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In reply to the discussion: Was at grocery store yesterday, saw something disturbing. [View all]Doremus
(7,261 posts)231. "feed corn doesn't make livestock sick." You're quite mistaken.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/meat/interviews/pollan.html
By the time a modern American beef cow is six months old, it has seen its last blade of grass for the rest of its life. As soon as they wean, they spend the first six months out on the pasture with their moms, nursing, nibbling grass. The mom is converting the grass's protein that's turning into milk for the animal, doing the way they've done it for millions of years. We take them off grass. We put them in pens, called backgrounding pens, and we teach them how to eat something that they are not evolved to eat, which is grain, and mostly corn.
Why do we do this? Well, it's a very good question, because it makes absolutely no sense from an ecological standpoint. From a financial standpoint, it does. It makes them grow much more quickly. It makes them get fat, and we like our meat really fat and marbled. And it allows us to speed up the lifespan. In capitalism, time is money.
We're taking cows that we used to let grow to be four or five years old before we eat them [and] we've got it down to 14 months, and we're heading toward 11 months. What allows us to do this is getting them [on] corn, getting them off this whole evolutionary relationship they've had with grass. ...
snip
The problem with this system, or one of the problems with this system, is that cows are not evolved to digest corn. It creates all sorts of problems for them. The rumen is designed for grass. And corn is just too rich, too starchy. So as soon as you introduce corn, the animal is liable to get sick.
It creates a whole [host] of changes to the animal. So you have to essentially teach them how to eat corn. You teach their bodies to adjust. And this is done in something called the backgrounding pen at the ranch, which is kind of the prep school for the feedlot. Here's where you teach them how to eat corn.
You start giving them antibiotics, because as soon as you give them corn, you've disturbed their digestion, and they're apt to get sick, so you then have to give them drugs. That's how you get in this whole cycle of drugs and meat. By feeding them what they're not equipped to eat well, we then go down this path of technological fixes, and the first is the antibiotics. Once they start eating the [corn], they're more vulnerable. They're stressed, so they're more vulnerable to all the different diseases cows get. But specifically they get bloat, which is just a horrible thing to happen. They stop ruminating.
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It is! They just keep cranking the price up to see what the market will bear. Sell less at a higher
RKP5637
Jun 2016
#1
It's what they feed cattle because it's cheap, making the cows sick in the process,
Doremus
Jun 2016
#221
ignorance knows no bounds..lol, you have no idea what I think..but you might now:)
Demonaut
Jun 2016
#42
Humans, like every other organism, are meant to seek out nutrition where they can find it
Major Nikon
Jun 2016
#149
You're going to be waiting a very long time for me to prove an assertion I never made
Major Nikon
Jun 2016
#228
http://www.thedailymeal.com/why-you-should-stop-drinking-milk-right-now/013014
ciaobaby
Jun 2016
#56
Well then you are much better off than the baby cow who got none of his mother's milk cause you had
ciaobaby
Jun 2016
#67
I have 2 women friends who goat farm and sell their goat cheese and milk
womanofthehills
Jun 2016
#181
Cheese is made from fermented milk, so I'm not sure what you are referring
Major Nikon
Jun 2016
#177
Just another scam to seperate upper-middle class latte liberals from their money.
Odin2005
Jun 2016
#21
lol, sorry...I was going to post "are you serious?" but I respect you too much
Demonaut
Jun 2016
#52
where do you shop? at the supermarket I use, organic gallon is 5.17. regular is 2.99 to 3.59.
niyad
Jun 2016
#33
yes, the whole foods and tj here are very similar in that regard, as well as my supermarket.
niyad
Jun 2016
#128
Because there are fewer small dairy's that produce the milk and the polluted milk from
bkkyosemite
Jun 2016
#51
Even a non organic dairy in Oregon uses no antibiotics, hormones etc and their
bkkyosemite
Jun 2016
#165
http://www.thedailymeal.com/why-you-should-stop-drinking-milk-right-now/013014
ciaobaby
Jun 2016
#57
Unless you are a practicing cannibal, everything you consume comes from another species
Major Nikon
Jun 2016
#88
If you think organic milk is nonsensical, and if regular milk is still the same price,
djean111
Jun 2016
#79
It's definitely not organic, and it's definitely no more than a marketing term
Major Nikon
Jun 2016
#113
Actually, my 5 yr old grandson told me the milk I have tastes better than what he drinks at home
womanofthehills
Jun 2016
#187
around here(houston) regular retail milk is about 4.70 a gal. & horizons organic about $8-10 halfg.
Sunlei
Jun 2016
#93
What cracks me up is people buy organic everything and still drink alcohol like fish.
Gomez163
Jun 2016
#101
I think organic wine is a good idea because grapes are one of the most heavily pesticided fruits
womanofthehills
Jun 2016
#188
I have to say I was impressed by the organic orange juice I got to try at Costco
brewens
Jun 2016
#103
I don't know where you are buying your milk but I have never paid anywhere that for organic milk and
EV_Ares
Jun 2016
#151
and if it isn't a scam then it's elitest that only the rich get to eat healthy food. n/t
leeroysphitz
Jun 2016
#194
That is pretty much life in these United States. For everything, including food. n/t
djean111
Jun 2016
#204