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On the death of my family's dairy farm (2019)

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Re: On the death of my family's dairy farm (2019)

#181

Post by rootusrootus »

analog31 wrote: post #177
xipho wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to equate hard work ethic with sustainability, this is false. You obviously have never experienced the joys of winters with nothing todo except read, learn, cook and play, because you worked insanely hard on the farm for 6-8 months of the growing season (being your own boss, but who cares about that).

A friend of mine is a farmer -- typical Wisconsin corn & beans. Those winters are spent finding other income sources. Some of his activities: Driving the big snow plows. Short haul truck driving on country roads in the dark. Repairing his ancient equipment. Being a local dealer for something or other. Same with any time slot that he can fill during the growing season. An issue he faces is that he pays more for seeds…

> he looks about 20 years older

OTOH, my grandfather, who worked his own farm until he was deep into his 80s, is just about to celebrate 102. Up until a couple years ago he was still taking stairs two at a time, and winning corn shucking contests. Would he have made it so far, or in such good shape, if he had spent his life at a desk?

Re: On the death of my family's dairy farm (2019)

#182

Post by missingrib »

esaym wrote: post #160
ainiriand wrote: post #13

As a vegan, I am concerned about the cruel treatment of farm animals. Losing family farms only aggravates the problem in this price race against the bigger actors in dairy production. While dairy is not strictly necessary for grown ups, I recognise that it will be present for some time so we should care about how it is produced. Dairy should be more expensive than it is now, similar to what happens to meat.

>As a vegan, I am concerned about the cruel treatment of farm animals. For a somewhat malicious counter point... if the entire world stopped using dairy and beef, the cow as we know it would quickly go extinct. They have no natural habitat, they can't take care of themselves, and they make really lousy pets. It is a somewhat similar story with elephants. They make lousy pets as well and selling ivory is illegal. So t…

I don't understand this focus on "species" in the abstract over the individual members of the species.

Re: On the death of my family's dairy farm (2019)

#183

Post by saalweachter »

fogihujy wrote: post #51
corty wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chores around a house are an educational tool and may be considered beneficial. On a farm, you get lots of additional "chores" on top. Where the "chores" are hard labour, often dangerous, at times early in the morning before school and in an amount where you do replace paid workers. A household does work without a child doing chores. A family farm won't be profitable without the free labour from the children. There i…

Just an anecdotal observation from a part-time farmer: I couldn't keep my daughter away from farmwork even if I wanted to; it's not all about exploitation.

As both a child and a parent my experience has been, (young) children want to do whatever their parents are doing.

Re: On the death of my family's dairy farm (2019)

#184

Post by rootusrootus »

lettergram wrote: post #71
DC1350 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Couldn’t you feed a family high quality food for a few decades with $500k? This seems like a lot of effort if you aren’t planning on making a profit.

That’s fair, but two posits (1) you can’t really get high quality food outside a lot of sourcing and effort. As an example, I grow purple green beans that taste better than any green bean I’ve every bought. You may be able to get that particular green bean from a specialty shop, but I’m doing this with 30 different plants on 1-2 acres. I can harvest and eat the plants the same day as well (which has far more nutritio…

> you can’t really get high quality food outside a lot of sourcing and effort

To be fair, this is very dependent upon the region you live in. I live in a suburban area bordering on farmland, and so I can get piles of really good quality foods at my local farmer's market every weekend. There's farms naturally raising grass fed beef, as well. And a couple people that go out to the Pacific and catch fish and then sell it at the same farmer's market.

I imagine that's a bit of a luxury in some places, for sure, but I'd bet it's not that uncommon, either.

Re: On the death of my family's dairy farm (2019)

#185

Post by Falling3 »

efiecho wrote: post #46
ainiriand wrote: post #13

As a vegan, I am concerned about the cruel treatment of farm animals. Losing family farms only aggravates the problem in this price race against the bigger actors in dairy production. While dairy is not strictly necessary for grown ups, I recognise that it will be present for some time so we should care about how it is produced. Dairy should be more expensive than it is now, similar to what happens to meat.

> While dairy is not strictly necessary for grown ups, I recognise that it will be present for some time so we should care about how it is produced. Dairy should be more expensive than it is now, similar to what happens to meat. Dairy and meat is part of a healthy diet. While not impossible to do without, health problems often develops with time. That's why most people (84%) who adopts a vegan diet at some point in t…

> [health problems are] why most people (84%) who adopts a vegan diet at some point in their lives, returns to eating meat and dairy again

How did you come to that conclusion and what data do you have to support it? The overwhelming majority of ex-vegans I know did so because of either convenience or missing specific foods.

Re: On the death of my family's dairy farm (2019)

#187

Post by xipho »

nineplay wrote: post #164
xipho wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My grandfather had a dairy barn, I'm aware of this. The community around it rebuilt it when it was burned, looked after it when he travelled across the country etc. Was it hard? Certainly. To suggest his (and his families) life was somehow less joyous than a 9-5 hacking l33t code all year is insanity.

The writer of the articles was very clear that _he_ found farming less joyous than "9-5 hacking l33t code". Your argument is more with him than with me. The writer's other two siblings also found more "joyous" things to do. It isn't for everyone, and that is going to continue to be the reason that they can't survive against Big Ag.

Right. I don't have an argument with the writer, its a wonderful article, spot on. Yes my families work was largely pre-big ag. Nothing is for everyone. The trigger that looped me in here was the "not sustainable because hard work", I drifted to tangents too quickly.

Re: On the death of my family's dairy farm (2019)

#188

Post by kayodelycaon »

efiecho wrote: post #46
ainiriand wrote: post #13

As a vegan, I am concerned about the cruel treatment of farm animals. Losing family farms only aggravates the problem in this price race against the bigger actors in dairy production. While dairy is not strictly necessary for grown ups, I recognise that it will be present for some time so we should care about how it is produced. Dairy should be more expensive than it is now, similar to what happens to meat.

> While dairy is not strictly necessary for grown ups, I recognise that it will be present for some time so we should care about how it is produced. Dairy should be more expensive than it is now, similar to what happens to meat. Dairy and meat is part of a healthy diet. While not impossible to do without, health problems often develops with time. That's why most people (84%) who adopts a vegan diet at some point in t…

> While not impossible to do without, health problems often develops with time.

I beg to differ here. I'm allergic to all dairy products (protein allergy), and I haven't had any problem keeping a healthy diet.

Dairy isn't at all necessary for survival after you're able to eat and digest solid food. In fact, most mammals and 65% of humans develop lactose intolerance by adulthood.

Meat? That's a bit more difficult to replace in a completely vegan diet without vitamin supplements.

Re: On the death of my family's dairy farm (2019)

#189

Post by hshshs2 »

rootusrootus wrote: post #181
analog31 wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A friend of mine is a farmer -- typical Wisconsin corn & beans. Those winters are spent finding other income sources. Some of his activities: Driving the big snow plows. Short haul truck driving on country roads in the dark. Repairing his ancient equipment. Being a local dealer for something or other. Same with any time slot that he can fill during the growing season. An issue he faces is that he pays more for seeds…

> he looks about 20 years older OTOH, my grandfather, who worked his own farm until he was deep into his 80s, is just about to celebrate 102. Up until a couple years ago he was still taking stairs two at a time, and winning corn shucking contests. Would he have made it so far, or in such good shape, if he had spent his life at a desk?

he might have - health is important but once you pass a general fitness baseline living past 100 is just a crapshoot

if it were simply a matter of exercise we’d have a lot more people living past 100

Re: On the death of my family's dairy farm (2019)

#190

Post by m463 »

I think there's one thing to mention - this has been happening for a long long time.

In my family tree, there were lots and lots of farmers, and now there are no farmers left.

Looking backward along your family tree you'll probably find the same, probably like something in this blog post.

I think this is the graph that might describe it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture#/media/File:Transi...

I think we have to sort of figure out not only the loss, but the gain.

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