Playing the “Stock” Market
From her delicate forelegs and onyx coat to her big brown eyes and expansive udder, Eastside Lewisdale Gold Missy is an admittedly attractive bovine. But is she worth $1.2-million? Morsan Farms in Alberta certainly thinks so. That’s who bought the comely cow at auction during the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair in Toronto last November.
Missy was bred in Frenchfort, Prince Edward Island by Bloyce Thompson, owner of Eastside Holsteins. Thompson says that she’s currently the most valuable cow in the world, and one of the top “show cows” in North America. What makes her so exceptional? “This has nothing to do with milk,” says Thompson. “Good genetics are in demand around the world, and Missy has a unique blood line.”
He explains that genetics and blood lines are more complex and fascinating with breeding cows than with race horses. In Missy’s case, if she turns out to be as prolific an embryo producer as her mother, she can be expected to produce 170 embryos a year which will sell for $6,000 each. Which means that Missy’s new owners can expect to recoup their investment in about a year and a half.
Was he surprised at Missy’s selling price? Thompson says he and his business partner were anticipating that she’d sell for $500,000, so they were shocked when bidding went over a million. “We were at the auction. We sat behind the runner-up bidder, he was from England. He was willing to go higher, but his wife stopped him at $1.15-million.”
Missy’s $1.2-million price tag is the second-highest amount ever paid for a cow at auction in Canada. The highest price ever paid was $1.5-million, back in the ‘80s.
Travel Trivia
The following table shows the top three U.S. destinations for four Atlantic Canadian cities (inbound/outbound travel total) in 2008, as tabulated by Statistics Canada. Halifax Regional Municipality, with 1.6 times the population of Newfoundland’s Avalon Peninsula, has approximately three times the traffic volume of St. John’s International Airport (SJIA). A similar statistic appears between St. John’s and Moncton. The Greater Avalon population (which feeds into the SJIA) is approximately double that of Greater Moncton, and SJIA’s air traffic volume is triple that of Moncton’s airport. It’ll be curious to see what this chart looks like after this year’s recessionary figures are factored in.
| City | Destination | Outbound | Inbound | Total | % Change over 2007 |
| Charlottetown, PEI | New York, New York | 2,220 | 2,270 | 4,490 | 42% |
| Boston, Massachusetts | 1,900 | 1,860 | 3,760 | -20% | |
| Orlando, Florida | 1,190 | 1,150 | 2,340 | 34% | |
| Moncton, NB | Orlando, Florida | 2,930 | 3210 | 6,140 | 4% |
| Ft. Lauderdale, Florida | 1,820 | 1,900 | 3,720 | 35% | |
| Las Vegas, Nevada | 1,490 | 1,640 | 3,130 | -4% | |
| Halifax, NS | New York, New York | 20,040 | 20,500 | 40,540 | -1% |
| Orlando, Florida | 18,280 | 18,210 | 36,490 | 29% | |
| Boston, Massachusetts | 17,740 | 17,460 | 35,200 | -2% | |
| St. John’s, NL | Orlando, Florida | 7,260 | 7,380 | 14,640 | 51% |
| Tampa/St. Petersburg, Florida | 6,670 | 6,870 | 13,540 | 40% | |
| New York, New York | 4,610 | 5,280 | 9,890 | 90% |
Downtown Moves Up
At a meeting in Moncton on December 3, the Downtown Business Improvement Associations of Atlantic Canada signed an MOU to form a new organization: Downtowns Atlantic Canada (DAC). The alliance is intended to: “…work to improve the positioning (of) Downtown Business Improvement Areas as unique, diverse, vibrant and economically healthy urban cores.” Though their official release describes their concept as a “self-help approach”, the founders see increased partnerships with all levels of government as essential to achieving growth, investment and downtown revitalization in their respective urban cores.
