Having heard stories of my homesteading great-grandparents being chased 'round and 'round their sod house by a steer while screaming at their significant other to "open the **ing door, for **'* sake!" I'm gonna stick with befriending crows.
(Cows give birth to steers, that's what not to like.)
I don't think his comment meant "edibility rises linearly with age." I think it meant "it reaches a peak" and implicitly "and then declines from there."