RePrint - The importance of what your food eats

This is a great article, we have reprinted here in entirety instead of just a link, becasue it is so good.  The link to the original article is :

http://www.cavemandoctor.com/2016/02/08/4938/

Alchemists and Animals – The Importance of What Your Food Eats

Caveman Doctor > Nutrition > Alchemists and Animals – The Importance of What Your Food Eats

cavemandoctor February 8, 2016 0 Comments

Nutrition

alchemist chicken, cage-free eggs, david perlmutter,free range eggs, healthy eggs, omega eggs, pastured chicken, pastured eggs

Alchemists and Animals – The Importance of What Your Food Eats

The Alchemist Chicken

During the Integrative Health Conference in New York City several years back, I participated in a debate regarding the optimal human diet – vegan, paleo, or Mediterranean. During this debate, Dr. David Perlmutter, author of Grain Brain,used the term the alchemist cow. He was referring to cows that are fed a poor diet, given antibiotics, and stuffed in a small space – yet we somehow believe that their milk and meat would still be as healthy as a cow that is raised appropriately. Click here for the entire debate.

Alchemy is the ancient practice of trying to transform metals into gold. Even the mega-genius Isaac Newton thought that he could perform alchemy. However, as he and others found out, it does not work.

We cannot make gold out of nothing. We cannot feed animals garbage and treat them poorly and expect them to magically be healthy.

When contextualizing to humans, the difference in health between a stressed out person, stuffed in a cubicle at work, never exercising, never sleeping well, and never eating versus a stress-free, healthy counterpart, the health differences become obvious.  Yet, why do we ignore this when it comes to animals?

Enter Tina and Cassandra…

Tina and Cassandra

Meet Tina. Tina lives in an empty 300 square foot apartment. Tina’s cubical at his work is so small that her elbows touch each wall and her head is a couple of feet from the ceiling. Tina is part of typical corporate America and her boss screams at her all day long causing her to be stressed. Tina’s constant level of stress causes the habitual release of a hormone called cortisol – often called the stress hormone – which causes her blood sugar to skyrocket many times throughout the day.¹ Tina’s body is frequently releasing many catecholamines (like adrenaline) that are linked to an increased risk of experiencing a heart attack, high blood pressure, and a stroke. The barrage of cortisol puts her at an increased risk of heart disease, diabetes, cognitive impairment, and a poorly functioning immune system.²

She sleeps terribly at night because of her stress level and is at an increased risk of cancer.³ To make matters worse, she is fed Boost and Ensure every day at work (link article), both foods that are quite foreign to her body.

All of these issues leave Tina sick quite often. She has to take antibiotics regularly, and sometimes even gets antibiotic-resistant infections. She has even been given hormones to help build some muscle on her paltry frame.

Man, Tina’s life stinks.

Meet Cassandra. Cassandra lives on a 15-acre plot of land. She sleeps well and wakes up with the sun. She actually works at home taking care of the land. She also finds food on the land around her home, which she freely roams. The majority of her day is spent running around this land. There is much vegetation around Cassandra’s home and she gets her daily vitamins and nutrients through her healthy diet and she even finds time to hunt. Sometimes she has to supplement it in the winter, but this is a last resort. The animals around her property provide her with the fat, protein, and nutrients she needs.

Cassandra gets stressed here and there, as we all do. However, overall she leads a very happy life. She exercises everyday by walking around freely. She rarely gets sick and has a strong immune system.

Man, Cassandra’s life is awesome.

Meet Tina and Cassandra

Tina and Cassandra are actually chickens. Tina is stuffed in a cage for her life, as she lives in a confined animal feeding operation (CAFO). She can barely move, eats unnatural foods, and is constantly stressed, secreting hormones like cortisol into her eggs and meat. Much like a stressed human mother, her offspring are unhealthy.

Tina spends all her life stuffed in her “cubicle.” Image courtesy of koko-tewan at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Each and every day of Tina’s life is pretty terrible…

Cassandra, on the other hand, lives in a farm where she is raised on pasture. In other words, she runs around picking insects out of the ground and eating grass – her normal diet.

Cassandra spending a typical day running around and foraging. Image courtesy of suwatpo at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Cassandra’s life is pretty awesome. Cassandra health is pretty awesome. The eggs that Cassandra lays are pretty awesome too.

Whether It Is Chickens or People

Few people give thought to Tina and Cassandra when they are buying eggs at the grocery store. Tina’s eggs are obviously much cheaper, as we would expect. It is much cheaper to stuff Tina in a cage and feed her unnatural food than to let her run around eating worms and insects, some grass, and the occasional supplemental feed.

Along these lines, it is also much easier to push Tina and Cassandra to the back of your head, forget about them and Tina’s cruel and unhealthy upbringing, and pay $1.66 for a dozen of Tina’s less healthy eggs from her less healthy body.

Tina and Cassandra’s Eggs

Much like Tina and Cassandra’s health, their eggs are very different from each another. While this seems quite obvious after reading about their daily lifestyle, the differences can be remarkable.

Cassadra’s pastured eggs contain:

1. Double the amount of vitamin E than Tina’s eggs
2. Double the amount of healthy omega-3 fatty acids
3. 38% more vitamin A

Tina’s eggs, on the other hand, contain significantly more inflammatory omega-6 fatty acids.⁴

Much like Tina’s life, Tina’s eggs stink in comparison to Cassandra’s.

Tina’s eggs also contain a much higher ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids. In other words, Cassandra’s eggs have much more anti-inflammatory omega-3s, while Tina’s have significantly more omega-6’s. The ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 is closer to 4:1 or 1:1, which is what our ancestors consumed for thousands of years.⁵ A high ratio of omega-6 to omega-3s is associated with an increased risk of diseases like prostate cancer⁶ and significantly higher amounts of autoimmune disease, inflammation, and circulating inflammatory factors.^5,7

Cassandra’s eggs also look better with their deep golden-hued yolks. They taste better too. They are a great addition to healthy bone broth (LINK BONE BROTH) and a healthy part of the diet.

Much like Cassandra’s life, her eggs are healthy and fulfilling.

Tina’s Effect On Us

While it is obvious that the meat and eggs of our chickens strongly depend on the environment where they are raised, the resultant effect on our body is no different. And if the information above is not enough to get you to consider what you eat, then perhaps this information will change your mind.

Eating eggs from pastured chickens and those with high omega-3 fatty acid feeds result in:

1. 22.4% more vitamin E within blood values
2. 55% more carotenoids in the blood
3. Decreased serum C-reactive protein (CRP), a marker of inflammation.⁸

CAFO eggs, on the other hand, increase oxidized LDL cholesterol (cholesterol bound with free radicals) which is a major risk of heart disease and cancer. One researcher has gone as far as stating that omega-3 eggs “provide protection against oxidative stress, inflammation, and acute effects of high glycemic load” with “a unique capacity to transform and concentrate protective nutrients.”⁹ In other words, healthy eggs are nutrient-dense foods that help fight inflammation and provide significant health benefit.

The (Non) Cost Differential

A common excuse to buy less healthy and less ethical eggs is the difference in cost. Right now eggs cost $1.66 per dozen in New York, while eggs from pastured hens cost anywhere from $4.99-6.99. The price is clearly higher and this is certainly a sensitive issue for those families with a limited budget. Eggs are still an incredibly healthy food, and I would not eliminate them based on the information above.

Yet, for those of us that eat 1-2 dozen per week the difference in price comes out to about $256 per year, or half the price of an iPhone, two months of cable television, or two expensive dinners. Many of us can certainly find this money from entertainment spending or other less essential costs throughout the week. Pastured eggs are also larger, more flavorful, and more nutrient-dense, so including nutrition-per-dollar likely leaves that $256 as significantly less.

For those of us with farmer’s markets around, pastured eggs are even cheaper. This may take a little more time and effort, but we can use the time saved from cancelling our cable (along with all the extra cash…). This also follows “voting with our wallets.” If we continue to buy ethical pastured eggs instead of the less healthy confined eggs, prices may begin to accommodate the consumer.

The Alchemist Animal

It is time to think about Tina and Cassandra when shopping at the grocery store or local farmer’s market for chicken or any animal products. The push for ethical and more natural foods may be more expensive, but it may be hard to put a price on the health benefits for us and ethical benefits for the animals.

As Tina knows, there are no alchemist chickens.

References:

1. Smyth J, Ockenfels MC, Porter L, Kirschbaum C, Hellhammer DH, Stone AA. Stressors and Mood Measured on a Momentary Basis are Associated With Salivary Cortisol Secretion. Psychoneuroendocrinology. 1998;23(4):353-370. doi:10.1016/S0306-4530(98)00008-0.
2. Lundberg U. Stress hormones in health and illness: the roles of work and gender. Psychoneuroendocrinology. 2005;30(10):1017-1021. doi:10.1016/j.psyneuen.2005.03.014.
3. Blask DE. Melatonin, sleep disturbance and cancer risk. Sleep Med Rev. 2009;13(4):257-264. http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S1087079208000786?showall=true.
4. Karsten HD, Patterson PH, Stout R, Crews G. Vitamins A, E and fatty acid composition of the eggs of caged hens and pastured hens. Renew Agric Food Syst. 2010;25(01):45. doi:10.1017/S1742170509990214.
5. A.P S. The importance of the ratio of omega-6/omega-3 essential fatty acids. Biomed & Pharmacother. 2002;56(8):365-379. doi:10.1016/s0753-3322(02)00253-6.
6. Williams CD, Whitley BM, Hoyo C, et al. A high ratio of dietary n-6/n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids is associated with increased risk of prostate cancer. Nutr Res. 2011;31(1):1-8. doi:10.1016/j.nutres.2011.01.002.
7. Simopoulos AP. Omega-3 Fatty Acids in Inflammation and Autoimmune Diseases. J Am Coll Nutr. 2002;21(6):495-505. http://www.jacn.org/content/21/6/495.abstract.
8. Burns-Whitmore B, Sapwarobol S, Haddad E, Sabate J, Rajaram S. N-3 Fatty Acid Enriched Egg Decreases C-Reactive Protein in Healthy Adults. FASEB J. 2007;21(6):A740 – b – . http://www.fasebj.org/cgi/content/meeting_abstract/21/6/A740-b. Accessed February 6, 2016.
9. Shapira N. Not all eggs are created equal: the effect on health depends on the composition. Can J Cardiol. 2011;27(2):264.e5; 264.e7-e8. doi:10.1016/j.cjca.2010.11.010.

Are you my Mother?

Woke up this morning to these adorable faces peering through the glass. Priceless. I love this job!

Welcome to the world little ducklings. May God give us the means to provide a wonderful life for each one of you.

Yet another duck pen

Ducks are perhaps the hardest small animal to contain!  We have tried numerous types of fencing to keep them code enough to collect the eggs,  and all have failed.  So...  Here we go again!

This time we use 16 foot hard panels, arranged in a zip zag walked square, and lashed together tightly with baleing twine. Hopefully this will work.

Duck eggs anyone?

The silver appleyard flock

Here is our second generation silver Appleyard ducks.  They were all hatched from the original 3 hens and 1 Drake. 

When these guys grow up...  We will have enough to stay offering duck meat at least once a year.

The Appleyard is a sturdy beautiful heritage breed.  These guys have been on open foraging since they left the brooder.  They don't look like they have missed any meals!

Ducks finally have a home!

We have been struggling with the ducks this year, trying to give them a free ranging containment system that protects them and yet allows them freedom, access to water, nesting boxes, and plenty of forage.  Today we set the girls into a test patch to see how they do.

It is 2 poultry nets strung together, with a fancy pallet and 2x4 door, out in the back of the pasture.  inside is a 4 hole nesting box setup with shade, and a sprinkler for misting and "puddling". That should provide them enough coolness for the summer while giving some water play but not creating soaked eggs nor killing the ground. We will move the sprinkler every day or two to keep it wet but not soggy enough to kill the grass from little trampling feet.

If this works out, we will have duck eggs available

You can see the pallet gate in this shot, and the test girls posing in their new home. If you look very closely you might see the sprinkler spray to the right of the gate. 

Here is the other half, where the nesting boxes are. 

And here is the nesting box setup, made from 4 5 gallon buckets and an old steel table with a roofing panel piece nailed to it. 

again!

Big brother TOBY

Toby (who is now 5 months old) has been sidekick to the baby ducklings since they first started popping out of their eggs. He has been seen as a shadow for the individual bringing ducklings from the incubator to the brooder, and also with his nose inside the brooder sniffing and getting acquainted with these adorable animated puff balls. Taking on the protective big brother role, naturally he joined us in the grand adventure outside this afternoon. In the pictures below you will see him looking after and protecting these precious babies. Good boy Toby, its a BIG world out there!

The last picture is of Oliver and Everett on second guard shift. Toby has taught them well!

Nurturing little gifts

While bringing a few ducklings out of our in home brooder area to get some sunshine this afternoon, our 3 year old son Everett noticed one of them unable to open one of their eyes. Unsure if it was slightly gummed up or if it had been a victim of a sibling pecking at him, I suggested we problem solve how we might help this little creature. Our first attempt was for him to put a tiny amount of water on his finger and gently place it on the closed eye. His face lit up like a Christmas tree when the precious duckling opened his eye! "It worked! He can see!" We were so thankful. What a blessing to be here to serve.
Here is also a picture of us enjoying the babies take a dip in the children's water table. Although we only let them swim for 5 minutes at this age (they get cold), they are thoroughly enjoying themselves.

Duck hatching season

Duck season is in full swing here, with cute little ducklings hatching daily. The kids love ducks, wholly different personality than chicks. Ducks are cuddly, loving, and will happily follow anyone. Levi and everett spent the morning with some lucky little ducks

Silver Appleyards hatch

The first batch of silver appleyard ducks have hatched! We are excited to bring these fine heritage meat birds to little sprouts. Soon there will be a flock of twenty or so running around the farm.

In a few months these buyers week provide a very unique collection of pastured poultry products, all soy free, organic, free ranged, and heritage. Stay tuned!

This used to work

Boars relaxing "poolside"

Well.. the new boars are having a little trouble with the farm rules about who lives where.... they keep slipping under the electric fence and heading to the duck pond. Not where they are supposed to be. But who can blame them in this summer heat! nothing like laying poolside for a leisurely afternoon.

Looks like I'll have to work on the electric fencing to get it up to full voltage again!

Can you find the poolside pigs in this short video?

Let's walk around the pond to the "pig" side...

Welcome silver Appleyard ducks

Duck eggs are very popular,  especially with those allergic to chicken eggs.  Duck eggs are  also preferred by those using egg yolk as a healing food. Over the last year the sales of duck eggs has increased to about 40%of our total egg sales.  While that is all good news, the US a recurring problem,  the duck egg production is unsteady.

There have been many times when the production had barely met needs,  and now we faced one delivery where we were unable to meet all subscriptions.  We do apologize for the need to substitute chicken eggs for last week,  and appreciate everyone's willingness to temporarily adjust. We realize now that a change is in order to allow a more consistent duck egg supply.

The problem.?  Simply put,  stress!  Kaki Campbell ducks are great producers,  making close to 350 eggs per year per duck,  but only in a low stress environment.  Our farm,  by nature,  is not low stress.  We use rotational grazing if several species to improve health overall,  which requires lots of moving and change.  This in itself causes stress for the khakis.

Research has shown that this is a universal problem for khakis. Farms that rely on this breed go to great lengths to prevent change for the ducks.  Even so far as not only collecting eggs same time every day but the same person wearing the same clothes every time!  These ducks require rigid routine.

At present at are plagued with  large crows that are stealing the duck eggs,  which in turn stresses the duck and lowers production.  Also working with the fruit trees and berries causes them further stress. Production is currently very low.

So we have chosen to add a new breadth the farm,  silver Appleyard!  These are beautiful large size ducks that are useful both for eggs and meat.  They do not suffer from stress like khakis,  Appleyards are write calm and forgiving,  great forgers,  and very beautiful!  With his breed we expect a steady supply of eggs  and also the addition of duck meat to our offered products!

We will be hatching the Appleyards ourself from fertile eggs beginning next week.  If all goes well they silk be laying by March and we will be able to sell duck meat for Christmas!

We are very excited to bring this breed to the farm!

Blended families

Blended families happen all over... even in the animal world. Here is. Hen that hatched both a chick and a duck. She happily mothers both as if they were her own.

Love and motherly responsibility know no bounds.

Wild ducks hatch

We allowed some of the birds to do their own hatching this year... and so far its working well. These little ducks joined the world with two moms!

Excelerite Minerals Available Now

We are pleased to announce that Little Sprouts is now a re-seller of  Excelerite Rare Earth Minerals.  We will be using these minerals ourselves as well as stocking them in smaller packages for resell  through farm pickup or home deliveries.

Excelerite is the brand of rare earth minerals from US RareEarth Minerals. It is produced from an ancient evaporated lake bed in Panaca Nevada. Many scientists consider this lake bed to be the world's richest source of micro, macro, and nano nutrients.

Excelerite is provided in two forms, agriculture  and livestock. the only difference is that the AG type is filtered to remove some unneeded silica and has a slightly higher price.  the mineral content otherwise is the same.

You can read more about his amazing product at their website: http://us-rem.com/

Why minerals? Minerals, especially ancient sea and lake minerals, contain the building blocks that make life work. Everything improves in the presence of abundant minerals in the proper balance, both pant and animal. In fact, life is not truly possible without minerals! Unfortunately much of the worlds soil and therefore foods are depleted of minerals through years of abuse and use. Remineralizing with excelerite restore the soil to its healthy natural state, providing benefits to the ecology (life) of the soil itself and any plants grown in it.

For livestock (poultry, hogs, sheep, etc) these minerals in livestock form are added to their feed to give them the boost that is not contained in their feed and world.  This gives an immediate benefit to all livestock in a number of ways.

We encourage you to try this amazing product and see for yourself how ancient minerals can boost health, vitality, fertility, and production.

you can find Excelerite in our online store: http://www.farmigo.com/store/littlesproutsfarm

Time to Waddle Home!

We caught the ducks returning to the orchard pen this evening. How cute these little ladies are, waddling back 2 by 2 all in a straight line. This is where the expression came from "All your ducks in a row"... because this is how ducks travel.. in a row!

Two days of Duck Eggs lost

It seems we have lost at least a couple days of duck eggs to the new pasture management process.  There are so many small details in this sort of thing, and so many chances for things to go wrong!

This time, we had an unexpected rain. This produced mud overnight that didnt do well with 150 ducks in a small area. their little webbed feet are just perfect for flattening land... and that they did! No more holes! the down side is they laid eggs all over in the mud and water. These eggs, of course, cant be sold.

I think we will be ok yet for delivering orders. The production went up dramatically with the light in the duck pen in march, then back down when we moved them to pasture, but was recovering when this happened. I wont know for sure till friday rolls around and we do a count, but lets hope there are enough to go around!

The birds are now moved to the other pasture, the one with taller grass to keep these little ladies up out of the mud in the next rain.  Hopefully this is a one time thing.

Intensive grazing... a new beginning

Today marks yet another new beginning at little sprouts. After researching and planning for 2 years... we finally start our own version of a pasture management technique sometimes intensive grazing.

Intensive grazing is just what the name implies... grazing on steroids. It is a small scale implementation of a grand plan of nature to build and maintain grasslands... called the herd effect.  Grazing animals (herbivores like sheep, cows, horses) are vulnerable to predators in the wild. Their defense is two things... collecting into a tight herd and moving at any hint of danger. Therein lies natures secret to land management and fertility.

Herding is necessary for survival because the individual is safest inside a large herd. An animal off by itself is easy prey. This effect creates a small tight herd that simultaneously tramples, disturbs, and fertilizes a small plot of land. the combined effects of this for short times are not unlike what we do to prepare a garden in the spring.... tilling and fertilizing combined with mulch.

But then movement... the herd must move on. Either for safety, scared from an attack or simply running low on clean food, the herd moves. This is usually within a few days. From the viewpoint of the land, it is stressed and then left to rest and regrow. The plants react by gaining strength, nutrients, and hardiness. Roots deepen, green spring forth, nature rebuilds quickly after a herd passes through.

This effect is what built and preserved open grasslands around the world for hundreds or thousands of years. Large herds rotating around the land building it up as if coordinates by some master gardener. It is only with more modern grazing techniques that this changed... the math formula of "x number of head on x acres of land" is death to a pasture. That type of grazing neither stresses nor relaxes the land. It remains in a steady state of slow decline.

Intensive grazing is a farm implementation of this natural effect. The animals are held in smaller area simulating a herd, and that is moved around the pasture every day or two. Stress and relax the land to promote growth, fertility, and robustness.

Our own version of this will initially include sheep followed by ducks followed some seeding and rest. Eventually we hope to include hogs in this mix for some extra deep "disruption of soils".  With the ducks will be adding moisture, and then right when the ducks move on, sprinkling of new seeds. This gives is the added benefit of some irrigation at a critical time in a small area at a time. Its not really irrigation though, it is only watering of livestock (ducks) while they happen to be on land that would benefit from irrigation.

This model is inspired by both joel salatin and the savory institute. The latter of which speciliazes in restoring barren infertile desert land into fertile pasture and forests. The research we did into this shows some absolutely incredible results.

So today... here we go! We have our own version of moveable herd containment, and a plan. Surely there will be many modifications along the way but I am confident that in the end we will see results as improvement in these old clay soils.

Getting ready for winter breeding

Lots of changes around here this week! Let's recap:
Processed a few more turkeys, all toms not needed for breeding. These toms look excellent! All consistently large with good fat content. We have a few more to go before we retire the processing equipment for the winter. Some turkeys will be available for sale through the winter as frozen.
To facilitate processing we finally put a real shelter over the equipment creating a mostly closed area. Even have a little propane camp heater to warm up by! This makes the experience much more comfortable. I remember three years ago learning how to do this on a card table in the freezing rain. How far we have come!
The turkey numbers are now small enough to fill only one turkey breeder coop. That frees up another coop. We have split the next chicken flock into his and hers living quarters. These chickens were getting much too big to all fit in one! There are 270 or so birds total. Now the hens can mature into laying hens and the boys can fatten up for heritage meat chickens using our soy free broiler chicken ration. These will be our first meat chickens for sale.
We also moved the ducks into the old pig pen. They are easier to protect from predators here, and mostly will stop escaping the pasture and ruining our back yard! Ducks wreck havoc on lawn grass! The smaller area can be lighted so egg production will climb again. Also this area is destined to be next years garden so what the ducks leave behind will be gold to the plants!
Next steps are adding lighting to turkey coop, chicken coop, and duck pen to get egg production going. Also we still need to design some laying boxes for these new pens and get the solar winch rebuilt and working.
Never a dull moment!

ducklings enjoy duck house

The ducklings are moved to their new house and pen, and seem to really enjoy it! The Duck house has a heat light and deep straw bedding to keep them warm at night.  They have a nice pond to swim in too.
Funny thing is they are small enough to slip through the fencing,  so they can come and go as they please,  but the bigger  birds can't get in.  They can forage for food all over the farm,  and return to the safety of the pen  if threatened. It is fun to watch the entire flock running around the yard in a big group.

cozy warm

bedtime snack