Genetically Engineered Alfalfa

I just read in the "News Bleat" section of Sheep! magazine that the Center for Food Safety has filed suit against the USDA for approving Monsanto's "Roundup Ready Alfalfa." This legal action dates back to February but this is the first I've heard of this genetically engineered alfalfa.

According to the article, the USDA Inspector General released a report in December which criticized the USDA. The report said, "Current [USDA] regulations, policies and procedures do not go far enough to ensure the safe introduction of agricultural biotechnology."

Frankly, this scares the crap out of me. We at Liberty Farm have gone to expensive lengths to avoid feeeding any genetically engineered grain to our chickens but GE alfalfa is much more worrisome than GE grain because it is a perennial. Fields of alfalfa can live for many, many years and be pollinated by many, many thousands of bees. Figure as many as four blooming periods a year versus one for annual crops times ten or more years. These bees then range for miles. Even the certified organic hay fields won't be safe.

tags: center food safety, alfalfa, GMO, GE alfalfa, GM alfalfa

What's In The Works and Some New Links

We've got a few projects in the works for this week(end) here at Liberty Farm. Our chicks are two weeks old today and have outgrown their brooder box. I'm clearing out a place for them to move to in one of the barns. The tricky part is going to be keeping the cats out. They're great mousers and would probably consider themselves to have died and gone to kitty heaven with 50 chicks to prey on.

The UPS man brought strawberry plants today from Johnny's. I hope to plant them tomorrow evening. This will be the first thing to go into the garden and while I'm at it, I've got some lettuce and brassicas to harden off and will probably plant more lettuce, spinach, beets and carrots. Last night I tranplanted and fertilized celery and tomato seedlings. The celery is doing great. The tomatoes were in 2" soil blocks so I set them down into 4" pots. Our peppers are germinating slowly. After seeing our last electric bill I turned off the heater in the cellar so it hasn't been warm enough for optimal germination.

We've still got three ewes yet to lamb and they all look like they could go at any time.

I put some new links in the right hand column today. GRAIN "is an international non-governmental organisation which promotes the sustainable management and use of agricultural biodiversity based on people's control over genetic resources and local knowledge." ATTRA is the National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service and the 100-Mile Diet is a cool site about two people who went for a year only eating food that was produced within 100 miles of their home in Vancouver, B.C. The site is loaded with good information for anyone who is interested in drastically cutting food miles.

Grazelines

I moved the temporary fence in the pasture this morning and this photo shows the grazeline between the new area on the left and the already grazed area on the right. Right now the ewes are on about a three day rotation. As the grass begins growing faster that will get down to 1 day. This part of the pasture is primarily orchard grass and white clover, although the white clover hasn't come on yet.

tags: graze, grazeline, orchard grass, pasture, sheep

Grazing, SGF Kudos, Lamb Update

Our first season of Management-Intensive Grazing (MiG) is officially underway here at Liberty Farm. Much of my posting this summer will probably be dedicated to our grazing practices. We will be doing quite a lot of mowing until we build up the size of our sheep flock and can afford to add a couple cows to the mix.

I call what we're doing here mini-MiG because we have only 10 acres on our farm. At the end of the season I may write to the Stockman Grass Farmer with a description of mini-MiG. Maybe it will be a really slow month and the editor, Allan Nation, will come here to profile us. Hey, a farmer can dream, right?

Speaking of SGF, I've finally had time to read through this month's issue and have kudos for them, as usual. First, here is an excerpt from a letter to the editor entitled, "Disgruntled Reader" and the reply (in italics) which shows the integrity of this publication:

...Now though, you have gone to this grass fed, everything paper.
...So in closing, if you are going to start putting out a magazine that is helpful to all your readers, let me know so I can sign up. If it is going to be a steady diet of articles about grass fed animals and their processing and marketing I think I will pass.

...We made the decision a few years ago that we would rather be a smaller publication with a bigger mission than the reverse. We know our shift in editorial toward all grass feeding has alienated some people and cost us subscribers.
However, all of us here at SGF have found creating a new grass fed future is a lot more fun and exciting than endlessly preaching cost control, which is the only tool commodity producers have.
Apparently, 11,000 plus paid subscribers agree. Sorry to see you go.

Amen, brother.

They also have a cool article about the importance of forage self-sufficiency before going certified organic. If a grass farmer has to buy a few bales of hay from a non-certified neighbor to get over a rough patch in the grazing year, that $650 organic certification fee is just flushed down the toilet.

Two of our five ewes have lambed for a total of four lambs - 2 boys, 2 girls. It seems that our rams didn't breed the ewes on their first heat cycle. The guys were only seven months old at the time so I guess we can't blame them for taking awhile to get the hang of it. The truth is, I'm glad for it now. The end of March was cold and brown here.

tags: stockman grass farmer, MiG, management-intensive, grazing, forage, organic, ewe, lamb

More lambs

We had our second lambing a little while ago. Ingrid gave us two boys. One is white and we think the other is moorit (brown) but he may be black. We won't know for sure until he's completely dry. We were speculating, based on her size, that she may have triplets. She hasn't passed the afterbirth yet so it's still possible.

These lambs were born unassisted.

We Finally Have Lambs!

Here is a photo of our ewe, Lambie, with her new lambs - both girls. Lambie is the first ewe lamb we had - in 2003. The lambs are both white and were born about 30 minutes before this photo was taken. One is covered in meconium (newborn baby poop). In a trouble-free birth this doesn't happen but she had a little trouble coming into the world.

My wife called me at work to tell me Lambie was in labor and had some mucus hanging out. When I got here, I saw that the mucus was actually the broken water bag and I could see the lamb's nose but the ewe wasn't making any progress. It took a lot of work to get the lamb past the vulva. It got to the point where I was considering doing an episiotomy but a little more stretching with my fingers got the front legs out enough to get a grip and pull. I'm sure the ewe appreciates not being cut. She is now doing a good job cleaning the babies and they have both nursed.

tags: newborn, lamb, ewe

Some Photos

Wow, third post today. Here are two photos from this week. The White Rock chicks were hatched yesterday. Jennifer took the picture of the kids in the pasture with the ewes earlier this week.