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Non-Tech : Farming -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: John Stichnoth who wrote (47)	5/6/1999 4:19:00 AM
From: Jon Koplik	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 4441

Chickens eat algae and produce eggs with "omega-3" fatty acids (!) May 6, 1999 Hens Lay Eggs With 'Good Fat' Filed at 1:39 a.m. EDT By The Associated Press PETALUMA, Calif. (AP) -- There's something fishy going on at an egg farm in bucolic Sonoma County. Steve Mahrt's hens are feasting on more than just corn and soybeans. Dining on algae is giving their eggs a power dose of DHA omega-3 fatty acids -- the ''good fat'' doctors say is great for your eyes, brain and heart. The eggs look, smell and taste generally the same as regular eggs. Some think they taste better, says Mahrt, a third-generation egg farmer in the town once known as the Egg Basket of the World. But these eggs have three times the amount of DHA and six times more vitamin E, he says. ''We understand it's going to take awhile to understand because people go 'An egg's an egg,''' Mahrt said. ''But it's not. If you're going to eat eggs anyway, why not eat eggs that are extra healthy?'' Doctors have said for years that omega-3 fatty acids, polyunsaturated acids found in breast milk, cold-water fish and wild game, lower the rate of coronary heart disease. The American Heart Association suggests eating several helpings of fish a week. Mahrt began paying attention to studies that showed Greenland Eskimos -- eating seal, walrus and mackerel -- had lower heart attack death rates than the Danish. ''What intrigued me was that Eskimos almost had no cardiovascular disease. And they eat a high-fat diet all animal in origin,'' he said. Learning that the American diet was particularly low in DHA, Mahrt started thinking of ways to make an egg filled with omega-3. ''We're not a great fish-eating society. That's why people are looking at eggs -- it's something people eat,'' said Lucia Kaiser, a nutrition expert at the University of California, Davis. Mahrt encountered scientist Bill Barclay, who founded OmegaTech Inc. to restore DHA to the American food supply. Fish oil capsules gave eggs a fishy taste. And feeding chickens salmon didn't work. Barclay discovered a marine algae rich in DHA off the California coast, which he engineered in a dried form. ''We've gone back down the food chain and naturally brought the DHA from the algae to the chickens,'' Barclay said. Today, the algae is grown on farms in San Diego -- without chemicals, fertilizers or the threat of ocean pollution. A year ago, OmegaTech began producing the eggs at Gold Circle Farms in Boulder, Colo., with a label that bills them as ''The Extra Nutritious Egg.'' Kaiser, the nutritionist, called the egg ''promising.'' ''If you were consuming even a single egg a day, this enrichment still could have great benefits,'' she said. Mahrt produces the eggs under the Gold Circle Farms label throughout Northern California; other farms do the same in Southern California, Denver, Indianapolis and Phoenix. Up among the rolling hills of Petaluma, where hundreds of egg farms flourished 60 years ago, Mahrt has about 4,000 to 5,000 hens who feast on the mixture. Mahrt adds the golden-colored algae to corn and soybeans, about a quarter-pound per hen a day. ''I think the first couple of days, they were going 'Gee, this is different.' Chickens have a palate,'' he said. ''But after a few days, they got acclimated. The chickens like it.'' Copyright 1999 The New York Times Company