All this talk about eggs laced with toxins makes some of us avoid an excellent whole food, eggs.

Eggs from a family farm are healthy food, whole food. What we need to avoid is eggs and chickens from factory farms, CAFOs where crowded, unsanitary conditions can breed dangerous bacteria.

Dr Mercola recommends eggs as healthy food. Buy eggs from someone you know, maybe someone in your neighborhood. His rather lengthy article is below.  The article is a little long, but interesting, especially if you’re playing with the idea of having a few chickens in your back yard…

http://tinyurl.com/3yf88e5

Janice

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Recalled eggs, 380 million of them. Source farm was found according to New York Times and it’s Wright County Egg Farm near Clarion, Iowa, owned by the DeCoster family. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/27/us/27eggs.html?_r=2&src=twt&twt=nytimesdining

(Check my post yesterday. We talked about DeCoster farms.)

DeCoster farms does 2.3 million dozen eggs, a week….that makes you pause.  Ever seen 2.3 million dozen in one place at one time?

Neither have I.  But don’t dump them in MY kitchen any time soon.

Apparently DeCoster has been fined numerous times for environmental pollution and sexual harrassment.

Check out the New York Times article.  It’s enlightening.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/27/us/27eggs.html?_r=2&src=twt&twt=nytimesdining

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Know where your food comes from?

When I grew up in the 50s we knew.  The back yard garden, the back pasture, the neighbor next door who had a few chickens.

Now, it’s not so easy.

AMERICA’S FOOD, CONTROLLED BY ONLY FOUR CORPORATIONS

Food is big business. Hogs, chickens, and beef production is controlled by only four (4) corporations.  These four corporations control the animals, the buildings, the feed, the feedlots, and the distribution centers that supply meat to American grocers.

Controlled Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) control most of our egg supply, too.  Unless you buy eggs from a local small farm!

I found a great website just yesterday.
Amy Goodman, “Democracy Now!” interviewed Kirby about his book, “Animal Factory.” (check the 8/25 blog post).  Here’s his website. It’s a good one. http://animalfactorybook.com/

And, here’s a video from his website:

POLLUTION MACHINES=INDUSTRIAL AGRICULTURE

“These factory farms, known as “Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations,” or CAFOs, confine thousands of pigs, dairy and beef cattle, and poultry in small spaces, often under stressful conditions, and generate enormous volumes of fecal and biological waste as well as other toxins.”

DISEASE FACTORIES

Kirby: “Swine flu. MRSA. Unusual concentrations of cancer and other diseases. Massive fish kills from algal blooms and flesh-eating parasites. Recalls of meats, vegetables, and fruits because of deadly E-coli bacteria contamination, salmonella and 380 million eggs…

Recent public health crises raise urgent questions about how our animal-derived food is raised and brought to market.”

NOT SO EASY TO TELL WHAT’S REAL FOOD

It’s not not so easy today to tell what’s really food.  But, there are still a few tell tale guidelines.

Michael Pollan (In “Defense of Food”) lists five.

• Don’t eat anything your great grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.
• Avoid food containing ingredients that are a: unfamiliar, b: unpronounceable, c: more than five in number, or that include d: high fructose corn syrup.
• Avoid food products that make health claims.
• Shop the peripheries of the supermarket and stay out of the middle.
• Get out of the supermarket whenever possible.

Know where your food comes from?

It’s the responsibility of the consumer now.  Read labels.  What else do you do?
Food is big business today. Corporations aren’t concerned with your health; they’re money-making machines.  Each of us must take responsibility.

So, what do you do?  I’ll take new ideas, your thoughts about food sources.  Let me know below

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380 Million eggs recalled since last week.

Were they from a small family farm or CAFO?

What’s your guess?

Two Iowa farms, CAFOs, recalled more than half a billion potentially tainted eggs this month. Those two farms share close ties since they supply both the chickens and the feed and yet are owned by the same company.

DECOSTER FARMS CITED FOR ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE

Both farms are linked to businessman Austin “Jack” DeCoster, cited for numerous health, safety and employment violations over the years. DeCoster owns Wright County Egg, the original farm that recalled 380 million eggs Aug. 13 after they were linked to more than 1,000 reported cases of salmonella poisoning.

FDA SEEKS FURTHER REGULATORY AUTHORITY

According to Sherri McGarry of the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, “There are preventive measures that would have been in place that could have prevented this.” She and other officials declined to say what specific measures would have prevented this particular outbreak, citing an ongoing FDA investigation. The FDA recommends stronger regulatory powers be given to the agency.

CHEAP EGGS, FILTHY CONDITIONS

Michael Pollan, “Omnivore’s Dilemma,” would call these eggs, “battery cage eggs,” because the chickens are crammed into tiny cages, unable to walk or spread their wings.

They’re covered in feces, often forced to share cages with the bodies of dead neighbors. These unnatural conditions produce sick birds, which increases the likelihood of infected eggs.

DeCoster has been warned before of environmental violations. Hog effluent, from his hog farm, contaminated the chicken operation. Rats contaminated the feed, and carried contamination from one to the other.

Hog effluent, rats rummaging in chicken feed.  It’s no surprise there’s salmonella.

Picture courtesy of “Farm Sanctuary”

FACTORY FARMS FIGHT NATURAL DESIGN

I wonder how the FDA proposes to inspect and regulate huge animal factories.

Why try to regulate “farms” that are, by design, breeding grounds for disease and bacteria? It seems to me this problem does not stem frm lack the lack of regulation as much as faulty design.

It’s the industry itself. How do you present factories that treat animals/birds inhumanely as sources of healthy food for our bodies?

Can we expect food from abused creatures to really nourish and bring health?

EGG INDUSTRY CONSOLIDATION MEANS FEWER FOOD SOURCES

The egg industry has consolidated over recent years, leaving a few very large businesses.  Controlled Animal Feeding Operations, CAFOs, control most of the nation’s egg supply.  That’s not a sustainable system.

Amy Goodman interviews, Aug 24, on “Democracy Now” author David Kirby, “Animal Factory,” about the dangerous consolidation of our food supply:

WHERE DOES OUR FOOD COME FROM?

WHERE DO I GET MY EGGS?

Thanks for asking!! Our family buys chickens and eggs from a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) Program. The chickens are raised on a small family farm in Nevada.  Even in the city you can find today folks who raise a few chickens and are willing to sell their eggs. 

The chickens run free, are not cramped in small cages with no room to turn.  They’re allowed to express their “chickenness,” as Joel Saladin would say.

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