you guys have Michael Schmidt the Amish diary farmer who had to pay and live through court battles over the raw milk issue in Pennsilvania.
We now have another example of bullying here in Canada. I signed the petition I hope you will too.
Nothing seems safe anymore. Enjoy the read
http://shropshiresheep.org/farmedanddangerous/
IF YOU DONT INTEND TO READ IT HERE IS THE [GIST] OF IT.
Govt invaded a farm and killed all the sheep. Claiming a possible Scapie contamination of course they were wrong! Oops no sorry no compensation just literally years of genetics and work down the tube. Not to mention a lot of dead healthy animals.
Looks like Russia continues to spread her errors.
Apologize if this is the wrong place to post I wasn't sure where.
Thanks your friendly canadian :farmer:
It's not just Pennsylvania, it's all over America.
There are numerous stories of government heavy-handed tyranny toward farms that milk cows and sell the raw milk.
Alta-Dena in California was once the largest chain that sold raw milk. Through the 1950's, 60's, 70's and into the 80's (maybe longer) my family bought raw milk at their dairy shops in Riverside and Los Angeles counties. Then because of court lawsuits and government regulations, eventually they threw in the towel.
Following them, many other small farms gave up the fight. As of last year, there were only two small farms in all of California that sold raw milk, and they were literally HAUNTED by state regulatory agents like they were criminals.
A major organic food chain, Whole Foods Markets, stopped selling raw milk a few years ago, and the only places left are small dairy shops and a couple of chains, one of which is Sprouts. As I recall their brand is
Organic Pastures. One quart of milk costs $8.
One of the most unreasonable rules is they made RAW COTTAGE CHEESE as if it were contraband. You could go to jail for selling it, and they sent out agents under disguise to work their way in confidence into small stores to see if they could convince the shopkeepers that they wanted raw Cottage Cheese for the health of their families. They lied through their teeth, and they were trained how to do it, acting the part and busting the shops. You would think they were pushing drugs or something -- like crack or heroin.
Raw Cottage Cheese is the stuff you remember as a child if you're 50 or more years old. It's FULL OF FLAVOR, not runny but firm and wonderful smelling. You can pile it up like it's ice cream. One spoonful and you think you're in heaven.
Oh, but the rich and famous and Congressmen can get all the raw cottage cheese they want, no problem. Get the point?
Then there was one party you can read about on the Internet, when a raw milk and organic crops farm invited friends from all the western states to come and have a festival. They hired a top rated chef to prepare their foods. He followed all the rules according to the books, as he was a professional food service man who knew what he could do and what was forbidden. They had large deli trays and on-site mobile kitchen on the farm that day, preparing food. Hundreds of customers showed up and they were starting to have appetizers and homemade organic wine, when the woman from the Food Inspection Department (or whatever it's called) showed up and started going down her checklist of what makes them criminals for this food event.
Long story short, they ended up throwing away most of their food in 55-gallon drums that were intended for trash cans but were now filled with prepared food.
Somehow the farmers managed to not disappoint their guests too much, but the day was all-in-all a wasted event.
If they had tried this stunt in Kentucky or Tennessee, they would have had a missing inspector.
One would think that Texas would be a stronghold:
"Don't mess with Texas!" But in the whole state there is not one raw milk farm anymore, as of about 10 years ago.
Raw milk does not putrefy or spoil, but when it sets out at room temperature, it starts to turn into cheese. It's the pasteurization and homogenization of milk that makes for that rotten smell when it expires. It is like a battlefield with all the dead bodies of good bacteria (as well as a few bad ones that the good ones actually fight off) lying all around, and that's what goes 'BAD' when the milk spoils.
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