Rivenrock Gardens Cactus Blog

  New products development can take a great deal of time, and this product was no different,
but we are happy, and proud to be able to say that our cactus is now an ingredient in the
new Aveda product line called ‘Green Science Skin Care’.

  Yes, four different products in that line,
and each one has our Opuntia robusta organically grown cactus.

   Wow, cool!

   This line of products started selling a couple of months ago in parts of Asia,
and now is selling at your own Aveda Salon near you.

   It is a fun thing to be knowing that people the world over will be using and enjoying products that have our cactus as an ingredient.

Factory Farming is a word that means the overcrowding of animals in miserable conditions, depriving them usually of sunlight and the ability to feel the ground underneath their feet. It is a modern response to a system in which animals are regarded as having no value other than their inherent value as a commodity, their own feelings of discomfort are relegated to inconsequential if they are even regarded in any way at all other than as a value product.

   This type of close-quarters stocking results in cannibalism and other severe psychological distress on the animals. Due to the quick and easy transmission of disease in these unnatural conditions, the animals are dosed regularly with high amounts of antibiotics, as well as hormones to increase the meat production.

   “you are what you eat’ is the old axiom… but why is it when it comes to this method of ‘animal husbandry’ (I can’t really regard it with those words I learned in Ag. classes), we don’t apply the same thinking? It is precisely because these farms are not at our doorstep.  No one really sees the miserable conditions of the average ‘laying hen’, kept with a dozen other hens in a small area just large enough to stand in, with no nesting box, the hard wire cage floor designed to roll the egg down the bottom and out a chute where it will roll on to it’s eventual cleaning and crating.

   Yes, this makes for a low-cost food source in terms of economics. But what is the cost to the body of the hormones and antibiotics in our foods? What are we doing to our children, the next generation when we encourage them to eat these chemicals? Might there be a correlation in the age of puberty American children are now entering so early and their food sources? The rise in autism is attributed to several factors, but none have been proven yet, might the meat ingested by the mother while pregnant be a factor? The aggression seen among young women now, how much of that is merely sociological, and how much might be attributable to high levels of chemicals in their blood and brain from before birth?

   One thing to know, if you buy your meat from an organic farm, the animals cannot be given antibiotics unless there is a definite reason to prevent the death of the animal.  And as I recall, that animal cannot then be sold as organic. (we don’t raise meat animals, so I never studied the rules too closely). Animals on organic farms are also required to be allowed to get out into the sunshine a little each day. The sun is the great giver of energy, it enters the body and the cells and gives us vitamins that the body cannot properly make without it. It is essential for animals also. When I go by our neighbors cattle pastures, and see a ten acre field with twenty head in there, I see the young calves playing, butting heads, I know those are well-cared-for animals with plenty of room to roam.

   I don’t know the solution to this issue… primarily I guess it rests on the shoulders of the government to pass laws to restrict or eliminate factor farming. this will doubtless cause meat prices to rise a bit, but it will also result in more rural jobs for farm workers to care for the animals, the factory farms are designed to be as low on human labor as possible to decrease costs. The huge amounts of manure from the concentrated animals would be spread over a larger area, resulting in less localized pollution from manure. And perhaps the food supply would be healthier than we now have, with less antibiotics messing up our own immune systems, and fewer growth hormones causing rage incidents and ten year-old women.

   At any rate, the article that caused this rant is at the NY Times, ‘The worst way of farming’.

This is from the newsletter I sent out this morning….

 Our cactus is one of those plants that puts out growth spurts depending on the weather and seasons.
   At this time, we have more growth coming off the plants than what sales can keep up with. This is when we start reaching out to restaurants and markets to sell our excess leaves.
   Of course, anyone who wants to buy larger lot sizes should be getting a substantial discount on the prices.
   So we now offer our Commercial Grade Nopalea grande cactus at a special price for those who need the boxes big and heavy.
   Thirty five pound boxes of cactus for forty five dollars. And you pay the UPS shipping costs. You can go to http://www.rivenrock.com/bulknopal.htm to see the page with the details.
   This is a very substantial discount, and one we are sure most bulk buyers will be happy to get.
   We offer you the opportunity to take advantage of this special offer… but it will not last long. As I’d mentioned before, this offer is based upon the growth patterns of the plants, and when they stop this current flush of growth, we will get caught up with the cycle of output/demand, and take this offer off the table to await the next flush of growth.
 
   This is what I find so good about this newsletter, I am able to notify buyers and potential buyers of the availability, and help them to take advantage of the growth spurts the cactus put out…. using this tool, I am able to more effectively keep up with the growth of the cactus, and the plants are happy because the demand will more easily meet their output.
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Also, for those of you who don’t really know… we are big on the concept of people knowing where their food was grown and the growing practices of the grower. This is somewhat possible to do in a Farmer’s Market setting, or perhaps even through your local co-op that might post notices detailing who grew the particular sustenance you seek. But what of foods bought over the Internet and sent thousands of miles away through the mail?    We want you to know who we are, and what we think.. to that end we offer you a glimpse into our lives through our blog at http://www.nopalcactusblog.com/ . This way you can get an idea of the people who grow your cactus, and what our soils are like, our cultural practices, and the overall look of our countryside here on California’s Crown jewel, the Central Coast.
We live in a special spot, and we like to show off our home, do pop in and take a look.

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If you’d like to subscribe to the newsletter to be notified when we have special buys, the link is at our main cactus sales website at www.rivenrock.com, or from the link below…
  

   We’ll not be sending out mails to you all the time, this newsletter is just for an occasional ‘heads up’ when there are availability issues, or the occasional flushes of growth that tempt us to pass on savings to our customers who wish to take advantage of the temporary overabundance of cactus leaves.
   Expect an e-mail newsletter perhaps every week or two in the spring and summer, less often in the winter.