Southland letter

I received this letter yesterday, from a woman who was married to a Southland farmer for many years and holds concerns about farming practices in the region. She's happy that I publish on her (anonymous) behalf.

Dear Robert

I was talking to a retired farmer a few days ago and he told me that the dairy cows only live for five years now and they are smaller than when we were growing up. He maintains that the cows on the dairy farms are burning up inside with the forced growth ingestion of the grass. This is why you smell dairy farms at a distance .

When I was around house cows when I was young they were much taller and they lived for seven to nine years. Their effluent did not smell like it does now.
I believe that when cows are on organic pastures they have normal motions and with this forced growth of pastures they are living with the equivalent of diarrhorea continuously.
Southland is producing all this milk and it is toxic for consumption of man or beast.

I believe that is why we have such a high rate of bowel cancer in this province and country.

If dairying continues at this rate there will be nobody home.

Yours sincerely etc.