The Problem With Plastic Chemicals
Bisphenols and phthalates in our food are concerning for several reasons.
To start, growing research shows that they are endocrine disruptors, which means that they can interfere with the production and regulation of estrogen and other hormones. Even minor disruptions in hormone levels can contribute to an increased risk of several health problems, including diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular disease, certain cancers, birth defects, premature birth, neurodevelopmental disorders, and infertility.
https://www.consumerreports.org/health/food-contaminants/the-plastic-chemicals-hiding-in-your-food-a7358224781/
If you're worried about ticks, put up an owl box.
The animal driving most Lyme disease in the eastern US is the white-footed mouse. Ticks that feed on them are far more likely to come away infected than ticks that feed on other animals. The bigger the local mouse population, the worse the next year's tick year.
A single barred owl pair raising chicks can take hundreds of rodents in a breeding season. Owls also don't carry Lyme. The bacterium can't survive their digestive tract, so an owl that eats an infected mouse is a dead end for the disease.
Researchers at the Cary Institute, the leading lab on Lyme ecology, have been explicit about this: "Landscapes that support predators have reduced Lyme disease risk."
One owl box on its own isn't going to fix a tick year. But a yard with owls, foxes, bobcats, and weasels in it has fewer mice, and a yard with fewer mice has fewer infected ticks.
If you have woods or fields nearby, a properly sized barn owl or screech owl box (different species, different ...
Alcohol and tobacco are available on every street corner.
Cigarettes proven to cause cancer. Alcohol proven to destroy the liver, the brain, the marriage, and the careful plans of an entire weekend.
Both legal. Both taxed. Both stocked at the petrol station.
Raw milk, on the other hand, sold by a farmer three miles down the road from a cow that has a name, must apparently be regulated as a public health threat.
The petrol station sells nicotine pouches, vodka, energy drinks containing seven grams of taurine and a kilogram of sugar, and an entire wall of ultra-processed snacks designed by chemists.
The farm gate down the lane sells a glass of milk. The same milk humans have been drinking for ten thousand years.
The petrol station is fine. The farm gate is the problem.
You can decide which of these your government is actually trying to protect you from.
https://x.com/i/status/2060387799908626776
Raw milk is a nutritional powerhouse like no other. That’s why it’s illegal. They only want us ...
Activist: "Your cows are putting carbon into the atmosphere."
Farmer: "Where did they get it?"
Activist: "What?"
Farmer: "The carbon. Where did the cow get it before it put it anywhere."
Activist: "From... eating?"
Farmer: "From eating grass. And where did the grass get it."
Activist: "The soil?"
Farmer: "The air. The grass pulled it out of the air last spring. The cow ate the grass. The cow breathed some of it back out. It went back into the air it came from."
Activist: "But it's still going into the atmosphere."
Farmer: "It's going back. There's a difference between a thing going somewhere and a thing going back. You've described a circle and you're frightened of it."
Activist: "Then just don't have the cow."
Farmer: "The grass still dies in autumn. It rots where it falls. The carbon goes back into the air either way, just without anyone getting fed in the middle."
Activist: "It's not that simple."
Farmer: "It's grass, cow, breath, grass. Or it's grass, rot, air, grass. Same circle, fewer dinners. ...