¡Join the fight!
El Dragón's Most Popular Posts
Rosendale Dairy and the Green Bay of Manure
Like the rest of America's dairy industry, Wisconsin's has consolidated greatly over the last generation -- with the number of farms decreasing and the average size increasing -- but dairyman Jim Ostrom would like to take it a step further by expanding his operation, Rosendale Dairy, from 4000 to 8000 head, making it the largest CAFO in the state.
To date, the Dairy State has resisted taking the California strategy of mega-consolidation, and as a result, in the mid-nineties, Wisconsin's dairy production, a point of real state pride (I know, I grew up there), was eclipsed by California's production, whose average dairy herd size is now 825 head compared to Wisconsin's more family-farm-sized 97 cattle.
Those numbers only tell part of the story, since 800-head dairies aren't the source of California's dairy muscle. In the biggest California dairies, after all, giant milking parlors of 10,000 cattle are "fed" by loafing barns, each of which could hold 1000 to 2000 cattle -- making for CAFOs of 15,000 to 20,000 head. This is the trend for the American dairy industry, to "bigger and bigger" as Dr. Seuss called it; especially out west, this strategy has been fully embraced (see chart below -- New Mexico is the fastest growing dairy state): The largest dairy CAFO in America holds 50- to 55,000 milk cows -- Threemile Canyon Dairy in Oregon.
Chart via UMass Center for Agriculture
So one hears provincial pride, loud and clear, when Jim Ostrom argued for bringing the West Coast megadairy strategy to Wisconsin back in 2006. His vision of an 8000-head dairy west of Fond dul Lac, Wisconsin, will most likely become reality when the DNR approves his permit in January. In fact, so confident is Ostrom that Rosendale has already completed Phase I of its expansion.
So all that's left is public relations. In a recent op-ed to the Fond du Lac Reporter, Ostrom said two critics had recently visited Rosendale Dairy and walked away wooed by the kinder, gentler operation. One visitor even emailed later to say that this was a good CAFO.
Now, I'm not a watershed specialist or environmental scientist, but as long as CEO Ostrom is entertaining opinions of ordinary citizens, I'd like to weigh in, too. Because, as someone who grew up about a half hour from the proposed site, I think its a disaster waiting to happen.
My first thought when I heard about 8000 cows for Rosendale Dairy, was that this was (a) too many cows, too close to Wisconsin's largest inland lake, Lake Winnebago, which is already an ecological problem thanks to the state's paper mill industry, because (b) the manure spreading plan looks like a horrible joke. Just look at the map and the number of streams over which Rosendale's manure will be spread. Those streams feed the West Branch of the Fond du Lac River, which flows ultimately into Lake Winnebago, less than 15 miles away.
Ostrom claims the manure is a resource for area farmers (a common CAFO defense), but I'm not the only one who thinks the Rosendale manure plan is a problem. From Midwest Environmental Advocates:
The sheer scale of Rosendale Dairy is unprecedented in Wisconsin. The new factory farm will produce and store over 90 million gallons of manure and wastewater each year; only the cities of Milwaukee and Madison produce more biological waste. Yet unlike these municipalities, the dairy will store the untreated manure in open lagoons before spreading it – still untreated – on area cropland. (MEA's complete comments to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources can be read here.)
Indeed. It will be a Green Bay's worth of manure (via "The Motely Cow" -- click on link to read a good column).
Worse is the potential damage to wells and water in the region. In September, The New York Times reported on CAFO pollution to the north of Lake Winnebago, including kids that were sickened from polluted wells. But the landform on which Rosendale's megadairy sits is a karst topography, meaning that the soil is shallow and the water table is sometimes only a few feet below the surface, making it particularly vulnerable to runoff pollution (thank you Mr. Moen and Landforms of Wisconsin Geology class, freshman year in high school). For this reason, Wisconsin Trout Unlimited called for an independent audit of Rosendale's permit back in April, when it was just a 4000-head dairy.
At the Motely Cow link, Mark Peterson reports that "Rosendale has already been caught spreading manure too close to established wells, in violation of their permit." But I couldn't verify that myself.
In the final analysis, I'm not optimistic that caution will prevail. Innovation and ag go together in Wisconsin like beer and Harleys, and Ostrom talks a good game in this regard (as you can see from the video below, where Ostrom tells the Rosendale story is in his own words). It's very difficult to imagine the State of Wisconsin resisting Ostrom's plan for competing with California, New Mexico and Oregon, and regaining Wisconsin's stature as Number One Dairy State.
El Dragón
Comments
CAFO approval
Approval of the permit may or may not be inevitable, but the neighbors and others band together and make a stink about a couple of things, they may be able to hold him accountable and discourage other CAFOs from setting up shop:
1) baseline and continued regular testing: of soil nutrient loads, ground water quality (full panels of the usual, and including hormones, antibiotics, and heavy metals), and air quality. Also a full assessment of property values in the surrounding area. If they want to argue about the need to do these things, it would be very easy to put together a list of places where dairy CAFOs have set up shop and subsequently wrecked all of them. A quick example: back in 1999, 64% of Idaho's ammonia emissions were due to livestock; since then, our dairy cattle inventory has grown exponentially, and our air quality and ground water nitrate problems have gotten far worse.
2) bonding: just to make sure that if he does set up shop and then go out of business, the state isn't stuck with the clean-up tab. Also, if he winds up polluting people's wells, he can be held accountable.
3) make sure EPA is involved and up-to-date: in the not-so-long-past dark ages, EPA was woefully ineffective at dealing with CAFO issues; nowadays is another story entirely. If there are streams nearby that run into waters of the US, you'll have their attention. Also, find out if the CAFO's going to be sitting on top of a sole-source aquifer-- if it is, you'll have even more of their attention.
Lastly, if he does get approval, that shouldn't be thought of as the end of the fight. Neighbors should keep as detailed documentation of problems they have with him as possible-- photos with time and date stamps, log books, private well test records, etc. The more evidence you have in hand when you ask the state or feds to take enforcement action or shut him down, the better. It'll also come in handy in the event of a lawsuit.
And if anyone would like to talk with me more in-depth about this stuff, I'd be more than happy. ICARE fights CAFOs in Idaho, but we do what we can to help and support people outside the state as well. Just shoot me an email.
a day at the beach
those cows have it made!
sand that feels like 'laying on the beach', better food than humans... makes you wish you were a dairy cow in that CAFO, poisoning the aquifer with your concentrated excrement.
i guess wisconsin isn't america's "cow hell" afterall
This "Disney" presentation
This "Disney" presentation only fools the the naive. They don't show you the manure lagoons and the rest of the facility.
all roads lead to CAFOs
Or what's going to happen to the rural roads around this area.
If you're a civil administrator at ANY level, and you happen to be weighing whether or not to approve a CAFO, get it in writing that your CAFO's owner will pay substantial, yearly fees to upkeep roads in a 10-30 mile radius around the "farm."
I'm growing to realize that damage to public roads from all the heavy traffic in and out of a big CAFO is one of the costliest aspects of centralizing livestock ag this way.
Really?
I love how all of you can come on here and bad mouth the expansion of a businesss. Would you all create this big of a stick if walmart were to expand or build another facility? I highly doubt it!!! Have any of you taken the time to research and go deeper into the operation what actually goes on, the tight regulation's that they are held to. Or are you just going off what you "think" goes on.
Farming is the backbone of america, it has been around since the beginning of time. Farmer's spend long hours, year round working there tail off, putting family and personal life n the back burner, to support YOU!!! And provide for you the esseential and finer emmenities you enjoy on a daily basis. Do you know where that cold glass of milk came from that you drank for breakfast? No it was not the store, it was a farm, probabaly the same farm you want to shut down!!! Take the time once to see what the farm provide's you in your daily life, then think about what it would be like without. Quite different i know.
Farming is the heart and sole of several wisconsin family's, as it is mine. Farmer's have a passion for the land, and the animal's that is more than anyone out there. We also have a strong passion for our job, and our quest to produce the best, highest quality products posible for YOU!! Maybe some of you should step back and look at that, and look at the big picture instead trying to find all the negative's!!!!
Farming built america and this is how you treat us!!! Very Sad!!!
Get in the ring, baby
Hi. Thanks for stopping by.
First off, since you obviously Googled your way to this 3-month old post and didn't bother reading anything else, let me explain what Fair Food Fight is. We talk about food and farming here. Organics, sustainability, real food, the labeling games that big food companies play to fool shoppers, and even the ins and outs of big ag farming.
Fair Food Fight is sponsored by Equal Exchange, a fair trade food company (coffee, bananas, nuts, chocolates, teas) that has done an exemplary job of providing access-to-market for small, organic, sustainable farmers abroad who are otherwise shut out of the food system because of their size, who don't have access to credit that big comglomerate farms do, and who are creating a just and democratic food system.
My goal as a blogger is to take those same principles of Equal Exchange's and examine issues swirling around US domestic food and ag system. Why? Because small farmers in the US face the same issues that small coffee farmers face in, say, Nicaragua -- particularly in this rough economy. Particularly in the dairy industry. As I'm sure you know, many, many small US dairy farmers are not receiving a price for milk that even covers their cost of goods, and haven't been for over a year. That's beyond unsustainable. That's a nightmare.
What's the answer? Many in the industry think they need to get bigger and consolidate, drive prices down, and volume up. That's the Rosendale Dairy strategy. But I say that's how we got here in the first place. Consolidation edges out small, independent farmers, even in good economies -- and there we are, back to the access-to-market issue that many small coffee farmers have sadly faced.
I'm not saying all CAFOs and big operations are problematic. But the strategy of consolidation does have its drawbacks, particularly, that bigger CAFOs have dire consequences when they fail. As citizens, we owe it to our land and ourselves to ask lots of questions about CAFO expansion, because when big CAFOs do fail, as in Union-Go Dairy in Indiana, they create a host of environmental problems and stick taxpayers with the clean-up cost when they go out of business.
Small farms don't tend to create such problems. Especially small, sustainable farms.
Is Rosendale Dairy going to fail or become a massive polluter? I've laid out my case as to why the State of Wisconsin should have been very skeptical about issuing a permit. If you want an even deeper dig into the problems that Rosendale Dairy might pose to the local water system, read this article at La Vida Locavore. I also question Rosendale's financial viability, being built as it is during the midst of a giant milk glut.
So I'm not bashing farmers. I literally have my local dairy's number in my cell phone (Cedar Summit Organic Dairy) and I call when I need to learn something from the Minars about dairying, grazing, or organic production. The whole goal of Fair Food Fight is to hammer these issues out so that shoppers and consumers know what they're getting when they make choices at the grocery.
Lots of non "organic" farmers like to hang out here and educate me, argue with me, and I like engaging in the discussion with them. Check out this discussion on dehorning -- I think there are some 10 different farmers weighing in on that thread, maybe more. We don't always agree, but the debate is typically pretty rich for everyone, but it means actually talking to each other, proving your point, and not just scolding or stamping your feet, anonymous.
I welcome you as a farmer to hang around and actually join the debate here on Fair Food Fight.
California Dairy Cafos
Dear all - am a UK citizen currently stranded in the US and wishing to make the most of my time here - back home I am part of a group fighting the proposal for our first diary CAFO - 8100 cows are the target - in a country which is only 2/3 the size of California ... am interested to see how one of the Californian CAFOs works - any suggestions please?
California
You're interested in visiting a big CAFO, as in, a classic "factory farm"? That might be tough, especially if you approach the CAFO employees/managers with a skeptical, judgemental demeanor. But are you asking where they are? Advice on how to contact?
California
Thanks for your reply - Yes please, suggestions of those I would benefit from visiting - I need to do my research. I'm a BBC trained journalist,, so you can rely on my to be non confrontational - this is what it is, a fact finding exercise using some time that I didn't expect to have!
Post new comment