>
> It was from cow poop, often used as fertiliser on fields.


Kind of funny, but I read about a vegetarian group somewhere, Iraq or India,
> that didn't suffer from B12 vitamin deficiency, because they used animal
> poop on their farms, and didn't wash the veggies before they ate them, so
> they got enough B12 to survive. It is made by bacteria in the gut.



The poop is not converted to strange chemicals, nor used to control bugs. It
is just spead onto the soil. Any farmer with livestock will do this, but for
organic farmers it is an absolute necesity, because they need to replace the
soil nutrients lost. That is one reason e-coli outbreaks are often traced
back to organic crops.

PS  Last night, my hubby and a friend of ours was asking me how spinach and
> onions are getting the ecoli.  I read something about that a while back, but
> forgot exactly what the deal was.  If it's appropriate subject matter for
> this list, could someone re-inform me???  Seems to me that the farmers were
> using some kind of animal matter (in chemical form??) for pest-control, or
> something like that.  ?????
>
>