“Food Freedom” and the debate over raw milk in Colorado

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BOONE

A blonde cow named Punky munches on a clump of deep-green alfalfa and orchard grass, her bottomless brown eyes fixed on the spot where her newborn calf is hidden in the tall weeds.

Farmer Doug Wiley will load the hours-old calf and his jersey-Brown Swiss cow into a trailer later today headed from the pasture to the milking barn. Punky has too much milk for the baby bull to drink on his own, though the cow will nurse her calf for the next few months. They’ll spend their days moving from pasture to pasture, chasing the thickest and greenest grasses. 

From the peaceful farm east of Pueblo, where yellow sulphur butterflies hover above the fields and the cows seem like they’re living their best lives, comes perhaps the most…