Latest / Beyond Labels Premium / Episode #145: Mail Bag: Sewage Sludge on Your Food & Homesteading Answers

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Episode #145: Mail Bag: Sewage Sludge on Your Food & Homesteading Answers · Beyond Labels Premium

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh in fact, Sir Albert Howard, who developed, you know, modern composting, said that we should make diamond cities, you know, 25 houses with one acre in the middle, employing a master gardener that would compost all the human excrement and compost it and use it on the on the crops.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: There's a big difference between composted things and you know and and raw and fresh.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: You got to go somewhere with it.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it does make a big difference whether it goes on crops that we're gonna eat versus, for example, hay or grass that's gonna be gone through another animal and get another biological barrier, which that's one reason why I like to feed kitchen scraps.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: Whenever I talk about feeding kitchen scraps to animals, I never talk about feeding it to pigs.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: I feed it to laying hens who then take those kitchen scraps and lay an egg out of it.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_01: You've got another biological chain there uh going through.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_01: So not to blabor the point, Cena, but I did want to just make the point so that all biosolids are not created equal, all sewage is not created equal, and all poop is not equal.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_01: We want to be aware of um those kind of nuances.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: Hi, everybody.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to another episode of Beyond Labels.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: I'm your host, Joel Salatin, with our favorite researcher, Dr.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: Cena McCullough.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: Today we're gonna take a uh a little enjoyable romp through our emails.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: We love getting emails from you.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: We love posing questions to us.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: We don't always have the answers, but if we don't, I send Cena on a on a sleuthing trip and she pretty much comes up with the answer uh while I'm out while I'm out uh watering chickens and cutting trees.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: So it sounds like an unfair deal to me.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_01: Oh um, it's very fair.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's very fair.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so so our our our first question comes from uh Tim Gallagher in in Kansas, and he it's it's a question about um septic systems, especially domestic septic systems.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: So you got a house, you got a you know, a toilet, it's going out to a leaching field, a septic drain field.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: So the way this works is you go to the toilet, you flush it, it goes into a concrete tank.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: The concrete tank has microbes in it, and the microbes um break down the solids, and out the top then comes a smelly liquid, okay.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh this isn't gray water, okay.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's not the stuff that comes from your washing machine or your washing dishes.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: This is known as black water, and it goes into this series of pipes, usually put you know three to four feet in the ground uh with with a bunch of gravel around them, and it's called a leach field, and it kind of goes into your into your uh ground there.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: Well, the holes in the pipe where it leaks out.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: The holes, the whole the pipe is uh called leaky, leaky pipe, um, leaky on purpose, not leaky because there's a mistake, and uh and and that that black water then leaks out into the into the ground and gradually it's taken up by roots of plants and you know turned into vegetation.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: So the question is there's several, so we'll go through them really quickly.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: Number one, can I graze graze dwarf goats on it?
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I I think probably the best re the best uh use of a septic field is absolutely grazing animals.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_01: That puts a biological barrier, you know, between your you know, between your your septic uh effluent and your and whatever you're eating.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_01: Number two then, so so grazing.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: We we graze over our septic field.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, in fact, you know, grass always grows greener over the septic field.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: If I could put a septic field under my whole farm, I would, because man, does grass grow under the septic field.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_01: So, so yeah, grazing is a is a great uh thing on top.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: All right, next one is garden for human consumption.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: You know, could you put a garden on it?
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: That I'm I'm a lot more concerned about because there's no because now you're you're actually eating exactly the plant whose roots are right in that in that um human effluent.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: So and remember, this is not composted.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: This is not composted.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: So uh you've got a little more, you know, a little more uh uh risk there uh because it's not composted.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um you know the the question then is, well, what if you what if you don't till uh and you maybe make a raised bed?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh look, if you've got a raised bed, something a raised bed, I don't know, two or three feet over a septic field, I would think you wouldn't have any problem there.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_01: No roots, even carrots, nothing's gonna go down into this into the strata, you know, where your where your plants are.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: Forage crops, absolutely.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: Hay, again, grazing, fruit trees.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um the problem with trees on a septic field, and and normally uh anybody installing a septic field, part of the agreement or the the regular the license to do it is that it will be kept tree-free because tree roots can grow down into it.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_01: They go a lot deeper than you know, than grasses and and garden vegetables and things.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so you wouldn't want to have your tree roots going in and clogging up the leech field.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: Then you're gonna have to you know redig it, redo it, and very, very expensive.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm not a believer of fruit trees planted where the where those deep roots can go in and entangle these uh leech fields.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: Uh next one is a fluent pump to the top of a hill and an absorption field on a hill.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, what about planting downhill from the absorption field?
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I see no problem with that.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I mean, you you look, look, look, look at look at where the green is.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_01: And outside the green line is probably fine for doing anything you want to do.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: And you can easily tell where that, especially in a drought, you can tell where that green, you know, it'll just be like a green square.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: You can see the boundaries of of where this is uh moving.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: And then is there any difference uh this based on rock and pipe versus a chamber systems, other type of systems?
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um I I'm not I'm I'm not an aficionado on the different kinds of water-based affluent systems.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: I do know that if you if you have two buried tanks and you and you have one and then it goes into another one, that often that can help to digest it a lot more with microbes.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: So people that do uh living systems where they're using um a manufactured wetland, like with you know, cattails and daylilies and and irises and things to you know to to use up the the um the effluent like in a you know in a in a bladder-based uh you know system where you you kind of dig a shallow pan, you put a bladder in, you fill that with a medium, and then you grow plants on it to use up the nutrients.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, those systems generally use two holding tanks instead of just one septic tank, you go into a second one just to make sure that there aren't any pieces, you know, pieces that are flowing into your, you know, into your um your wetland system.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: So I hope that answers some of those questions and um and we'll go on then that that brings us to another one that we uh got from Alex, just the whole biosolid sewage sludge, industrial farming thing.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and Cena's got a little bit of information on that, so I'll let you deal with that one.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, this question came from Alex Van Alman.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: He says, please consider looking into using septic sludge, human excrement, as farm field fertilizer.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's widespread and common, it appears, but I've only just recently heard of it and I am very concerned.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: So, yes, um, this is what we call biosolids.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_00: So the term biosolids and sewage sludge are often used interchangeably.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: And what I wanted to do was I'm gonna share my screen with you because um I'm gonna pop up some websites.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're following on audio on the podcast version as opposed to the video version, don't worry.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: I will have the links in the show description so you can follow along there.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_00: So this is a website from the EPA and it's titled Basic Information about biosolids.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: So, according to the EPA, biosolids are produced from the wastewater treatment process during wastewater treatment.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: The liquids are separated from the solid.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: Those solids are then treated physically and chemically to produce a semi-solid, literally, they're calling this a nutrient-rich product known as biosolids.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: And again, the term biosolid and sewage sludge are often used interchangeably.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: So, yes, this is true.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: We do get uh waste, we do get they collect human feces and urine, and they go to these water treatment plants and then they get treated, like they said, physically and chemically, and it produces what's called these biosolids or what we call sewage sludge, and these can actually be used on crops.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: So if you scroll down on that website, it talks about the different classes of biosolids, and then it talks about biosolids uses.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: So here's a chart.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: And Joel, can you see this chart?
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, I can.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so this just says biosolids use and disposal from 2022.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_00: So if you if you're looking at this chart, it divides up the different uses for these biosolids.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: So some are stuck into landfills, and from 2022, it's saying roughly 27% of the biosolids, the sewage sludge, ended up in landfills.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, 1% ended up in another storage or deep well injection, which really grosses me out, right?
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: Deep well injection.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, 16% of it was incarcer, um, incinerated, so burned.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: And then the majority, though, 56% was applied to land.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: So in that category, a 56% of this sewage sludge being applied to land, one point one percent was for um reclamation, 31% was for agriculture.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the part we're talking about where yes, they can take human feces, human urine, they process it in these facilities, and then they can actually apply it to crops.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, then there's this other category, which I think our audience might be interested in.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: 24% of that land application went toward another, which includes home gardens, landscaping and golf courses.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so uh so you can actually buy this stuff to put in your home garden.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: Now, one thing I do want to say is for the agricultural application, that one can only be on, or at least in the regulations, it's stated that it can only be on conventional crops.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: So organically grown crops are not allowed to have biosludge, right, or the sewage sludge placed on them.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, that's one reason.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we and Joel, you and I covered this in our book, In Beyond Labels.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: We did mention that very fact.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and that's one reason why I don't eat conventional foods.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: So, as you know, I'm a big proponent of um giving my kids the freedom to opt in to the system in which I've created for our family.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I do that in large part by educating them.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: And so what I've done is I've explained to them this is what is, these are the inputs in a conventional crop, and these are the inputs in an organic crop.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: And let them choose what they want to eat, right?
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: Instead of forcing them, you will eat organic, because I'm going for long-term compliance with my children.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I tell you, Joel, when it came down to me telling them, oh yeah, human feces and urine can just be treated by, you know, like uh uh we can be treated by this plant.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: And the government determines that it's safe and then it can be applied to the crops, the conventional crops, they were like, oh my goodness, yuck.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: Like that was it.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: That was the deciding factor where they're like, we're never eating conventional again, right?
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, this is so basic that I mean, you know, my 10-year-old is like, this is gross.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not doing this.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: Now, if you want to go a little further and figure out what are the chemicals that are in these biosolids, the EPA has it right here on their website.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, if you can see this, Joel, it's actually the EPA's own website and it says list chemicals in biosolids 2022.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: So all you do is you go down here and you type in to the search bar a certain chemical that you're looking for to see what kind of chemicals are in these.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: And by the way, I read somewhere that there was like, oh yeah, here, it's right here on this page.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_00: To date, 739 chemicals have been found in biosolids.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: So 739 different chemicals, and the government decides the um the regulations behind how which chemicals and and what level can be allowed in these biosolids that are put on these food crops.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of disturbing.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: So if you go down to this results section, you can type in things like I'm gonna type in lead.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, if it pops up here, it's a chemical that's found in it.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: So here's lead found in this biosolid database.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: Let's type in mercury.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: Mercury is in here.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: You can go down this um oops, you can go down the list.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: Aluminum, aluminum's in there, arsenic, cadmium, chromium, remember chromium in the water supply?
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: What a big deal that was.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, it's in it's in biosolids, but just put it in on the crops.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: You can go through all those.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: If you don't have one that, if you don't have a compound in mind, you literally can just scroll through the list.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, and look at these things that are that are in here.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, caffeine um was in here, but things like um, I wrote down some of them, things like mestrinol, right?
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: This is actually an estrogen medication used in birth control pills, menopausal hormone therapy, and the treatment of menstrual disorders, right?
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: So this is a prescription medication that's found in these biosolids.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there's other ones I found like estradiol, that's an estrogen steroid hormone hormone involved in the regulation of female cycles.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: So you can just scroll down the list and see all of these different, I mean, how many of these compounds can you even pronounce, right?
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: Try try chlorophon, like you know, chloromethane.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I mean, it the list goes on and on.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: And as you know, 739 different chemicals.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: So you can look at all these chemicals for yourself to see what's in it.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: Then they also have on this EPA website um another link where it talks about the regulatory determinations for these pollutants in biosolids.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like literally, Joel, I'm not like, I'm not making this up, I'm not exaggerating.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: You can see it here.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: It literally says on the EPA's website regulatory determinations for pollutants in biosolids, right?
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: They're calling the pollutants.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: So if you scroll down, here's pollutant limits for land applied sewage sludge.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and you can go down to like surface disposed sewage sludge.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: So here's the land applied sewage sludge.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: This is the one we're talking about.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: They have actually, so not only do they recognize that there's these heavy metals in the sewage sludge, but they've created limits for how much can be in the sewage sludge before it can be applied to the crop.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: So the limits are right here.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: Then I found this interesting.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: There's a category of pollutants called dioxins and dioxin-like compounds.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: Like if you've heard most people have heard of dioxins.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: These are environmental pollutants.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_00: They belong to what we call the dirty dozen.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: The dirty dozen is actually a group of dangerous chemicals that are known as persistent organic pollutants, and they actually harm your organs and your, you know, your organ systems.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the government itself has even said that it can lead to, it leads to the formation of cancers, or that it can.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, here I have a quote from the EPA.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: Dioxins have been shown to cause both cancer and a variety of non-cancer effects in animals, and there is strong evidence to indicate the humans are susceptible to the same toxic effects.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: But if you look on here, under their regulatory um determinations, that said in 2003, the EPA made a determination not to regulate dioxins and dioxin-like compounds in land-applied sewage sludge.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: So if you click on the PDF here, it actually goes through their rationale as to why they're not requiring that to be, you know, measured or regulated.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: And what it says is even though right underneath where they recognize it can cause cancer, it says um they've modeled, so they use the model of a family farm that would actually be applying this sewage sludge onto their land and eating the food.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: And it says that they deem based on the model that there's a low cancer risk.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, based on a model that they created of some farmer.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: And then they said regarding the non-cancerous effects, and I quote, there are currently no dependable methods for calculating possible non-cancer risks to either the highly exposed family farm or the general population.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then they said they performed a screening ecological risk analysis.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_00: So that's another model.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: And they were trying to figure out the risk to wildlife.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: And it says um, they did that.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: It says, while the estimates are not without some uncertainty, the screening indicates that wildlife should not be significantly impacted as a result of exposure to dioxins in the land-applied sewage sludge.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: So basically, based on their model and based on this uh model for the animals that have, quote, some uncertainty, they decided that it was fine for us to have these dioxins be persistent in our land and on the crops.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_00: So another reason to not consume these conventional foods and the and the food products made from them.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: So so less people get uh whatever, uh just to make sure everybody's on the same page here.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um I do not view I do not view a your household domestic leech field um at the same level of these industrial biosolids.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I've I can tell you in our area um there are there are biosolids that are fairly benign, that are just coming from, for example, residential places that that actually where they actually put in a bunch of microbes.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, uh I'm friends with some people who've actually developed microbes that eat up all this stuff that you're talking about.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh there's actually a fair amount of of development, of innovation in this space right now because it has become such a big issue.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_01: And so there are now uh microbes that will eat this toxic material.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_01: And and uh just just like just like in our bodies, uh there are there are regimens that we can do to teach tox.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if we're if you've got a toxic situation, and of course we're gonna talk about that at our at our uh beyond lay uh at our uh two days of truth summit coming up here in uh in a few weeks.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: So um, you know, human human excrement has been used in a positive way for a long time.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, in in farmers for 50 centuries, you know, the Chinese used to, the Chinese farmers that bordered main travel routes used to used to put uh you know outhouses um um with you know with flower decorations, all sorts of things, stop and leave it here, you know.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and that that was a uh that was a very common thing.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, that's before dioxins and before all these uh chemicals were invented by by people.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, human excrement has always been just like just like cow poop, chicken poop, and anything else, it's been a very positive uh um, you know, uh Fertilizer.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, Sir Albert Howard, who developed, you know, modern composting, said that we should make diamond cities, you know, 25 houses with one acre in the middle, employing a master gardener that would compost all the human excrement and compost and then use it on the on the crops.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_01: There's a big difference between composted things and you know and and raw and fresh.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, the so I I don't want to you got to go somewhere with it.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: And and and and there's gotta be uh a way to deal with it.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_01: And and and it and I think it does make a big difference whether it goes on on crops that we're gonna eat versus, for example, hay or grass that's gonna be gone gone through another animal and get another biological barrier, which that that's one reason why I like to feed kitchen scraps.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: Whenever I talk about feeding kitchen scraps to animals, I never I never talk about feeding it to pigs.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_01: I feed it to laying hens who then take those kitchen scraps and lay an egg out of it.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: You've got another biological, you know, uh um chain there uh going through.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: So not to blabor the point, Cena, but I did want to just make the point so that you know all biosolids are not created equal, all sewage is not created equal, and all poop is not equal.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so, so uh we want to be, you know, we want to be aware of of um those kind of nuances.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up because well, you even have researchers trying to get their hands on your poop, right?
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: Remember Dr.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: Sabine Hazan?
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: She wants a sample of your poop because it's so great.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_00: So, yes, not all poop is the same.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: The problem, one of the big problems here is that the these uh wastewater treatment plants, they're not just getting domestic sewage, which comes with its own problem, as you mentioned.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um humans, we are now exposed to hundreds, possibly thousands of toxins every single day.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, most of us have dioxins in our body, most of us have glyphosate in our body, most of us have heavy metals in our body, right?
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: And so what our uh poop is one way you can get rid of toxins, right?
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_00: And and a lot of people are on prescription medications, right?
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_00: And those are processed and taken out through the urine and the poop as well.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: So one thing is we're we're as the culture gets um less and less healthy, right?
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_00: As we get sicker and sicker, and um we have more and more toxins being that we're exposed to, and we have more and more people getting on medications that are ending up in the domestic sewage, you end up having more compounds and more chemicals in in these things.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then the other part is when uh wastewater, not just from homes, but businesses and industries, when those come into the wastewater treatment plants, that's a problem, right?
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: Because they the and that's different than like what you're talking about.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: So when you have these other waste treatment plants, they will have industry come uh industry waste coming into it.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: And those are going to be a lot of the harsher chemicals, too, that I would not want to have my phone food exposed to.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um and my husband and I've talked about this a lot too.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what do you do with all the poop?
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: I I'm totally on board with you, Joel.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: I I think poop can be a great way uh you you know to to have fertilizer, you know, for for your so your your crops and whatnot.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: I would personally much rather use my own family's or or yours, Joel.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_00: Send me some poop and I can put that on my land here, you know.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, it's it's it's way too precious.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_01: I don't give that stuff away.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: But but yeah, so you know, we we have actually um uh we have a a big plant up just north of us that makes the um the McNuggets for McDonald's.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's a big chicken processing plant.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_01: They make the McDonald's uh McNuggets for McDonald's.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I've talked to people where where that the the the biosolids from that plant are are despicable.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, and the analysis is out of this world.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: And and so so I know that there's a huge difference in sourcing, you know, from when you start dealing with with these kind of things.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: All right, we gotta we gotta go on quickly to the next question.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh, which, you know, um the the show is not going to the dogs yet, but it's gonna go to dogs on this question.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: This is from Nicole Edwards in Winchester, and she wants to know, Cena, what do you feed your dogs?
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I love this question.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm glad you mailed in because that means that Nicole, I have another dog lover friend now.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so really simple.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I actually feed my dogs raw, organic, or beyond organic food.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: I never feed them processed food.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: So my dogs, my my um husband jokes around that our dogs eat better than 99% of Americans, which is true, right?
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_00: So, so um to give you an example, my dogs would eat, uh they they eat once a day in the morning.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: The food, the food bowl might look like this um raw ground beef from the farm, right?
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: I never give them meat from the grocery store.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: So it's raw ground meat from the farm, no no pesticides, no hormones, no antibiotics, no vaccines, nothing.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_00: Then they'll have some raw vegetables that are low glycemic index vegetables.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm not giving them things like corn or carrots or peas.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm giving them things like broccoli.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_00: They love cauliflower.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, green beans, it's a little higher glycemic index, but I give them that sometimes.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then I give them a lot of healthy fat.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: So I'll put on they love like lard if I have that.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um, if not, I'll use uh an organic cold press extra virgin olive oil and I coat the food in that and I sprinkle uh real salt all over it.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_00: All right, because they need their salt too.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um that's a typical meal.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_00: Look, if I had one dog versus five dogs, I would be feeding them differently.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_00: But feeding five dogs like that is costly, right?
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: So um I do I do try to feed them bone broth, like homemade bone broth from time to time.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, if I had one dog, I'd be doing that more regularly.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_00: When I feel the, you know, intuitively that one of the dogs needs something else, I will add something else to it.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but that that's on a case-by-case basis.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_00: So that's typically what I feed the dogs um in a day.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_00: And um, you know, and of course they get plenty of exercise, they go outside, like we build their microbiome, pet them a lot, love them.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, and sometimes, and I want to just add this in there because people might be like, gosh, that's kind of crazy that she's spending that money on the dogs.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: But just like us, we do preventative.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's much more cost effective for us to invest in their health in the moment to prevent the onset of or progression of disease than to treat them later.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_00: And we found that out because my before I had the five dogs, I had one dog.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_00: His name was Mason, uh, a beautiful golden retriever.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_00: He's 120 pounds, Joel, but like lean, lean dog.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_00: He was like my little pony, you know.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_00: Love that dog.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_00: He's been he went through thick and thin with me.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, he actually ended up getting cancer.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't know what I know now.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: So I did the only thing I knew how to do.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_00: I we went through the Western treatment and we ended up having he lost, we had ended up having to amputate the leg.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: And like this is how much I love that dog.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: They're like, we're gonna have to amputate the leg, and then it's up here on the spine, and so we're gonna have the orthopedic surgeon go in, cut the leg, and go up the spine.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, No, the orthopedic surgeon will come in and cut the leg, and I want the nerve specialists to then step in to that operating room and deal with the spine because that I I love this dog, you know, and so they did.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: I know it was very expensive.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: We only had one child at the time, so a lot of more money to go around, right?
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_00: And he was my one furry baby, yeah.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: And they did, they did the surgery and they, you know, they called me and they said we got clean margins and they were ecstatic, and I knew I just knew intuitively they didn't get clean margins.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_00: And they the vet even said, Why aren't you excited?
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Oh, yeah, you know, it's just a lot to process.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't want to tell her, like, oh, intuitively, I know you didn't get it, you know.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_00: But anyhow, um, he didn't live much longer, you know, less than six months.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_00: And to this day, I'm like so upset with myself because I he was eating kibble.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I knew.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's what my parents fed their dogs.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so I got him good kibble, right?
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_00: He was on like grain-free kibble at that time that had like no fillers, preservatives, like you know, the expensive kibble, but yet he was on kibble.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: And um after after we lost him, I did a lot of research.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I then I saw the truth about pet cancer.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they have like Ty Bollinger has that truth about cancer series.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: There's a truth about pet cancer series, and I'll never forget it, Joel.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's like it's like we were talking about a different podcast.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_00: Like someone says something to you that's so obvious, but you just never thought of it before.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: And then it's like, bam, like, you know, should have gotten that.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: So in this truth about pet cancer series, they had a picture that they showed.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: It was a picture of um a bowl of kibble, and right next to it was a bowl of kids' sugary cereal.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, side-by-side comparison.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, light bulb click.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my gosh.
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_00: That's really what it is.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_00: I fed him ultra-processed food that no matter what you do to that, that's not even close to food, right?
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_00: No matter how many like non-byproducts they had in it and stuff.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_00: I fed him ultra-processed food.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and that's a hyoglycemic thing, too.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: So it clicked in that moment, and I said, I'm never going back.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_00: And immediately I changed.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: And in that series, they gave you a calculation.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_00: So it was amazing.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_00: That um, that company who they worked with for that uh documentary, they heal dogs from cancer.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_00: And they do it largely by putting them on a ketogenic diet.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_00: But there's specific calculations they make per dog.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so what they offered was you can send it in.
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_00: Like, here's the calculation.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to calculate it for your dog, send it to us.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_00: We'll check your calculation and make sure you did it right.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_00: So I did for all, I had my five dogs at that time for all five dogs.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_00: I went through and calculated everything, sent it.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_00: They said it was right.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_00: And at the beginning, I was measuring everything out, you know, like, oh, it's got to be perfect because you know, I'm making up for what I didn't know for the first dog, right?
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: Anyhow, it was amazing because my dogs um were still very useful, youthful at that time.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I don't know, they're probably four or five years old, somewhere in that range.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_00: And by all means, you look at them and be like, oh, totally healthy dogs, you know.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_00: I kid you not.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_00: Once I changed their diet, oh man, they were like spring chickens.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: They were like all of them, totally playful all the time.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: One of them, I didn't realize, was bloated.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_00: And all of a sudden, after about maybe after about a week, bloating totally gone.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_00: One of them was experiencing um chronic ear infections.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: And the vet was like, Oh, it's probably just allergies, you know, there's nothing we can do about it because they swabbed it and it was fine.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_00: Once I changed the diet, the ear infections went away.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like crazy.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_00: Now my dogs almost cry when I think about it.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_00: Now they're like 11 and I kid you not, they're like pulling us on the walks, like constantly playing.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like they're they're still puppies.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_00: So, so it is an investment, right?
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_00: Eating this way, feeding your dogs that way is an investment up front.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_00: But oh my gosh, like the benefits.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: They have such a high quality of life.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not having to pay vet bills for any diseases.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I highly encourage it for you know anybody, but you got to get the good stuff.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_00: You can't feed them raw food from the grocery store.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_00: Like that can make them sick.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_00: The microbiome is totally different, right?
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_00: So you have to be really careful with your sourcing.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_01: Wow, that's great.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's great.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_01: Good.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks, Zina.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_01: So the next question, and we're yeah, we're gonna be bumping time here.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_01: So we'll we'll try to deal with these quickly.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the next question is um it's kind of directed at me um to see if I've ever dealt with crack quack grass.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we're trying to garden, and quack grass makes it impossible.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_01: We tried wood chips, goat bedding for mulch tilling, pulling it all out and digging the roots out, planting chicory, clover to smother it.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's still going strong.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_01: Help, please.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, by from uh from Lydia Blum, I guess.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and uh I wish I had a magic bullet.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, we have dealt with quackgrass.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_01: The only thing I know that actually um you know deals with crack quack grass is unfortunately deep tillage, like a broad fork, something to really um uh till it up.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_01: Now, the neat thing is you can eat the roots as salad.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: The salads are uh are a uh I mean the the roots are real sweet.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you can eat them fresh, raw.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_01: And there are few things that can give you more uh joy than eating the roots of your crack quack grass.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: So um like in a revengeful way, like I'm gonna eat you.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: Is that what you're talking about?
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_01: I get the last laugh.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_01: So um, so I I I guess my encouragement here is um is to to simp to stay with it, but I would encourage you to get a broad fork and um and another thing that you can do is go to a um a plastic mulch.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I know there's you know different people that like it or don't like it, but a plastic mulch uh where you actually use that for a couple of years and just not let that uh quack grass grow at all uh for a couple of years, and then you know it'll it'll finally look it will finally go, but you can't give up.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh and and definitely you can't mulch it out.
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, we've been down that path too.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_01: The only thing that we know that really gets it is like a broad fork, really deep, deep molestation.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh get those roots up out of the ground, eat them in your salad, and have the last laugh.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, question number four differences in price, ease of putting up durability, pros, cons of different kinds of structures on a homestead.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_01: Pole barn versus hoop house versus high tunnel versus greenhouse.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_01: You know, did I forget something?
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_01: This is um this is from Susan Taylor Moroni in Wheatfield, New York.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Susan, for the question.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so much to unpack here.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I we certainly have uh hoop houses, high tunnels.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um we have a solarium on our house, and I'm a fan of pole barns.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_01: So I've got at least one and not several of all of these things you've described.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_01: I'm glad that you didn't put on um, you know, post and beam barns.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, even though those are really cool, they're iconic and people love them, they're extremely unfunctional with machinery and and cost and and durability and price.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_01: So um, so yeah, I'm a huge believer in pole barns.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_01: If you have your own poles, um, especially locust or cedar, then obviously you can save a lot of money.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, a pole barn, if you have your own poles and you can get access to a sawmill or have one, you can almost build a pole barn cheaper than even a hoop house or a high tunnel because all you have to buy is the roofing.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_01: So there's a lot to be said there.
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_01: And the nice thing about nice thing about a pole barn is that you can uh that you've got structure inside.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_01: Those poles give you structure.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_01: You can, you know, you can put up barricades, you can hang gates, you can do all sorts of things internally because you've got that that uh that pole to work on with a hoop house and a tight tunnel, high tunnel, you know, there's no there's no internal whole post structure to hook anything to.
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, if you want to make uh if you want to you know panel or or or or make um you know divisions for pigs or chickens or or whatever.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_01: So tall tunnel is a little problematic that way.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and of course, in the summer, you're definitely gonna have to have, at least if you live uh anywhere except the Arctic Circle, in the summer, you're gonna need some sort of shade cloth.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_01: So the tall tunnel is not just by itself, then you need also, you know, a shade cloth in the summer.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas a pole barn, you put your roof on and you're done for both winter and summer.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's all weather.
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_01: So from a from a typical livestock functional system, I'm a huge believer in pole barns, especially if you have your own material.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_01: Now, if you're buying everything, then probably your high tunnel or hoop house is even going to be better.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_01: But remember to put it on a ponywall or get some sort of a barrier up so you can have deep bedding in there uh with your livestock.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_01: You want to have your your carbonaceous diaper uh in there.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_01: So I hope that gives you a little bit of a little bit of insight as to you know what's what's one building better than than another one.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_01: Next question quickly uh from Cody in North Carolina, having trouble with leg problems.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not gonna read the whole thing it it it in in uh pastured poultry, raising Cornish cross chickens and uh having leg problems.
• 40:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Hatchery says, Oh, they don't have these problems with other people, you know, what you're kind of dismissive.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_01: And um, so leg problems generally come from the birds growing too fast.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_01: So um my encouragement here is next batch, when they when they hit about you know four weeks old, um take the feed away from them or let them run out of feed about three o'clock in the afternoon and don't refeed them till tomorrow and just slow them down.
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_01: Don't worry, they're not gonna starve, they're not gonna go nuts.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, they will be hungry in the morning when you feed them, but uh what you're trying to do is slow them down.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_01: These Cornish crops are are are bred and selected to grow extremely fast, and they can actually outgrow their nerve sheaths and and and their their muck their mass can grow faster than their um than their ligaments.
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_01: And then you mentioned uh uh flip overs, uh heart attacks.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that's definitely from growing too fast.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_01: So sometimes in a small situation like this, you know, you're coddling them, you're you're you're you know, you love these chickens, and you kind of over, whatever, over-coddle them, and then they grow too fast, these more, you know, um what we call racecar, nascar, high octane, double-breasted uh birds, they can grow too fast and literally grow themselves out of their ligaments and their organs.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so just slow them down.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_01: You know, take a couple weeks, um, let them run out of feed.
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_01: You're saying you feed them twice a day.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_01: All right, well, don't feed them but once a day, and just let them run out of feed for a week or so, slow them down, and um, and hopefully that'll um that'll solve a lot of your problem.
• 42:01
  SPEAKER_01: And the final question here is um about Oregon, where they're trying, looks like they're trying to claim that even a three-cal dairy, where Oregon's one of the wonderful states where uh you can sell raw milk with impunity.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_01: No licensing, no regulations, no nothing.
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_01: Sell raw milk, but with from only three cows.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_01: And uh apparently there's an effort in Oregon, according to Kate uh Henderson, who wrote in um saying that that they're trying to because you put a cow in a stanchion, um, they're calling these three cow dairies concentrated animal feeding operations because they put the cows in a stanchion.
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_01: Well, if if the stanchion is what defines the KFO, don't use a stanchion.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_01: We used to we we milked we milked by hand for decades on our farm, a couple Guernseys, up to two or three at a time, and we just we just put a rope around her neck.
• 43:06
  SPEAKER_01: We didn't use a stanchion.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_01: So if a I I don't know what the law is here, but if but if it's if a stanchion is the problem, don't use a stanchion.
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_01: You can milk a cow without a stanchion.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um you know, there's there's a lot of different ways to to get around a lot of these regulations.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_01: And so just don't do whatever the definition is and and maybe you can get around it.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_01: Now, if if the stanchion is not really the issue and they're just trying to to call even a three-cow dairy a concentrated animal feeding operation, that's obviously a different, you know, a different story, a different solution.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_01: But um, you can be assured that that um that there are a lot of efforts to eliminate all sorts of things, you know, around the world.
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_01: And um, and we're no exception.
• 43:59
  SPEAKER_01: So there's no end to the machinations of the government and people who think they're sincerely doing well to um you know to try to regulatorily and with federal agencies uh botch up both freedom to innovate and um and trying to to get to people that they want to regulate.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_01: So the you have these unintended consequences, unfortunately.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_01: So we got through all the questions there, Cena.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh and I I guess I guess uh if we want to pose a question to people at at this end, um I think I think it'd be a fair question.
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_01: I think our group probably gets the whole raw milk um you know situation.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_01: And um we talk about parallel universes and that at some point there needs to be a way for for people to not enter the bureaucracy, the bureaucratic regulatory structure.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe we could throw out this question to our community.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_01: Oregon has had for years a three cow, uh a three cow uh exemption for licensing for raw milk.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_01: What do you think it should be?
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_01: Should it be three cows, four cows, five cows, ten cows?
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if you wanted to put a uh an exemption on a raw milk dairy, how many cows do you think makes it small enough that it's so non-industrial that we can just come outside of the industrial regulatory system?
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_01: How many cows is that?
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_01: But but I I find a lot of um interesting discussion comes when you look at at benchmarks and extremes.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_01: Articulating that, I think, is an interesting thought discussion on what what is clearly something that's that's cottage cottage-based, uh, that is small enough that it could never be called an industrial scale thing that has to go through the you know the government regulatory process licensing.
• 46:10
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, yeah, and we'll jump on the forum and check it out.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_00: And we'd love to hear your guys' questions and comments on there.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_00: So uh we do read them.
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_00: So uh feel free to jump over there and connect with us on the forum outside of the weekly release of the podcast.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_00: All right, thank you so much, everybody, for joining us.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_00: And again, Joel, thank you for your wisdom and thank you, Alex, for the question about the bio sludge.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure I don't think a lot of people know that, that biosludge can be used on conventional crops.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_00: So uh we may actually get some more questions on that too.
• 46:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like, email us if you want us to talk about that some more as well.
• 46:50
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, we've enjoyed today and we look forward to connecting with you next week.