Latest / Beyond Labels Premium / Episode #140: Mail Bag: Desiccation, Purple Tomato Lawsuit & Protecting Heirloom Seeds, Poisonous Plants & Joel's Mom's Home Care

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Episode #140: Mail Bag: Desiccation, Purple Tomato Lawsuit & Protecting Heirloom Seeds, Poisonous Plants & Joel's Mom's Home Care · Beyond Labels Premium

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Instead of concentrating on stuff we don't like, we try to concentrate on managing for stuff that we do like.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_01: The livestock doesn't eat poisonous stuff unless they're hungry.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: Very, very seldom will they eat something that they don't that's not good for them unless they're really pushed.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of these things have gotten a terrible reputation because people do often, I don't want to say starve their animals, but but make their animals very hungry.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, around here, I remember a few years back I was talking to one of our local vets, and uh he said that every fall, every fall when we have a drought here, we don't have a drought every fall, their vet practice is called in for uh numerous cases in our area of tetanus, tetanus in cows.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: And it's because the farmers have grazed their grass so short they're eating too much dirt with the blades, the short blades of grass, and it's overriding their immune system and are just toxifying themselves with all this dirt that's going in.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_02: Hi everyone, welcome to Beyond Labels.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_02: I'm Dr.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_02: Stina McKella, and I'm here with our favorite farmer, Joel Salatin.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_02: And today we are answering your questions.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_02: Joel, I'm so excited to announce that we have so many questions that the listeners have sent in.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_02: I literally had to combine them all into a Word document and print them out.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's like 25 pages.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_02: So yay!
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: Well, good.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: Looks like we won't we won't run out of content for a little bit, will we?
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_02: No, we won't.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_02: And such great questions.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_02: I love our listeners sending in questions, so keep sending them in.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_02: Let's jump right in and let's see how many we can get through, Joel.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we'll we'll do this kind of uh pop popcorn popcorn fashion.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, lightning round.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, the first question comes from Morgan uh Michallock, I want to say, or McCulloch.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_02: Sorry if I'm pronouncing these names right.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_02: This, you know, language is Joel's area, not mine.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_02: So this is from Morgan.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, her first question is Joel, are there plans for a rogue food conference in 2024 at Polyface?
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yes, absolutely.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, rogue food is coming here May.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: Where are we?
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: May 22 and 23, I believe.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: May, where are we?
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um wait a minute.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I'm sorry, May 18.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: May, May 18 um is the Rogue Food Conference here at Polyface.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: And yes, we have plenty of room.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we, you know, last year we had to turn people away.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: This year uh we're not, but man, do we have a lineup?
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: Katherine Austin Fitz is gonna be here, Congressman Thomas Massey, um, uh Senator uh Craig Hickman from Maine.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and we're gonna have a we're gonna have a debate on on private membership associations, pro and con.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: So it's gonna be a very, very lively time.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_01: Uh please come.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you you can you can um you know you can jump on to rogue foodconference.org, I guess it is, roguefoodconference.org, uh, May 18.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, look forward to seeing you here.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: Plenty of room right now.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_02: Cool.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_02: And if you want to come back in June, you could come to the two days of truth summit hosted by Beyond Labels.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_02: That one's June 14th and 15th, where we're gonna teach you how to detoxify the body, mind, and spirit, right?
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_02: I I had to give a little plug, Joel.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_01: Like, that's great.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's all good.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: All good.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, Morgan's second question is this my understanding is that organically certified grains cannot be sprayed with glyphosate, but non-GMO grains can be sprayed with glyphosate.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_02: Or are non-GMO grains not sprayed with glyphosate because they aren't genetically modified to handle the glyphosate and they would die.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_02: So um, I can start out with this one, and then if Joel, you want to add to it.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um so along with uh wheat and oats, glyphosate is used actually to desiccate a wide range of other crops, right?
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_02: So it is it is sprayed on the crops during the desiccation for wheat, oats, some lentils, peas, even non-GMO soybeans, corn, flax, rye, buckwheat, millet, canola, sugar beets, even potatoes.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so it can be used for desiccation.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I also found this article that was published by Environmental Working Group.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_02: And they said that most glyphosate is sprayed on Roundup ready corn and soybeans that are genetically engineered to whisk down the herbicide.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_02: But increasingly, glyphosate is also being sprayed just before harvest, right?
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_02: The desiccation process on the wheat, barley, and oats and beans in particular, even when they are not genetically engineered.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_02: And the reason, of course, is because glyphosate kills the crops, right?
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_02: It dries it out so they can be harvested than if the plant was allowed to just die and dry out naturally.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um, Joel, do you want to add anything?
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Sina, I I want to I I want to uh try to pick up a little bit of this so that so that folks understand um understand the situation.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: So glyphosate Roundup is an herbicide.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: This herbicide um kills the foliage.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the it it kills the it it it kills the foliage, so the foliage turns brown.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: Now, now in a in a growing crop like corn or soybeans, the reason they had so so it's it's used for weeds.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: It I mean it was invented to control weeds.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: The the problem is it could only be used pre-emergence.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, you plant corn, you plant soybeans, a seed.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: You could only use it before the seed sprouted, or if you sprayed, you killed the plant.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: Well, then the plant starts growing, the weeds start growing, and now you can't control, you can't spray the weeds because if you spray the weeds, the the the plant dies too.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_01: And so the the GMO, the Roundup Ready, was developed so that you could spray corn and soybeans anytime and kill the weeds, but the the corn and soybeans would not be defoliated.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm using the word defoliated carefully because that's why all the all the crops that you mentioned, see you know, potatoes and wheat and oats and all these things.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you know, why do they got to spray it on that?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: Why are they trying to kill the plant?
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_01: Well, so they're trying, so so when you spray it on a on a mature plant that's already grown, it's potato, it's wheat, it's whatever, it it kills the foliage, but doesn't destroy the potato, the actual tuber.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't destroy the the grain, the wheat, but it does get the plant to dry down, the leaves to dry down quickly to st to um to make harvesting more efficient.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: So that's why it's not actually um, you know, it's not actually I guess yeah, it is killing the plant, but it's but it's simply it's simply spleeting uh speeding up the defoliation, making the harvest easier.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so that can obviously be done to non-GMO crops.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: You're right.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um glyphosate is not to be used at all on organic certified products.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: That is absolutely true.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: It it can be used on non-GMO products.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: That's what this desiccation is.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_01: Desiccation is the brown down, it's it's the it's the shriveling up of the foliage, which is a harvesting efficiency technique.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: Some people use it, some people don't.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: For sure, the lion's share of it is used as a weed control in GMO, corn, and soybeans.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: Some is certainly used as a dry down to accelerate harvest in in in other in other things.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's kind of where we are, and um and that's why uh you you know uh ideally you get stuff from a mill that actually tests for glyphosate residues on its uh grains.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_01: And and just in, you know, just so you know, uh, our mill does.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: Our mill tests every um every batch of grain that comes in for glyphosate residue.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, what in general, all things being equal, it can sometimes speed up harvest, you know, by by a few days.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's a it's a convenience thing.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: It's like it's like uh like instead of instead of fast food, it's fast harvest.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, I like that.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_02: I like these little tw terms you come up with because it makes it so memorable, you know, fast harvest, yeah, brown down, fast harvest.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I found another study that was showing that um the level, so we know the level of glyphosate residue is increasing, right, on the food, livestock feed and food for humans.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_02: But this study was showing that the level of glyphosate residue on livestock feed, um that that they're exposed to more of it than humans.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_02: And they're saying in this in this study that the feed residues of glyphosate um are showing up to actually affect the gut microbiome of the livestock.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_02: So something that we've already discussed that we know intuitively, but it's been more of a theoretical thing.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_02: And now data is coming out, starting to come out to show that that is actually happening.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_02: So again, so you can help those cows and those animals and that and those plants, right?
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_02: Plants have feelings too, right?
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_02: You can help them all by supporting your local farmers that are aligned with your principles.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, or at least when you're in the grocery store, if you're not if you're not that ready for that step, that's okay.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_02: At least when you go in the grocery store, don't choose the conventional variety, right?
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_02: You can like that's one of the easy changes to make.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_02: Don't choose that conventional, choose that organic one.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and preferably the one that's the organic paired with the um detox label, the um detox residue free label from the detox project.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_02: Sorry, the detox projects glyphosate residue free label.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_02: So that will be paired with the USDA organic label.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so oh go ahead.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_02: Question number two.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_02: Yay! How long did that one take us?
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_02: 10 minutes?
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_02: Uh yeah, a little over five minutes.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_02: The next two questions are about the purple tomato.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_02: So this first question is from Cynthia Catten.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_02: She says, um, she listens to the podcast about the purple tomato.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_02: The question is could the maker of the purple tomatoes be sued in a class action lawsuit, or couldn't a class action lawsuit be brought against them in regards to the drift problem possibly contaminating people's heritage tomato seeds?
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: Well, she obviously has not heard of Percy Schmeiser.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: So Percy Schmeiser was a farmer in Canada who was growing, I think, canola.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: And and um GMO canola drifted over into his crops, and he he had been growing you know crops for long, long, long, long time and saving seed.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_01: He he he he didn't grow hybrids, he grew you know open pollinated so where he'd save his own seed all the time.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_01: And the um the GMO genocally modified organism um pollen drifted over, got onto his crops, and um I think it was Monsanto, did aerial infrared photography.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_01: With they can fly over with a drone with infrared photography and determine if the if the crop has um you know it is is GMO.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's what they did, and they took him to court for patent infringement.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: Uh in other words, he was not licensed to grow their GMO crop, and he lost.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: And that set a precedent, it's come into the US as well, and so now if I am growing, you know, corn and GMO drift comes over into my non-hybrid cornfield, impregnates my corn with GMOs, not only can I not sue for lie for liability or or loss, but I have to pay the intellectual property license to the GMO outfit for the privilege of uh of having my corn infected with pollen drift.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: It it is it is it is just it's unspeakable, Cena.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's so unfair and against everything that is ethical and moral that it's almost unspeakable.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: But that's where we are.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_01: So the answer to the question is, man, I wish, because if if you if you could sue the neighbor for the purple tomato contamination in your tomatoes, if you could, we would have, we would have, well, if you could, we probably wouldn't have any GMOs now.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: All the farmers that had tainted, you know, uh tainted pollen drift crops would have won in court and there would be no GMOs.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: So the only the only way GMOs are still with us is that they are protected from liability for pollen drift.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I'm like, oh, I don't even want to open that rabbit hole right there of how they became protected.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_02: But right, it that that goes more into Jimmy's question that we talked about the last podcast about underhanded, undermined things, you know.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right, right.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_02: So um, okay, so the second the second question that's related to this, right?
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_02: This the purple uh tomato is this one comes from Mary Loving.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_02: That's actually her last name, loving.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_02: I would love to have that as my last name, Cena Loving.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_02: Like that just sounds great.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_02: Like, okay, so this was from Mary Loving, and she says, um, her question is whether someone growing a GMO vegetable like Norfolk's purple tomato, if they're growing that in the neighborhood, um, how is that going to affect my seed saving?
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_02: I know that tomatoes don't usually cross, but it moves me to isolate my peppers when saving the seeds.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_02: It seems that uh pure seeds may be quite valuable one day if we aren't already there.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_02: And now, before I toss this over to you, I'll also give another update that piggybacks with Mary's question.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_02: When we did the podcast about the purple tomato, remember I said that I had emailed the company, the Norfolk Healthy Produce, um, asking them about can this, the purple tomato seed, be cross-pollinated with other tomatoes that are in my garden?
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_02: And if yes, um, will the new variety that's formed from this cross-pollination still produce high levels of the anthocyanids?
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_02: So basically, would the purple tomato characteristic with that trait, you know, remain?
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so they have emailed back.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_02: And this is what the team said.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, you can cross-pollinate with other varieties.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_02: As tomatoes generally only self-pollinate, you'll need to pollinate manually.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_02: Our purple trait will segregate.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_02: Depending upon what you cross to, you may not know which plants are carrying the trait until they bear flute fruit.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_02: So, Joel, let's answer Mary's question and translate that response from Norfolk for us.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: In that response.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's not it's not real clear.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: I would disagree with them.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: We have certainly in our garden, we have had tomatoes cross-pollinate, and we certainly didn't go out there and hand hand cross them.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_01: So I think they are absolutely wrong in that regard.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and every every vegetable Cena has a a different uh like pollination zone.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_01: When you're saving seed, every plant has a different pol.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I off the top of my head, I can't I can't tell you what all the zones are.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_01: I think tomato, tomato can be as far as half a mile.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_01: Tomatoes pretty far.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: But but but but here's the thing.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: Generally speaking, if you've got uh on tomatoes, if you've got you know a couple hundred feet, you're okay you're okay.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: And so um in general, it's better to you know, to or if you have some obstruction.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: Like, for example, in our area, um, we like to grow tomatoes in a in a hoop house, or if you have a tomato on one side of the house and on the other side of the house.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_01: So if you have some sort of a physical barrier between them, then you can drop this way, way, way, way down.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, even a even a uh a nice high hedge, uh a clump of trees, uh, just anything that you know, not not a volleyball net.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, that's not enough.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: But but but if you've got some sort of a physical barrier, uh a building, a vegetation or something structure uh between, you can drop that way down to you know uh more you know, 50 feet or so.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: But I know I know that tomatoes are are very prone to that, and so are um so are the gourds.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: The the the pumpkins, um, fall squashes and gourds, they they are very easy to to uh cross, you know, and then you got you thought you planted squash and you got a bunch of gourds and and you know it's it's really kind of weird.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_01: So you just you know you just want to wanna have some separation, you know, at least uh you know, 30 or 40 feet if you can.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_01: Otherwise, just plant one variety, plant one type this year, plant one type next year, plant one type next year, or or go to the other side of the house, you know, and and and put in a few plants on one side, a few plants on the other side, go to the you know, the back side of the garage, tuck, tuck some up against the wall.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: Anytime you can tuck something up against a barrier, again, you've really greatly reduced the chance of that pollen to move somewhere else.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_02: That's great.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_02: And so it sounds like now with the purple tomato out there, I'm also gonna have to start putting up hedges all around my property or like greenhouses or something, right?
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_02: To protect the outskirts so it doesn't come in and it's not as likely to come in.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, some uh, you know, some nice thornless, thornless raspberries uh would make a wonderful, you know, wonderful uh edge.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and um yeah, just anything like that that's gonna give you a nice edge is is good.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_02: It's like I'm picturing in my mind we're having to build these fortresses now, you know, to you know, not only keep people out that we don't want there, but to keep the bad scenes out, the literal bad scenes.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_02: Keep that out there.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, okay.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_02: So the next one, uh, this is a comment.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_02: This is from Ethan Johnson.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_02: Ethan says, You read my email on the show regarding intuitive eating, and I didn't even think to put my name on the email anywhere.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_02: Ethan Johnson is my name.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_02: I got one moment of quote unquote fame, and I squandered it by not putting my name.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_02: He says, Thanks for doing the video on intuitive eating.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_02: I had to say this one, Ethan.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_02: We we your name is Ethan.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: We got it.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_02: I'm always gonna remember that now.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_02: Ethan Johnson.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_02: He is the one from the previous QA that asked about the intuitive eating.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_02: And Ethan, yours is one of the emails I received that actually encouraged and motivated me to produce that intuitive eating series.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so thank you so much.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_02: And I hope you are enjoying it.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, Ethan and others.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_02: If you have specific recipes you want me to make or create, then send them to me.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_02: I, you know, I'm open to all that.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, now this question is for Joel.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_02: This comes from Tim Jeffries.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_02: Tim says, I'm curious to know if you spend extra time trying to eradicate poisonous plants on your property, specifically poison hemlock and white.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: Snake root.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um the short answer is no.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: Instead of concentrating on stuff we don't like, we try to concentrate on managing for stuff that we do like.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: And um the livestock, the livestock doesn't eat poisonous stuff unless they're hungry.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_01: Very, very seldom will they eat something that they don't that's not good for them unless they're really pushed.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so a lot of these things have gotten a terrible reputation because people do often um uh I don't want to say starve their animals, but but make their animals very hungry.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, around here, I remember uh a few years back I was talking to one of our local vets, and uh he said that every fall, every fall when we have a drought here, we don't have a drought every fall, but if we do have a drought in the fall, he said their vet practice um is called in for uh numerous cases in our area of tetanus, tetanus in cows.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_01: And it's because the farmers have grazed their grass so short the cows are eating, they're they're they're eating too much dirt with the blades, the short blades of grass, and it's overriding their immune system and are just toxifying themselves with all this dirt that's going in.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_01: They can tolerate some.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, you know, they're it's a big old cow, you know, she's got a big old, you know, uh uh ruminating rumen system.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, she can tolerate some, but she can't tolerate that much.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: Same thing with acorns.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: Acorns are very toxic to cows, but only in large numbers.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_01: So, again, same vet told me every fall, you know, they have these cows that die from eating too many acorns.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: We've never had a cow die from eating too many acorns uh because our our cows are never hungry.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: But a lot of times in the fall, when pastures are short and your lack of rain, uh farmers are pushing things and the cows are getting really, really hungry, and so they're looking for things, and they'll eat things like you, which is very poisonous.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um I I thought you said they'll eat things like you.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: No, you you w.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's an ornamental, it's an ornamental that's often found around old homesteads, like old abandoned homesteads.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: We had a neighbor once lost six cows in one night.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: They it was it was an it was old abandoned, it was an old abandoned homestead, just literally, you know, half a mile up the road, and had a fence, old yard fence that had gotten dilapidated.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: The cows broke through the yard fence, ate the the the you, and six of them were dead in the morning.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_01: So, so it happens, and Cena, that's why you know the vet books and the literature is full of this you know, beware, beware, beware.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_01: But but in actuality, a happy, healthy, well-fed animal, they they know what to eat.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_01: They know what to eat and what not to eat, and it's just not a problem.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we don't uh we don't actually pull the poisonous plants either, even though we have the five dogs.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I remember when we first moved to Virginia and you know, we were up against the preserve, and there's it would the beautiful nature everywhere.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_02: And the neighbor saw that we had dogs, and she came running over and she was like, Oh, you gotta pull this up and this up.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_02: Don't let the dogs eat such and such.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, Whoa, like, you know, a wave of stress followed me.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_02: And then I thought about it and I was like, no, like, you know, my dogs are very intuitive and they're gonna figure out what to do on their own.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_02: And it's true, you know, you see you see the dogs eating certain herbs that come up and you know, medicinals that other people will call weeds and spray them.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_02: The dogs know they'll start eating those medicinals when they come up, you know.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_02: Even when I take them out in the forest and go walk, they know what to eat and what not to eat.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_02: So they're very brilliant.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I think I think there are some cases where you've removed them, like in a dog, for instance, you've domesticated it too much, you've removed it too far from its roots, and then they tend to lose that just like humans, right?
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_02: We we tend to have lost some of those skills too.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_02: So I do think that is possible.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm not saying everybody with a dog should just let them go roam and eat ate everything, but we have tried to have that balance between the dogs being my love puffs and it and appreciating the dogness of the dog, as Joel would say.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, I totally agree.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_02: Um, Joel, how are we doing on time?
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_02: Do we have time for one more?
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_02: No, we're we got 10 minutes.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_02: Oh my gosh.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so this question has it's a couple questions, and it comes from Jessica Revis, and she was talking about the episode that Joel, you and I recorded with Donnie about being a caregiver, you know, when when somebody is chronically sick, um, whether that be a husband or someone to take care of their elderly parents, okay?
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_02: And specifically, Jessica has asked, would Joel be willing to expand on the topic of caring for an aging parent?
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_02: How do he and his family accomplish keeping his mother in her home?
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_02: Was keeping his mother at home something the family discussed, or was it something they just did out of love and duty?
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_02: And her final question is what happened in our society that led us to relinquish our responsibility to our elders?
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_02: And how do we care for aging and dying parents when we are trying to run a homestead or a farm?
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: Wow, there's a there's a lot of stuff packed up in that, uh Cena.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um and let let me let me say a couple things.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_01: One is that where we are right now in in our history in America, in American history for us, believe it or not, one of the biggest impediments for caring for parents is parents who have vowed I'm never gonna be a burden to my kids.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so so we've gone through that a couple of times in our family, um, with with grandparents, and then now with with parents, that that we we would be glad to actually keep them in our home.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_01: We we would Teresa and I would move our bedroom upstairs.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we would be glad to, you know, to to change, but but you've got this this old uh World War II, you know, uh generation.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um we're we're never gonna be a burden on our kids.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh many of them took care of their elderly parents, and and so they, you know, they don't want to be a burden.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so even though we are willing, we are willing and happy to care for them uh in our home, they refuse to come because they they they've they made some sort of vow, you know, uh, and and said we're not gonna be a burden to anybody.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so that that is as big an issue as as I think the real question uh is how do you, you know, how do you care for them?
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_01: So for us, uh, if you know the Amish at all, they have what's called a doty house.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: So the Amish, so I'm I'm gonna give you an example of an Amish of I'm very friendly with many Amish, and um, and just it it's a it's a it's it's a it's a it's a very interesting um dynamic.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so for example, we we know an elderly Amish couple who had no children.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: I um I think I think he had scarlet fever when he was a little child and was and was sterile.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: That's so they're never they've never had kids.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but but they love child, they love kids.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_01: They and and they've gotten old now.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_01: They're they're uh a little older than I am.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: And um, and so as they got older, what were we gonna do?
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: And so a nearby Amish family said the the a young family that was looking for land said, if you will trade us your little, and and they owned like uh this this this elderly couple owned, I don't know, uh 10 acres, okay.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh they didn't make their living farming.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: He actually had a had a sawmill, made his made his living um in a had a sawmill.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_01: They said, if you will trade us your farm, you can build a little cottage next to our house, and we will take care of you until you die.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what they've done.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_01: And and they made the trade, they've been there now for several years.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's working beautifully, it's working just great.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: What where I'm going with this is this kind of arrangement takes a communal relational appreciation that we we whatever uh Westerners, we uh generally we we Americans, we self-made Americans, we don't cultivate that.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_01: We're we we uh I mean we want the kids to get up and get a good enough job to move far enough away to get paid enough to pay for our nursing home care when we get too old.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that that's kind of the way we we don't cultivate that in our families.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: We don't have this.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, in Italy, if you remember when COVID came in, Italy had this huge spike in COVID cases, and and the reason was because they had so many multi-generational families uh living in the same house.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: And so um, and so these elderly were um, you know, they they they were they were multifamily living in there.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_01: And and so and so um what we what we've done here is essentially when Teresa and I had the two kids, we were living in the attic.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: Mom and dad gave us the house, and moved, and and and by that time my grandmother had had died, she had put in a little uh uh a mobile home next to our house, you know, uh whatever, 30, 40 feet away.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_01: Mom, mom cared for her as she aged, and she passed away.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_01: So mom and dad replaced that with a much bigger one and moved into there, um, and gave Teresa and I the big house here.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_01: And so then dad passed away actually a year later, uh after they moved into that house.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_01: Mom, of course, took care of him because she was quite able to do that.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_01: We didn't have a whole lot to do with that.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um, she took care of him, and so now mom is, as you know, over a hundred years old.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_01: She's still able to live there.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_01: She's she's definitely deteriorating.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um, Teresa's over there.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_01: Teresa's her, my wife is her primary uh caregiver now.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_01: She's over there, I don't know, um, I'm gonna say two to three hours a day.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_01: She helps her get up, helps her get dressed.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, a weekly shower.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_01: She gets her in and out of the, you know, the the uh shower, um gets her to bed.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we we she doesn't cook.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_01: We you know, we fix all of her meals.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um and and so you know, we're we're we're we're we're just praying she doesn't go bed fast.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_01: If she goes bed fast, we're gonna we're we we probably with with our life responsibilities, it's gonna be very difficult for us to handle it.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_01: We're we're gonna have to get help, whether we whether we institutionalize her or bring in uh help.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_01: Now, with all that said, what happened in March was a one of our one of our customers um lost her both of her parents in the last year.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_01: And so she kind of had this, you know, um it's it's not just grieving, it's it's almost um orphaning.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_01: I I don't care when you lose your parents, you're always an orphan.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't matter how old you are.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_01: You're you become you become an orphan.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, by definition, I guess, uh if nothing else.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_01: But but emotionally, you become an orphan no matter when that happens.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, she's going through this, and then she's going through a very ugly divorce, unfortunately, and she needed a place to hang out, to to be a safe place, abusive, abusive husband, different things.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so, make a long story short, she kind of she was down here picking up some meat one day, saw mom sitting on the porch, went up, talked to her.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_01: She had just buried both of her parents in the last year, and and um, and just said, Hey, when you guys need a break, call me.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so, make a long story short, in March, she moved into mom's spare bedroom as an in-home caregiver.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, wow.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_01: Teresa's still over there a couple hours a day, but now there's somebody there.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_01: And and she now has a safe place.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: We're paying her, not what home health care would cost by any means, but she's getting a free place to live, free food.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_01: Her life is now she can handle her uh, you know, a turn get trying to get herself, you know, uh back together.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_01: She has a safe place.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_01: She's able to minister to another uh elderly person that kind of I think emotionally has taken the place of her her parents as you know as an object of care.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, and and so still feels extremely uh valuable and useful there.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_01: And um, and and we're just we're just rocking along.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_01: And and and if I may be as candid as I know how to be, we just pray that mom doesn't wake up one morning.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we we as energetic, I mean she was driving until 97, okay.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_01: So so she has lived such an active life, and it's it's really hard to watch her become so dependent now.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, to where she just she just depends on us for everything.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, uh four four mornings ago, Therese went over to check on her.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_01: The other lady was was um was in her in her room on a phone call, and uh Theresa just went over, and there's mom on the on the bathroom floor.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_01: She'd fallen, she was on the she'd slipped and she was down on the bathroom floor.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_01: So Teresa called me.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_01: I went over, picked mom up, got her up on her feet, and um and so you know this is where we are.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this this is just where we are.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_01: And um and what happened to our society, you know, what happened to our society was we we we lost we lost home centricity in our life.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: Our homes be in in our in our pell mell rush to get rich and keep up with the Kardashians and the latest fashion and the latest car and whatever else, we we lost the real values of life, which is functional family home centricity.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_01: And when we lost that, we lost all these threads of loyalty, relational care, and all those things that that have glued that have glued tribes and families together for so long.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh I I'm not a psychologist, I but that that's that that's that's what I see.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_01: And um, and we've just been really blessed to be able to have her close and um have her, you know, have her here when she was really, really healthy, and that was good, and now we're in a different time of life, and um and here we are, and we will we will always sorry we'll always be thankful that we invested, we invested that time in her days.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_02: You know, it brings up all these memories too of you know, my mom passing and um which is quite amazing, my mom passed before your mom, because you know, I'm quite a bit younger.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and when you said that you like now you're praying that she just doesn't wake up one morning, right?
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_02: And I was at the same point with my mom, and that's because um, you know the story that even though we healed her from all her ailments, her laundry list of sicknesses, uh once I realized that she didn't want to live, then I realized there wasn't anything I can do.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_02: Like I I couldn't give her any, I couldn't change her mind.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_02: And in the end, it was, you know, it happened it happened pretty quickly.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_02: When you look back in the moment, it seemed like it took an eternity for her to finally pass, you know, on her own terms.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_02: But now looking back, I'm glad that it happened quickly because it didn't replace all of my kids' memories of her, right?
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_02: They still have those memories of her from when she was more active and when we would fly to California and visit, and she would take out the pots and pans and drum on them with my kids and you know, appreciate those little things in life.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_02: Um, whereas toward the end, obviously it wasn't like that whatsoever.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, when someone wants to pass.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm grateful now that it was a quick process and that it my kids remember it, but because it didn't drag on, it didn't replace all those wonderful memories, so they can still hold on to those at the same time.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_02: But was to Jessica's question, too.
• 40:37
  SPEAKER_02: It was so Teresa is now helping to take care of your mom.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_02: Was that something that you and Teresa discussed ahead of time?
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_02: Or was that something that Teresa just uh she was raised the same way?
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_02: And so she just jumped right in and did it.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_01: I I don't I don't think I don't think we we never really I mean obviously we discuss it quite a bit right now, you know.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_01: I mean it's literally a a weekly deterioration right now that we're seeing.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um so we're we're in we're in you know it's discussions.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, I have two siblings, so we we we keep them in the loop uh with you know with with uh whatever pro progress, negative progress.
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh but no, uh listen, every every mother, let me tell you that every mother would want a daughter-in-law like Teresa.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_01: Every mother would want a daughter-in-law like Teresa, you know, my sister isn't up here, and I love my sister, it's great.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_01: She's in Texas.
• 41:31
  SPEAKER_01: We're we're here, you know, mom's here, we're here.
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and and so yeah, you you you do what you have to do.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_01: And and and and I we're out of time here, Cena, but I I would as I as I've as you were going through, you know, what's changed, you know, I think we're just an incredibly selfish culture right now.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_01: I think we're just really selfish.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, we've got Frank Sinatra, you know, I did it my way.
• 42:01
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, I mean, okay, we we want that individuality, we want creativity, we want self-expression, but uh but not to the point of just um indulging to where I get to do everything I want to do.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_01: No, you you you somebody's got to clean the toilets, you know, somebody's gotta do the laundry.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_01: You you don't just get to do uh what's convenient and and what you want to do.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I think I think that we have uh, you know, that World War II generation, moms and you know, been, I mean, independent to a fault, but they duty, you know, they they understood duty.
• 42:44
  SPEAKER_01: And and even if even if you can't find it in your heart to do it out of love, even if you can't find it, um, whatever, to do because you want to, I'm sorry.
• 42:57
  SPEAKER_01: You know, these folks washed you, put baby powder on your rear, changed your diapers, put food in your mouth.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_01: Just duty demands that you you step up with some sort of loyalty in those last days.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_01: Just duty.
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, the Bible says um um your um where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_01: We've got it backwards so many times.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_01: We say, get your heart right in your treasure.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_01: No, no, no, no.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus says, put your treasure someplace and your heart will naturally be drawn there.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_01: And and what I find, I I can tell you this for sure, for because you know, I wasn't a perfect kid, mom wasn't a perfect parent.
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we can go down that rabbit hole.
• 43:49
  SPEAKER_01: But I found that as I step up to the duty, to the obligatory duty, and and and care for her, pick her up off the floor and and do, and I bring her over here in a wheelchair to supper, you know, in the evening.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_01: And and when I when I do that, I'm finding my heart drawn to her like I've never had it drawn to her before.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_01: And and so, so you you do what you're supposed to do, and then your heart follows that.
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_01: And and I I think that that is something that we have missed in our culture.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_01: We have just said, do whatever you turn, turn John, you know, and it'll all be cool.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_01: No, no, no, no, no.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_01: You do what you're supposed to do, and your love, your heart, it'll be drawn with it.
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_02: Because God rewards you for doing those things, yeah.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_02: You know, and that's why in our family, our the litmus test we use is what would Jesus do?
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it all the time.
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_02: That's what we we drill that into our kids' heads whenever they make a decision it individually or as a family.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_02: What would Jesus do?
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_02: So I I completely agree with you.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_02: Uh let's end it on a positive.
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_02: I do think that's there's there is a shift in our culture, uh, at least among our community, that we are seeking more of a tribe, right?
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_01: Instead of homeschoolers, homeschoolers, homesteaders.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um you know, the the the word home in front of these things is strategic.
• 45:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's strategic.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_01: And and absolutely, we are we're seeing seeing hearts turn toward home um in a in a big segment of the population, and that is a really, really good cultural shift.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and just think, I'll in on this, just think all of us that are homesteading homeschooling, that's affecting the next generation of kids and grandkids that are coming up under us.
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_02: So we could actually turn this thing around, you know?
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_01: So thanks for thanks for tuning in for another um uh I hope I didn't hope it didn't make you use too many uh tissues here in this one.
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_01: But this is this is heart stuff, and um and Cena and I are not afraid to tackle heart stuff.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_01: It's that's the that's that's the real foundations of life.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_01: It's what makes things go.
• 46:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so thanks for tuning in to another episode of Beyond Labels, and we'll look forward to being with you again next week.