Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t we back to where we were on the first of this month?
For all the hearings, and blistering legislator criticism of the California Department of Food and Agriculture, and reassurances from this politician and that regulator, and the involvement of high-priced lobbyists, and thousands of phone calls and faxes to legislators…isn’t AB 1735, with its 10-coliform-per-milliliter limit on raw milk—in the bottle—still in force? Isn’t California’s raw milk supply in danger?
That’s what I read into the various reports on my previous posting—thanks for all the legwork from several individuals, including Amanda Rose, Anna, AuLait, and Dave Hopton. This is a tough story to report–the powers that be don’t really want it reported at all–and a number of people have put a lot of time into trying to figure out what’s happening.
Believe me, I really wish I were wrong. I have felt any number of times during the past month that I’ve been too cynical and too pessimistic, that I’ve let myself be influenced too much by Aajonus Vonderplanitz’s bleak warnings that you can’t trust anything any of the politicians and regulators say about raw milk without having it in writing.
After all that effort, we get a commission to look into the safety of raw milk? That’s almost comical. In legislatures around the globe, when they want to stall something into oblivion, they set up a commission. Do you have any idea how many commissions we’ve had investigating what to do about Social Security? How to balance the federal budget? How to improve race relations? I don’t know exactly, but I do know that even after they recommend reasonable solutions, the politicians usually ignore them, and eventually, when the situation gets worse, set up another commission to investigate the same thing over again.
No, these guys at CDFA have taken Muhammad Ali’s rope-a-dope strategy to another level. I feel a little like I did a few years ago during a visit to Barcelona. I had just arrived to visit my daughter, who was living there, and one of the first things she advised me as we boarded a subway was to watch out for the pickpockets. So, I kept my hands on my pockets and on my fanny pack. But as I headed through a turnstyle exit, a guy in back of me tapped me on the shoulder, distracting me for just a couple seconds, and in that brief period, a guy in front opened my fanny pack and got my wallet.
I was pissed, but I was also admiring. Those guys were good. They turned pickpocketing into an art form.
That’s kind of how I feel about the CDFA guys. They really are in the wrong profession. Instead of drawing regular middle class salaries, they should be out doing Ponzi schemes and card-sharking—they’d make a lot more money. When the dust cleared, and there was a lot of dust, they kind of brushed themselves off, looked over their victims lying outside the bar, got back on their horses, and rode off into the sunset.
Maybe some tough judge will catch up with them. Mark McAfee of Organic Pastures Dairy Co tells me the next step is to seek some kind of legal injunction against enforcement of AB 1735—hopefully in the next couple of weeks. The suggestion in Amanda Rose’s otherwise great writeup on The Ethicurean that there is an injunction is incorrect—there’s nothing between California consumers and AB 1735.
I feel badly for Mark. He was trying very hard to be reasonable and flexible and to compromise. But he was in with a bunch of people like you sometimes run into in Times Square, who move the thimbles and peas around and suck your money up. I probably should have entitled this posting, “The Education of a Raw Milk Dairyman.”
Sorry about my fact check problem. Maybe it was wishful thinking from some of the parties involved.
Amanda
http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/07/04/news/state/19_24_437_3_07.txt
Backing off on the 10 mL level will be tricky. There really is no clear "safe" or "clean" level in the literature so I doubt that the commission will come away with a grand recommendation with a solid research basis. At the end of the day, it all comes back to food philosophy. If all parties shared philosophies, there would be no heat over AB1735 and David wouldn’t have this blog.
Florez (in the article linked) chairs an e coli committee. I am sure he will be interested in musing over the raw milk research but I doubt he will come to the same conclusions as Mark McAfee.
Amanda
Raw milk drinkers, in asserting that living harmoniously with pathogens (however you choose to define that word) is not only inevitable, but also necessary for health, challenge nothing less than culture. And as Don alludes, with todays aggressive state bureaucracies supporting that culture, it will not go away soon.
Our local communities can give us relief in the short term, and for some fortunate souls, the long term as well (see http://www.mundanedaily.com/?p=189 for an explanation) but hope for society as a whole rests only mans enduring belief in natural rights, and on truth.
Truth, unfortunately, is a rare commodity in systems like our state bureaucracies, which are driven by culture and power grabbing. So most of what raw milk drinkers want will necessarily be won in the courts. The courts, in turn, will beat down the bureaucracies.
In the meantime, it is important to proclaim the truth always, for to do otherwise will only energize the bureaucrats and the lies that they enforce. (I believe that is precisely whats happening right now in California with the 50 rule. Once we allowed that the test is a reasonable standard for milk quality, we conceded that the philosophy of the bureaucrats was correct, or more to the point, right. The only question left then was how hard the rule enforcers would swing their cudgel.)
http://discovermagazine.com/2007/jul/raw-data-is-dirt-the-new-prozac/article_print
The food movement needs a better way to fight the corporations, with science to counter their claims. We need a philanthropist to pay for the research that shows smaller is better and safer, not only because it doesn’t produce superbugs, but because it also maintains variability of genetic heritage.
We see the energy companies paying millions for pseudo-science to create propaganda and false claims that global warming is not human-induced. Why does anyone take this seriously? Our system is so messed up by corporate monopoly of money and power. I think I need some dirt…now!
If we have indeed reverted to 1735, it seems to me that the producers’ lawsuit team should file immediately for injunction to block 1735’s standards from being enforced. I’ve heard that was not part of their original filing — this could be incorrect — but if it’s true, then now would be the time.
I work with Aajonus’ team, which is working on filing a consumer lawsuit as well, but that suit is still cranking up, as it involves significantly more plaintiffs. The producers’ suit having already been filed makes me hopeful that they can seek an injunction right away, as we can’t move that quickly.
We put out a call for plaintiffs a while ago, which I’ll link to here — if anyone wants to get involved, you can use the Contact feature at saverawmilk.org:
http://saverawmilk.org/node/21
I’m trying to reach someone by phone who may be able to tell me what the producers’ team is planning, and if I can get that, and am allowed to share it, I will.
Thanks again —
What I keep trying to draw out the raw-milk microbiology geeks on is: If the "pathogens" issue is removed, then what would be a reasonable coliform count? Ron has said that it can become a taste/smell issue at levels "several orders of magnitude higher" than the two-digit numbers CDFA is using. And many of us want it to be pretty high, for obvious reasons. But if the milk got too funky too soon after purchase, a lot of folks wouldn’t like it, and those of us who want it really high can always just leave it out of the fridge for a day or two at home.
But so far none of the tech geeks has taken my bait. In a near-perfect world, where we had to set a limit, but we got to choose the number, what would it be? 500? 1000? 2000? 100? Let’s say at the bulk tank. Given that a) we like bacteria but b) many people like the milk to stay fresh-tasting for a while, what would be a good compromise? Again, if the whole pathogen thing is taken off the table by the specific testing, which it seems to me it is. (Or am I wrong about that part?)
Hoping I get a bite,
thanks,
I agree that taste and smell can tell you what you need to know about the safety of your milk. Unless they aren’t working very well,your nose and tongue can detect the waste products of undesirable bacteria and by the taste and smell you can infer the type of bacteria in the milk.Proffessional wine and cheese tasters are doing just that.They have taken the time to educate their taste and smell senses to differentiate between the waste products(acids and gases)of different bacteria. Different acids have different flavors and indicate the presence of different bacteria.The same is true with the gas byproducts of fermentation.
Fresh milk straight from a cows teat is incredibly sweet if everything is normal.After years of experience testing milk with a california mastitis test and then tasting the milk,I can say without any doubt that your tonge can detect a much finer difference in flavor than any mastitis test can.When we have any doubt about milk quality in one teat it is easy to simply compare the flavor to that of a different teat.
http://www.lamotte.com/pages/edu/ideas/bacteria.html
Total Coliform Bacteria Kit (4-3616 and 5850)… How does it Work?
Charlie, Technical Service, replies to a request for more information on what causes a positive Total Coliform Test using LaMotte tablets.
The tablets used to detect the presence of total coliforms contain nutrients (a proprietary cocktail!) that support the growth of coliform bacteria, a casein gelling substance (like Jell-O), and a pH indicator.
If coliform bacteria are present in the sample, a sequence of events occurs:
1. The bacteria metabolize the nutrients in the tablet, releasing CO2 gas and acids as by-products.
2. CO2 gas is trapped in the gelling substance, causing the gel to rise in the tube.
3. Acid by-products lower the pH of the sample, changing the phenol red pH indicator from red to yellow.
4. Both CO2 and acids have to be produced to detect the presence of Total Coliforms.
http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:dvoAKs_JbKcJ:edu.shams.edu.eg/%D8%A3%D9%82%D8%B3%D8%A7%D9%85%2520%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%83%D9%84%D9%8A%D8%A9/%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A3%D9%82%D8%B3%D8%A7%D9%85%2520%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B9%D9%84%D9%85%D9%8A%D8%A9/Biology/CVS/Botany/%D9%85%D9%82%D8%B1%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%AA%2520%D8%AD%D8%B3%D8%A7%D9%85/applied%2520bacteriology/%D8%A7%D8%A8%D8%AD%D8%A7%D8%AB%2520%D8%B7%D9%84%D8%A7%D8%A8/applied%2520bacteriology.doc+gas+producing+homofermenters&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=5&gl=us&client=firefox-a
Despite their complexity, the whole basis of lactic acid fermentation centres on the ability of lactic acid bacteria to produce acid, which then inhibits the growth of other non-desirable organisms. All lactic acid producers are micro-aerophilic, that is they require small amounts of oxygen to function. Species of the genera Streptococcus and Leuconostoc produce the least acid. Next are the heterofermentative species of Lactobacillus which produce intermediate amounts of acid, followed by the Pediococcus and lastly the homofermenters of the Lactobacillus species, which produce the most acid. Homofermenters, convert sugars primarily to lactic acid, while heterofermenters produce about 50% lactic acid plus 25% acetic acid and ethyl alcohol and 25% carbon dioxide. These other compounds are important as they impart particular tastes and aromas to the final product.
This is all ridiculously theoretical at the moment anyway — I think we are back to AB1735 for now but am still checking that out — but I am dreaming of the day when we can have input into what a reasonable standard would actually be. And I know that many of us want no limit at all on coliforms, but if we ever got a rulemaking process going, I suspect we would have to set some limit. But I’m thinking it could be really, really high, compared to say 50, and a high limit would help enable new raw dairies to start up. So I’m hoping someone will come up with a number that compromises well between the freshness-favoring and the funkiness-favoring consumers. Would you like to give it a whirl? Thanks,
Who do you trust more,a lab technician or your own nose and tongue? If we are talking about taste then we don’t need to enforce a standard on anyone. If you want a number,lets pick a number of days that the milk still tastes fresh to you when it is kept at 36 deg F.If you buy milk once a week,it better still taste fresh for a week.Really good quality milk can taste fresh for longer.
Save a bit of milk from your last jar and compare it to the fresh milk you just brought home. It should taste almost as sweet as the fresh milk.