He did not.
“How much?”
She wiped the shovel.
“Depends.”
“On?”
“Animal class.”
“Moisture.”
“Other ingredients.”
“Analysis.”
The neighbor frowned.
“Can’t just tell me pounds?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because then you’ll copy one number, ignore everything around it, and blame me if something goes wrong.”
He stared.
“That what you think of me?”
“Yes.”
He laughed.
Fair.
“Costs?”
She hesitated.
Then told him.
His smile vanished.
“What?”
She repeated it.
He stared toward the herd.
“Sixty-three percent?”
“On purchased supplemental feed in the best comparison period.”
“Not total farm feed cost.”
“No.”
“Still.”
“Yes.”
He looked toward the bunk.
“Can I see your notebook?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“You laughed at my notebook.”
“That was before it saved money.”
“Exactly.”
He smiled slowly.
“Fair.”
Then drove away.
He returned two weeks later with his own notebook.
She let him see selected numbers.
That was the beginning.
The first outside cattle producer called in August.
“I heard what you’re feeding.”
The farm woman stood in the barn holding the phone between her shoulder and ear.
“Who told you?”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me.”
“Guy at the sale barn.”
Of course.
“What do you want?”
“To see your cattle.”
“No.”
Silence.
“You don’t want to sell feed?”
“I don’t sell feed.”
“I didn’t say buy.”
“You said see cattle.”
“Yes.”
“That usually becomes advice.”
The producer laughed.
“You always this friendly?”
“When strangers call asking for months of free work.”
He visited anyway.
Not without permission.
He called again.
They scheduled Saturday.
The producer arrived with two others.
The farm woman walked them through the program.
Not exact proprietary details.
There was not much proprietary yet.
Mostly discipline.
Test.
Balance.
Store correctly.
Monitor.
One producer looked disappointed.
“That’s it?”
“What did you expect?”
“Some secret mix.”
“There is no magic feed.”
The man pointed toward the distillery grain.
“Then why isn’t everybody doing this?”
“Logistics.”
“Storage.”
“Variability.”
“Risk.”
“And because cheap byproduct becomes expensive if you waste half of it.”
The older producer nodded.
Better questioner.
“How much labor?”
She told him.
“Equipment?”
She told him.
“Distance?”
“Fourteen miles.”
He whistled.
“That helps.”
“Yes.”
The producer looked toward her.
“If I’m sixty miles away?”