by Rowena Mills
After Pat Becker moved from Oklahoma to Arkansas
three years ago, she discovered a new focus for her interest in animals — a worldwide organization called Heifer International. Becker, whose movie and television acting credits include A Guide for the Married Man, In Like Flint, and the Batman series, is also an animal advocate and a certified dog trainer. She produced and hosted Dog Talk on Oklahoma City KAUT Channel 43 and the award-winning series The World of Dogs on the Public Broadcasting Service.
Becker and her husband, Jim Wallis, have rescued numerous dogs. She has written children’s books about animals, and she sponsors other authors who write about animals. She encourages quality existence for animals and says children’s involvement with animals imparts responsibility and compassion.
“My mission is to help educate children to be kind to animals,” Becker says.
Through her contacts at a recording studio, Becker met Stephanie Chesher, senior director
of Heifer International, which has headquarters in Little Rock. Chesher invited Becker to visit Heifer Ranch near Perryville, Arkansas.
Heifer International
Heifer International is a global nonprofit organization that works to eradicate poverty and hunger through sustainable community development. Since Dan West founded the organization in 1944, Heifer has helped more
than 39 million families. Working in 20 countries in Africa, Asia, and the Americas, including the United States, Heifer International supports farmers and food producers to strengthen local economies and build secure livelihoods.
Heifer International provides feed, irrigation, and pregnant animals and trains people how to care for them. The donated animals are native to the countries where Heifer operates and are purchased there, says Chesher.
Heifer works with small-scale farmers to achieve education for their children. Small farms produce 80 percent of food in the developing world, and women play an important role on those farms and in the world’s food production. Heifer advocates women’s empowerment through gender equality.
Heifer Ranch
Animals raised at the 1,200- acre Heifer Ranch are donated within the United States, says Chesher.
Heifer USA provides farmers access to high-quality training and education, says Liz Ellis, corporate brand partnerships manager of Heifer International. Its Grass Roots Farmers’ Cooperative supports farmers across the South with access to marketing and sales. A twopronged approach —training and supporting farmers and building local, sustainable businesses using regenerative farming practices — is the foundation needed for inclusive rural food systems and economies to thrive, Ellis points out.
Heifer Ranch recently became a Savory Global Network hub. Ellis says the partnership with the Savory Institute aims to train more farmers in regenerative agriculture and holistic management to combat climate change.
Donna Kilpatrick, Heifer Ranch manager and land steward, says, “As a Savory Hub, Heifer USA is applying best-in-class expertise to the farms and cooperatives it works with across the South and making its knowledge available to more farmers across the country. By showcasing the financial and social benefits of regenerative agriculture for farmers and their communities, we are promoting green jobs and sustainable development.”
Ellis says, “Fourteen people work for Heifer USA/Heifer Ranch, and there is always a rotating group of volunteers who live and work here as well.”
She enumerates the animals at the ranch now: 225 cows, 300 pigs, 4,000 chickens, 500 turkeys, 300 sheep, two livestock guardian geese, and two livestock guardian dogs — Sam and Uno, who look after the Heifer Ranch sheep flock.
Faithful Guardians
Sam and Uno are Akbash dogs, a breed originally from Turkey. When Heifer acquired them in July 2019, Uno, a female, was 18 months old, and Sam was 22 months old, says Dr. An Peischel of Goats Unlimited in Chapmansboro, Tennessee. “Uno was a personal guardian dog that I raised on my farm and selected from a litter of 10 pups. When Heifer needed another older guardian, I purchased Sam from Elaine Dustin of Lawrenceburg, Tennessee.”
Peischel facilitates guardian dogs to fulfill their role. She explains, “Facilitation is allowing the livestock guardian dogs to progress, work, and succeed on their natural instincts. I stay out of their way but put the pups in situations where they can gain experience and be successful on their own right. Training a dog is totally different — come, sit, stay, along with other commands. The dog is working on your structured guidance.”
Peischel’s book on Akbash dogs, Guardian Dogs for Goats, was published this year by Total Publishing and Media in Tulsa. “It was written for goat producers who have predators and need to use livestock guardian dogs,” Peischel says.
Becker’s 2021 book for children, Sam and Uno: Sheep Guardians of Heifer Ranch, illustrated by Mina Sadeghi, also was published by Total Publishing and Media. Proceeds from the sale of Becker’s book are donated to Heifer International’s Read To Feed initiative.
Read To Feed
Read To Feed, which Heifer has operated for 25 years, helps to feed people worldwide through Heifer’s programs, Chesher says, while improving young readers’ key literacy skills. This spring, Read To Feed will be available as a digital app and free on all mobile devices. Children can set reading goals and track reading time. As youngsters meet reading goals, they will unlock corporate-funded sponsorships to help families and will learn that they can help end hunger and poverty while reading.
Sam and Uno are proud to be part of Heifer’s Read To Feed efforts — and happy to aid Pat Becker’s mission of encouraging children to be kind to animals.
For more information, go to http://www. heifer.org or www.PatBeckerBooks.com.
