Well what do ya know about that? (Probiotics)

Aren't they cute?  (Keep reading)

Some of you may know that one point in my professional career, I was doing some work for a pharmaceutical company... I learned a few things there.  In addition, I've listened to a guy named Gary Collins, a former FDA special agent (for the government) and his comments back up what I've experienced... call me tin hat if you want, but I heard it and so did he: 

The major pharmaceutical companies want you to be sick.   Why?  Well if you are sick, you need their medicine!  If you need their medicine, they get your money!  They don't necessarily want you to be healthy, then you might stop taking their medicine... they prefer you feel good and stay sick.  

But what if there were an alternative?   I subscribe to the "you are what you eat" club, and a healthy digestive tract is mostly bacteria, to the extent that it makes up 90% of the cells in our body!  Where does the bacteria come from... well if you were not fortunate enough to be born (you pick up some good bacteria in the birth canal on the way out if it's not a c-section) of a mother with a healthy digestive tract, then you have to eat them.  You can buy them or make your own... you guys know I    prefer to make my own, as you can read about here (click here for a list of all my fermenting articles).  
So my manager at work recently announced he's moving on to another company and has since been, well... coasting, just ever so slightly?  The other day he sent out an e-mail with a link to an article on 3D printing body parts for medical research.  Interesting stuff, really... but what I found more interesting was at the bottom... this article goes well with all of the things we are doing to try and be healthy... check it out yourself!

Probiotics dramatically modulate liver cancer growth in mice

Interestingly enough, that wasn't the only one at this site... which goes against what I've typically seen.  Yep, back to the tin-foil hat conspiracy stuff again... if you are a company that wants the public to think something is good, one way you can control that thought process is to "donate" lots of money to a university and have them publish a study that says your product is safe and great for everybody and anyone who thinks otherwise is stupid!  I think the medical, pharmaceutical and big agriculture industries have all done this... but I'm getting side tracked.  The point I raise here is that this type of research doesn't seem to have any strings attached.  It doesn't have anything to sell... so what's the point?  Could it be that it is nothing more than true research for the benefit of man kind?  (I honestly can't tell... but I'm open to ideas and suggestions!)

Regardless, here are a few other articles from the same site that I found to be very accurate, considering my understanding of the human bacteria relationship...

Microbes in the gut help determine risk of tumors

Gut microbiota transplantation may prevent development of diabetes and fatty liver disease

Bacterial imbalance contributes to intestinal inflammation and carcinogenesis

Study finds link between liver cancer and gut bacteria in obese mice

This one rings home for me... considering the issues my son recently had with his blood work!  Researchers find link between intestinal bacteria and white blood cell cancer

Collaborative effects of multiple bacterial strains in the gut may help prevent onset of certain inflammatory diseases

Need any encouragement to breast feed your baby? Breast is best: Good bacteria arrive from mum's gut via breast milk

Well that should keep you busy for a few minutes...

A wrap-up of Rome in April

Tardy...

You'll have to forgive me for being late... we had an early delivery last week and life has been a little more exciting lately!

Medical issues...

Things have been amazingly crazy this month.  My youngest, roughly 18months old, spent some time in the hospital last month and this month they spent a good bit of time trying to figure out what was wrong with him.  After being poked too many times and multiple trips to the hospital (an hour away), they don't really know what happened to him or why his blood counts were way low (Red cells, white cells, bone marrow cells, etc).  But after coming out of the hospital, we have now invested some $'s in essential oils as well as Manuka Honey for his staph infection on his leg, skin level.

Around the farm

(I just like to say that... it may not be a true farm yet, but the property does have a farm number!)  In addition to medial issues, I've been trying my hand at some plant propagation.  I started with what I had on hand.... box wood, lavender, bush cherry, burning bush and a few others.  I'll save you the wonder and let you know that, so far, it's not working... is March too early to start in zone 5b?  Anyway, here's some pic's...

Hansen's Bush Cherry... before taking a cutting

Scraping off some bark...

Rooting Hormone

I know, you shouldn't do it this way... you should pour it into another container and brush it on...

Here was to high hopes... but it just didn't work out. 

It didn't work out, with the exception of the boxwood cuttings... they are still alive.  I should note that I put a plastic bag over each pot to keep the humidity up... but perhaps they just go too hot?  We'll see what happens... maybe next time I'll try out a technique called "Air Layering".

The Bunk Bed...

So not too long ago I mentioned an expanding effort taking place in our home as well... well it's not too far away and I'm not quite done with the bunk beds.  At this point I just need to put some slats across and throw the mattresses on top... sort of.  Anyway, here they are a few days go...

(UPDATE: I hate it when I don't measure twice and cut once... in this case, my mattress from high school must have been a tall single mattress, as it does not fit.  A new on is on order...)

The glue is still drying...

Grafting Fruit onto a junk tree

Do you know what a Bradford Pear tree is?  Anybody?  Well you can look it up here.

Here is the fruit from a Bradford Pear... about the size of a marble.

My neighbors had them growing up and they always stunk like dead fish in the spring. They look pretty, I guess, in the spring when they put out all those white blossoms... but they don't produce any fruit.  If you live in the suburban utopia of keeping things nice and tidy, I suppose that's good... in a weird kind of way.  But I live in the country, my third child is on it's way and the first two combined eat more than I do!  (Did I mention they are 1-1/2 and 3-1/2 years old?)  All that to say, I can't afford to have worthless tree's hanging out when I can make them do some work!  (Kind of like having kids, eh?) 

This one looks like it took!  Woohoo!

Around the beginning of April I drove past my hunting spot on the way home from work and stopped to take some cuttings off the pear tree at the end of the hedge row.  Then I came home and, with the help of my box cutter, some Teflon (pipe thread sealing) tape, a roll of masking tape, and the knowledge garnered from watching The Hollistic Orchard DVD, I proceeded to make some grafts.  I'm quite excited to see that it appears as though they were a success!  Maybe I didn't need to buy that grafting knife after all...

The Bradford Pear is a pear tree that was bread (breeding via cross pollination) to NOT PRODUCE FRUIT (because food growing on a tree is known to many people as an eye sore or more work to clean up in their perfectly manicured lawn).  All I did was take a cutting from a tree that does grow food and stuck it on the trunk of one that doesn't... and walla, a worthless tree is made worthy of keeping around!

Chickens!

It's that time of year again!  Unfortunately with all that has been going on I got my order in a little late.  This year we won't be getting our little birds in the mail till the first of July... and even then I could only get hens.  They are smaller birds, so they may eat less but there will also be less eating at the end of process...

Last years Red Rangers

Anywho, I'm going to wrap this one up and hit publish.  Have a good week!