One-Horse Town Has Five Ostriches That Lay $35 Eggs --- People of Plentywood, Mont., Also Try to Make a Buck Selling Korea Elk Velvet

• Published in: The Wall Street journal. Eastern edition
• Main Author: By Scott McMurray
• Format: Newspaper Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York, N.Y Dow Jones & Company Inc 21.08.1989
• Edition: Eastern edition
• Subjects: Birds; Elk; Sheep
• ISSN: 0099-9660

There are 2,500 people here, too, a number of whom -- 10 maybe -- have turned to exotic-animal husbandry as a way around drought and persistent rural recession. To make money, in other words. Nobody knows why people are taking up this sideline -- here particularly -- but they are. At least, says Steven Howard, county attorney and ostrich rancher: "It's more interesting than cattle or sheep." So when breakfast conversation down at Randy's Cafe turns to the subject of eggs, it might just be a local banker and Mr. Howard discussing ostrich fertility rates -- and counting their $3,000 chicks before they are hatched. Sometimes, the talk concerns elk velvet -- another Plentywood export. The fuzz-covered immature antlers that sprout each year from elk heads are, in powdered form, a popular aphrodisiac in Korea and elsewhere in Asia. People here figure the rising price of antlers has to do with the 1986 nuclear-reactor disaster in Chernobyl. Radioactive fallout from the plant contaminated the reindeer feeding grounds in northern Scandinavia. Hence, Koreans, who also have a lot of discretionary income these days, are shopping for elk antlers in Montana.