Continuing Ed with Dr. Paul

Phil left before 7:30am this morning for a seminar put on by Lancaster Ag, the company that blended our minerals. Dr. Paul Detloff, head veterinarian for the Organic Valley milk co-op, presented. I have heard several lectures by Dr. Paul—what an interesting man! He uses homeopathic medicines on the herds under his care, as well as paying attention to things such as stray currents.

Phil said that he pulled up to the home where it was held and there were only about three cars in the parking lot, and he thought, “Am I the only one here? These three cars could all belong to the residents. How awkward!”

When he walked in, there were about 20 guys sitting in the room. He couldn’t figure out how they all got there until lunchtime, when he walked by an outbuilding and saw dozens of bikes. Amish or Mennonite! In Boulder world-class athletes bike to train for major races; in Virginia, religious farmers bike for higher education.

I had pushed for him to attend, and was a bit concerned about the whole thing. Would it be just an extended sales meeting? How distressing! After a quick stop at Costco (fairly close to the seminar), he came home and told me about it. And it was worth it!

Some of the new or good review thoughts: the most important natural resource on the farm: water. If you have hard water, your minerals won’t be able to penetrate the soil. Action: we should at least test our water’s softness, and if it’s hard, we should consider a reverse osmosis system for the farm. This would help in crop irrigation, animal and human drinking water, foliar sprays, and probably some other applications I’m forgetting. (Rain water, in general, doesn’t need softening. It’s long descent from heaven makes it well suited for irrigation and drinking.)

Good nutrition will improve your animals’ genetics. Almost impossible to believe, if we improve the babydolls’ nutrition, their offspring will be closer to the ideal babydoll. Exciting! And disconcerting, as the opposite is also true: poor nutrition quickly degrades the offspring. We have more to learn about this, but I am pleased to know that good food helps the animals so much.

Aloe vera: the miracle juice. Useful generally for animals and humans. Action: get aloe vera juice!

Most farms need five to eight years to really heal from non-organic agricultural practices. Lancaster Ag sees many farms that go organic for three or four years, and their yields and crops are just not that good, so they give up, just a bit too early. Phil came home encouraged that we aren’t trying to heal poisoned soil, but simply rebuild naturally eroded and exhausted soil. It seems less daunting.

Marketing: “Never fall in love with your product: fall in love with your customer.”

Biochemistry trivia: Dr. Paul wondered at one time why we are carbon life forms, and not, say, selenium life forms. A younger vet said, “That’s easy, Dr. Paul. Carbon is the only element that can bond to itself.”

Most important: Dr. Paul mentioned the book Devil in the Milk, a book on the connection between certain milk and autism, type 1 diabetes, heart disease and schizophrenia. Most European and North American cows produce A1 milk, which has a protein fragment (a beta-casein), that studies link to all those maladies.

The great thing is, cows in other parts of the world are A2, which means that their milk doesn’t have that bad fragment, and is safe and good for humanity. Even better, the trait is dominant. So if a person had an A2-A2 bull, all the progeny he bred would be A2, with good milk. And animals can be tested by sending 20 hairs in a Ziploc bag, so we would know what we’re buying.

Can you imagine the marketing potential? With one in every 150 children today in the US diagnosed with autism, there is a huge market! (Not to mention heart disease!)

Needless to say, Phil came home energized and happy. The children and I had a good, if uneventful day, too.