How to Get Organic Beef Certification

by Shelley Proffitt Eagan, Proffitt Family Cattle Co.

Considering Becoming Certified Organic?

Proffitt Family Cattle Company's happy cattle graze tall grass. Photo from proffittfarms.com.

If you already heighten grass-fed beef and don't use antibiotics or hormone implants on your cattle, you may think that becoming a USDA certified organic beef producer volition set you lot apart from the competition without likewise much more than effort. What could be more organic than not feeding your animals commercial feeds and leaving off the inputs so synonymous with conventional beefiness? There are a couple of other fundamental differences that you lot will want to consider before applying for organic certification. All your organic practices need to be in identify before y'all apply and are audited past a certifying agent. The process of condign a certified organic producer is certainly not easy (it took usa 3 years), but we did information technology and so can you!

Organic Feed

Stop and think for a moment almost what exactly goes into the body of your cattle. Let'southward get-go with the biggest input: food! What exactly exercise they eat? If your cattle consume pasture grasses and hay, then you will need to get your grazing pastures and hay fields certified organic. This means no herbicides, pesticides, and commercial fertilizers and all of your seeds must be organic for 3 years. The iii years volition begin from the concluding application of any of those materials. Keep in mind that a soil supplement, like lime, is okay and chicken litter is too an acceptable form of fertilizer while municipal sludge is NOT organic. If you use a

bag of feed to phone call them up, even very rarely, it must be certified organic.  We find it easiest to apply hay for this or organic alfalfa pellets. When you wean your calves, what exercise you feed them during this time of stress? There are not many options out at that place if you lot choose to be grass-fed and certified organic every bit they both limit using conventional feeds. Organic alfalfa pellets are the only option we have plant that meets both requirements.

Organic Supplements

Thinking further about what goes into your cattle, the mineral supplement you lot utilize is something y'all must consider if you desire to become certified organic. This is a tough challenge and will depend on the make-up of your soil. What minerals your soil lacks, your grass volition also lack. Yous must know this in order to meet your animals' mineral needs. If they take rusting of hair on the shoulders, your soil might exist scarce in copper. Do a soil test of your grazing pastures to know for sure. You can also go a full mineral contour done on the liver of a harvested beeve. This will tell you more than precisely what minerals your animals accept in abundance and where in that location are deficiencies. Your local extension agent can direct you to the nearest NCDA Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory. Most conventional pre-mixed supplements contain urea and additives to make them more palatable, merely these are not organic.

Organic Treatments and Cattle Direction

Some other seemingly large hurdle to leap is the de-worming issue. If you are like nigh cattlefolk, you have been taught that you must deworm your cattle with pour-ons, sprays, or oral applications every year. There are some organic options out there but, again, it's best to manage the cattle so they aren't exposed to the worms in the first place. Move them frequently. Practice not allow them to graze pastures too low during the times of twelvemonth when parasites breed. Utilise holistic treatments, like diatomaceous earth (DE), equally a supplement to make their systems uninhabitable for parasites. DE will also help with external parasites.

The terminal common input to consider is fly spray. There are organic fly sprays available that will do the trick for brusk amounts of fourth dimension but genetic selection and whole farm management can go far much easier. Take too many flies? Make more bird houses; have the chickens follow the herd and eat the fly larva from the manure; move the herd away from manure each day and consider where the flies are in the ecosystem of the farm. Ever observe how some cows in your herd have very few flies and some who receive the aforementioned treatment and access to the aforementioned pastures are covered in them? Take note of such traits when y'all cull.

Organic Processing

Lucky for you, there is already a certified USDA Organic processor hither in the Carolinas! May's Meats, in Taylorsville, NC, can process your organic cattle correctly so that your meat tin take the USDA Organic stamp on every parcel!  Back in the spring of 2011, Misty, at May'due south Meats, and I saturday down and plowed through the awarding for processors.  She took it from in that location and had their plant prepare for the audit this fall.  The certified animals have their own belongings pen, no tool or automobile touches them that has not been sanitized, they have a designated hanging space, and their meat will be cut with tools that touched no other beef!  If you have customers who ask about the cleanliness of processing, it doesn't become whatsoever cleaner than certified organic. This last organic processing piece adds a lot of value to our product.

Becoming certified organic means you must look at your whole subcontract practices and direction strategies.  Many of the obstacles that I mention in a higher place can be dealt with in a holistic way and through proper direction.  If you determine you desire to get certified, your next steps should be to read the NOP standards found at http://1.usa.gov/wIeyaT, implement the changes on your farm, then discover a certifying amanuensis most you and consummate their application process.  Information technology may be a bit more work, only it's past no means impossible!  And the pay off?  Healthier animals, cleaner meat, and happy customers.

Shelley Proffitt Eagan and her family raise 100% Grass Fed, Certified Organic Beefiness in the Charlotte expanse. They are the get-go certified organic beefiness cattle subcontract in NC and ane of but a handful in the United states of america that are certified USDA organic and 100% grass fed.

> Visit them at www.proffittfarms.com.

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Source: https://www.carolinafarmstewards.org/beyond-grass-fed-what-to-consider-if-youre-considering-certified-organic/

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