AlO-Lancaster Fanning, Saturday, February 13, 1993
OPINION
Farmers
Should Be Complimented
You usually serve environment and the public best when you
cultivate the land in the most cost effective manner. Grant Troop,
president of the Pennsylvania Master Com Growers, said it best.
“...when you look at what pays and what doesn’t, the limits of
economy are in line with what’s best for the environment,” Troop
said.
Chemicals are needed for weed control. Fertilizers are needed
as plant food. When chemicals are used according to label restric
tions, they serve food production well and do no harm to the envi
ronment. Harmful chemicals have been taken from the market
long ago.
And when fertilizers are applied according to present plant
needs in proper applications according to soil tests, no excess
nutrients build up in the soil. And the environment sustains man
kind in the process. This applies to farming.
But the same principle of management applies to other land
uses as well. It makes no sense to allow a renewable resource to
rot and go to waste. Plants and trees can be used or harvested and
new replacement crops planted. Young healthy plants and trees
are better for the environment than dead and rotting trees in a
forest. Barren fields left to wild growths of obnoxious weeds and
deteriorating soils cost taxpayers money.
Farming contributes to the public good by providing a bounti
ful food supply. And farming contributes to the environment by
holding off development, keeping the soil porous so rainwater
can be asborbed and by growing millions of plants that help keep
the air clean. Farmers should be complimented, not berated, for
their efforts and contributions to society and the environment.
Farm Forum
Editor:
Some decades ago there were
20,000,000 farmers in America.
That number dwindled until, as of
July, there were 900,000, and each
day since it declined by 2,000. It
could be that there are just about
600- to 700-thousand farmers
now.
Divide 600,000 into
260,000,000 Americans and that
comes out to over 400 persons per
farmer, for whom those farmers
have to provide food and supplies.
Add to those 400 Americans per
farmer about another 400 foreig
ners. No farmer can provide all the
needs for 800 people. That’s
impossible.
It looks like the big question is
coming over the horizon Who
shall eat and who shall not?
It’s not that the population
expanded that is the problem; it is
that the number of farmers have
declined.
The environmentalists, DER,
EPA, OSHA, labor laws, ordi
nances, wildlife-lovers and the
kind are absolutely responsible for
the decline and scarcity of the far
mers. There should be no less than
Farm Calendar
Cumberland County Holstein
Club annual meeting, Penn
Twp. Fire Hall, Huntsdale,
10:45 a.m.
Small and Part-Time Farmer
Workshop, Clarion Co. Vo-
Tech.
Sund.i\. 1 iln ii.ii \ 14
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Pa. Nursery Conference, Hershey
5 million farmers to provide the
needs for the people.
Our politicians failed to under
stand this. It’s too late to under
stand or do much about it, because
the damage is here.
TheyTl have to forget the envir
onmental laws, and stop harassing
the farmers.
Farmers don’t have to produce
food at all and do it in fear. But
everybody has to eat
Food is more important than the
environment or the Bay. People
drink out of the river down to the
Maryland line. Baltimore is the
biggest polluter of the Bay. What’s
more is the fish and aquatic life in
the Bay discharge more excrement
into the Bay than all the livestock
in Pennsylvania, Maryland, New
York and Delaware do.
It’s time to gekoff of the backs
of the farmers and forget all envir
onmental laws including the nutri
ent bill.
Forty million people in America
are starving and, if the environ
mentalists have their way, most of
America will starve.
Paul Holowka
York
Convention Center, thru Feb.
17.
Crop Production Satellite Semi
nar. Grain Crops.
Bradford Co. Dairy Day, Troy
Middle School, Troy, 9:30
a.m.-3:30 p.m.
Tunnel Ventilation of Dairy Bams,
Lancaster Farm and Home Cen-
ter, 1 p.m.
New Holland Vegetable Day,
Summit Valley School, New
Holland, 9:30 a.m.-3:15 p.m.
NOW IS
THE TIME
By John Schwartz
Lancaster County
Agricultural Agent
To Acclimate
Young Cattle
According to Chester Hughes,
extension livestock agent, the first
few days calves and young cattle
are in the feed yard will have the
biggest influence on your profits.
Newly arrived cattle typically
face a great deal of stress when
they arrive to the feed yard. They
may be arriving after hours on a
truck only to find themselves con
fronted by unfamiliar
surroundings.
The stress may be such that the
cattle do not even recognize the
feed bunk or the feed in it. Several
basic steps may help smooth the
transition and encourage the new
arrivals to settle and begin normal
eating.
Start the cattle on a mixture of
high quality long stem grass hay
and concentrate. The ration should
be 40 to 60 percent concentrate (14
percent protein, 0.67 percent cal
cium, 0.45 percent phosphorus,
0.80 percent potassium, and about
2,000 units of vitamin A per pound
dry matter). Lean toward the lower
concentrate mix if steers or heifers
are headed toward a high roughage
ration; pick the higher concentrate
level if their destination is a finish
ing diet.
Over the first three to four days,
begin reducing the hay component
of the mixture until you are putting
no hay in the bunk. Start dusting
Dear Editor:
I would like to add to the article
covering the dairy industry’s
meeting with Sen. Wofford’s
office.
Every dairy farmer in the coun
try would feel the shock waves if
the post-communist countries and
third-world nations are givend
uty-free access to our market.
They are not under the gun to pro
duce quality milk.
We pay the U.S. government to
store “surplus” dairy products in
the spirit of the deficit-reduction
bill.
We pay the USDA in order to
advertise our milk and dairy
products.
The U.S. dairy farmers will feel
the blast of the media when
imported cheese is found to have
residues or poor quality. It will
affect all of us and it would under
mine all the effort we put forth in
advertising our own product.
Highly subsidized Western
European nations such as England
and Germany could send milk into
(Turn to Page A3O)
ABC Disk 5, Southern Lancaster,
Hoffman Bldg., Solanco Fair
grounds, 7 p.m.
ABC Disk 6, Maryland Emory
Church, Street, Md., noon.
ABC Dish 10, Fayette, Firmani’s
Rest., Uniontown, 10:30 a.m. Legalism tends to tunnel vision.
ABC Disk 12, Redwood Restaur- Focused on living up to certain
rules, we tend to overlook other
(Turn to Page A3l)
the ration with silage in place of
hay. Cattle should be ready to
move to a regular feeding program
within 14 to 21 days.
To Reduce
Stress On
Newly Arrived Cattle
To minimize stress on newly
arrived calves and young cattle,
Hughes suggests a probiotic and
vitamin B be included in the feed if
the cattle have been off feed for
more than a few days. Also, anti
biotics may be appropriate if the
cattle have been stressed severely
or otherwise may be likely candi
dates for shipping fever.
A coccidiostat should be given
to calves or cattle that have been
through public marketing chan
nels. Design the vaccination and
processing program to fit what you
know about the history of the
calves and cattle being received.
If possible, postpone any castra
tion, dehoming or other stress
creating management steps until
the new arrivals have adjusted to
their surroundings and settled on to
feed.
To Buy
High Quality
Pullets
The quality of the pullet going
HERIT BADGE
RELIGION
February 14,1993
Background Scripture:
Romans 10.
Devotional Reading:
1 Corinthians 9:19-27
Lots of things in life work on
the merit basis-or are supposed
to: school, scouting, profession,
employment, athletics, awards,
medals and honors.
Many expect merit to be the
basis of religion too. Whatever
religious awards there are
salvation, eternal life, and so
forth—it is logical that we would
assume that those benefits are to
be appropriated on the basis of our
personal merit: the more righteous
we are, the greater our reward. If
we attain this, it is our
accomplishment.
Paul says: “I bear them witness
that they have a zeal for God, but
it is not enlightened. For, being
ignorant of the righteousness that
comes from God, and seeking to
establish their own, they did not
submit to God’s righteousness.
For Christ is the end of the 1aw...”
(10:2-4).
UNENLIGHTENED
The merit approach tended to
make people proud and arrogank
not humble. Instead of focusing on
the goodness of God, people were
intent on their own legal merit-'
righteousness as a personal
achievement rather than a divine
gift. That is still true, isn’t it?
Arrogant pride is often the result.
The merit approach also leads
some people to go in the opposite
direction. Instead of becoming
complacent with their moral per
formance, they despair of salva
tion because they know they can
never be righteous enough. These
people go through life suspecting
that they are too sinful to be saved,
that their sin is greater than God’s
grace.
into the laying house is one of the
biggest factors determining egg
production.
Frank Baber. DeKalb, at the
recent poultry management semi
nar, showed actual production
graphs where the number of eggs
produced to 30 weeks of age varied
by 16 eggs per hen housed. This
translates into a income difference
of at least 64 cents per bird.
Trying to buy or produce the
cheapest pullet is not the most pro
fitable. That 64 cents bird differ
ence will easily pay for proper
feeding. heath, and rrowina nrop
rams. Also, we must recognize the
geneticist has changed the genetics
of today’s laying hen.
To take advantage of these
changes, we must make adjust
ments to both our pullet growing
programs and laying house man
agement. If you have not made
adjustments in your management
programs during the last five
years, you should re-evaluate
them.
Discuss these programs with
your chick and feed sales people.
At 64 cents per bird, now is the
time to take action.
Feather Profs Footnote:
"Quality only happens when you
care enough to do your best."
moral imperatives that may be
even more important. If we
achieve respectable lifestylcs
don’t steal, get drunk, commit
adultery, kill or blaspheme, but go
to church and pay our pledge--we
may likely assume that is all that
God requires of us. We forget that
‘respectability’ has to do with how
other people regard us, while
‘righteousness’ is concerned with
how we relate to God.
A SUBSTITUTE FOR
GOD
The ‘law’ can become a sub
sume for God. In the 10 com
mandments it is specified that
Israel shall have no other gods
before the Lord and forswear ido
latry. But their passion for the law
sometimes superseded their pas
sion for God and their pharasaic
approach to the law often became
an idol that they venerated in place
of God.
Finally, Paul saw they were
wrong in assuming that righteous
ness produced salvation. In actual
ity, says Paul, salvation produces
righteousness. No matter how
well he kept the law, Paul realized
he could never be righteous
enough to merit God’s salvation.
Only the undeserved love of God
-grace-could save him. But,
because he was saved by God’s
love, he then was motivated to live
righteously and that often look
him considerably beyond the law.
If merit badge religion is right, I
don’t have a chance, for, like Paul,
I can never be good enough to
merit God’s love. But if Paul is
right, God’s love is dependent, not
upon me, but upon his own gra
cious nature and will. And, if he
loves me and saves me, just as 1
am, then I will do all I can to show
my gratitude and thanksgiving in
living as righteously as I can.
You, too?
Lancaster Farming
Established 19SS
Published Every Saturday
Ephrata Review Building
1 E. Main St.
Ephrata. PA 17522
by
Lancaster Farming, Inc.
A SHiiumn £nhtpm»
Robert C. Campbell General Manager
Everett R. Newewanger Managing Editor
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