Iowans: Pig-Odor Project Is Not Pork

A $1.7 million earmark to control pig odor in Iowa has provoked much laughter. But many Iowans say that the pig project is not pork. Pigs outnumber people 3-1 in Iowa, and that makes for a rather putrid environment:

In Iowa, where the 20 million hogs easily outnumber the 3 million people, the rotten-egg-and-ammonia smell of hog waste often wafts into homes, landing like a punch to the chest.

"Once, we couldn't go outside for a week," said Karen Forbes, who lives near a hog feedlot outside Lorimor. "It burned your eyes. You couldn't breathe. You had to take a deep breath and run for your garage. It was horrid."

She recalls a citywide garage sale held in the town of 420 a couple of years ago that no one attended because of the stink that day.