THE NON-GMO DAIRY REVOLUTION . . . ANTIGONISH LIMESTONE TO HAVE NEW ACCESS  . . . KING’S CHOICE  . . . PESTICIDE APPLICATOR’S CERTIFICATION . . . SCIENTISTS PRODUCE TB-RESISTANT COWS . . . OTHER NEWS OF INTEREST...

THE NON-GMO DAIRY REVOLUTION
Source: ACORN
Snowville Creamery, based in Pomeroy, Ohio, is a small dairy operation, but its owner, Warren Taylor, has big ideas. Taylor wants to change the food system – from one based on factory farms and GMOs to one based on local, sustainable, non-GMO, and organic farms and foods. He is starting with his own operation. Taylor is a career dairyman; he followed in his father’s footsteps and became a dairy process engineer. In his 40-plus-year career, Taylor designed processing plants and systems for companies such as Safeway, Dannon, Land O’ Lakes, and Yoplait. Cut him and Taylor says he will “bleed white.” (read more)

ANTIGONISH LIMESTONE TO HAVE NEW ACCESS
Source: The Chronicle Herald
Bernie Landry continues to be employed. “It’s just the two of us here," the manager of the two-man workforce at Antigonish Limestone Ltd. said Monday. The province recently approved a 20-year lease of 41.7 hectares of Crown land next to the firm’s existing Southside Antigonish Harbour quarry. For nearly 50 years, it has been quarrying limestone for use as an acid neutralizer on farms and at Northern Pulp in Pictou County, he said. The company’s 2.4 hectares have been exhausted and the access to Crown land will allow it to maintain production, he said. (read more)

KING’S CHOICE
Source: Atlantic Beef & Sheep
Kings Mutual Insurance Company has chosen BLM Meats, a three-member beef marketing co-op in Pictou County, as its Producer of the Year. The award was presented at the Nova Scotia Cattle Producers annual general meeting in Truro Feb. 21. The three beef farmers pictured here with NSCP Chair Larry Weatherby holding the plaque are, left to right, David Lavers, Auchencairn Farm in Rockfield; Blair Battist, Lochview Farm, Lyons Brook; and Danny MacDonald of Little Dan-D Farms, Mt. Thom. The three family farms raise hormone and antibiotic-free beef that’s killed, aged two weeks, and butchered at a provincially licensed abattoirs. The cuts – ground beef, grilling steaks, roasts, stew meat, soup bones, etc. are sold at the New Glasgow Farmers’ Market throughout the market season, Saturdays nine to noon in the market’s parking lot throughout the rest of the year, as well as from each of the farms.

PESTICIDE APPLICATOR’S CERTIFICATION
Source: Dalhousie Faculty of Agriculture
This course is delivered at the Agricultural Campus, in Bible Hill, N.S., Monday through Thursday, April 13-16. Application deadline: Monday, March 23. This four-day course is excellent preparation if you are writing the Pesticide Applicator’s Examination. You will learn the basic principles and practices of safe use, handling, and storage of pesticides. (read more)

SCIENTISTS PRODUCE TB-RESISTANT COWS
Source: BBC
Scientists in China have produced a herd of genetically engineered cows that are better able to ward off bovine TB infection. The long-term goal of the research is to avoid the need to cull livestock by breeding disease resistant cattle. Bovine TB is a risk in many areas, including New Zealand, England, Wales, and parts of Africa and Asia. In the UK more than 26,000 cattle were slaughtered in 2013 at a cost to taxpayers of £100m. (read more)