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I think that we need to struggle with discussing and even trying to define “sustainable” or stop using term if it’s too nebulous.

You’re right George – until humans can photosynthesize or digest cellulose, ruminants are the best option. There’s a pretty good portion of land that is unsuitable for crop production but can still be used for grazing.

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“Geoff, it never ceases to amaze me the kind of people that inhabit this earth.”

But aren’t the surprises fun?

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http://naturalbuildingblog.com/

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I think that is the point – do we look at sustainability from a local perspective or a global one? BTW – I ran across a site where there might be some “volunteers” —-caled the “Voluntary Human Extinction Program (or Project)” The internet truly has everything!!

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Mark – thanks for the suggestion. I looked at an excerpt and liked this quote right off:

“Farmers have lived and worked like this with plants and animals for centuries, and it is arguable that advocates of permaculture would have had to coin a new name only because industrial farmers have brought the term agriculture into disrepute.”

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George – a question for you.

What do you keep in your chest freezers and how long are they full? I’m just guessing that you’re needing that full capacity more on a seasonal basis – so any chances of utilizing some pre-existing facility for those needs?

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Feel free to lambaste me for engaging these folks but I’m stupid that way. So I’ve posted my comments regarding an article they did RE: there can be no “happy meat” …… Side note: they have used an amazing range of arguments and even accused the president of GMC of trying to get critics of GMC fired by contacting their employers. Wow.

No matter how beautifully written an argument is presented, laden with emotional metaphors and shocking analogies, it still hinges on facts. So cut through all the prose and poetry and think for yourself. Do you think that a small group of people who want global veganism should be able to force others attempting to produce meat in a humane manner to cease and desist? IMO – they’ve chosen “to kick the dog” so to speak by attacking places like GMC because the Tysons, Cargills and Perdues are too big and powerfu.
Below are just a few thoughts regarding this article regarding “happy meat” – BTW, meat is inanimate and can not be happy or sad.

“the environmental waste associated with meat, dairy, and egg production will be lower on a small-scale farm than on a factory farm or CAFO (confined animal feeding operation). While CAFOs do pollute their local environments much more intensely, this is due to the number of animals they confine, not to any greater per-animal rate of pollution.”
First, more specifically define what you’re calling pollution. Second, I’ve never heard anyone try and say that small producers have a lower per animal rate of what you’re clling “pollution”. Third, it IS the very act of having too many animals in too confined an area that changes the game. It should be looked at not as “per animal” but “per acre per unit time”

“male dairy calves will always be disposed of within the first year of their lives; dairy cows’ milk will always be diverted from their bovine babies to humans; piglets will always be castrated; steers will always be dehorned;”
While this may always occur in some settings and in some places, it is by far not a foregone conclusion that this is or will be happening everywhere. There are plenty of horned steers out there – Bill and Lou for example – and polled ones as well. Many producers have their calves suckle on the dam. And there are literally tens of thousands of Holstein steers out there over the age of 1 yr. So while the speech may have moved you, it was more emotion and less truth. Seems to be a common theme.

K OConnor – First, read this passage and ask yourself if you think you could get a reasonable response to your question from a forum with this thinking “At best, there might be a kind of dissociated affection–or perhaps even the possessive love of the husband who believes he has the right to control, rape, and even kill his spouse”

---

To even associate rape and murder of a spouse with humanely raising animals should negate your acceptance of any further arguments from this group.

I agree with bbird – Start by making sure they have the facts. But this is not the place to get facts. This blog is rife with inaccuracies, speculation and down right untruths used to promote a specific agenda. No animal agriculture of any kind. So it is a non-starter to ask the question you posed. But for your friends you are looking for humanely and sustainably raised meat, milk and eggs – Vermont and most of New England has plenty of small farmers who could fill that need. Contact your food co-op or local farmer’s market and I’m sure they could identify local producers. Or Rural Vermont.

WELL – as often happens with blogs, the vegan owner/moderator removed the above post calling it off topic and spam. So much for dialogue but it sure was fun.

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You can still employ more than one level without using stairs. I spent time in a hospital that used spiral ramps to connect levels. Look at having part of your bulding below grade to take advantage of the earth’s temperature moderation. I have a few bookmarks on my other computer so I’ll see about posting them here later. Google “earth bag building” too.

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I posted this on DAPNet FB page too but I encourage each of us to look into the wording of our state’s “right to farm” law – if you have one. Many, like VT, protect against nuisance lawsuits but say nothing about harassment, which could hurt a small producer pretty quickly. Rewording or adding to the existing law may be a quicker and easier way of protecting against what occurred at GMC.

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Here’s a copy of a letter sent to the GMC community by its president. Nicely done and kudos.

Date: November 11, 2012
To: GMC Community
From: President Paul J. Fonteyn
RE: Oxen Update

Green Mountain College and our senior team of oxen have been much in the news lately: their lives as working animals on the GMC farm, our recent community decision to slaughter them, and the national and international attention that has come our way as a result of our collaborative and rational decision.

As reported in my October 31 email to the community, our original timetable was disrupted by outside organizations seeking to appropriate the images of the oxen for their extremist agendas, including the abolition of animal agriculture. Without shame, these groups harassed and threatened local slaughterhouses, making it impossible for them to accept our animals, and therefore for us to carry out our decision expeditiously. Despite our attempts to use the most humane and local options available, one of the only Animal Welfare Approved slaughterhouses in the area was forced to cancel our appointment as a result of these hostile threats. Some individuals associated with these efforts have even discussed giving drugs to our animals, which would render the meat unacceptable for human consumption.

In the meantime, Lou’s overall physical condition continued to deteriorate. Medication made him more comfortable, but even walking from pasture to pasture has now become an arduous and painful process. Close consultations with several veterinarians over the course of the summer and fall have consistently indicated that Lou’s condition would not improve and that his quality of life would only continue to diminish–as has held true. The arrival of cold temperatures and icy conditions are certain to increase his suffering, and we have concurred with our veterinarians’ judgment that it not humane for him to suffer further. Therefore, I authorized euthanization, which took place this morning.

Bill will not be sent to a sanctuary but will stay on Cerridwen Farm and will be cared for in a manner that follows sustainable, humane livestock practices, as is the case with all of our animals. We take responsibility for our animals on the farm–it is an obligation we will not ask others to bear.

I know at times the attention has been harsh and unfair, but it has also provided a platform to present some of the best aspects of Green Mountain College: our intellectual courage to squarely examine moral dilemmas, our values of sustainability, and our commitment to discourse over doctrine. I am proud of how GMC students have engaged with colleagues and with people outside our community in mature, thoughtful, and civil ways. Outside scrutiny can be an unwelcome distraction–I urge you not to allow online discussions, which can become volatile and unconstructive, to interfere with your wider educational endeavors at GMC. I consider your safety and your educational progress my top priorities. If you believe you are a victim of any abusive behavior, please do not hesitate to contact the Office of Student Affairs.

Sincerely,

Paul J. Fonteyn

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Ben –

You and those who had the pleasure of knowing and working Lou have my deepest sympathy. As Jay says, it’s never easy but I think the sadness indicates the level of relationship you had with him.

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I agree with an immediate and forceful response. If you can believe it VINE : 1) has already have posted Philip’s letter to their blog site (although they edited out the comments regarding VINE) 2) doesn’t believe that Lou was euthanized but rather killed and sneaked out to a local butcher shop 3) speculates that the remaining ox, Bill, will be intentionally isolated and forced into a state of depression so that GMC can use his condition as reason to kill him too 4) blames GMC for their own negative publicity by not being willing to find “common ground” with VINE.

These people are nuts. Foolishly they decided to attack one of the few places doing things right.

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As I’m reading it, rather than “process vs product” the process IS the product. In other words, the act(s) necessary to put together the field days, workshops etc (the fungal mycellium below the surface) are the true product even though they are manifest in a more visual “mushroom” – field days, workshops etc.

The workshops etc are tangible things that we people can wrap our heads around, like/dislike, evaluate, enjoy, and change. The networking/building contacts etc is less visible, more nebulous and even more challenging but is the foundation for all of this. If we ever think we are “there”, then we’ve sort of missed the point.

So, I encourage the field day planners to do some old stuff you liked and add in some new (I like the oxen idea). It doesn’t have to be anything other than the 2013 Field Days. BTW – I’m thinking that Idaho might be a good venue this year : )

Hope I made some sense.

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(Part 2 of letter)

Unfortunately, this issue is not just about the fate of Bill and Lou or the intense local and international pressures faced by a small but diverse college community that opted for transparency, truth, and accountability in its own food system. If the extremist elements in this activist agenda succeed in forcing our college to choose a course not of our own making in this issue, then they will have the power and the confidence to do it again—perhaps next time to a smaller and less resourceful community or farm or even to a bigger institution or initiative. Such an outcome would be inconvenient to some and perhaps tragic to others. And it flies directly in the face of Vermont’s innovative efforts to develop community-based food systems, envisioned on a grand and courageous scale through our nationally-acclaimed Farm to Plate Initiative, a strategic ten-year plan to build the vision of interlinked local and sustainable food systems that can build thriving communities even in the most rural reaches of our state.

Imagine the pressures our college has faced in recent weeks and consider how other communities placed under such pressure might fare:
Numerous petition drives, with tens of thousands of signees from all over the world—people who know nothing of Bill and Lou’s conditions, much less the accountability and transparency we have built into our college food system
Action alerts that have generated email assaults (at least one staff person received almost 1000 emails in a single day) and switchboard and voicemail overloads of our campus phone system
One cyber-attack generated 3.9 million emails filtered in a period of several days—all from a single domain
Harassment and threats of physical violence to students, faculty, staff, and administrators
Constant surveillance of our college farm by stealthy intrusions, video cameras, and Facebook reports of our daily activities
Driving a livestock trailer to the edge of campus and barging into our administrative offices demanding that Bill and Lou be turned over
Dishonest and highly abusive postings on the college’s social media sites, requiring around-the-clock monitoring and editing
Attempts at widespread defamation of character of faculty, staff, and administrators through letters, emails, websites, and social media channels
Threats of continued negative publicity campaigns unless we turned Bill and Lou over to VINE Sanctuary
Online discussion of whether to give Bill and Lou medications that would render their meat unsafe and inedible
Slaughterhouses throughout Vermont and New York were threatened with protests, harassment, and potential violence if they agreed to work with the college, ultimately eliminating virtually all such possibilities for us, including our scheduled date at a local Animal Welfare Approved facility

Throughout it all, we have attempted to avoid a polarization among parties. After all, our student body is comprised of approximately 70% meat-eaters and 30% vegetarians and vegans. One of my colleagues in helping our students to think critically about these livestock decisions is Dr. Steven Fesmire, a philosopher and a vegetarian. For ten years, he and I have tried to model open and civil discourse about dietary choices and related animal issues through forums, joint classes, and guest lectures. We are unaccustomed to diatribe replacing dialogue, and our students tend to be open to a diversity of ideas and respectful of differences in opinion. Our community finds it odd that certain extremists have opted to try and make us out as villains when one of our stated goals is to become the first college or university in the United States with a major food service provider to eliminate all animal products that are not humanely raised and slaughtered.

Our college honors different dietary choices and encourages a diversity of philosophical perspectives related to agriculture and animal ethics. Were that not the case, we would not have a higher than average population of students who are vegetarians and vegans. We teach animal rights perspectives in our classes, as we believe that these philosophical ideas can help to illuminate the path toward more humane and sustainable livestock agriculture. The challenge we are now facing is not one of a philosophical perspective that we find inappropriate but rather of an extreme activist agenda that is divisive and destructive. The end goal is the abolition of livestock agriculture, whereas our college is invested in the transformation of livestock agriculture.

What happens next in this situation may have ramifications far beyond our campus community. If VINE, Farm Sanctuary, and PETA succeed in harassing and threatening not only us but also our regional livestock businesses to the point at which we succumb to their abolitionist desires, then they will march forward with their activist agenda and wreak havoc not only on the rebuilding of community-based food systems but also on the longstanding efforts in our region to create increasingly humane and ecologically appropriate livestock production and processing.

It is time for more organizations and individuals to come forward to denounce the intrusive and unethical bullying orchestrated by these organizations. Their tactics do not promote discourse, diversity, or democracy. Ultimately, they impede animal welfare reform by putting backyard poultry on the same level as a poorly managed “Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation” (CAFO). You may or may not agree with our community’s decisions regarding Bill and Lou. We recognize that people can come to different conclusions in what is the best alternative for each of these animals, and these discussions can be civil and frank. Regardless of your opinion in this particular matter, it is important to recognize that the extreme bullying tactics employed by these groups need to be countered with the courage, reason, and civility of people and organizations that believe in the transformation of livestock agriculture, not its abolition.

During the early morning hours of November 11th, under the cover of darkness and with complex security plans in place, we had to euthanize Lou and bury him in an undisclosed location, as outlined in a statement to our community by President Paul Fonteyn. It was a difficult and complex decision. President Fonteyn offered these words regarding Bill: “Bill will not be sent to a sanctuary but will stay on Cerridwen Farm and will be cared for in a manner that follows sustainable, humane livestock practices, as is the case with all of our animals. We take responsibility for our animals on the farm–it is an obligation we will not ask others to bear.”

Please make your voice heard on this issue, whether it be through letters to the editor, calls and emails to your elected officials, or by appropriate direct action through your organization. Green Mountain College has decided to stand up against the bullying directed at us while also standing up for farmers, businesses, educational farms, local food systems, and burgeoning farm-to-institution programs—in Vermont and elsewhere in the country. It is our ardent hope that reason and civility will prevail and perhaps save some other farm or organization from the onslaught that our college has opted to engage, oppose, and defeat.

Sincerely,

Philip Ackerman-Leist
Director of the GMC Farm & Food Project
Director of the Masters in Sustainable Food Systems (MSFS)
Associate Professor of Environmental Studies

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Here’s the address for Donn’s pics – there’s a file of his GD setup and his power forecart (and much more).

picasaweb.google.commulemandonn

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