Posted on 03/08/2009 12:30:24 PM PDT by SJackson
The proposed Rosendale Dairy is not a dairy farm.
It's a factory, where 8,000 cows would be treated as parts of a machine, where 75 million gallons of manure per year -- as much waste as produced by the city of Green Bay -- would be generated, and where environmental "mishaps" would be likely.
And that's not the worst of it.
The Rosendale project would damage the image and reputation of Wisconsin dairy products.
For reasons of geography and climate, and because of the immigrants who settled Wisconsin, this state has many small dairy farms. Our working farmers have a commitment to producing safe, healthy milk and premium dairy products.
That is why Organic Valley, a cooperative with a reputation for quality, developed its operations in the state. That is why Oberweis Dairy, which markets its product to Chicago suburbanites "who don't think milk should taste like plastic," has so many small Wisconsin farms under contract.
The future of dairy farming in this state is intricately linked to the reputation for producing top-quality milk, cheese and butter.
The Rosendale factory farm project threatens that future at a time when declining prices pose genuine harm to even the most efficient producers.
"Dairy plants are flush with milk right now and most are not accepting new patrons. A dairy of this size could displace our family farmers who have been farming and raising their family for several generations on their farm, who have been mindful of our environment and who have been an active part of their local community," says Wisconsin Farmers Union President Sue Beitlich. "This is not a positive move for Wisconsin's dairy industry nor for our economy."
So why are state officials encouraging the largest concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO) in state history? Why did the Department of Natural Resources approve permits for this project? Why have the governor and the Commerce Department gotten this issue so very wrong?
It's a two-fold problem.
First, Wisconsin officials don't understand working farmers. They see farming as an "industry," and they treat it as such. So they err -- and they are erring -- on the side of corporate agribusiness interests. Second, they do not have a long-term plan for building the reputation of Wisconsin farm products and for expanding demand. While some folks at the Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection get it, they are constantly undermined by a Commerce Department working at cross purposes.
The reality is this: The Rosendale factory farm poses a serious threat not just to the environment but to the future of working farmers in Wisconsin -- and to Wisconsin's ability to compete in national and global markets. The WFU's Beitlich is right: "We need to change our policies to prevent a hijacking of Wisconsin's rural communities and agricultural heritage. We need to ask ourselves if this type of large-scale expansion is the direction Wisconsin wants to move toward. WFU members say 'no' and ask for change." Our elected officials and state regulators should do the same.
I suddenly have a craving for a huge medium rare steak...
*drool*
Are high food prices bad for anything?
I've no problem banning large operations, but it's important to recognize it's a social issue. John is mistaken, farming is an "industry", if there are enviornmental problems, it's because his beloved state regulators made a mistake, they appear to have the necessary permits, and while factory operations are a threat to the small working farmers in Wisconsin, I seriously doubt it impairs Wisconsin's ability to compete in national and global markets, in fact probably enhances it.
Sounds like a lib attack on a cow-milking Walmart.
Bad for the Poor and Middle class.
Odinga’s war on Energy war on food, war on Capitalism, war on the middle class.
stop that! you’re making me hungry and dinner is hours away!
My family has farmed in Haskell County, Texas for 110 years. High farm prices are bad for everyone. Including the farmers.
Instability raises the risk and the cost of operating. Place unnecessary regulation on top of it and everyone looses.
"Organic" farming is a set of niche agricultural techniques used to create products for that special set of consumers who will pay extra for that kind of thing. Let organic farmers farm organically, and let "factory farmers" as he calls them, sell to the rest of the consumer base. It's called a free market. These people need to use it, instead of trying to get government to make their competition illegal.
Didn’t know manure was a matter of volume. A gallon of manure, huh?
So manure spills are a "environmental mishap" that is something. I wonder what these nutjobs think was going on when the Plains were covered with Bison for as far as the eye could see?
you call it waste - plants call it FOOD.
The "journalist" grew up on concrete?
I have to wonder what he would think of a recycled fertilizer applicator.
Better known as a manure spreader.
Around 1900, somewhere north of 80% of the U.S. population lived in rural areas and on farms. That is down in the low single digits today, by choice. Lots of people know the dangers, the long hours and the financial vicissitudes of farming and choose not to do it (count me in that group). The Capital Times will not give up on this attitude - the good news is that their paper is not long for this world and will soon go the way of theRocky Mountain News, not having learned much.
Out of the back end of dairy cattle... uh, yes.
Dairy cattle don’t so much “plop” as the “squirt.”
It ain’t pretty.
The Netherlands has an interesting idea for farming. Their biggest problem is space, so they had the idea of building a “high rise farm” of sorts. It provides some interesting advantages.
First of all, distance is a typical problem, with a given amount of area per animal. So logistical needs tend to pack them together too tightly. A high rise farm, on the other hand, has somewhat the same needs as an apartment block, but can actually provide more space per animal.
Being indoors, environmental control and noise abatement are easier, and the building design can be appropriate to the climate. That is, giving the animals more sun in colder climates, more shade in warmer climates.
Food can be provided more individually, with feces removed through a central system. This reduces communicable diseases and a lot of the odor associated with farms.
The disadvantage is the large up front cost, which is mitigated somewhat with lower transportation cost to market.
Understand, I’ve been a farmer and I’ve got nothing but a flaming hatred for these enviro-marxist twits.
But in dairy farming, the manure is loose - very loose. Think of a chunky liquid mud and you’ll understand the consistency of dairy muck.
OK, so they muck out the yards and the barns every day, and then wash everything down, adding yet MORE water to the manure problem. The sanitation standards for dairies are very high, so they have to have a LOT of cheap hot water available to them to wash the place down - every day and possibly multiple times every day. All of this muck and muck-infested water gets flushed out to a “lagoon” where the solids drop out to the bottom of the pond and you have the water on top.
OK, the water can be applied to the fields, and now you’re left with the solids, which you can compost and sell as rich composted manure (and some dairies do).
Or you can mix up the water and the solids and put it into a tank, which you bring out to a field and then apply it to the fields. The old way was to simply spray it around, but this created huge clouds of ammonia, which would waft away on the wind. Folks downwind don’t like that too much. So the new technology is to ‘knife’ it into the ground, ie, inject the manure slurry into the ground.
http://www.agweekly.com/articles/2007/10/15/commodities/dairy/dairy02.txt
At the other end of that orange hose is a honkin’ large tanker.
This keeps more nitrogen in the soil, BTW, so there’s an upside for the farmer as well. Ammonia that boils off into the air is a loss of N for the farmer.
OK, now “spills” — every now and then, a manure lagoon system is inundated with a huge precipitation event, and overflows. That overflow is what they’re calling a “spill” and you’d better have a NPDES permit for that spill, or otherwise you’re looking at fines of $50K to $100K per ‘event.’
Never stand behind a cow while it’s relieving itself.The cow might cough,and that ain’t pretty.
Dave:
It kind of sounds like things are being managed already before this pantywaist Nichols decided he needed a crusade. I bet also that Nichols didn’t go near a farm to write his article.
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