Author Topic: nutritional content  (Read 3986 times)

Fleecewife

  • Joined May 2010
  • South Lanarkshire
    • ScotHebs
nutritional content
« on: January 09, 2013, 11:34:24 am »
My OH listened to Farming Today, and also heard reports on the News that the nutritional content of plants was reduced last season because of the heavy rainfall and lack of sunshine.  Apparently minerals have been washed out and food is less sweet.  From my own experience, potatoes have been quite watery and unappetising.   Not much else grew in my outdoor veg patch.
I wonder if this accounts for the increased number of people reporting problems with their stock, and with their own health this winter?
"Let's not talk about what we can do, but do what we can"

There is NO planet B - what are YOU doing to save our home?

Do something today that your future self will thank you for - plant a tree

 Love your soil - it's the lifeblood of your land.

RUSTYME

  • Joined Oct 2009
.
« Reply #1 on: January 09, 2013, 11:46:13 am »
Doubt it fw , 60% of our food is imported anyway.
Those that supply their own veg may have some impact from it though . Pure lack of sunlight in 2012 would have made a difference though surely ?

Fleecewife

  • Joined May 2010
  • South Lanarkshire
    • ScotHebs
Re: nutritional content
« Reply #2 on: January 09, 2013, 01:05:13 pm »
Hi Russ.  I meant those of us who grow our own food and forage because of course you are right about imports, and other countries have had drought whilst we have had rain.
 
I think the lack of sunshine will account for the lack of sugars in forage and in veggies such as tomatoes (I know - they are fruits  ;D   :tomato: ) but the excess rain may well be causing veg to be tasteless and watery - when it has survived the sog.
"Let's not talk about what we can do, but do what we can"

There is NO planet B - what are YOU doing to save our home?

Do something today that your future self will thank you for - plant a tree

 Love your soil - it's the lifeblood of your land.

jaykay

  • Joined Aug 2012
  • Cumbria/N Yorks border
Re: nutritional content
« Reply #3 on: January 09, 2013, 01:57:04 pm »
It feels as though that makes sense. And if the same applies to the grass, it's not surprising our animals aren't in such good condition as usual. I wonder what the effect on lambing will be.......

RUSTYME

  • Joined Oct 2009
.
« Reply #4 on: January 09, 2013, 06:09:42 pm »
Sorry fw , yes with you now .
Round here we had non stop rain , but a good year for silage and haylage . Don't know about the nutritional content though ?
 My horses are holding weight so far this year .
My spuds were lovely this year , and i moved the whole crop to a different bed 1/3rd of the way through the season .
Still digging them up now , best spuds in years .
A couple of farmers i know here , sowed barley late due to the weather and it didn't head up at all , so they cut it for silage . I grew a tiny amount of oats and barley planted late (spilled seed) and it croped very well . Another lot , 3 10'x10' , beds sowed late , i lost to the rain , it got beaten flat , too late to recover , just before flowering .
My garlic was small , planted in March , harvested very late , but it is very strong and is keeping very well .
Beetroot was fantastic , other stuff got mullered due to weather , slugs , birds , or just washed away in heavy rain water .
Lady on the radio just now was saying some veg may lack some vits or mins , but others will be fine . She said what happens to it after harvest would have a bigger effect . Just eat as varied diet as poss she said .
Didn't catch what she was , but it was a food nutritionist of some sort lol , will see if she comes on again later .
I would have thought that home grown veg , eaten fresh  in the main , would be so much better than mass produced chemical pap , that even if it did lack some content , it would still be better than the chemically fed gunk ?
 Rice may be a good crop to try this year ?

Ina

  • Joined Feb 2012
  • South Aberdeenshire
Re: nutritional content
« Reply #5 on: January 09, 2013, 06:14:35 pm »
We must have been listening to the same programme on radio!  ;)

I think we all lack vit D due to lack of sunshine. And potatoes? You are lucky; on the veg farm I work for we are running out of tatties now (for the veg boxes); normally our own would last until April, or March at least. I still have chard, though... (Only a couple of plants, but enough for the occasional omelette!)

SallyintNorth

  • Joined Feb 2011
  • Cornwall
  • Rarely short of an opinion but I mean well
    • Trelay Cohousing Community
Re: nutritional content
« Reply #6 on: January 10, 2013, 12:19:00 pm »
Yes, interminable rain washes the goodness out of the grass.  Ours even looks yellowed and washed out.

Hereabouts, we've all struggled to finish our lambs this year; they've needed extra cake and extra meds.  And on this farm we've been caking most of our ewes right through from when we put the tups out, whereas we don't normally cake until after Christmas unless the ground is frozen or under several inches of snow. 

The native ponies have been needing a bit of hay for a month or so, whereas again we would not normally need to give hay to adults not in work and not pregnant until the New Year, if then.

And as I've mentioned elsewhere, we've continued to worm the sheep right through the winter, had to worm the lambs for lungworm in the summer (which we don't normally need to treat for) and have had to fluke right through the summer too - all the parasites seem to be viable year-round in the current weather  :(
Don't listen to the money men - they know the price of everything and the value of nothing

Live in a cohousing community with small farm for our own use.  Dairy cows (rearing their own calves for beef), pigs, sheep for meat and fleece, ducks and hens for eggs, veg and fruit growing

SteveHants

  • Joined Aug 2011
Re: nutritional content
« Reply #7 on: January 10, 2013, 12:34:41 pm »

Hereabouts, we've all struggled to finish our lambs this year; they've needed extra cake and extra meds.  And on this farm we've been caking most of our ewes right through from when we put the tups out, whereas we don't normally cake until after Christmas unless the ground is frozen or under several inches of snow. 


Gah! Finishing lambs? I have got less than 1/4 of my lamb crop away, I'm just fortunate I took on loads more keep than I needed and have people giving me hay left right and centre. Still, the price were rubbish at the back end so I'm quite happy to hang on for spring, but If I didnt have the keep I do, I would have been in the pits of despair by now (or alternativeley I would have sold them all as stores and would not be worrying about them now  ;D  )

tizaala

  • Joined Mar 2011
  • Dolau, Llandrindod Wells,Powys
Re: nutritional content
« Reply #8 on: January 10, 2013, 12:56:56 pm »
The program on exercise and diet last week said that tomatoes and spinach had lost 60% of their nutritional and vitamin content compared to the 1930's. So much for progress.

Lesley Silvester

  • Joined Sep 2011
  • Telford
Re: nutritional content
« Reply #9 on: January 10, 2013, 04:16:53 pm »
That no doubt has a lot to do with the chemicals pumped into them and the ground.

RUSTYME

  • Joined Oct 2009
.
« Reply #10 on: January 10, 2013, 04:35:51 pm »
 The continued 'improvement ?' of veg for looks over nutrition is a very big cause of that , as is the use of man made chemical fertiliser over natural .
I was speaking to a bloke who works at the Aberystwyth grass thingymajig , and he was saying about how grass varieties are created to grow with just man made fert . What an insane situation . If you don't use man made fert it won't grow !
Much the same with modern veg .
I grow nearly all old variety , named , veg . Not only does it taste better , but the different varieties came about over years for specific soils in specific areas . Some withstand drought , others excess water .
The nutritional content seems to have gone down over the years .
 The choice of variety has dropped from hundreds or even thousands for some veg , to not much more than a handful , and most of them f1 .
With grass nutrition , round here a lot of farmers had big problems getting slurry spead in dry windows between the constant rain . So nutrients get washed away by constant heavy rain , and nothing gets put back on the ground . That that did , went on saturated ground and got washed away , again .
 Constant rain again today , hardly any let up .

 

© The Accidental Smallholder Ltd 2003-2025. All rights reserved.

Design by Furness Internet

Site developed by Champion IS