Posted on 08/27/2010 7:50:12 AM PDT by stillafreemind
Ever see a chicken peck the corn out of cow pies?
Sure have!
It appears you are aware then of the sometimes helpful, sometimes hurtful effects of soy. It is a phytoestrogen that will add estrogen directly to your body. Some women are estrogen dominant, so adding more soy to their diet isn’t a good thing. If you’re estrogen deficient then it would help you. Men shouldn’t find any benefit of adding the soy since they don’t have estrogen/progesterone cycles (although they do naturally produce small amounts of estrogen). With all the environmental estrogens that we pick up, from pesticides, plastics, etc. they are finding more and more people having estrogen overload.
So, there’s the theory that birds eating these phytoestrogens puts estrogen into their systems and then when you eat the birds you’re putting estrogen into your system. That’s why I say soy free feed.
But, if you personally don’t have any excess estrogen issues then I don’t see any reason to stop drinking soy milk.
I have switched to mostly grass fed raw milk and love it. This is from a small local farmer who tests her cows yearly for tuberculosis, brucellosis and Johnes.
There is some grass fed beef I’ve had that has a very “swampy” (don’t know how to describe it better than that) flavor, but for the most part I haven’t noticed any taste difference, and cooked properly is just as juicy and tender. And, has a lot more good nutrients than corn fed.
My research of corn and other grain fed beef showed that the cows’ systems just aren’t developed to digest the grains properly. Their intestinal tracts become very acidic and that’s one reason we see more e coli outbreaks; from super bacteria that has survived the higher acidity. Plus, the feed lots are bacteria breeding grounds, with all the cows packed in, and why it’s pretty much a necessity to give antibiotics to them on a regular basis. Mind you this is just some reading I’ve done, never worked a beef farm myself, so if someone has some different experience with big commercial operations would love to hear it.
Having read most of the informative posts on this thread I am still of the opinion that the salmonella is external contamination rather than internal. IIRC, even the mad cow disease scare is still of indeterminate origin. Yes, I remember the same arguments made here about contaminated brain matter getting into the feed, etc. Interestingly enough, considering the nature of this thread, where did the first case come from? It is another chicken or egg thing.
The main instruction about preparing chicken is to wash it well before using. Then of course you cook it because chicken ain’t sushi. Eggs could easily have gotten contaminated when cracked and used, especially in bulk operations.
I have been eating chicken and eggs for over seventy years and I have never had salmonella. Therefore, I must be an expert!
I am not an expert, only a simple former biology teacher. However, I remember reading years ago that salmonella had been found in the ovaries of hens. It would make sense then, that eggs can be contaminated before they leave the hen. Wild birds tend to carry it as well. I personally think this is a lot of hype for something that’s fairly easy to avoid (and if you do get it, yes, you’ll be sick as a dog, but you will probably survive).
I have eaten my eggs with the yolk runny my whole life, and as far as I know I have never had it. On the other hand, some of us may have immune systems that are simply better at fighting it off than others. I rarely get any kind of stomach bug, and I can’t believe that it’s because I’m never exposed.
Just a note of interest. I used to feed my dogs raw food (when I had a lot more dogs). I fed raw chicken, and often gave them eggs as well. I never had a dog get sick from it. Dogs have a more acidic digestive tract (they are designed to be able to eat garbage and dead things) and they process stuff thru pretty quickly. Maybe some people have a system that is less hospitable to that sort of bacteria than others? Just thinking out loud.
LOL!
Because the use of ruminant tissue in ruminant feed was probably a necessary factor responsible for the BSE outbreak in the United Kingdom and because of the current evidence for possible transmission of BSE to humans, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration instituted a ruminant feed ban in June 1997 that became fully effective as of October 1997. As of October 26, 2009, a regulation issued by FDA in April 2009 came into effect establishing an enhanced BSE-related feed ban in the U.S. This enhanced feed ban will further harmonize BSE feed control measures in the U.S. with those in Canada (see below). In addition, FDA continues to enforce its important 1997 mammalian-to-ruminant feed ban through its BSE inspection and BSE feed testing programs.
As of July 12, 2007, an enhanced BSE-related feed ban came into effect in Canada. CFIA established this ban to more effectively prevent and quickly eliminate BSE from Canada. The enhanced ban prohibits most proteins, including potentially BSE infectious tissues known as “specified risk materials” (SRM) from all animal feeds, pet foods, and fertilizers, not just from cattle feed as required by the ban instituted in 1997. The 1997 feed ban in Canada was similar to the feed ban instituted in the United States that same year. As recently reported by CFIA, removing SRM from the entire animal feed system addresses risks associated with the potential contamination of cattle feed during production, distribution, storage, and use. Applying the same measure to pet food and fertilizer materials addresses the possible exposure of cattle and other susceptible animals to these products. With this ban in place, CFIA expects BSE should be eliminated from the Canadian cattle herd by about the year 2017.
In late 2001, the Harvard Center for Risk Assessment study of various scenarios involving BSE in the U.S. concluded that the FDA ruminant feed rule provides a major defense against this disease.
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvrd/vcjd/factsheet_nvcjd.htm
When I had my chickens, I shared the eggs but never loaned them out for bug duty. I wanted those girls patroling MY yard!
Thanks
You are right, grass fed tastes swampy.
We’ve not had any problems with coyotes or foxes. Neighbor dogs (who are history now ;)) have killed a couple and an owl took two. Our barn (it’s pretty huge) is not that far from the house and we have yard dogs that bark and keep them away mostly. They usually stay close to the barn or the house yard so are pretty safe. Not sure why they stay close. Guess there are more bugs in the watered yard than out in the pasture (111 acres) We do have a couple of aracuana/Easter egg chickens that roam but they still hide pretty good. We see coyotes close, they get shot at - as a matter of fact, any predator tame or wild gets the same attention. Neighbors had a pit bull mix rescue that ran our horses through the fence and then was after our cows. Neighbor said he was learning to “round up” cattle. Back of 111 acres and no one telling him to “round up” cattle is not “rounding up”. It’s running. Had to shoot him. He came at my husband so he is history. Neighbor understood.
Thanks for your response. As i hope I indicated, I am not an expert but I am skeptical of the scare tactics of the government. Do you remember the recent avian flu PANDEMIC? It never happened but they balleyhooed it to kingdom come. I don’t think we have had this problem in the past and I don’t think it is a problem today. That is the basis of my opinion.
Good to know, I would eventually like to live in the country again and have chickens. I’d rather let them run loose, but I wondered about predators. Of course, I would have to figure out a way to keep my retrievers from retrieving them. :)
On the Aracuana chickens, I’m very familiar with them. When I was a kid I bought 3 chicks, hoping for at least one little hen so I could get those pretty eggs. All 3 turned out to be roosters! They were beautiful, but of course, no eggs. We did win some ribbons at the fair with them tho.
I don’t trust the media or the government on these things. If someone sees a way to further an agenda, they will certainly use scare tactics with the public. I can easily see the Animal Rights kooks wanting this out there, they would love nothing more than to close down our entire farming industry. And the media? Even if they don’t have a political agenda, they love a good scary story.
When the grandkids came over this year and saw the green eggs, they were so excited. Thought the Easter bunny was living here LOL Green is all I have gotten so far but I have a young brood coming up from one of the hens that, hopefully, will result in other colors. Not penning chickens up is the best way to raise them, IMO. Leghorns are pretty stupid about rustling up their own grub but if you get an older variety they do very well.
It’s hard to keep a dog that’s purpose is to get birds to NOT to it but it can be done if they are trained in any way. We have heelers both an old one and a young brainless (LOL) one. Coulter ignores the chickens. When we let Rattler out, he immediately heads towards them (they look soooo good running away from him) We call him back and correct. He is slowly getting the message but I guess he will still try until he gets out of the dumb@ss puppy stage. (He’s only 5 months old)
Yeah, five months old don’t have all their brain cells hooked up! When I had chickens, we had a coop in the back yard, but I let them out to play every day (I was a kid, I thought they were fun..stupid but fun!) I had a couple of bantam hens also (probably crosses, but they were small like banties). Later, we let the roosters run loose where we kept our horses because they were too noisy and quarrelsome to live in town in a coop.
I hope I can have chickens again, and I had forgotten about the colored eggs, that would be fun. Plus, they were gorgeous, 2 were mostly black and one was mostly gold with black edging on his feathers.
No longer 77!
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