Ruth Sullivan stands near a pair of registered Belted Galloway cows at her farm in Blue Hill.— STAFF PHOTO BY JAMES STRAUB 

Though there is less to do in winter, taking care of about half as many animals as they tend in summer, the Sullivans maintain a vigorous agenda of farm chores year-round.

Bob Sullivan started Monday morning by carrying feed and water to his laying hens, throwing down some hay for his cows then lugging some 20 gallons of water to them.

His afternoon was booked with more chores: collecting eggs, feeding and watering the cows again and tending to plant seeds and seedlings.

The farm routine is just what the Sullivans expected when they bought the 150-acre farm about two years ago.

Their involvement with the National Animal Identification System is totally unexpected.

Citing ongoing efforts to safeguard U.S. animal health, the United States Department of Agriculture launched its National Animal Identification System in 2004.

The USDA describes the program as a “cooperative state-federal-industry partnership to standardize and expand animal identification programs and practices to all livestock species and poultry.”

Hancock County farmers have called it invasive, insulting and ineffective.

Local farmers were out in force at an Ellsworth forum last Saturday to protest the state’s involvement with the federal identification program.

At the state level, the Legislature is considering a bill that would authorize the state’s commissioner of agriculture to establish rules for the Maine Animal Identification (IDME) program that would be consistent with the federal program.

“I am fiercely opposed to the IDME and the National Animal Identification System,” Ruth Sullivan wrote in a statement she delivered at Saturday’s forum. “This is a bad plan.”

The goal of the plan is to register farms and tag individual animals to enable the state to track any animal to its registered location within 48 hours.

State and federal officials say the identification and tracking program would be useful in containing an outbreak of animal-borne disease.

For the Sullivans, that would mean tagging, or inserting an identification chip, in 1,500 meat birds, as well as cows, pigs and laying hens at their farm.

Sullivan said she doesn’t know what the cost in time and dollars would be, but she is certain the plan is an unnecessary burden.

“Our markets are local markets,” she said. “We sell to people who come here and to restaurants and food stores that are within a half-hour of the farm.

“That sets us apart from larger agriculture businesses. We’re raising an exceptional quality product and selling it locally. There’s no reason to treat farmers selling to local markets the same as you treat Tyson, Cargill, Purdue and Iowa Beef Packing.

“It makes no sense to require us to put ID chips in our animals while we do everything possible to raise healthy birds and process them on the farm.”

The excitement at Sunset Acres Farm in Brooksville this time of year centers on newborn goats.

Bob Bowen and his wife, Anne Bossi, expect to welcome some 250 goats into the world this spring.

The topic of animal identification also comes up for discussion at Sunset Acres, and, like Sullivan, Bowen believes it’s a bad plan for Maine farmers.

“Number one, it’s a pipe dream because the cost to implement and maintain it becomes a big government bureaucracy,” Bowen said. “I thought we were trying to do away with that.”

Bowen also argues that the effort to contain outbreaks of animal-borne disease is misguided.

He said the source of the majority of such sickness in this country comes from large commercial producers.

“You never see a recall for small farms,” he added. “You’re apt to see a recall for Purdue Turkey or International Beef Producer, but that’s not us. We’re not really in the food chain.

“I’m small. It’s not hard to find where I went. We’re not shipping across the country. We need to support local agriculture, not only buying it, but containing it to a local area.”

Though 90 percent of Bowen’s dairy goats never leave his farm, he criticized aspects of the government’s tracking program that require farmers to document all instances when an animal leaves and returns to the farm.

He said showing animals at the Blue Hill Fair would require four incident reports, one when the animals leave the farm, another when they arrive at the fair, another leaving the fair and a fourth when they return to the farm.

Bowen maintains that local farmers and state and federal health officials would be much better served by creating and funding state veterinarian positions.

State vets who would regularly visit farms as supporters, rather than enforcers, would eventually learn where farms and animals are located in Maine.

“Face-to-face contact has been eliminated,” he said. “Bringing it back would make the whole country better.

“There used to be a network of people to people that worked. Game wardens were always down on the farm. Now, nobody comes. You can’t get a veterinarian. There are no large-animal vets available for most of the state, and I haven’t seen a feed sale representative in years.”

Paul Birdsall, along with his late wife, Mollie, started Horsepower Farm in Penobscot 33 years ago. He joins a strong chorus of farmers singing out against the identification and tracking proposal.

“The federal proposal is very threatening,” he said. “Our hope is to work with the state to pre-empt the federal program and accomplishing animal identification without the stupid, horrendous federal program.”

One of the shortcomings he sees in the federal program is the inability of any computer system to handle the volume of identification and tracking involved.

He and many other local farmers also object to the undue influence from big agri-business and the makers of identification chips and equipment in writing the federal program.

Sullivan agrees.

“The critical point is that federal legislation is being designed by agri-business to meet their needs; yet it’s being imposed upon people like us who are selling our product within a half hour of our farms,” she said.

In addition to citing high costs and program inefficiencies in their discontent with the federal program, local farmers dismiss the proposal for its intrusion into their lives.

“It’s an incursion on our property rights,” Birdsall said. “Animals are private property.”

Sullivan is wary of incurring costs and time-consuming inconvenience to comply with the federal program, but she is more troubled by other aspects.

“More important is the invasion of it,” she said. “There is a need for vigilance, absolutely, and it’s important to make sure your animals are healthy.

“That the federal government thinks it can do a better job of tracking my animals than I can and my local vet can is appalling.”