Consolidated Kansas

[chicken danz]

@HEChicken I guess you missed that neither of us is lactose intolerant. We are in fact allergic to milk. There's a huge difference. When I was a child I would completely quit breathing if I consumed milk and or break out in hives if I ate things like pudding that contained cooked milk. People always assume it is lactose intolerance. That just isn't the case. I can go to the store and buy lactose free milk and get just as sick from it as I do ordinary milk. It's simply an allergy.... not an intolerance of some part of it.
It's no different than someone who is allergic to eggs or peanuts. It's simply a food allergy and can in fact be deadly if it is consumed in large enough amounts. I hate milk anyway so other than the treats I really don't miss it.
I did have goats at one time with the intent of milking so I could see if I could tolerate goats milk, but never did get a milking stance so I never tried it. In reality I don't miss what I never had so it's no big deal. DH buys milk but it seems most of it goes to the animals anyway. He doesn't drink that much.

 

[sharol]

@HEChicken I guess you missed that neither of us is lactose intolerant. We are in fact allergic to milk. There's a huge difference. When I was a child I would completely quit breathing if I consumed milk and or break out in hives if I ate things like pudding that contained cooked milk. People always assume it is lactose intolerance. That just isn't the case. I can go to the store and buy lactose free milk and get just as sick from it as I do ordinary milk. It's simply an allergy.... not an intolerance of some part of it.
It's no different than someone who is allergic to eggs or peanuts. It's simply a food allergy and can in fact be deadly if it is consumed in large enough amounts. I hate milk anyway so other than the treats I really don't miss it.
I did have goats at one time with the intent of milking so I could see if I could tolerate goats milk, but never did get a milking stance so I never tried it. In reality I don't miss what I never had so it's no big deal. DH buys milk but it seems most of it goes to the animals anyway. He doesn't drink that much.

I have lots of food allergies. The top two are milk products (all of the) and soy oil. When I was born, my mother didn't have adequate milk to feed me after spending 8 months concentrating on carrying me term. They tried cows milk and I swelled up (hives) so badly I couldn't breathe easily, so the doctors tried the new fangled formula made from soy. That almost killed me. At that point my grandfather bought a mama goat and started milking her. Every week, my dad would drive from Chanute to Baldwin to pick up the week's supply of goats milk. It saved my life -- I was one lucky little kid that my parents and grandparents were able to go that extra mile.

Now, of course, the biggest issue is soy oil. Virtually all margerines are soy based as are most milk substitute products. My hives morphed into asthma when I was in my early 40's, so now it is even more dangerous to overdo the allergens.

With the 4th coming up, I'm planning to hide out in the house because another of my triggers is the fallout from fireworks. I didn't figure that out until I was about 40. I woke up on the 5th covered in hives, and when I went to get my medicine, the date on the label was July 5th the year previous.

I figure I'm lucky that none of them are out of my control. At least when I eat at home.

 

[HEChicken]

@HEChicken I guess you missed that neither of us is lactose intolerant. We are in fact allergic to milk. There's a huge difference.

I didn't miss it - I was RESPONDING to it. Maybe read my post again? What I was saying that many people BELIEVE they are lactose intolerant when they are NOT. They are, in fact, A1 intolerant. A1 intolerance manifests with a wide range of symptoms, making people believe they are either lactose intolerant or allergic to milk. I was suggesting that this might be the case for you and that drinking A2 milk, you may not react at all.

 

[HEChicken]

I will add that the reason some people who can't drink cow milk CAN drink goat milk is almost always because goat milk is also A2

 

[HEChicken]

I think the confusion may lie in the fact that I used the word "intolerant" where you are using "allergy". I see them as one and the same in this context. Whatever word you use, it is the body encountering something it believes is "foreign" or "dangerous" and reacting to it.

I also failed to mention in my original post that the Lactaid type products never actually helped my DH. We kept trying different formations in hopes one would, because at the time we didn't know enough to know that his symptoms weren't lactose intolerance. In fact, they didn't really fit the typical symptoms of lactose intolerance - but we had nothing else to go on as we couldn't imagine what else in milk could be causing his symptoms. It wasn't until we read about A1/A2 that the lightbulb went on and in his case, it has turned out to be the solution.

I've had this conversation dozens of times in the last year and a half. It always starts with disbelief that it could be something as simple, followed by elation when a serving of A2 milk produces no negative reaction. To date, everyone who thought they couldn't drink milk, whom I've convinced to has try my A2 milk has found this to be their solution. The cynic in me would say that the big dairy industry is deliberately attempting to keep this information from consumers because they don't want it getting out there, which would affect milk sales. However, it is slowly becoming more widely known. In Australia and New Zealand now, milk is required to be labeled whether it is A1 or A2.

 

[chicken danz]

I did get some whole milk from a local dairy last year that comes from Jersey cattle in hopes it might be different and made old fashioned pudding with it. I still had the same reactions. Not sure what kind of cattle you have, but these are an older type dairy cow. I guess your word intolerant did throw me off. It really is a different thing in the way that your body responds to it. My story is similar to yours @sharol , only my reaction to milk occurred when I was hospitalized for other life threatening issues at a week old and put on IV's. My mother had to quit nursing me and after that they tried to put me on formula and ended up coding me because I quit breathing. Then I refused to drink milk as a toddler and threw it up if I was forced to drink it. But would gasp for breath or break out in hives if I consumed many dairy products.
When I was very sick and hospitalized in the 70s because I couldn't eat anything without getting sick, they did some test on some basic things and that is when I learned I was allergic to milk.
I too have several food allergies and intend at some point to be tested for all of them. Due to a lot of digestive issues, it's been suggested that it's actually some food allergies are causing a lot of problems. Hard to avoid them if you don't know what all of them are.
I've also got a huge list of drug allergies and seasonal allergies. Not sure where this came from but I unfortunately passed it on to my offspring.
@HEChicken I would really love to find out that a simple enzyme was what was between me and milk! It would open up a whole new world for me. But of course then I'd have to be making my own cheese and ice cream and stuff too.

 

[chicklover56]

Hello everybody.

I have a hen that hasn't laid in the nesting box for two weeks. I thought she may have just been laying somewhere else, but the past few days she has been sitting in the nesting boxes, and no egg. She is acting fine. I took her out and examined her and her crop is soft and her vent looks pretty pink, maybe a little inflamed.

Don't know if it posted earlier. Have a great day!

 

[Trish44]

Hello everybody.

I have a hen that hasn't laid in the nesting box for two weeks. I thought she may have just been laying somewhere else, but the past few days she has been sitting in the nesting boxes, and no egg. She is acting fine. I took her out and examined her and her crop is soft and her vent looks pretty pink, maybe a little inflamed.

Don't know if it posted earlier. Have a great day!

Are you sure she isn't just broody? Hens will sit in a nest box when broody even if there are no eggs to sit on. I've had a few doing that lately & I take all of the eggs. I kick them out of the nest box when I go in to collect eggs.

 

[chicken danz]

Hello everybody.

I have a hen that hasn't laid in the nesting box for two weeks. I thought she may have just been laying somewhere else, but the past few days she has been sitting in the nesting boxes, and no egg. She is acting fine. I took her out and examined her and her crop is soft and her vent looks pretty pink, maybe a little inflamed.

Don't know if it posted earlier. Have a great day!

Yep I agree with Trish. She is probably just broody. She will either give up eventually or you can give her some eggs to hatch.Or you can keep removing her until she is done.

 

[HEChicken]

@HEChicken I would really love to find out that a simple enzyme was what was between me and milk! It would open up a whole new world for me. But of course then I'd have to be making my own cheese and ice cream and stuff too.

Well, the good news it does have to be a component of the milk that is what you are reacting to. In other words, milk is made up of lots of different things, including plain old water, and it is unlikely you are allergic to every component - far more likely that it is only one or perhaps two of the components that is causing the issue.

Where I grew up, schools were required to provide students a pint of milk per day because it was considered healthy. Unfortunately, the milk was delivered to the classrooms at the start of the school day and with no refrigeration....by lunch time it was sour. We were forced to drink it anyway, unless we had a note from a parent stating that we didn't have to. I begged my mother for some time before she finally relented, after extracting a promise from me that I would continue to drink milk at home. By that point I would have agreed to anything to get her to sign that note, but in reality it was ruined for me and I never touched another drop after that. I'd still use it on cereal or in cooking but never again poured myself a glass of milk to drink.

After we got the cows, I braved it. From the first milking, I poured a glass of milk and drank it - for the first time in decades. It wasn't bad. But - decades of "habit" or whatever you want to call it and I haven't done it since. I eat yogurt, cheese and ice cream but these days I don't ever eat cereal, so my milk consumption is only in cooking/baked goods or those other dairy products.

Are you sure she isn't just broody? Hens will sit in a nest box when broody even if there are no eggs to sit on. I've had a few doing that lately & I take all of the eggs. I kick them out of the nest box when I go in to collect eggs.

Agreed. I currently have 7 broody chicken hens and a few broody turkeys. I am not interested in more chicks so my broody hens get their eggs taken every night. Unlike Trish, I don't kick them out as I figure they'll just get straight back on anyway. I just take their eggs and leave them there. Eventually they'll give it up. I already had a couple quit brooding but a couple more started to take their place. It is always broody central around here

@sharol I don't know your set up but have you considered getting a couple of milk goats so you can make your own cheese? I hesitated to get dairy animals for a long time because I didn't want to be tied to twice a day milking and never be able to travel. However I can honestly say after doing it a year and a half that I don't regret it at all. I could do without the cows but I find the goats really easy. They aren't near so hard to contain as people will tell you - ours are really very good (this morning notwithstanding - more on that in a minute). They stay in the pasture without challenging the fencing and right now when we're doing rotational grazing, they respect the portable electric fence very well. Milking them only takes about 15 minutes for two goats. Right now I am doing twice a day but plan to get them down to once a day milking in the next few weeks. Compared to the cows I find the goats to be very cheap and easy. The cows cost a ton more to initially purchase and as they only have 1 calf a year and that calf has to stay on them 8-9 months, it will take a long time to get our money back in calf sales. By comparison, the goats initial purchase price was low, ours have each produced twins every pregnancy and the kids can be sold at 10 weeks. We are already "in the black" on the goats so if we sold them tomorrow, it would be pure profit.

Okay, so this morning didn't start out so well. I went out around 6:30am to check on everyone, only to find the goats in the hedge. We currently have them grazing in our lagoon as part of the rotation and the previous owner fenced the lagoon with 2x4 welded wire fencing. This of course does NOT stand up well to animals and I've told DH a number of times that at some point we're going to have to re-fence it, preferably with livestock panels. I knew the fencing was weak, particularly on the hedge side, as the goats will stand and lean on the fence to try to reach the leaves on the hedge trees and bushes. However I was hoping it would stand up to a few days of rotation and then we'll be moving them anyway. I didn't get so lucky. One whole section between t-posts was completely gone so the goats had taken advantage and started browsing the hedge. The sheep of course stayed right within the lagoon fencing because "Mom said we're supposed to stay in here". You gotta love sheep - they are so GOOD all the time

Anyway, fortunately the goats are halter trained, so it was an easy matter to get them back. All I had to do was go to the gate that leads into the hedge, call them and they came running. I put their halters on and led them back to the lagoon. However, I knew they'd be out again in a flash if I didn't repair the fencing so there I was at 7am wiring a livestock panel to the posts to keep them in. BEFORE COFFEE no less. My fellow coffee addicts will understand how hard that was

Fortunately it was the only really vulnerable spot so I think we'll make it through this rotation now, but we do need to get that fencing repaired more permanently before we try to graze animals in there again. Its always something isn't it?