Free Republic

BERLIN (Reuters) - A German farmer angry with police for trying to confiscate his tractor wrecked three patrol cars and evaded capture for seven hours before an elite unit managed to arrest him, a police spokesman said Wednesday. The farmer, 53, was pulled over by police for driving his tractor without a license, despite several previous warnings. The officers called in three patrol cars for help before asking the farmer to get out of his vehicle. He refused, and proceeded to ram the cars with his tractor, making full use of its attached muck spreader and hydraulic fork. Officers were...

Norridgewock - Everywhere Richard White looked Monday there were big clumps of dried, smelly chicken manure. It was hanging from his mailbox, sloshed all over his snowmobile, lying next to his well and dried on his garage door more than 30 feet across the yard. Two vehicles parked nearby looked like they had been through a very sloppy and thick mud run. "There's stuff still 20 feet up the tree," White said, pointing. "It was like a tsunami wave of hot chicken (manure)." The pungent odor of the nitrogen-concentrated chicken excrement still hung in the air at White's 441 Walker...

The spontaneous combustion of a manure pile sparked a blaze that grew to about 200 acres Sunday, fire officials said. No injuries were reported and no structures were threatened. The blaze, dubbed the Red Star Fire because of its origins at the Red Star Fertilizer Co., was 50 percent contained, said Jonathan Pangburn, a spokesman with the California Department of Forestry. The fire was expected to be fully contained by late Sunday. The blaze, which consisted of a main 175-acre fire and several smaller ones, was reported shortly before 5 a.m. It was partially burning in Prado Regional Park near...

Tainted spinach traced to California By ANDREW BRIDGES, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 43 minutes ago WASHINGTON - A California natural foods company was linked Friday to a nationwide E. coli outbreak that has killed one person and sickened nearly 100 others. Supermarkets across the country pulled spinach from shelves, and consumers tossed out the leafy green. Food and Drug Administration officials said that they had received reports of illness in 19 states. Twenty-nine people have been hospitalized, 14 of them with kidney failure. The outbreak was traced to Natural Selection Foods, a holding company based in San Juan Bautista,...

While at the Society of Environmental Journalists' annual meeting last month, I and several other writers toured northwest Vermont's dairy land, home to many family-owned and -operated farms. Some enterprises milk as few as a dozen cows. Others handle more than 50 times that many. A number of the farms specialize in organic milk and specialty cheeses. Others deliver large quantities of typical supermarket milk. f7905_1186.jpg UDDERS AT THE READY. With about 1,000 cows to milk twice a day, the Blue Spruce Farm is a mechanized operation. © 2006 J. Raloff All of these dairying operations have at least one...

As he sold investors on an improbable plan for turning Inland Empire cow manure into electricity, W. Patrick Moriarty had an answer for everything. With a folksy delivery, the Orange County businessman promised cutting-edge technology, a respected engineering firm and tax-exempt financing to extract methane gas from mountains of manure and use it to generate enough power to light a small city. "He told me categorically that we would get our money back with interest and that the project was good as gold," said Shmuel Erde, a Beverly Hills lender. What Moriarty and his business partner, Wayne Stephens, didn't tell...

When in Iowa, don't forget to duck By Dave Barry (This classic DAVE BARRY column was originally published on Aug. 20, 1995.) If you're looking for a vacation travel destination that blends excitement with huge amounts of corn, I strongly recommend Iowa. I recently spent a few days there, and I can honestly say that it was comparable to experiences I've had in sophisticated, prestige travel destinations such as Paris, in the sense that I was not once engulfed by hog manure. I was concerned about this, however. The second day I was in Iowa, the top story on the...

Environmental activists are teaming up with state attorneys general and trial lawyers to bankrupt the nation's livestock farmers -- in the name of saving the environment. If the situation wasn't so serious, it would be hilarious.     The activists -- including the Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club and the Union of Concerned Scientists -- are trying to convince Congress the nation's farms should be treated as industrial waste sites and therefore subject to severe penalties under the federal Superfund law. Some state attorneys general, supported by trial lawyers, have filed lawsuits to the same end. Why? They argue, animal manure...

A BAVARIAN village was flooded by liquid pig manure after a tank containing 240,000 litres of it burst, German police said today. Sewage rose to 50cm in the courtyards and streets of Elsa after gushing from the tank. "The village was swamped with green-brown liquid and it was pig manure - the mother of all muck," said Rainer Prediger, a police spokesman in the nearby town of Coburg. Police estimated the pig waste had caused at least 100,000 euro ($161,590) worth of damage.

SAN RAFAEL, Calif. (AP) - Researchers here are looking to horse manure to study the spread of invasive weeds. Dominican University has received a $100,000 National Park Service grant to study how to slow the spread of nonnative plants and weeds in state parks, school officials said. Horse manure might be part of the problem, according to scientists. Researchers began collecting horse manure samples from trails and pastures this summer. They want to test an assumption that seeds can pass through horses, leading to sprouts of invasive weeds. "We need to know through scientific research if horses do or do...

Last night I was pickin my banjo, drinkin a beer and enjoying a dip of Copenhagen and started thinkin bout my all time favorite C&W songs. You know, the ones you don't get tired of listening to. This is my top 5. 5. He Stopped Loving Her Today by George Jones 4. You're Not the Best by Charlie Robison 3. Rodeo by Garth Brooks 2. Amarillo by Morning by George Strait 1. Song of Wyoming by Chris LeDoux

Interest grows in digesters that turn manure into energy, fertilizer and bedding for cows Chilton - The manure management side of farming is far less smelly and far more profitable when the animal waste is converted into a power source. Such a biomass process is up and running at farms across Wisconsin and other states. Although the basic technology isn't new, it's generating attention for a local company, GHD Inc. Company owner Steve Dvorak has run a farm implement dealership for 27 years. The farm boy turned engineer kept hearing farmers complain about manure management, and ended up developing his...

Czech man dies in work-related accident; investigation under way PRAGUE, Czech Republic - A Czech tractor driver died under eight tons of manure in a bizarre accident that has baffled his employers, local media reported. The 34-year old man, identified only as Martin T., suffocated after the load fell on him while he was dumping it in a field near the western Czech city of Karlovy Vary, news Web Site www.novinky.cz reported on Sunday. “It absolutely beats me how this could happen,” said Vladimir Erps, chief of the company employing the victim. “

POCATELLO - National Public Radio's award-winning talk show host, Terry Gross, took a break from interviewing political leaders and cultural icons for a speaking tour, including a stop-off at Idaho State University Wednesday. Some conservatives have tagged NPR as one of the cornerstones of the "liberal media," but Gross said that isn't completely true. The word liberal has two connotations, she said, politically left and liberal, as in the liberal arts. In the first political sense of the word, Gross said NPR has no agenda and presents unbiased, balanced coverage of national and world events. "Some people in this day...

A HARVARD professor who specialises in environmental economics was arrested on suspicion of trying to steal a load of manure from a Massachusetts farm, a police officer said today. Professor Martin Weitzman was arrested near the town of Rockport on April 1, Rockport police officer Michael Marino said. Philip Casey, who manages a horse stable at the farm, had called police after finding Prof Weitzman and his truck on the farm and stopped him from leaving, Marino said. The Harvard academic was charged with trespassing, larceny under $US250 ($326), and malicious destruction of property - because the truck left marks...

Manure Lands Harvard Professor In A Mess Apr 6, 2005 10:44 am US/EasternROCKPORT, Mass.A Harvard economics professor has been accused of neglecting the standard market practice of paying for goods and services by trying to steal a truckload of manure from a horse farmer. Stable manager Phillip Casey says Martin Weitzman, Harvard University's Ernest E. Monrad Professor of Economics, has been stealing manure from Charlie Lane's Rockport farm for years. Police said said Casey found Weitzman on the property last Friday, so he blocked in Weitzman's pickup truck and called police. Weitzman got angry, Casey said, then offered to pay...

I Saw Fire In The Sky Judy Curmi 2-11-2005 This was a very vivid dream. The dream occurred on a bright sunny day. I was walking along a black-topped road. My mother and sister Rosie were with me. We were in an upscale salt-water community, perhaps along the coast of California or Florida. Along the sides of the road were guardrails made of steel rods and thick beams of wood painted white, in keeping with a nautical theme. To our right a ramp went down steeply to wooden docks holding a number of small pleasure craft. Due to the steepness...

MILFORD, Neb. - It took nearly four months, but to the relief of neighbors miles around, a burning manure pile has been extinguished. David Dickinson, owner and manager of Midwest Feeding Co., said Wednesday that several weeks of pulling the 2,000-ton pile apart proved effective by late last week. "We got far enough through it, that it quit," Dickinson said. Dickinson's feedlot, about 20 miles west of Lincoln, takes in as many as 12,000 cows at a time from farmers and ranchers and fattens them for market. Byproducts from the massive operation resulted in a dung pile measuring 100 feet...

Northern winds have been sending a stench of manure from across the Canadian border to the town of Frenchville, and the Maine community is tired of holding its nose: FRENCHVILLE, Maine (AP) -- Frenchville Town Manager Philip Levesque calls it an international problem. Levesque says the odor comes from a chicken manure composting facility in Canada. He says it smells like acid or sulfur, it's really strong, and the last couple of weeks have been especially bad. The town is inviting politicians and government officials from both sides of the Saint John River to meet with local residents February 16th...

Burning Manure Pile Has Neighbors Fuming 2 hours, 1 minute ago Strange News - AP MILFORD, Neb. - A large pile of composting manure burning for almost two months has neighbors upset and state officials looking for a way to put it out. Concerned about emissions, the state's Department of Environmental Quality will make its recommendation by the end of the week, said spokesman Rich Webster. David Dickinson, who owns and operates Midwest Feeding Co. near this town about 20 miles west of Lincoln, said he has tried to spread the pile out and douse it with water but the...