Bio 1 - Wendy Lu McGill and RMMR

The Ento Podcast

You're listening to the Ento podcast and I am your host Ross.

Thanks so much for tuning in; I really appreciate you giving me your ears.

Today’s show is not a usual show as they will start again in the new year, but more of a bio show where we look at at someone leading the way in the Into world.

But before we do that I just want to say hi to some of the latest followers, really think I should have started this when I stared the show back in 2017 but the show is now listed to in too many countries and by too many people for me to start but leave me a comment for todays show at TheEntopodcast.co.uk and you could get a shout out on the next one.

So Hi and thanks for tuning in to Karol B, Marco Vash and Anaman Hassan thanks so much for liking the show.

Ok, as I said earlier todays show is going to be a Bio show and we will be looking at Wendy Lu McGill.

Wendy Lu is the Founder/CEO of Rocky Mountain Micro Ranch, Colorado’s first and only edible insect farm.

Together with business partner Kyle they raise crickets and mealworms in a modified shipping container heated by solar power in Denver Colorado,

Prior to founding Rocky Mountain Micro Ranch, Wendy Lu worked for nearly twelve years with international aid agencies around the world in sectors as diverse as water and sanitation, human trafficking and rural infrastructure development.

An executive board member of Little Herds, the world’s only non-profit organization advocating for insects as food and feed, Wendy Lu is also a founding member of the National North American Edible Insect Coalition, which is working with federal agencies to set regulations for insects as food and feed in the U.S. and Canada.

she holds an MA in international and intercultural communication from the University of Denver and a BA in international affairs from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

As a PhD candidate at the Plant and AgriBiosciences Centre at the National University ofIreland at Galway, my focus is on edible insect farming as a climate smart agriculture practice for food and nutritional security, specifically researching the political and cultural systems that affect insect farming.

Wendy Lu has also spoken at Ted a couple of time and I will put links to these in the show notes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlzUT9L8jjM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXeSG1sOA6k

The RMMR farm..sorry ranch as I mentioned earlier is a converted shipping container in the heart of Denver's vibrant Westwood neighbourhood.

One of about 12 such farms in the U.S

The team at Rmmr raise their stock on spent grain that they get from micro breweries and micro distillers in Denver which I think is great. I really like the whole idea of using waste from one process to feed another system or thing.

As well as using local brew houses and distilleries she has also collaborated with local chefs for snack flavours one example is their Kentucky cricket snack where Wendy Lu and chef Daniel Asher from Boulders River and Woods came up with the idea of brining crickets in local buttermilk then dredged through local cornmeal, salt along with 15 different herbs and spices.

The farms products can be sampled at the various restaurants in Colorado Linger Comida (The Source and the Stanley) el Jefe

and Las Vegas Sushi-Ko (Las Vegas, NV)

With the Butterfly Pavilion, Denver’s invertebrate zoo, we recently launched Insectables, an insect snack line, now available in three Denver area museums

AND CAN BE BOUGHT IN

Butterfly Pavilion Children’s Museum of Denver Denver Museum of Nature & Science EntoSense Old Town Spice Shop

The guys at RMMR have also successfully completed a crowdfunding project on pie shell (https://www.pieshell.com/projects/rocky-mountain-micro-ranch) where they raised over $11k

The project funds were needed as their sales in the last 3 years have jumped so much their one shipping container is at max production.

As they already stock products in 3 Denver they are planning on expanding this range into the remaining six museums in the beginning of 2019 and into a dozen more retail stores (think airports and at special attractions) by the end of the year.

I am a big fan of the use of insects as food as well as animal feed and this is another great business and one I happily supported so I want to say to the listeners in the US and especially the Colorado area if you see these products pick them up, I am not sure Wendy Lu runs tours so do her a favour and follow the guys on twitter @ and Facebook and I am excited to try their products when they get shipped out.

That’s it for today’s show, so thanks again for listening it really means a lot and if you enjoyed it please head over to iTunes and subscribe to the show or like us on Facebook.

But that’s it for today so this is Ross saying Ta-ra for now.