Features
How Magnets Changed my Life (And my Farm)
They say if you left half a dozen monkeys typing at random for eternity they would eventually write Hamlet. Given similar amounts of time you might be able to work out the connection between magnets, cows and farming. However, reading this column will save you a few decades.
For Cornish farmer Brian Julian magnets are his most important agricultural accessory. He has magnets in his cows water troughs, he ties them to the legs of his animals and he wraps them around the necks of his young calves. So convinced is he of the health benefits of magnets that he even has a magnet tied around his own neck for the past seven years. Brians magnetic conversion occurred at a local fair. "I suffered extreme pain from trapped nerves in my spine" he says. "This guy on a stall gave me a belt with four magnets on it to try on. Within ten minutes the pain was gone."
Animal experiments
Having witnessed the positive effect on his own health it wasn't long before it occurred to Brain to try the magnets on his animals. When ten-year-old Daisy developed arthritis in her front legs he tried tying magnets to the affected areas. Within twenty-four hours the cow was running around the garden like a two-year-old heifer. Now he uses magnets for all sorts of problems on his farm.
"If I get a calf with scour or stomach problems I put a magnetic collar around her neck" he says. "With any problem on the farm I try the magnets first. It's a lot cheaper than the vet."
Magnetic plants
Apparently the benefits of magnets apply to plants as well. John Mace, President of his local horticultural society in the UK believes they can make plants grow faster. He kept two Fuchsias in the same soil and in the same conditions. One he watered with magnetised water and the other with ordinary tap water. And yes, you've guessed it, the plant watered with the magnetised water had about a 25% advance on the other.
Clodagh Hegarty of Healthways who markets these 'central reverse polarity' magnets in Ireland has collected numerous press cuttings about their benefits. One article recounts how magnets improved the sex life of a bull elephant at Woburn Safari Park in Gloucestershire. Raja, a four-year-old Asian elephant was brought to the park for breeding but couldn't stand properly on his back legs -an obvious necessity for a mating elephant. Magnets were applied to the problem and in no time at all the bull elephant was behaving like one. The animal minders at the safari park are so impressed they are currently giving the same treatment to a run down giraffe and an arthritic rhinoceros.
Gillian Westbrook has been appointed to the new position of
General Manager with IOFGA. Coming from a background in the regulatory area...
