And These People Want to Microchip my Chickens?

Have you read this AP story on Chinese seafood imports? You really need to read the unbelievable audacity of these governmental agencies who purport to safeguard our food supply. The shipments were clearly marked and tagged for further testing for carcinogens and unapproved antibiotics. The cargo was held on very large ships at major ports on the west coast. Everyone knew where the product was and what needed to be done to it.

And yet.......being that it's the government, something broke down and at least one shipment out of four was released for consumption without the required testing taking place.

The more the government tries to do, the more they do poorly. Which brings me to the point of the title of this post: the USDA has tried repeatedly to make mandatory the National Animal Identification System for every livestock animal in the USA.

Under NAIS, as the owner of a backyard flock of chickens, I would be mandated by law to implant a microchip in every one of my chickens. I would have to pay for the chips and the radio frequency device the local USDA office would use to "track" my chickens. USDA claims that having a nationwide database (which they promise they'll keep secret and secure) would allow them to "respond" to an outbreak of some killer animal disease (bird flu, hoof-and-mouth, etc.) threatening to sweep the nation's food supply.

Let me ask you to apply just a little bit of logic here: how am I supposed to believe that the same government that cannot manage or be trusted to test seafood shipped from China when they know where the seafood is (on the boat, in the port) and they know what's potentially wrong with it (contaminated with bad stuff that could kill Americans) can effectively manage my personal farm data on the backyard chickens?

Go to the NoNAIS.org website if you are unfamiliar with the program and read up on the punitive damages this same ineffective government would impose on me if I either mess up my paperwork or if they mess up my paperwork.

And then, do a little bit of reading about the hoof-and-mouth outbreak in Great Britain. Either the lab-originated virus was released on purpose as a sabotage weapon or it was released due to error by someone on staff at the government lab testing for antidotes for such a breakout. The Government that is supposed to protect will wind up being the party responsible for the death, carnage and economic loss suffered by the farmers.

I beg you to reconsider putting the federal or state government in charge of managing anything more than they are already doing (poorly) and in fact, I would welcome a serious discussion about scaling back their current responsibilities significantly.

Where I'm spending my blog time

Our friend, Mark Read, has revamped the Burns Best Farm website by moving us onto Moveable Type and incorporating my blog into the website proper. I love the new look and having the blog right there makes keeping up to date handy.

Which means that I'm blogging pretty exclusively right there on the farm website. I'll try to check back in here, as having the Blogger account allows me to comment as a member of "the club" at Testosterhome, The Common Room, Entdraughts and other Blogger blogs I like to read.

And you know how I like to comment!

Between the garden and the blog, the summer is flying by. I hope yours is full of fun and relaxation, too. Check our farm website to see our latest adventure.

Redneck Swimming Pool

Hot day + dirty boys= Fun in the tractor bucket

Photo Copyright D.P.Burns, 2007

Farm Newsletter

Our family farm website homepage, Burns Best Farm, is now featuring the Spring/Summer Berry Bucket Newsletter. Several article are featured, including a great piece by Mike on buying food within your geographic "foodshed".

And there are pictures! Go check it out.

The Very Latest

We have had a little liquid heaven in the last 10 days or so, and while I am thankful for it, the total accumulation is not even an inch. A couple of times the dirt has actually changed to a darker color, but there is nothing that could remotely resemble mud going on here.

Our first crop to arrive in any quantity is summer squash. Mike started transplants of yellow crookneck and a lovely scalloped pattypan squash; he also direct seeded both of those plus an Italian zucchini. The tranplants have been bearing now for a couple of weeks. (Those plants direct seeded look good but are still a few weeks away from production.) The squash tastes great and I have roasted and stuffed the pattypan a couple of times. It has a nice sweetness that comes out when it's roasted.

The lettuce, which we can't eat quickly enough to keep up with, has begun to bolt, or so have the largest heads. The tomato plants look good and we completed the trellis this week for all nine rows. Yes, we have close to 300 tomato plants in the ground. The cherry tomato plants have begun to set fruit and I am anxiously awaiting the first hint of color. How else do you know it's summer?

In the tomato bed we have 7 or 8 volunteer watermelon and/or canteloupe plants that have situated themselves close to a drip irrigation source. This same field last year was given over to the johnson grass weeds that popped up instead of the corn we actually planted (this was the second corn planting that we lost to last summer's drought....are you catching a theme here?) The summer before that, in '05, for those still hanging with me, we planted watermelon and canteloupe in that field.

We knew there were a few volunteer melon plants of unknown varieties that grew in with the johnson grass, but the weeds got so high and thick we gave up on trying to find any actual melons. These little volunteers that are showing themselves now are second generation to the last melon seeds we bought in '05. Don't you love heirloom, open-pollinated plants? I am fairly certain I have at least two different varieties this summer by looking at the leaves. And since we have drip irrigation around the tomatoes and we keep that area weeded well (ok, weeded), we should be able to harvest something. I'll keep you posted on what they turn out to be.

I have harvested a few potatoes from my potato bed and while I'll do things differently this fall when I plant more, I am generally pleased with the outcome.

There's more going on and I'll just have to check back in by early next week to post those details. The chickens are growing and the roosters are crowing and the beans are blooming, and life is good. I hope yours is.

Will It Ever Rain Again?

We are now approaching the end of our third week with no measurable rainfall. The last measurable amount we had was a quarter inch, and that was after two weeks of no precipitation. In that it's been six weeks since I last posted a blog entry, I would explain most of that time away being outside watering the garden trying to keep everything alive, and the rest either educating my children or goofing off.

The beets germinated nicely and are coming along fine after stalling in the first two weeks of April due to the cold weather. My potato plants took about a month to send up replacement green shoots to repair the freezing damage. I lost three or four, but all three varieties came back in some form.

The chard looks to be a little slow and thin. Disappointing. The Isar yellow wax beans have germinated nicely but seem to have stalled in this protracted dry period. Thus the daily watering. My okra (three varieties) has hardly germinated at all, with maybe ten plants popping up out of five 40 foot rows. Even okra needs some moisture to germinate!

We are three-quarters done with putting tomatoes into the ground and the Matt's Wild Cherry are already starting to bloom, so we should not be too far into June before we see some fruit. That will make me very happy.

On a bit of a whim, I ordered 100 organic strawberry crowns from Seeds of Change and they are beginning to sprout green leaves. I have water going on them now, which reminds me I need to move the sprinkler.

On a poultry note, the chickens are doing very well and growing like weeds (or weeds when we get rain....even the weeds are not growing much!) They are fiesty and fast and funny. The one remaining Pearl Leghorn Rooster found his voice the last week and he gives a very Peter Bradyish "cockadoodledoo!!!" almost on command. He's not loud enough yet to hear from the house, but when I check on them in the morning, he's more than willing to show off. The rest of the roosters have been slower to mature than this fella, so I'm sure he's feeling pretty superior.

Must make more of an effort in the next few days to journal. I'm off to move the water around and harvest a head of lettuce for supper.

Read This and Weep

I did. Peaches. Blueberries. Apples. HAY, for crying out loud. All of it, frozen and worthless because of this cold weather. With more on the way for this weekend.

Blackberries are the only fruit we've got left for the year. That's a dent in the ol' wallet.