05 And most people listening to this are a part of that demand. Most people listening to this have stopped at a fast food burger place this week and- and picked up a product of this system.

Jenni Harris 59:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:18 And they wanna be able to do that. If you're hungry and you're- you're on the go and you wanted to be able to pull into a drive through, get a cheeseburger and some fries and a soda, bam. Takes... It's kind of extraordinary, the system they've created, it sucks that you can't do it in a healthy way, but it's kind of extraordinary that you can just pull into somewhere and get 1,000 calories (fingers snap) like that.

Jenni Harris 59:36 It's so convenient.

Joe Rogan 59:37 Yeah.

Will Harris 59:37 And cheap.

Joe Rogan 59:37 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 59:38 Very cheap.

Will Harris 59:38 Incredibly cheap.

Joe Rogan 59:39 Yeah. For the amount of calories, uh, and that- and that is also reflected in the health consequences of impoverished people. If you look at people that are poor that rely upon this kind of food all the time, those are the people that have the worst health outcomes, because they're eating stuff that's- doesn't have any nutrients in it, it's terrible for you, it's filled with seed oils and bullshit and preservatives and... I'm sure you've seen those, um, uh, they- they've done these, uh, little tests where they've taken a McDonald's cheeseburger and just sit it on a shelf-

Will Harris 1:00:10 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:00:11 Oh, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:11 ... for, like, weeks and nothing happens to it.

Will Harris 1:00:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:14 You could probably eat it, which is so insane.

Jenni Harris 1:00:17 That's crazy.

Joe Rogan 1:00:18 I mean, you could sit it for weeks.

Will Harris 1:00:20 But, you know, these companies, as bad as this is, these companies have done what the public told them to do. The public has said, "We want food cheaper, cheaper, cheaper, cheaper, cheaper."

Joe Rogan 1:00:31 Right.

Jenni Harris 1:00:31 Quicker.

Joe Rogan 1:00:33 And chea-

Jamie Vernon 1:00:33 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:00:33 Consistent.

Will Harris 1:00:33 ... che- and quicker. And- and-

Joe Rogan 1:00:34 Yeah.

Will Harris 1:00:34 ... you know- you know how you get cheaper and quicker.

Joe Rogan 1:00:37 Okay, this is exactly the same after five years.

Jenni Harris 1:00:40 Oh (laughs) .

Joe Rogan 1:00:41 Five years.

Will Harris 1:00:43 Wow.

Jenni Harris 1:00:43 Way to go, Jamie.

Joe Rogan 1:00:44 That is wild.

Will Harris 1:00:46 It doesn't look that bad.

Jenni Harris 1:00:47 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:00:48 That is crazy.

Jenni Harris 1:00:50 Stick a fork in me, I'm done.

Will Harris 1:00:52 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:00:52 Wow.So, Megan wants to find out whether the cheeseburger will stay the same after another five years. (laughs) So, I bet it will.

Jenni Harris 1:01:01 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:01:01 I mean, what's gonna change? Five years. It says here she was inspired to carry out the experiment after seeing an old burger being showcased in her doctor's office. And so, she set this burger down and just left it out there for five years, and that's what it looks like. Hi, Megan.

Jenni Harris 1:01:17 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:01:18 (laughs) Kinda crazy, but also disturbing if you- you eat that. Like what is that doing to your gut microbiome?

Jenni Harris 1:01:24 (coughs)

Joe Rogan 1:01:24 What is that doing to your health? I mean, the preservatives have a consequence on your health. The eating stuff that... You know, we were talking about dog food earlier. And, um, I feed my dog raw food, and, uh, I just started feeding him raw food about six, seven months ago and it kind of... It's embarrassing to me that that's the case. Because I always just thought if you go to the pet s-... I didn't think about it. You go to the pet store, you buy healthy food, uh, the best food that they have available at a, you know, a nice pet store. Like, "This has gotta be good for the dog. Oh, look at all the nutrients. Look at all the stuff." But then I was thinking like, "How is it just sitting there? How can it... How does it not go bad? How does it not..." There's never mold on pet food. There's the cheeseburger. 20 years.

Jenni Harris 1:02:06 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:02:07 Oh my God, a Utah man- (laughs) 20 y-... Well, there's your answer, Megan.

Jenni Harris 1:02:11 It doesn't even look like that one's been in the refrigerator.

Joe Rogan 1:02:13 Nope, just sittin' there. I don't think hers was either.

Jenni Harris 1:02:16 Dang.

Joe Rogan 1:02:17 This guy's just hoardin' cheeseburgers.

Jenni Harris 1:02:20 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:02:20 This guy's got a 14-year-old cheeseburger. There's quite- quite a few of 'em.

Jenni Harris 1:02:22 He just breaks it out every year for an update. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:02:25 Oh my God, that's insane. That's insane.

Jenni Harris 1:02:28 Ew. The pickle went bad.

Joe Rogan 1:02:29 Yeah, the pickle went bad. The pickle kinda... He's got it.

Jenni Harris 1:02:32 He's got the receipt.

Joe Rogan 1:02:32 He's got the receipt. That's incredible.

Jenni Harris 1:02:34 How much was it? 79 cents. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:02:37 79 cents. Not much more now, which is pretty shocking.

Jenni Harris 1:02:40 That's right.

Joe Rogan 1:02:40 Yeah. But there's a consequence. There's a consequence for all that. But what I was saying about my dog, uh, he was getting fat, and we were lowering the amount of food that he was eating because of that and increasing his exercise, and he still just-... He just didn't-... And then I was thinking, "I wouldn't eat that. Why am I feeding him what I would eat?" And so, I started feeding him... Well, I was feeding him, uh, elk meat. Uh, so I'd get-... I'd shoot an elk and I'd take some of the ground meat, and that's what I would use in his dog food and I'd cut it up. And boy, he would just dive on that food.

Jenni Harris 1:03:08 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:03:08 I mean, he (gobbling noises) like, he couldn't get it in his mouth quick enough. It just-... It was-... To him, it was what he was supposed to be eating.

Jenni Harris 1:03:14 That's right.

Joe Rogan 1:03:15 Now, when we switched over to, uh, what's f-... It's f-... The stuff we're using right now, there's a bunch of companies that do it really well, and they- they sell, uh, real food for dogs. And it's frozen, and it's cut up into cubes and it's just basically raw meat and some vegetables and some blueberries and stuff like that. And it's changed everything. It changed his coat. He changed-... His body slimmed down. He's got way more energy. His endurance when I throw the ball for him, he's got way more energy. It's incredible. It's incredible, um, but of course it is. I mean, it just makes sense. I-... You think about the high instances of cancer in dogs, and also the high instances of cancer in human beings that have been correlated to, uh, preservatives and all sorts of environmental contaminants that- that are in human beings' diets. It just makes sense that that would be in your-... Especially since the vast majority of dogs are being fed these processed, preserved, industrialized foods.

Jenni Harris 1:04:09 Yeah. Here- here's another one, too. We brought Marshall some rawhides and I think he'll completely love it. But, you know, there- there's another part of it and so, we became fast friends with a- a pet food manufacturer in Atlanta, uh, Whole Dog Market, who also coined farm hounds. They're really, really great people. But they told me about the fact that, you know, puppies chew. And, you know, you hate your puppy because it chews up all your stuff, your- your seat, your chair legs, your shoes, you know, whatever it is. Uh, and, you know, you- you spank the puppy and, you know, they learn not to chew and whatever else happens. But truthfully, chewing for dogs is, uh, is- is soothing for them. You know, it's- it's something that, uh, is calming. It relieves stress. It's a natural behavior. They're used to having to gnaw their food off of a carcass that they've run down-

Joe Rogan 1:05:03 Hmm.

Jenni Harris 1:05:03 ... or whatever it else it is. And so, um, y- you know, i- it is sad to think that we have turned dog food into something, you know, little bites that can be gulped down. And we don't give dogs something to chew on, and then they get in trouble for chewing on your shoes or chewing on your chair leg when that is how animals evolved, uh, you know, for thousands of years.

Joe Rogan 1:05:27 Yeah, it's natural behavior. It's also changed the way human beings' jaws are.

Jenni Harris 1:05:31 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:05:31 You know, the reason why human beings get crowded teeth and smaller jawbones is 'cause we stopped chewing on meat.

Jenni Harris 1:05:37 I know.

Joe Rogan 1:05:38 We- we stopped chewing on food that's real food and we started eating mush. And when you do that over generation and generation, the- the human body changes.

Jenni Harris 1:05:48 That's right.

Joe Rogan 1:05:49 Yeah. It's very bizarre.

Jenni Harris 1:05:51 I brought you some gum, and it's from Turkey, and it's- it's- it's called Phelum. I don't know if I'm saying that right. But it's exactly for that, and I have chewed it for probably a year and a half, and it is the best stress, uh, dealing with mechanism that I have. It is e-... You know, there's just something to be said for chewing.

Joe Rogan 1:06:11 Yeah, they sell that stuff. I think it's called masticating gum.

Jenni Harris 1:06:14 Yep. Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:06:14 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:06:15 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:15 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:06:15 I'm a huge fan.

Joe Rogan 1:06:16 It's actually good for your jaw. Boxers actually use that.

Jenni Harris 1:06:18 I'm not a boxer.

Joe Rogan 1:06:19 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:06:19 Shocking, I know.

Joe Rogan 1:06:19 (laughs)

Jenni Harris 1:06:20 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:06:20 But it's good for their jaw, their jaw muscles.

Jenni Harris 1:06:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:23 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:06:23 It's good for mine.

Joe Rogan 1:06:24 There's also a product called Jawzrsize that I use that's, uh, it's a rubber thing that you put in your mouth. I do-... I weight lift with my jaw, believe it or not. I put this thing in my- in between my teeth and I go like this (gobbling noises) and I do reps-

Jenni Harris 1:06:38 I hope we'll-

Joe Rogan 1:06:38 ... with my jaw.

Jenni Harris 1:06:39 Let's see.

Joe Rogan 1:06:39 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:06:39 Let's insert a video of you doing that on this episode.

Joe Rogan 1:06:41 It's made my jaw muscles bigger, 100%.

Jenni Harris 1:06:43 I was gonna say something about it.

Joe Rogan 1:06:44 You can- you can see it in my face. (laughs)

Jenni Harris 1:06:46 (laughs) I mean, you look. Your jaws, they look good, man.

Joe Rogan 1:06:49 Thank you very much.

Jenni Harris 1:06:50 You're welcome.

Joe Rogan 1:06:50 I'm very proud of my jaws. But there's people that go crazy with it, and, um, there's like a community that- online that- of people that have like overused their jaw muscles to the point where they develop these massive like bull mastiff jaw muscles on the side of their face. And it becomes a- a-... Like kind of a weird thing, like almost like anorexia or something. Like they-

Jenni Harris 1:07:10 Wow.

Joe Rogan 1:07:11 ... you know, they get obsessed with jaw muscles.

Jenni Harris 1:07:12 (laughs) That's disgusting.

Joe Rogan 1:07:14 Yeah, there's like before-

Jenni Harris 1:07:15 They need a hobby.

Joe Rogan 1:07:15 ... and after photos.

Jenni Harris 1:07:17 Ugh.

Joe Rogan 1:07:17 These people that are just, have developed these... because they want a square jaw.

Jenni Harris 1:07:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:07:21 Right? So in doing... That will give you a square jaw, because that's where it comes from. It comes from this, this muscle right here.

Jenni Harris 1:07:27 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:07:27 This fat muscle right here and you could build that muscle just like you could build your biceps or any other muscle and you build it from chewing and a lot of people are just eating mush. Like, what do they want when they want s- steak? "Oh, I want a tender steak."

Will Harris 1:07:39 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:07:39 Exactly right.

Joe Rogan 1:07:40 Yeah, it's one of the things that people don't like about game meat, is that it's chewy.

Jenni Harris 1:07:43 That's right. Or grass-fed beef.

Joe Rogan 1:07:44 Right.

Jenni Harris 1:07:44 We did a tremendous amount of education for, for cooking grass-fed beef and for the first several years that we had our e-commerce online store, we had, uh, you know, consumers calling saying, "It's like shoe leather." You know, "It's so, it's so tough." And you say, "Well, how did you cook it?" And you walk them through, you... And-

Will Harris 1:08:01 Mm-hmm.

Jenni Harris 1:08:01 Uh, you know, that has really cut down as consumers have become more familiar with it, but the fact that it melts in your mouth?

Joe Rogan 1:08:07 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:08:07 Meat's not supposed to melt in your mouth.

Joe Rogan 1:08:09 No, it's not.

Jenni Harris 1:08:10 That's not the way that works.

Joe Rogan 1:08:10 Well, I'm not a big fan of, uh, Kobe beef.

Jenni Harris 1:08:14 Ugh.

Joe Rogan 1:08:14 But th-... When I look at, like, when they slice Kobe beef and they talk about how expensive it is 'cause of all the marbling, I'm like, "That thing's dying." Like, that is a sick animal that is, uh, uh, like a severely morbidly obese human being. If you took a slice out of them, it's gonna look like that. Just a deep... Just fat is everywhere, it overcomes the food where you're, you're eating it and you're just... It, like, coats your mouth.

Jenni Harris 1:08:39 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:08:39 And some people like it, you know, and in, like, small pieces. Okay, c- whatever you want, if that's what you're into. Me, I like grass-fed beef. I like a dark, rich rib eye steak where it looks like a dark red, like a cow is supposed to look. Like a bison steak. If you eat a grass-fed p- bison steak and you cut into it, that is a dark red and that's what you're supposed to eat. That's nutrient-dense, it's better for you, it's much higher in protein. You know, that's what I like about wild game. When I'm eating wild game, I'm eating this animal that is essentially eating and living the way it's lived for thousands and thousands and thousands of years with no input from human beings whatsoever. And then there are some companies that do that, like certified Piedmontese has a, a sp- very specific cow that's much higher in, uh, protein than other cows because it's leaner and it looks different. It's darker, but you have to cook it differently and the way I cook it and the way I tell people to cook game is, um, what's called a reverse sear method. So I cook it very slowly until I get it up to an internal temperature of, like, 120 degrees or 115 degrees, then I sear the outside of it to give it a nice crust and it's tender that way and that way, you, you get all the flavor of the meat, but it's, it's not tender like Kobe beef. It's, it's, it's still a little chewy, but it's flavorful, it's delicious and moist and it's great for you.

Will Harris 1:10:01 You know, the life expectancy of a cow is, like, 24 years of age and a feedlot animal wouldn't live much over two.

Joe Rogan 1:10:09 Wow.

Will Harris 1:10:10 Obesity. Disease.

Joe Rogan 1:10:11 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:10:12 Tell them about the story about the presidential pardon.

Will Harris 1:10:15 Yeah. I- I tell them that, uh, tru- truly the way we raise cattle, they live to be 24 years old. We don't do that, but that's, that's what they would do. And I've always wanted to, to take a feedlot animal and give it a presidential pardon and say, "We're not gonna slaughter you. We're gonna see how long you'll live." And feed... Keep one in the feedlot and then turn one loose out there in the pasture with my cows and I would... I can guarantee you the fully feedlot animal wouldn't last but maybe three years or four years or five years.

Joe Rogan 1:10:50 Yeah, no one wants to do that 'cause if... Like, you got one of your friends-

Jenni Harris 1:10:55 (laughs)

Will Harris 1:10:55 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:10:55 ... say, "Let me make you a deal. Let's put a special tag on this cow. Put a little ear tag so nobody slaughters it and let's see what's up." They'd be like, "No, thanks."

Jenni Harris 1:11:03 No.

Joe Rogan 1:11:04 What do you think... How long do you think it would last, a feedlot animal?

Will Harris 1:11:07 You know, I've never done it. I don't... I don't have a feedlot anymore and when I did, I needed to sell them to get the cash flow, so I-I don't know that, but it wouldn't be long because they are dying of all the diseases of obesity and sedentary lifestyle that kills people.

Joe Rogan 1:11:24 Right.

Will Harris 1:11:25 So, they just... It wouldn't... They wouldn't last long.

Joe Rogan 1:11:27 As well as eating food that they're not really supposed to be eating.

Will Harris 1:11:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:11:31 Like, when you... People love a grain-fed animal because it's obese. That's really what they like. When they look for a lot of marbling-

Will Harris 1:11:37 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:11:37 ... that's obesity. That's what you're getting and that's what makes it juicy and delicious but that's also what makes it sick. That's-

Will Harris 1:11:43 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:11:43 And that's also why they have to use so many antibiotics.

Will Harris 1:11:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:11:46 You know, I'm, I'm sure you've seen... There was a documentary, I forget what the documentary was, but there was a documentary where they showed various cows and the- the- these cows... All these diseases that these cows encounter because of eating that way and all the, the chemicals that they have to use and the antibiotics they have to use to treat these cows and the unintended consequences those have on the consumer.

Will Harris 1:12:11 Well, you know, our concern is, you know, antibiotic resistance-

Joe Rogan 1:12:14 Yeah.

Will Harris 1:12:14 ... because we use those antibiotics, uh, th- on the pathogens at... when they're not sick. The cow's really not sick, it just makes them gain weight faster.

Joe Rogan 1:12:23 Antibiotics make a cow gain weight faster?

Will Harris 1:12:25 Yeah. Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:12:26 Sub-, subtherap-

Joe Rogan 1:12:27 Man.

Will Harris 1:12:27 Sup- sup-

Jenni Harris 1:12:27 Oh, go ahead. Sorry.

Will Harris 1:12:27 Yep, that's a word. Subtherapeutic.

Joe Rogan 1:12:29 Subtherapeutic.

Will Harris 1:12:29 Subtherapeutic.

Joe Rogan 1:12:30 How does it do that?

Will Harris 1:12:32 You know, that's, that's, uh, it's got to do with the rumen. I don't, I don't know that, but it's got to do with that... You know, a, a cow, uh, the way they digest is there are microbes in the rumen, the gut, that breaks down the cellulose or grain and somehow that, uh, mi- that, that, that, uh, antibiotics enhances that procedure, but I don't know that.

Joe Rogan 1:13:00 Hmm.

Jenni Harris 1:13:00 It probably keeps them, you know, keeps them functioning, uh, while still eating an unnatural diet.

Joe Rogan 1:13:09 Here it says, "The damage caused by antibiotics depends upon on the mechanism of action, dosage, treatment, duration, administration route. Antibiotics given at low doses to animals have the notable effect of increasing weight, a practiced term subtherapeutic antibiotic treatment and used since 1946 in livestock."Wow.

Will Harris 1:13:28 And, you know, we- we only have a certain number of antibiotics. And when we use them indiscriminately at very low levels, resistance in pathogen spills up.

Joe Rogan 1:13:40 Yeah.

Will Harris 1:13:40 So, we put ourself at risk of losing these life-saving drugs that we depend on.

Joe Rogan 1:13:45 Well, and then also the rise of MRSA. You know, medication-resistant, uh, staph infections-

Will Harris 1:13:50 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:13:50 ... are huge in this country.

Will Harris 1:13:52 For sure.

Joe Rogan 1:13:52 I mean, it's such a giant issue when people get surgery or if they get cuts. And, you know, in the jujitsu community, it's a giant issue. And I have several friends that have gone through lengthy hospital stays because they developed staph infection that didn't respond to antibiotics and it got systemic. And it's life-threatening, and people have died from it. And it- it's something very scary because they're pumping you full of antibiotics intravenously and it's not working. The- the antibiotics are not killing this bacteria, and this bacteria is consuming the person.

Will Harris 1:14:25 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:14:26 Scary, scary stuff. So, we're- we're playing around with nature itself. And we're playing around with nature itself essentially just for profit.

Jenni Harris 1:14:34 Well, and- and unknowingly. You know, I mean, we don't- we don't know what the effects of this stuff's going to be.

Joe Rogan 1:14:39 Right.

Jenni Harris 1:14:39 But for short-term profits, you know, that- that's one of the- the major, I think, differences between, uh, businesses like ours and corporations. You know, corporations are so steadily focused on quarterly reports and profits and, you know, whatever else. And there- there have been so many decisions, in fact, all of the big decisions, um, recently certainly, that when we get together, my- my wife, my sister, my brother-in-law, my dad, and he says, you know, "Do you wanna buy this land? I'll die before it's paid off. Is this something y'all wanna do?" And he abstains from the vote. And, you know, my sister, my wife, uh, my brother-in-law, we all decide if that's something we- we can or can't swing. And so, uh, businesses run like that for- for the longevity versus businesses for- for short-term profit-

Joe Rogan 1:15:34 Right.

Jenni Harris 1:15:34 ... uh, have completely different motivations.

Joe Rogan 1:15:37 Yeah, and, you know, we're seeing the health consequences of that with other things as well. I was watching this video the other day where this gentleman was talking about farm-raised salmon being one of the most toxic things that you can consume, which is so wild. If you think about salmon, salmon is just i- immediately associated with health. Like, "Oh, guy's eating salmon. Must care about his health."

Jenni Harris 1:15:59 Unless you're pregnant or meh. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:16:00 Right, right, right, right. But people think about salmon as being one of the healthiest things. And so, this guy holds open this filet of salmon. See if you can find a video on it, Jamie. This guy takes this filet of salmon, and it's a fresh piece of salmon, and he opens it up. And he's like, "Look at how easily these- these bones separate-"

Jenni Harris 1:16:20 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:16:21 "... from the flesh." And the color of the flesh is very different, which is one of the reasons why they have to use dye. When you see a farm-raised salmon and it's a dark red color, a lot of times what you're getting is people putting food coloring on the salmon itself in order to make it that color. Which is cra- Because if you get a wild salmon, it's from the insects that they consume that turns their flesh that color.

Jenni Harris 1:16:45 It's crazy to me. Y- And when I listened to your episode with RFK, and he was talking about the mercury levels in fish-

Joe Rogan 1:16:51 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:16:51 ... I mean, I was not a huge fish eater to begin with, but after that, I was like, "Whoa."

Joe Rogan 1:16:56 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:16:56 "This is incredible."

Joe Rogan 1:16:57 Yeah, it's pretty wild.

Jenni Harris 1:16:58 It's pretty wild.

Joe Rogan 1:16:59 But the farm-raised salmon thing is really crazy, because people just don't associate salmon at all with being something that's not good for you. And-

Jenni Harris 1:17:07 Or food.

Joe Rogan 1:17:08 Right.

Jenni Harris 1:17:08 I mean, why- why should consumers have to, you know, second-guess the- the- y- the nutritional density of food?

Joe Rogan 1:17:16 Yeah.

Will Harris 1:17:16 You know, b- because I've been in the confinement animal business with cattle and other species, this thing about the fish doesn't surprise me a bit. I mean, it's-

Joe Rogan 1:17:26 Right.

Will Harris 1:17:27 When you raise an animal as a monoculture-

Joe Rogan 1:17:29 Mm-hmm.

Will Harris 1:17:30 ... uh, uh, there are going to be problems with it.

Joe Rogan 1:17:32 Right.

Will Harris 1:17:32 It's just as simple as that.

Joe Rogan 1:17:34 Right.

Will Harris 1:17:34 Just, you're going against nature.

Joe Rogan 1:17:36 And you're pissing on your britches to try to stay warm. (laughs)

Will Harris 1:17:38 Pissing on your britches to stay warm, that's exactly right.

Joe Rogan 1:17:40 D- Could you find a video of the- the farm-raised salmon?

Jamie Vernon 1:17:43 Uh, there are a lot of vid- Uh, I think I found what you were just talking about, Joe.

Joe Rogan 1:17:47 'Cause it's- it's disturbing to look.

Jamie Vernon 1:17:48 Is it Paul Saldino probably? Do you think?

Jenni Harris 1:17:49 Yeah, he- he just put one up on social media.

Joe Rogan 1:17:52 It could-

Jenni Harris 1:17:52 Paul did.

Joe Rogan 1:17:52 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:17:54 There we go.

Joe Rogan 1:17:54 So, far- give me some volume on this.

Jamie Vernon 1:17:56 GMO corn, GMO soy, poo, and medications to prevent overgrowth of bacterial infections because it's so unhealthy. All fish is going to accumulate some heavy metals, which is not a good thing. But wild salmon is a much better choice, than any Atlantic salmon. All Atlantic salmon is gonna be farm raised. And we know that these chemicals, PCBs, PBDEs, are endocrine disruptors. Yes, it's an animal food. It's not a plant food. But this is one of my least fav- This-

Will Harris 1:18:21 Oh, he doesn't break it down. I know that.

Joe Rogan 1:18:21 Yeah. No, he doesn't break it down, but this one gentleman, uh, takes a filet. He, uh, takes a fresh filet and opens it up for you to see it. And he shows how this- this tissue is essentially just weak and soft, and it's just not the same.

Will Harris 1:18:38 This just doesn't surprise me. You know, the e- ecosystems are meant to be different species operating in symbiotic relationships with each other.

Joe Rogan 1:18:49 Yeah.

Will Harris 1:18:49 And I don't care if it's cows or hogs or salmon or-

Joe Rogan 1:18:52 Anything.

Will Harris 1:18:53 ... meat- meat, or it doesn't matter.

Joe Rogan 1:18:54 Yeah.

Will Harris 1:18:54 When you raise it in a monoculture-

Joe Rogan 1:18:57 Right.

Will Harris 1:18:57 ... problems, uh, problems will occur.

Joe Rogan 1:18:59 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:18:59 You fight nature.

Will Harris 1:19:00 It- it's inevitable.

Jenni Harris 1:19:01 You fight nature-

Will Harris 1:19:02 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:19:02 Yeah.

Jenni Harris 1:19:02 ... the whole time.

Joe Rogan 1:19:03 Yeah.

Will Harris 1:19:03 That's right. Yeah, there's just every reason for it not to work well.

Joe Rogan 1:19:08 Yeah, and it seems like the- the whole movement of this happening has happened for so long, and we're just sort of getting aware of it now. I mean, I've just been aware of it over the last few years, uh, last decade or so. But most people aren't even aware of it at all. You think of the vast majority of- of Americans hearing this are just going, "What?"What's going on? Like, this is... Now, I have to pay attention to this too? And what do I do?

Will Harris 1:19:33 But you... If- if you think about all the ecosystems that exist on the earth, from tundra to desert, to rainforest, to alpine, on and on, there's not a monoculture anywhere.

Joe Rogan 1:19:47 Anywhere. Yeah.

Will Harris 1:19:47 I don't believe you can find one anywhere.

Joe Rogan 1:19:49 No.

Will Harris 1:19:49 Everywhere there are plants and animals and microbes living in symbiotic relationships with each other.

Joe Rogan 1:19:56 Yeah.

Will Harris 1:19:56 And that's- that's... When you step away from that, which is what we've done in industrial farming, whether it's plants or animals, whether it's peanuts or- or hogs, you're fighting nature every step of the way. And the only... The tools we use to fight nature all have an unintended consequence. And- and- and then we have to take another tool to fight that unintended consequence, and another, and another, and another.

Joe Rogan 1:20:28 Similar to what she was talking about with medical interventions.

Will Harris 1:20:31 It's the same. I- I was gonna... I- I started to say that, you know, what- what she described with the medical is exactly what we've done in food production. One expensive technological tool that we pay money for that- that fixes a problem, but creates another problem that requires another expensive technical tool, and another, and another, and another. And there's no end to it.

Jenni Harris 1:20:59 You know, one thing that I'll say is that, it has been so, uh, interesting to watch nature balance itself. And the best example that we have of that is that, you know, we evolved as cattle people. You know, the- the first generation, you know, had multi-species and, you know, continued. And then we became a monoculture of cattle. And, uh, you know, around 2012, we started diversifying again. The first non-cattle specie that we introduced at White Oak Pastures was poultry. And we- we got good at raising them. And the way we insisted on raising poultry, like all the rest of the species, is in an environment where they can express their instinctive behavior. So, cattle were meant to roam and graze. Hogs were meant to root and wallow. Chickens were meant to peck and scratch. So, our chickens were outside, unconfined, unrestricted. You know, they could walk to Atlanta if they wanted to. Um, and shortly after we turned the chickens loose out on pasture, we noticed, um, maybe around 2013, um, a few bald eagles settled in. And, you know, that's, "Oh, come, come look. This is awesome." You know, mating pair. It was really neat. We were proud of them. You know, how American can you be?

Joe Rogan 1:22:20 (laughs)

Jenni Harris 1:22:20 You know, I mean, this is great. And then the... You know, they're migratory birds, so they left. And the next year, there were probably eight or something.

Joe Rogan 1:22:28 Hmm.

Jenni Harris 1:22:29 And it was like, "Man, that's- that's really cool." You know, they- they went and had such a great time here. They told their friends and, you know, brought more back. This is great. And then, you know, eight left, they migrated away and, you know, 20 came.