When I was in college many, many years ago, Sometimes cows get sick too. Fifty years ago, our veterinarian told me that 90 per cent of animal sickness was because of their diet. A few years after that, a medical doctor told me that people are the same. Nutritionists will tell you that the balance of fiber and energy is the base of good health, good production, and good reproduction, whether it is an animal nutritionist or a nutritionist in the hospital.
Ruminants (sheep, goats, cows) have more than one stomach and fibrous material is regurgitated as a cud and chewed over again. All animals (people too) have a biome which is made up of bacteria who help to digest food. People only have one stomach, while ruminants have four. The bacteria which make up the biome not only digest roughage and food, but also repair small holes or tears in the digestive system (leaky gut, etc.) If you use a lot of antacids like Tums, Rolaids, etc., you may have an unhappy gut. Animals don’t get little pills, but often sodium bicarb and/or limestone is added to their ration to prevent upset tummy.
Often, some residual chemical in the food is a cause. A doctor recently told me that there is a connection between the stomach and the brain and if the stomach is very upset, it tells the brain and the will to live is even affected. Once the biome in an animal is killed, the animal also loses the will to live and often does not recover.
I recently received a picture of one of my grandchildren holding a bag of calf grower, a bag of very green, fresh smelling hay that any cow would reach for, and a bottle of red wine. There was obviously a cow there that was not happy. That bag of calf grower had some molasses in it to make it smell good, some textured grain for fiber, cracked corn for energy, and maybe a little powdered skim milk for protein. The bag had a picture of the little blue cow to assure us that any milk product in there was a safe Canadian milk product. The bottle of red wine? Well, you know that wine makes everyone feel better. If that don’t get her going, then the veterinarian must be called.
That bag of calf grower with the little blue cow picture on it made me think of the CUSMA trade talks that are soon to be discussed. That skim milk powder that is in that bag is the least expensive milk product that the farmer gets paid for. The pay scale for milk used for dairy products goes like this, from highest to lowest: milk for drinking, milk used for ice cream, yogurt, butter, and skim milk powder. Skim milk powder also gets priced differently. It’s used for humans – in chocolates, in some cheap pizza cheese, in bakery products like bread or donuts, in cheaper ice cream, in protein supplement – and it’s the cheapest in animal feed like milk replacer. But all is the same safe high Canadian standard.
Since the first FTA agreement was signed by Brian Mulroony to today, Canada has bargained away 18 per cent of Canada’s dairy market, some to save our auto sector. One of our previous prime ministers gave away our softwood lumber market and any right to dispute U.S. tariffs on Canadian lumber in the future. Maybe it’s time to get some of those give-aways back.
Many years ago, that same prime minister that gave away our softwood lumber deal led a trade group to China to try to get some of our market back for beef, pork, and grain. Everything was going good until our PM brought up human rights. That was the end of the trade talks to get more agricultural products into China. Yes, the Chinese human rights situation was not and is still not as good as we want, but China didn’t bring up the way Canadians treated our First Nations people when we kicked them off their land, or how we ran the residential school system. Making trade deals is never easy, but there are things that we can bargain for and other things that we should just be quiet about. There is an old saying: People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. Well some of our wannabe politicians seem to have a very short memory.
Chris Judd is a farmer in Clarendon on land that has been in his family for generations. gladcrest@gmail.com
