Kit Pharo: “Poisoning Our Cattle”

I thought you might be interested in this article about “poisoning our cattle” from Pharo Cattle Company’s December 18th newsletter.  We found out about this problem several years ago and avoided it by using carefully selected US sources for minerals.  It takes serious searching and then trucking the minerals from out west, but it’s well worth it for the peace of mind. 

From Kit Pharo:

“I don’t know when commercial mineral mixtures first became available, but when I was growing up, we only fed salt and bone meal — and I don’t think we fed bone meal year-round.   We never had to deal with any sickness or health issues.   That, unfortunately, has not been the case for the last 40+ years.

I have talked with several producers who routinely dealt with poor conception rates, pink eye, foot rot, pneumonia, etc., etc.   When they stopped feeding their expensive mineral supplement, most of those problems all but disappeared.   They were unknowingly poisoning their cattle.

Cadmium is an extremely toxic heavy metal that should NEVER be present in any feed supplement.   However, because of price, most mineral ingredients are coming out of China — and nearly all of them contain Cadmium.

The biggest manufacturers of mineral supplements in the U.S. get their mineral ingredients from China.   Before you purchase another bag of mineral supplement, make sure none of the ingredients came from China.   There are a few good mineral packages — but I don’t think you will find them at your local Co-op.”