Free Republic

Does your dairy herd get skittish every time you hit the milking parlor drenched in Drakkar Noir? Does a splash of Hugo by Hugo Boss have your flock of sheep heading for the hills? If so, the answer to your fragrance faux pas may well be Portland General Store's new Farmer's Cologne. When I first caught wind of the cologne -- made by the same Maine-based company that makes manly grooming products like tobacco-scented beard oil, whiskey-scented aftershave and a soap called "Hunting Camp" -- I was intrigued by the notion that the potion was formulated to be "aromatherapeutic and...

My wife and I went semi-nomadic in 2010, traveling the mountain West for almost two years. Not having a settled home was eye-opening, and taught me a lot about one of my perennial themes: how much humans lost when we became domesticated by agriculture. For a committed permaculturist to give up a home and yard seems almost hypocritical, since a core tenet of permaculture is to deeply know a place and community. But our nomadic yen was strong. We were ready to leave the buzz of Portland, and in that fiercely Greened city I was feeling redundant. Yet no other...

Michelle Obama's Newest Initiative: Using Hip-Hop to Fight Obesity A nonprofit launched with the Let's Move! program plans to put hip-hop music videos in schools to get kids moving The full album, includes songs with names like "Veggie Luv," by Monifah and J Rome, "

Plants Use Underground 'Fungal Internet' to Communicate by Jeffrey Tomkins, Ph.D. * Researchers have just documented how plants use underground fungal networks to warn neighboring plants of impending insect attack, uniquely illustrating the complex and highly designed interconnected cooperation found in nature. The research study—just published in the July, 2013 issue of Ecology Letters—is the first such report that confirms and reveals how plants have uniquely co-designed physiologies that internetwork with other plants using an underground fungus as an information conduit.1 This amazing and intricate system allows the plants to readily and effectively communicate as a community, like a natural...

A bee removal expert took care of the thousands of bees that had been busy building a huge hive in a Cypress woman’s front yard. One beekeeper told Cheryl Best that 100,000 bees were living in the hive. That all changed Friday with the help of bee expert Anthony Samilo. “We call this a tree hugger, bees that build on the sides of trees,” he said. “The bees are going to get plenty aggressive when I get up there, and they are probably going to attack anybody on the ground.” When the bees started to swarm, curious neighbors who were...

CSIRO wants to stop methane emissions: but can they get a grant to stop El Nino’s and cap volcanoes?This type of trans-Siberian cow used to emit a lot of methane. Tom Quirk sent me a short note to point out that the big rise in global methane almost certainly was man-made — at least up to the mid 1980′s, but in the last 20 years, the culprit for rising methane appears to be volcanoes and El Ninos. (Note the timing of the spikes in the graph below, as methane pours into the atmosphere some years, but barely changes in...

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak set off an explosion Thursday, launching an ambitious and controversial plan to make the Western Desert bloom with water channeled from the Nile River. When the canal is done, if all goes according to plan, water will wind its way 190 miles (310 kilometers) across the Western Desert to irrigate 500,000 acres (200,000 hectares) of virgin land. And, if all goes according to plan, the newly irrigated land will be populated by hundreds of thousands of people. The explosion Thursday was the first step in the construction on a pumping station that Egypt claims will be...

In the 1970s, archaeologist Peter Bogucki was excavating a Stone Age site in the fertile plains of central Poland when he came across an assortment of odd artefacts. The people who had lived there around 7,000 years ago were among central Europe's first farmers, and they had left behind fragments of pottery dotted with tiny holes. It looked as though the coarse red clay had been baked while pierced with pieces of straw. Looking back through the archaeological literature, Bogucki found other examples of ancient perforated pottery. “They were so unusual — people would almost always include them in publications,”...

A carpenter friend recently showed me a gruesome scar on his arm that was the result of some surgery he performed on himself with a sewing needle without any form of anesthetic! He said he played doctor and sewed up the nasty cut himself because he had no insurance and felt qualified because he’d once sewn some sails. From the looks of his arm I can only assume the sailboat subsequently capsized or ran aground. It’s only in the last 100 years that people, like my friend, haven’t had to be their own doctor. If a cowboy in the 1800’s...

SALINAS, Calif. (AP) — On a windy morning in California’s Salinas Valley, a tractor pulled a wheeled, metal contraption over rows of budding iceberg lettuce plants. Engineers from Silicon Valley tinkered with the software on a laptop to ensure the machine was eliminating the right leafy buds. The engineers were testing the Lettuce Bot, a machine that can “thin” a field of lettuce in the time it takes about 20 workers to do the job by hand. The thinner is part of a new generation of machines that target the last frontier of agricultural mechanization – fruits and vegetables destined...

Microbiologists are trying to work out whether use of antibiotics on farms is fuelling the human epidemic of drug-resistant bacteria. The sight of just one boot coming through the doorway cues the clatter of tiny hoofs as 500 piglets scramble away from Mike Male. “That's the sound of healthy pigs,” shouts Male, a veterinarian who has been working on pig farms for more than 30 years. On a hot June afternoon, he walks down the central aisle of a nursery in eastern Iowa, scoops up a piglet and dangles her by her hind legs. A newborn piglet's navel is an...

OnMyHonor.Net Final Naming Survey After conducting multiple online and email surveys, conducting Focus Group testing in two cities with both parents and scouting age boys, and running initial trademark searches on selected names, we have narrowed the names down to the following selection. The list of names below has been carefully evaluated to address the goals contained in the Mission Statement. Please read through the following names and cast a vote for the ONE name you think best typifies the mission of the new organization. That's it! Based on your input and the recommendations of our steering committee we'll be...

A new study says Europe's first farmers used far more sophisticated practices than was previously thought. A research team led by the University of Oxford has found that Neolithic farmers manured and watered their crops as early as 6,000 BC. It had always been assumed that manure wasn't used as a fertiliser until Iron Age and Roman times. However, this new research shows that enriched levels of nitrogen-15, a stable isotope abundant in manure, have been found in the charred cereal grains and pulse seeds taken from 13 Neolithic sites around Europe. The findings are published in the early edition...

An old Washington joke goes that an employee of the Department of Agriculture sees a colleague sobbing and rushes to ask what's wrong? The man replies, "My farmer died." So it goes with this week's House rebellion on the farm bill, which has Democrats wailing in protest. Their latest vehicle for subsidies and food stamps died. House Republicans passed an historic farm bill on Thursday that for the first time in about 40 years separates food stamps from farm policy. This bids to divide what has been a political alliance of urban Democrats and farm-state Republicans that has bloated the...

The English colonists who landed at Jamestown 400 years ago undermined an ecosystem and changed the continent forever. It is just possible that John Rolfe was responsible for the worms—specifically the common night crawler and the red marsh worm, creatures that did not exist in the Americas before Columbus. Rolfe was a colonist in Jamestown, Virginia, the first successful English colony in North America. Most people know him today, if they know him at all, as the man who married Pocahontas. A few history buffs understand that Rolfe was one of the primary forces behind Jamestown's eventual success. The worms...

Latest in series of profitable transactions involving rare sheep at farm in NuairiyaA Saudi farmer has been offered SR one million (Dh990,000) for a rare sheep, but he has refused to sell the animal, a newspaper reported on Monday. Fahd bin Khattaf said he had just sold a “relative” of the sheep for SR320,000 (D317,000), the latest in a series of profitable transactions involving rare sheep he has at his farm in the eastern town of Nuairiya. “I have just received an offer to sell this ram for SR one million but I refused. I am making a lot of...

"Millsap is a calendar girl for the Bare Knuckle Babes (Miss May 2014), and on Saturday she served the Babes proudly by wrestling a 72-pound flathead catfish onto the banks of Oklahoma’s Lake Texoma."

Plants have a built-in capacity to do maths, which helps them regulate food reserves at night, research suggests. UK scientists say they were "amazed" to find an example of such a sophisticated arithmetic calculation in biology. Mathematical models show that the amount of starch consumed overnight is calculated by division in a process involving leaf chemicals, a John Innes Centre team reports in e-Life journal. Birds may use similar methods to preserve fat levels during migration. The scientists studied the plant Arabidopsis, which is regarded as a model plant for experiments. 'Astonished' Overnight, when the plant cannot use energy from...

WAPELLO, Iowa -- The winds came to Wapello on Monday. Damages to trees and some roofs were evident around the Wapello area. Probably the most devastating damage hit grain bins in this rural area. Farmers Elevator and Exchange sits along highway 61. They had two grain bins succumb to the high winds. A 200,000 bushel grain bin was totally disintegrated while a second bin of the same size was seriously damaged. The second bin was close to being lifted off of its foundation too.

he possibilities when it comes to marketing meat made from marijuana-fed animals are close to endless, but the man who came up with the idea has decided to simply call them “Pot Pigs.” William von Scheneidau, owner and founder of BB Ranch in Seattle, didn’t come up with the idea to feed pigs and other animals weed while sitting around a bong in the basement with his buddies. In fact, he doesn’t even smoke, he said. Von Scheneidau said the notion came to him when he met the owners of a weed dispensary who told him that, ever since marijuana...

In the year 802 C.E., the founder of the medieval Khmer empire, Jayavarman II, anointed himself "king of the world." In laying claim to such a grandiose title, he was a little ahead of his time: It would be another few centuries before the Khmers built Earth's largest religious monument, Angkor Wat, the crowning glory of a kingdom that stood in what is today northwestern Cambodia. But Jayavarman II had good reason to believe that his nascent kingdom, in the sacred Kulen hills northeast of Angkor, was a record-holder. Airborne laser scanning technology, or LiDAR, has revealed the imprint of...

I just bought two milk goats, and I'm thrilled with them! Are you thinking of a similar purchase? If so, you may want to read up on goats and milking. This article is meant to help new goat owners by giving them an outline of sorts. Think long and hard before buying a goat, but enjoy them if you get one!

India's environmental and food security activists who have so far succeeded in stalling attempts to introduce genetically modified (GM) food crops into this largely farming country now find themselves up against a bill in parliament that could criminalize such opposition. The Biotechnology Regulatory Authority of India (BRAI) bill, introduced into parliament in April, provides for "single window clearance" for projects by biotechnology and agribusiness companies including those to bring GM food crops into this country, 70% of whose 1.1 billion people are involved in agricultural activities. "Popular opposition to the introduction of GM crops is the result of a campaign...

In 1970, an organic chemist named John E. Franz was working at Monsanto when he and his team made a remarkable discovery: that synthesizing N-(phosphonomethyl) glycine produced glyphosate, a systemic herbicide that had the potential to rule them all. In 1974, the herbicide hit the market as “Roundup”, and since then the chemical has become the most-used herbicide in American agriculture...

CLICK HERE FOR PART 2 - CLICK HERE FOR PART 3 - CLICK HERE FOR PART 4APRIL 27, 2012, APPLE RIVER, IL – The little town of Apple River in northeast Jo Daviess County, Illinois is the hometown of a big man - Terrence Ingram. Though not big in a physical sense, when it comes to saving the American Bald Eagle, there is hardly anyone in the United States held in higher regard than Ingram. His years of documented research and expertise regarding eagles and the work of the Eagle Nature Foundation, founded by Ingram, is in great part responsible...

The animal-welfare group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals says Austin ranks first on its list of most vegan-friendly cities in the United States. Paul McCartney presented the award to Austin Mayor Lee Leffingwell while in town for a concert two weeks ago. Los Angeles, New York and Chicago round out the top five. Seattle is No. 6.

The booming deer population in the northern United States is bad for the animal's beloved hemlocks, a new study finds. During Michigan winters, white-tailed deer converge on stands of young hemlocks for protection from winter chill and predators. The same deer return every year to their favorite clumps of the bushy evergreens, called deeryards. The high concentration of deer in a small space saturates the soils with nitrogen from pee, according to a study published online in the journal Ecology. While deer pee can be a valuable source of nitrogen, a rare and necessary nutrient for plants, some deeryards are...

Danish Farmer Reverses Illnesses in pigs by reverting to a GM-free diet for his animals, which is yet further evidence for the toxicity of glyphosate tolerant GM crops Dr Eva SirinathsinghjiA Danish farmer has gained huge public recognition for publishing his simple method for ridding his pigs of illness- removing genetically modified (GM) ingredients from their diet.Published in the farming magazine Effektivt Landbrug on 13 April 2012 [1], the farmer Ib Borup Perderson describes how his pigs suffered from symptoms including chronic diarrhoea, birth defects, reproductive problems, reduced appetite, bloating, stomach ulcers, weaker and smaller piglets, and reduced litter sizes....

The ice served in six out of ten of Britain’s most popular high street restaurants contains more bacteria than the water found in their toilets, an investigation by The Mail on Sunday has found. Scientific tests have shown that ice from branches of McDonald’s, Burger King, KFC, Starbucks, Cafe Rouge and Nando’s all had higher levels of bacteria than samples of water taken from their lavatory bowls. Experts say it could be due to them being cleaned more often than the ice machines. None of the samples found presented an immediate health danger, but four contained such high levels of...

–The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) announced today that test results of plant samples from an Oregon farm indicate the presence of genetically engineered (GE) glyphosate-resistant wheat plants. Further testing by USDA laboratories indicates the presence of the same GE glyphosate-resistant wheat variety that Monsanto was authorized to field test in 16 states from 1998 to 2005. APHIS launched a formal investigation after being notified by an Oregon State University scientist that initial tests of wheat samples from an Oregon farm indicated the possible presence of GE glyphosate-resistant wheat plants. There are no...

Bees have been battling bad weather, loss of habitat and possible pesticide effects but now keepers are facing a new threat - bee-rustling. Cardiff beekeeper Elaine Spence found one her hives stripped of its honey bee colony in March. She said she knows of 10 other hives being stolen in the past year by people who need expert knowledge to do it. BBC Wales' Eye on Wales programme has found a number of hive theft cases although no officials figures are kept. (snip) She tells the the current affairs programme of her devastation to discover the theft of one of...

Fly Jumping Spider And with babies Aphids Dragonfly Woodlouse Nosy Beetle Longhorn Beetle Praying Mantis with prey Spider

Three months ago, Mira Winery in Napa embarked on a grand experiment: It lowered 48 bottles of its 2009 Cabernet Sauvignon into the ocean outside Charleston, S.C. in a custom-built cage to see what aging in the sea would do to the wine's flavor. On Tuesday, the bottles were retrieved and tasted. The differences between the wine aged in the ocean and the wine aged in the regular process are "incredible," according to Gutavo Gonzalez, Mira winemaker. Both were fruit-forward and jammy, as would be expected from a new wine, but the vino in the ocean-aged bottles had loosened up...

Researchers Have Finally Solved The Mystery Of The Irish Potato Famine Denise Chow, LiveScience May 24, 2013, 12:03 PM The Irish potato famine that caused mass starvation and approximately 1 million deaths in the mid-19th century was triggered by a newly identified strain of potato blight that has been christened "HERB-1," according to a new study. An international team of molecular biologists studied the historical spread of Phytophthora infestans, a funguslike organism that devastated potato crops and led to the famine in Ireland. The precise strain of the pathogen that caused the devastating outbreak, which lasted from 1845 to 1852,...

On a map, the rambling 2,500-acre inlet known as Drakes Estero looks like a chicken foot, its bony fingers pointing north from the larger Drakes Bay. In person, the estuary is strikingly beautiful: calm water protected from ocean waves by sand spits at its mouth, flanked by headlands and low, grassy hills dotted with cattle and a few trees tough enough to withstand the wind. It's also an ecological jewel, a stopping point for dozens of species of migrating birds, host to a thriving eelgrass population, a favorite sunning spot and pupping ground for harbor seals. There are signs of...

Billie Sol Estes, a flamboyant Texas huckster who became one of the most notorious men in America in 1962 when he was accused of looting a federal crop subsidy program, has died. He was 88... One of the strangest episodes in his life involved the death of a U.S. Department of Agriculture official who was investigating Estes just before he was accused in the fertilizer tank case. Henry Marshall's 1961 death was initially ruled a suicide even though he had five bullet wounds. But in 1984, Estes told a grand jury that Johnson had ordered the official killed to prevent...

Abstract: Glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup®, is the most popular herbicide used worldwide. The industry asserts it is minimally toxic to humans, but here we argue otherwise. Residues are found in the main foods of the Western diet, comprised primarily of sugar, corn, soy and wheat. Glyphosate's inhibition of cytochrome P450 (CYP) enzymes is an overlooked component of its toxicity to mammals. CYP enzymes play crucial roles in biology, one of which is to detoxify xenobiotics. Thus, glyphosate enhances the damaging effects of other food borne chemical residues and environmental toxins. Negative impact on the body is insidious and...

FRENCH CAMP, Calif. (KCRA) —San Joaquin County sheriff's deputies are still on the hunt for a pack of wild dogs believed to be responsible for nearly 200 livestock deaths

Nobody is quite sure where the wandering spider came from, but its travels ended Monday in a pool of alcohol. All 6-year-old Isabelle Tavares wanted Sunday night was a snack. Instead, what she found was a spider belonging to Ctenidae (pronounced TEN-ih-day) family, which includes the widely feared Brazilian wandering spider, rated deadliest on Earth by the Guinness Book of World Records in 2010. To Isabelle, it was just "Venomous Red-Fanged Jake."

A collection of nearly 100 antique tractors, mostly of the bright-yellow Caterpillar variety, will be auctioned at 10 a.m. Wednesday in Trout Run, Pa. The auction’s 109 lots, which range from farm tractors to heavy earthmovers and various durable parts, carry an total estimated value of $500,000, said Scott Edwards, territory manager for Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers, which is managing the sale. The presale value is Mr. Edwards’ own best guess because such collections of vintage industrial iron rarely come up for auction. Still, many antique tractor enthusiasts have inquired about the sale. “It’s not something you see every day,”...

Bryan Sobel grad is trying to help women in the Rwandan town of Butare through what some would say is an unusual method: growing mushrooms. Sobel first taught women in Butare mushroom cultivation methods for two weeks in December 2012. The trip was one of many that Sobel has embarked on to promote international development, from a stay in Bangladesh to a garden-based learning service trip to Belize over this past spring break. Sobel, who specializes in mushroom production and cultivation, promoted the nutritional and economic benefits of one specific variety — oyster mushrooms, or Pleurotus ostreatus — during his stay...

So beer drinkers, it's Saturday... as I sip [gulp] on my Stone Brewing IPA, I'm wondering if y'all have any recommendations on your favorite IPA's. Weigh in now, while you can still type!

Has anyone heard any more on this? I haven't found much written on it, not even on the Cornwall Alliance site.

The business of the Round Hollow Farm in Dubuque County focuses on the endless rows of cows. Mark and Karen Hosch have been here for decades. Mark has lived on this 400-acre farm all his life and the couple has raised four children here. Yet just as their youngest is about to leave the nest for college, the Hosches embarked on a major change from their usual schedule. "Three in the morning and three in the evening," Mark said of their twice-daily milking schedule for approximately 145 cows. In early December, they started the process of converting to operating a...

The past week has seen a tsunami of stories about the so-called “Monsanto Protection Act,” more accurately known as Section 735 of HR 933. It’s a tiny provision attached to a massive agricultural spending bill signed into law by President Obama last week. According to detractors, Section 735 is the “most dangerous food act ever” and a “terrifying piece of policy.” Why? Because, among other claims, it purportedly allows biotech companies to sell seeds that can cause serious consumer health problems. Here is how Gawker frames it: "Section 735 effectively shields large biotech companies, like Monsanto, from the federal courts...

Plenty has been written about concerns over elevated levels of carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere, but a Kansas State University researcher has found an upside to the higher CO2 levels. And it's been particularly relevant in light of drought that overspread the area in recent months.

The New England cottontail was once so common that Massachusetts author Thornton Burgess adapted one named Peter for the children's stories he penned a century ago. But the critter that inspired "The Adventures of Peter Cottontail" and the enduring song that came later faces an uncertain future. Its natural habitat is disappearing, and without intervention, it could be unhappy trails for the once-bountiful bunny. [snip] As neglected agricultural lands reverted back to forest and those forests matured, the population of New England cottontails thinned. More than 80 percent of their habitat disappeared over the past 50 years, according to the...

Imagine if suddenly, and completely without warning, the world experienced a total blackout – no electricity, no mobile phones, no banks, no internet, no TV, no emergency services. As it becomes apparent that the lights are never coming back on, nations are plunged into chaos, mass riots break out in major cities and, without electricity, governments are toppled. Into the vacuum step ad-hoc militias, armed and ready to enforce their own rule of law. This is the apocalyptic premise of the hit American TV series Revolution, which begins on Sky 1 this week. In the first episode, viewers are pulled...

FNN Rush Exclusive: President Obama was intrigued about the possibility of President Hugo Chavez being embalmed and put on public display forever. Because Hugo was not embalmed quickly enough, the procedure and public display could not be accomplished. President Zero was appalled and called his closest advisers and his science adviser in for a briefing. Upon their advice, President Zero has changed his will to ensure that when he dies that he is promptly embalmed and prepared for public display. The Lincoln Memorial will be removed and sent to Springfield, Il. for display. In its place President Zero's gold and...

I was on my way home today when my mom texted me that my dad's next younger brother had died of surgical complications. He was a great guy, took over my granddad's gun business, solid dude all the way. Pulled into the drive wanting to get more info and noticed something awry in the cow lot. The cows are still on hay welfare as it has not warmed up enough to spring the incipient grass up, though they are starting to pick around a bit for something fresh and green. One of my oldest cows, the last full-blood Texas Longhorn...