The grants from Smithfield Foods were negotiated in 2000 in a 25-year commitment of $50 million to help clean up hog farm waste lagoons. woman died after a boulder struck her as she bicycled with a group of friends in a Virginia state park. A former Marine and airline pilot was sentenced to nine years in federal prison Monday for traveling to Charlotte to engage in sexual conduct with a 10-year-old girl. Cooper, who lived in the Granite Falls area, had been sitting in the back middle seat...

Companies as diverse as Wolfgang Puck and Burger King are impressing sensitive consumers with meals featuring eggs from so-called cage-free hens or pork from pigs not confined to crates or small barn stalls. The percent of animal products that animal rights activists would call "humanely raised and slaughtered" remains small compared with that from industrial-type production methods. It often means more acres of expensive farmland to allow animals more space, and longer waits before they...

The project will cost 3.6 million ringgit ( 520,000) and is aimed at the thousands of Muslims who are infected with the disease during the annual Haj pilgrimage to Mecca. Please can other muslims stop attention seeking and acting so precious and at least learn the basics of your religion before showing the rest of us up. But surely, if someone dies because they have not been vaccinated this is part of Allah's big plan anyway? So why bother with a halal vaccine? The only difference for...

He realized in 1996 that he would have to eventually somehow diversify his farm operation or obtain an "off the farm " job to keep his cash flow in proper perspective. In 1998 Koschmeder signed a contract to erect three confinement buildings and manure reception pit on his property located 3 1/2 miles north and 3/4 of a mile west of Riceville. The contracted company is responsible for most of the general costs of the operation such as shipping, medical costs and cost of the hogs. He must...

Bastrop County Sheriff's deputies say a primate escaped for a few hours Friday from a cancer research facility that tests on animals. The Keeling Center is located on about 375 acres near Bastrop and houses chimpanzees, rhesus monkeys, sheep, cattle, swine, chickens and rodents. Several cancer pain medications have been tested, including two drugs approved for clinical trials. Researchers also have conducted studies on chemoprevention of ovarian cancer and early detection of the disease....