Massive Egg Farm Unwelcome in the San Joaquin Valley

Another outbreak of avian flu virus is all the more likely if additional factory farms are built in the region. The deadly combo of contaminated environment in the cages and the overdose of antibiotics (and anti-virals) being force fed to the birds doesn't protect them from deadly resistant viral or bacteria strains in the long term..

Contrary to corporate media spin dr.s, avian flu is not the result of migratory waterfowl. The instances of transmitted bird flu viruses in waterfowl is similar to in humans, it is like the common cold and within a few days the birds are better and return to their foraging. Since the migratory birds are essentially free to forage at will (until another corporate entity plops down into their former wetlands with a subdivision parking lot) they get plenty of fresh, vibrant food from wetlands plants and enjoi sun, fresh air and plenty of leg/wing motion. This in turn renders them heathier than the factory farmed birds and thus less suceptible to severe loss from avian flu epidemics..

Unlike their wild cousins, factory farmed chickens DO NOT get fresh air, sunlight, wing/leg motion or nutritious food. Nor is their environment clean, the constant need for antibiotics is an indication of their filthy surroundings. Many human workers in the poultry farms also experience acute respiratory disease from breathing in the fragmented dust of feces, feathers, food and fertilizer. Contained is this fine dust are particulates that transport viral matter for great distances in the San Joaquin Valley's winds. Somewhere in that delectable combo of fowl feather dust exists a really mean and angry avian flu bug with evolved resistance to the antivirals provided by pharmaceutical (No, Rumsfeld's 'Tamiflu' vaccine won't work long either!!) corporations and will then jump rapidly across the factory farm, resulting in human health issues in the future..

The cruelty and deprivation experienced by the sentient beings (many birds speak a language of specific pitched noises to express themselves) results in a form of avian depression that could mimic the avian flu. Even if they are seperate, an increase in illness from either virus or bacteria is always more likely if there is no room to breathe and walk around. What properties of illness both mental and physical are transferred to the humans who ingest these sick, mistreated chickens and their eggs??

Regardless of people's preference for poultry products, factory farmed poultry needs to go. There are certainly other backyard poultry growers who are a bit more friendly to their birds and provide for their basic needs and comforts, in the long term this also results in healthier poultry for slaughter. Humane treatment of animals in every process, from the egg/birth to the final cut of the butcher's blade is essential for the greater health of your society and people. Maybe the dependency of the people in the US on factory farmed animals saturated with antibiotics and hormones is why people in the US suffer from so many health issues, from obesity and depression to heart disease and aggression..

Another concern is the spread of a resistant strain of avian flu virus escaping the factory farms could result in the extinction of rare species of birds. Many migratory birds depend upon the wetlands of both the Sacramento and San Joaquin Valley for their survival. A severe outbreak and escaped avian flu virus from the nearby factory farms could cause rare species of migratory waterfowl to be at greater risk of inbreeding, thus speeding them on towards extinction..

Domestication of poultry is counter-evolutionary and the birds would be better of if they were allowed greater diversity of breeds instead of monoculture found in factory farms. The remaining genetic stock of rare breeds of poultry birds could also become extinct if monoculture factory farms continue to be breeding grounds for deadly antibiotic/anti-viral resistant strains of bacteris/viruses..

Here's some additional info from GRAIN;

"The internal poultry trade shows the same pattern. The media were quick to jump on migratory birds when reports came out of outbreaks of bird flu in a remote rural village in Eastern Turkey. But later, once villagers began to give their side of the story, it emerged that a large factory farm nearby regularly sends trucks to the town to sell off old birds at discount prices. One such truck was sent in a couple of weeks before the outbreak was discovered.[41] The FAO acknowledges that the poultry trade spread H5N1 within Turkey and even singled out the common practice of commercial poultry farms sending out huge truckloads of low-value birds to poor farmers.[42]

The global trade in poultry feed, another factor in this whole mess, is dominated by the same companies. One of the standard ingredients in industrial chicken feed, and most industrial animal feed, is "poultry litter". This is a euphemism for whatever is found on the floor of the factory farms: fecal matter, feathers, bedding, etc.[43] Chicken meat, under the label "animal by-product meal", also goes into industrial chicken feed.[44] The WHO says that bird flu can survive in bird faeces for up to 35 days and, in a recent update to its bird flu fact sheet, it mentions feed as a possible medium for the spread of bird flu between farms.[45] Russian authorities pointed to feed as one of the main suspected sources of an H5N1 outbreak at a large-scale factory farm in Kurgan province, where 460,000 birds were killed.[46] Yet, globally, nothing is being done to tighten regulations or monitoring of the feed industry. Instead it often seems that the industry, not governments, is calling the shots."

entire article @;
http://www.grain.org/briefings/?id=194

Letters to the editor (fill out online form):
http://www.centralvalleybusinesstimes.com/letters/submit

A 900,000-hen egg ranch proposed for San Joaquin County is meeting
opposition from its would-be neighbors who cite odor, noise and
pollution issues as well as the treatment of the chickens.

Olivera Egg Ranch LLC of San Jose has proposed the massive egg factory
on land across Old River from the proposed upscale River Islands at
Lathrop master planned development. Odors from the operation could waft
across many of the luxury homes in River Islands, says the developer,
the Cambay Group Inc., one of the opponents of the egg ranch.


Egg company president Ed Olivera, who was not available for an interview
for this story, has said in the past that the state and county laws
governing the right to farm protect his proposed plant.


While conceding that nothing in the proposal violates existing law,
opponents hope to block the development over issues of noise, the
potential for pollution of air and water, the smells from piles of
chicken manure, clouds of flies and over the company’s past practices
of how it treats its chickens.


CVBT talked recently with Rogene Reynolds, a Realtor whose two-acre
homestead is less than a mile from the egg factory, and Karen
Courtemanche, director of the nearby Harvest Home Animal Sanctuary,
about their concerns.


Please click on the link below to listen or to download to your iPod or
PC. Repeated efforts to reach Mr. Olivera were unsuccessful; if he
makes himself available to our microphones, we will add his interview
at that time.

"There may be fewer chickens, but there's even more grousing. A
San Jose-based egg producer has renewed its efforts to build a
poultry farm housing up to 900,000 chickens on unincorporated
farmland near Lathrop after air quality regulators threw the
project into limbo last year. The project now has fewer than the
1 million chickens originally proposed, but the number of its
opponents has increased. Home builders and landowners worried
about foul odors blowing onto their properties have found allies
in their fight against the egg ranch: animal rights activists
concerned about the treatment of chickens."

Read the full story from 'The Stockton Record':
http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070329/A_NEWS/703290341

Critics hope egg ranch does not hatch
Neighbors, animal rights activists oppose proposed site

By Cheryl Winkelman, STAFF WRITER
04/02/2007

Though it hasn't yet been given the final go-ahead, a proposed egg ranch
near Lathrop already has ruffled quite a few feathers.
Neighbors and animal rights groups have flooded San Joaquin County's
Community Development Department with letters of vociferous opposition.


Michael and Roberta Larkin wrote, "Our property lies parallel on the
east side of the proposed site of the egg facility. Therefore, the
smell will be intolerable."

The 240,000-square-foot egg ranch is planned for 4000 W. Undine Rd.,
which is west of Lathrop and the San Joaquin River. If built, it will
be near Lathrop's River Islands, an 11,000-unit housing development
that is under construction.

Up to 1 million chickens could inhabit the premises.

Another potential neighbor, William H. Reynolds, worried about the
manure disposal. He mentioned four children who are home-schooled near
the proposed site.

"The potential health issues for these youngsters is obvious," he wrote.


So far, the project has cleared one environmental hurdle. The San
Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District determined last week the
cancer risk produced by the farm would be less than significant,
according to county documents.

Other county departments still need to analyze the egg farm, including
the Public Health Department for vector control and Asian flu concerns,
before it again reaches the county's Planning Commission for a vote,
said County Planner Ray Hoo.

Meanwhile, animal rights activists are working with Lunardi's grocery
stores, a family-owned chain with stores in Danville and Walnut Creek,
to get the company to stop selling eggs from Olivera Family Limited
Partnership, the company behind the egg ranch. They run a smaller egg
ranch in French Camp and previously operated an egg ranch in Gilroy.
Company officials did not return telephone calls.
Fifteen animal advocacy groups also have banded together and created
http://www.nomoreolivera.com. ChristineMorrissey, a spokeswoman for
East Bay Advocates said, "our organization visited one of the
previously owned facilities.... The conditions were completely
unacceptable. The animals were living in filth."

Morrissey said the hens were confined to small wire enclosures. Often,
their beaks are removed so they didn't peck each other to death.

At the French Camp site, 250 to 300 birds die daily, she said. Though 90
percent of egg-laying hens are raised in cages, Olivera Farms'
sanitation practices are below par, Morrissey said.

The operational practices of the Gilroy facility were deemed a public
nuisance by the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors in 2002. Weekly
inspections from the county's Department of Environmental Health to
monitor flies and manure clean-ups followed, according to county
documents.

In late 2005, the poultry operation was shut down.

Complaints have also been filed with San Joaquin County's Department of
Environmental Health about Olivera Farms' French Camp egg ranch about
the bad smell.

egg ranch mp3, 11.94 mb, 12:44 length