Chickens

[sahtlinurk]

I have been through a flock of organic hens ( 2000 birds ) and seen how things work in organic beef unit, i have to plough/cultivate/combain organic fields and i see how much more fuel/time/troubles this organic standard consumes and bears. good thing is we are going out of organic hopefully next year.

Lauri

 

[Brosville]

lest there be the slightest doubt - chapter and verse

"The withdrawal period after the last administration of allopathic veterinary medicinal products must be twice the legal withdrawal period. Where the statutory withdrawal period is nil or less than 24 hours, a 48-hour withdrawal period must be observed. When allopathic veterinary medicinal products or other medicinal products are used off licence under veterinary supervision, a 7 day withdrawal period must be observed" - from here -
http://www.organic-vet.reading.ac.uk/cattleweb/health/stan.htm

Which in language that should be understandable to all means that it is perfectly acceptable to use "conventional" treatments on animals in organic systems (as may reasonably be resorted to as a result of injury or other surgery) as long as certain "withdrawal" periods are observed after their use...... you couldn't immediately slaughter the animal and brand it as "organic", or sell it's milk until after a reasonable withdrawal period.........

So as I said, crap farming, not crap "organic farming" as a whole......

Just to further confuse matters, it is also entirely possible to use "natural" remedies, which can often be MORE effective than "conventional" ones - I would cite the use of dried garlic powder - absolutely ideal for treatment of certain injuries in hens (more effective and faster in it's effects than the "conventional" antibiotic dusting powders)

 

[sahtlinurk]

would be very interesting human experiment to put two sick ( lets say really bad flu ) persons side to side and give one of them modern medicine and keep the other one on garlic powder, dried monkey testicles and this really 10x more active super hyper healthy manuka honey..





Lauri

 

[darrenperrett]

I agree with Brosville. We were a registered organic smallholding for two years and never had to resort to monkey testicles, thank god. You can use most of the same medications if required but they just require a longer period before you can send them to the abattoire. Worm burden in sheep is tested for and not assumed so you save money on routine drenching.

Darren.

 

[Brosville]

The one being given a good choice of "alternative" therapies would probably recover faster............ ('flu is a really bad example, conventional medicine can do clutter all, whereas things as simple as garlic actually have anti-viral properties)
I'm firmly of the belief that it's "horses for courses", "conventional" medicine has it's place - surgery and antibiotics for instance can be indispensible, BUT as we're now seeing in beekeeping, unfortunately the products of "Big Agrochem" and "Big Pharma" are grossly overused and misapplied, resulting in residues in much of our food, and resistance building in the pest population.
You mention that organic farming is "hard work" - it is indeed, any idiot can "do it chemically", but it takes knowledge and real farming skills to "do it organically", and certainly organic stock-keeping is usually more labour intensive.
Although I'm broadly in favour of "organics" as an ethical standpoint, I too find things wrong with parts of it as they are carried out nowadays - fossil fuels are running out (fast), certain fertilisers are becoming desperately short, which means we have to look towards truly sustainable systems, and a strengthening of "local food" (all that ploughing is bonkers - as mad as it is to grow beans in Kenya, then fly them in labelled "organic")

 

[Norm]

Those who are considering getting a single piglet, consider getting two. They are social animals and need to be with another pig(let).