Elk producers scored an unexpected hole-in-one last week when their product became the featured dinner item on golf’s biggest stage.
The Masters is one of the top four tournaments on the Professional Golfers Association tour. As reigning champion, Canadian Mike Weir had the privilege of selecting the menu for the Champions Dinner, a longstanding tradition at the Augusta National club in Augusta, Georgia.
He originally chose to serve Canadian caribou to his fellow Masters winners, but it was out of season, so elk became a last-minute substitute as the main entrée.
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The champions dinner is always a big storyline leading up to the four-day tournament and this year was no exception.
Weir’s elk meal garnered national newspaper headlines here at home and was mentioned numerous times on a CBS broadcast that reached millions of American households.
He told reporters that 65-70 percent of his fellow golfers tried the meat and “everybody raved about it.”
Saskatchewan Elk Breeders Association president Luke Perkins said the positive publicity was a “pleasant surprise” for an industry beset by slumping prices and disappearing markets.
“I guess anytime I see elk in a headline you kind of wonder what you’re about to wade into, but when you read a story like that it starts off your day really well,” said the producer from Star City, Sask.
The Mike Weir story was a nice respite from chronic wasting disease headlines that have besieged the industry in recent years.
“It goes to show that slowly but surely we’re starting to work into the mainstream of livestock and into the mainstream of people’s menus.”
Perkins said the industry has sponsored elk dinners at small rural golf tournaments but never imagined the meat would be served up at one of the world’s most prestigious sports championships.
“You had some pretty big names there eating it.”
He thinks the prime-time television exposure of the product will help fuel a growing sense of optimism among elk producers, which was evidenced at the association’s recent annual meeting.
Twenty-seven animals were sold at the convention, including 10 bull calves that fetched an average of $1,635 and three bred heifers that sold for an average of $1,400.
“It’s a ball that’s now rolling that’s going to continue rolling,” said Perkins. “We’ve been through some tough times in the elk industry and I think that the overwhelming feeling and mood is we’re beyond that.”
