Expert disputes bacteria findings
Posted on Tuesday, March 11, 2008
TULSA — Oklahoma failed to show the correlation between fecal bacteria found in poultry litter and in streams, a researcher testified Monday.
Sam Myoda, vice president of the Institute of Environmental Health Laboratories and Consulting Group in Lake Forest Park, Wash., made the assertion in U. S. District Court. Myoda, hired by the poultry companies, said Oklahoma failed to prove how fecal bacteria from poultry litter goes from poultry houses to fields and eventually rivers, lakes and groundwater.
Myoda’s testimony came on the seventh day of hearings to determine whether Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson obtains a preliminary injunction to ban poultry litter spreading on farm fields in the Illinois River watershed. The hearings are part of a lawsuit filed by Edmondson against eight poultry companies in 2005.
The lawsuit accuses the companies of polluting the watershed, which includes portions of eastern Oklahoma and Northwest Arkansas.
Myoda also attacked an opinion of an Oklahoma expert who previously testified that pathogens in poultry litter are “viable but not culturable.” Oklahoma has used the “viable but not culturable” assertion to explain why soil, water and poultry litter samples didn’t show high levels of pathogenic bacteria that can cause salmonella, campylobacter and certain strains of E. coli.
“It’s almost like looking out and saying there are 50 people here in the room, but there are really 300 people here because there are 250 ghosts,” Myoda testified.
Myoda said salmonella and campylobacter, for example, don’t routinely go into a nonculturable state. The diseases are almost always detectable in sampling.
“They didn’t find them because they were not there,” he said.
Testimony during the hearing’s first week included the opinions of Jody Harwood, a University of South Florida associate professor who says she found a bacteria biomarker for poultry litter by using what’s known as microbial source tracking. She found the same biomarker in streams and groundwater, leading her to determine that poultry litter is polluting water.
Myoda picked apart her work, saying she failed to rule out other animals as having the same biomarker. She didn’t find it in 25 cows that were tested. She found it in one duck among 20 that were tested. She found the biomarker in 1 of 20 tested geese. Other wildlife wasn’t tested.
Myoda said it was misguided to assume that bacteria from poultry litter goes from poultry houses to streams without ruling out the other animals. “It’s like leaps of faith,” he said. “My faith is my belief in God, not microbiology.”
Cattle manure remained an important part of Monday’s testimony as it has been since the hearing’s beginning on Feb. 19.
Judge Gregory Frizzell told attorneys he was growing tired of the repetition as the hearing stretches on. As Jay Jorgensen, an attorney representing Springdale-based Tyson Foods, raised the issue of cattle manure again, Frizzell stopped him mid-sentence.
Frizzell told the attorneys the repeated testimony is unnecessary.
“We don’t need to go over the same ground over and over,” Frizzell said. “Please stop.”
The defendants are Tyson Foods; Simmons Foods of Siloam Springs; Cargill Inc. of Minneapolis; Cobb-Vantress Inc. of Siloam Springs; George’s Inc. of Springdale; Peterson Farms Inc. of Decatur; Willow Brook Foods of Springfield, Mo.; and Cal-Maine Foods Inc. of Jackson, Miss.
The hearing continues at 9 a. m. today.
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