# US to ban GMO s and Neonicotinoids



## Haraga

That's good news.


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## nhoyt

Time to move my hive to a wildlife refuge lol


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## marshmasterpat

Just FYI - I am fairly certain that honey bees (being a European species) are not allowed to be kept on NWR or other properties owned by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service due to being non-native species. But you sure can stack them along the fence line and just like birds they are free to use the refuge for forage.  

There are some nice prairies on some of these lands.


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## cg3

I think they're just changing pesticides on the flowers at the visitor's center.


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## nhoyt

lucky for me they r on the fence line alrdy lol


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## Stonewall

This governmental action is about as silly as it gets.


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## seapro220

At least somebody, in Government, has recognized that GMO crops are bad. Not being in the discussion phase, and actually "doing" something about it is a great first step!

Notice I said "First" step ...


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## Nabber86

cg3 said:


> I think they're just changing pesticides on the flowers at the visitor's center.


Exactly. How many acres of National Wildlife Refuge land are planted with corn or soybeans? 

Reminds me of when the city of Boulder, Colorado banned fracking within the city limits.


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## Haraga

seapro220 said:


> At least somebody, in Government, has recognized that GMO crops are bad. Not being in the discussion phase, and actually "doing" something about it is a great first step!
> 
> Notice I said "First" step ...


Are you saying that all GMO crops are bad?


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## TWall

Nabber86 said:


> Exactly. How many acres of National Wildlife Refuge land are planted with corn or soybeans?
> 
> Reminds me of when the city of Boulder, Colorado banned fracking within the city limits.




I was surprised the number wasn't larger but, it looks like about 44,000 acres of NWR are farmed nationwide. http://www.indyweek.com/indyweek/us...onal-wildlife-refuge-land/Content?oid=3653745

It will probably make it harder to find farmers willing to rent the land. And/or the rent they are willing to pay will go down. It makes it a hassel to farm one way on your own land and another way on rented ground.

The comments about creating things like superweeds are pure bunk! Pests have been developing pesticide resistance ever since the first pesticides were used. One of the things that doomed DDT was the fact that many pest had developed resistance due to its' overuse.

Tom


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## peterloringborst

> genetically modified crops and an agricultural pesticide implicated in the mass die-off of pollinators.





seapro220 said:


> At least somebody, in Government, has recognized that GMO crops are bad.


GMOs have never been linked to mass die off of pollinators. Not to mention, there is no "mass die off of pollinators." GMOs have never been linked to any harm whatsoever. To ban them would be a triumph of superstition over science. Not that that is anything new.


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## camero7

peterloringborst said:


> GMOs have never been linked to mass die off of pollinators. Not to mention, there is no "mass die off of pollinators." GMOs have never been linked to any harm whatsoever. To ban them would be a triumph of superstition over science. Not that that is anything new.


:thumbsup:


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## Haraga

seapro220 said:


> At least somebody, in Government, has recognized that GMO crops are bad. Not being in the discussion phase, and actually "doing" something about it is a great first step!
> 
> Notice I said "First" step ...


Feel free to tell us why GMO crops are "bad".


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## Nabber86

TWall said:


> I was surprised the number wasn't larger but, it looks like about 44,000 acres of NWR are farmed nationwide. http://www.indyweek.com/indyweek/us...onal-wildlife-refuge-land/Content?oid=3653745
> 
> Tom


From the article: 

_Research on GMCs is murky. Some studies have suggested GMCs cause cancer in rats and might alter human DNA, but those studies have been widely discredited_.

Really? Genetically modified crops (GMC) cause cancer? That's news to me.


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## peterloringborst

Common sense on GMOs



> Labeling: Since practically all food has been genetically altered from nature, if you wanted labeling I suppose you could demand it, but then it should be for all such foods. Perhaps there could be two different designations: GMO-Agriculture GMO-Laboratory.
> 
> Monopolies are generally bad things in a free market. To the extent that the production of GMOs are a monopoly, the government should do all it can to spread the baseline of this industry. (My favorite monopoly joke ever, told by Stephen Wright: “I think it’s wrong that the game Monopoly is sold by only one company”)
> 
> If your objection to GMOs is the morality of selling non-prerennial seed stocks, then focus on that. If your objection to GMOs is the monopolistic conduct of agribusiness, then focus on that. But to paint the entire concept of GMO with these particular issues is to blind yourself to the underlying truth of what humans have been doing — and will continue to do — to nature so that it best serves our survival. That’s what all organisms do when they can, or would do, if they could. Those that didn’t, have gone extinct.


Neil deGrasse Tyson


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## Haraga

It has been my experience that the people that are opposed to GMO crops are also the same people that have never seeded ANY crops.


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## Dave Burrup

Haraga said:


> It has been my experience that the people that are opposed to GMO crops are also the same people that have never seeded ANY crops.


This is what I find the most irritating about the extremes in the green movement. They form their opinions based on emotion, and refuse to even consider any evidence that is contrary to their view. They will accept hands down very poor research as long as it supports their view and reject anything that is contrary to their view. The percentage of our population that has even a rudimentary knowledge of agriculture, and what it takes to produce our food supply is getting very small.
Dave


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## LanduytG

Dave Burrup said:


> This is what I find the most irritating about the extremes in the green movement. They form their opinions based on emotion, and refuse to even consider any evidence that is contrary to their view. They will accept hands down very poor research as long as it supports their view and reject anything that is contrary to their view. The percentage of our population that has even a rudimentary knowledge of agriculture, and what it takes to produce our food supply is getting very small.
> Dave


You hit the nail on the head. Don't forget the Hollywood stars if they say GMO's are bad their will be a lot climb onto that bandwagon too. So many now days cannot think for themselves or even be willing to read any creatable research to make and informed opinion. Those type of people are just like sheep and Chicken Little "the sky is falling"

Greg


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## peterloringborst

Well, it's seems to be human nature to _worry about something_. If you want a good read, though, try

*What Should We Be Worried About?: Real Scenarios That Keep Scientists Up at Night *
by John Brockman 

http://www.amazon.com/What-Should-W...bscriptionId=AKIAIUDIBB5W2YOHL3CQ&tag=edgeorg


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## ChrisBex

AWESOME NEWS! I literally live next to Mississippi Sandhill Crane National Wildlife Refuge!


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## SoylentYellow

Dave Burrup said:


> This is what I find the most irritating about the extremes in the green movement. They form their opinions based on emotion, and refuse to even consider any evidence that is contrary to their view. They will accept hands down very poor research as long as it supports their view and reject anything that is contrary to their view. The percentage of our population that has even a rudimentary knowledge of agriculture, and what it takes to produce our food supply is getting very small.
> Dave


Agree.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias


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## marshmasterpat

Sometimes I know I should keep my opinion to myself or I am going to stir up something unpleasant:no:, but that seems to have never altered much other that on a occasion or two of making this mug a little uglier. So why change now.

What spooked me was articles about some of the companies with GMO that had patents on them. And the lawsuits that have been won by the companies owning the patents against farmers on adjacent lands that had crops show up with genetic markers in the crop. The proof was against the farmers to indicate where they got the seed that produced the crop without paying for them. But pollination was not accepted as source of the genetic markers. Mega corporations can deal with those issues but if these are true and it happens to a few or a single small land farmer, he is likely going to lose everything. 

The second thing that spooks me is the issue of the genetically modified plant passing on the resistance or tolerance or whatever it has outside of the planned agriculture field. We are seeing glyphosate resistant plants that are the same genus as some of the commercial GMOs. Last thing we need in my mind is a new strain of XYZ weed in the agriculture community that is resistance to glyphosate or other cheaper herbicides. Then we have to bring in gen4 herbicide of ethyl-methyl-death that cost $200.00 a gallon (or much more) to control this new weed. Treatment rates are 2 quarts per acre and it must be done by helicopter with specific anti-drift agents within X miles of any commercial crops. 

Maybe I am seeing ghosts under my bed but I see a lot of non-GMO crops producing mega amounts that are on par with the GMO crops of the same variety in my area. So I don't see the benefit in this area, but we are out of the corn belt.

And just so I am not labeled a greenie - I spray moderate amounts of ethyl Methyl death on my property and have sprayed some much more deadly stuff in the past. That picloram and 2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid is nasty. That 2,4,5-Trichlorophenoxyacetic acid is even worse. Add the last two together and we get agent orange. Sure didn't know that in the late 70s as a teenager. But used the first stuff this spring. LOL


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## marshmasterpat

SoylentYellow said:


> Agree.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias


We should all remember that confirmation bias works both ways. For what we believe in and for what we don't. 


“We listen to what we wanted to hear, ignore the implications of what we did not want to hear, and fail to think through the consequences of truisms or the dogma of management to which we are exposed and with we were comfortable” – James Peek


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## SoylentYellow

> marshmasterpat said:
> 
> 
> 
> We should all remember that confirmation bias works both ways. For what we believe in and for what we don't.
> 
> 
> 
> Also agree with this statement. But the main thing is to recognize it happens. Once you are aware of this phenomena you can try to avoid it. I think many are unaware.
Click to expand...


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## peterloringborst

> What spooked me was articles about some of the companies with GMO that had patents on them. ... The second thing that spooks me is the issue of the genetically modified plant passing on the resistance or tolerance or whatever it has outside of the planned agriculture field.


Yes, but these are not issues that are restricted to GMOs. The patenting of life forms should be against the law, whereas the patenting of processes, should not. Resistance has always been a problem; having a system in place that can respond quickly to resistant issues is crucial. If plants can be upgraded like we upgrade our computers, then we can stay ahead in the arms race between agriculture and ag pests. Plants that defend themselves have to be better than plants that have to be sprayed


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## peterloringborst

how plants are genetically modified


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## Country Roots

I will chime in on the GMO issue with second hand knowledge from a guy I trust, who has had first hand experience on this issue... and yes, I'm paraphrasing:

When an animal is butchered, you can look at its organs to determine the overall health of the animal. If the liver is funky colors with spots on it or such, you can see fairly quickly that it is not well... You may not want to eat it! When you compare the organs of a cow that has been fed GMO feed to another that has not, there is a visible difference in the internal health of the animal. The cow who is fed the GMO's does not look healthy... end of 2nd hand info.

My problem with all of this is that the companies pushing the GMO's are making a killing and they don't care if they hurt you, me or the farmers. Yours and my health is the last thing in the mind of the pharmaceutical/ chemical/ medical companies. Why heal a person when they can make more money treating the symptoms?

If any of you look to the government as the ultimate non-bias authority on the issue, then disregard anything I've written. The difference between those who see the gov't as the problem and those who see the gov't as the solution are just too much to discuss here.

EDIT: 

When we went into Iraq in the first Desert Storm, the carpet baggers (Monsanto, etc) were close behind. For hundreds of years (if not longer) the farmers had been saving seed to plant the next year. After the carpet baggers came in, they claimed ownership (however it was done) of the seed strains the farmers had been using and now they can only buy from Monsanto - saving seed is an infringement punishable by law. 
That is disgusting... 

Another issue...
GMO crops allow the widespread use of herbicides that are not good for bees and I don't think they are good for me! Can anybody show me a report that shows that Roundup is good for anybody? Please don't tell me it's not taken up by the plant... I don't believe it! The plant takes it up through the roots and then it is in the food... you can't wash it out!

Lastly - you can spin it however you want to... but I believe this version of the story: Research firm blames Monsanto for bee deaths so Monsanto buys it


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## JRG13

Lol country, all I have to say about that... Beelogics was a technology acquisition, specifically RNAi


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## Country Roots

I was going to respond with a link to the report that Beelogics put out condemning Monsanto... but for some reason it's no longer on the journals web page... I'm trying not to put my tin foil hat on here. 

But instead of finding the information I was seeking, I inevitably ended up right back here... see forum thread. It really is exactly what your just said: 


JRG13 said:


> Beelogics was a technology acquisition, specifically RNAi


So great... whether you think Monsanto is a great thing, the anti-christ or somewhere between, I despise them and it scares the stuffing out of me to think that now I can be sued into oblivion because their genetically modified drone mated with my queen! History repeats itself... and too many farmers have lost it all because Monsanto's corn pollen didn't stay in the farmer's field where it was planted. 

If it can be proved that this stuff (roundup, gmo corn, gmo soy, gmo bee's, etc) is good for me and good for the bee's, I'll change my tune.


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## JRG13

You're very uninformed on the issue. Stop posting about it. There are no gmo bees, except in Germany now. I don't care what you think either about Monsanto, but I defend misinformation on the subject which you are spewing. Btw, you can't get sued for inadvertent advantitious presence on your behalf.


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## Ian

Country, What a load of malarkey !


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## peterloringborst

> If it can be proved that this stuff (roundup, gmo corn, gmo soy, gmo bee's, etc) is good for me and good for the bee's, I'll change my tune.


As they said, there are no GM bees. The likelihood of there ever being is very slim. What would be the point? Nobody has any idea what genes control what in the honey bee, so what genes would they modify? Would they make a bee that tastes bad to varroa? That might work!

Meanwhile, almost all the food you eat is GMO. Now, can I prove that eating food is bad for you? Depends on if you are fat. Moderate consumption of food is usually not a problem. If you eat only donuts, maybe you have an issue with a balanced diet. 

Years ago it was shown that if you avoid pesticides by avoiding fruit, you will suffer more from the lack of the health giving properties of fruit than you ever would from the pesticides you consumed by eating the fruit. 

GM food has a few genes altered that make the plants resistant to insects. These properties express primarily in the leaves and stems, not in the portions we eat. Even if they did appear in the edible parts, they affect insects and you are not an insect.

The point is: nobody has any evidence that GM food causes any health problems to people. To insects, they do.


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## Country Roots

It's disapointing that you simply dismiss me and claim I am "spewing" "misinformation" instead of providing links to reports or information that would cause me to change my opinion. If I am wrong, show me otherwise! Who knows, I just might change my mind...



JRG13 said:


> There are no gmo bees, except in Germany now.





peterloringborst said:


> As they said, there are no GM bees. The likelihood of there ever being is very slim. What would be the point? Nobody has any idea what genes control what in the honey bee, so what genes would they modify? Would they make a bee that tastes bad to varroa? That might work!


Well which one is it? 



JRG13 said:


> Btw, you can't get sued for inadvertent advantitious presence on your behalf.


Farmers who save seed from non-gmo corn that cross pollinates with gmo corn have lost it all due to patent infringement battles in court. It seems we will have to agree to disagree... but I believe there is evidence to back up my view.

There is a difference between animals that consume gmo's and those that don't... link
"Both hogs were about 5 months old and of butchering size.
GMO hog came from a commercial confinement feeding operation and was fed standard corn, which today is primarily GMO. 
Non-GMO hog came from farmer Scott Gaier and was fed only non-GMO corn grown on his farm from the time it was a piglet at 50 pounds.


GMO Hog
Blood was blackish-red when head was dropped.
Skin came off non-uniformly
Fat layer was uneven and non-uniform and a little yellow
Carcass had a repulsive stench when skinned
Disgustingly repulsive stench inside the carcass cavity after the internal organs were removed
Lungs were multi-colored white and light red with a lot of black spots
Gall bladder was yellow and contained repulsive yellow fluid
Intestines were bloated with gas and thin
Stomach contained a repulsive yellow fluid
Stomach walls had quite a few large perforations (ulcers) and had a yellow stain. Stomach wall was thin. 
Heart wall was thin on one side
Several small nodules or tumors beneath the backbone on the inside of the carcass cavity, near the rear of the carcass. 

NON-GMO Hog
Blood was bright red when head was dropped, indicating good oxygenation
Skin came off uniformly
Fat layer was even and uniform and pure white
Carcass had a sweet smell when skinned
Sweet smell of carcass was more pronounced inside carcass cavity after internal organs were removed
Lungs were healthy looking uniform pink color
Gall bladder looked good
Intestines were uniform and strong 
Stomach contained the grain from the last feeding 
Stomach wall had no perforations. Stomach wall was thick.
Heart wall was thick (strong)
No nodules or tumors visible"


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## JRG13

They only sue when the intent was purposeful. A few farmers knowingly selected for the gmo trait and propagated those lines only after discovering inadvertent presence in their fields which goes against contracts in place. Monsanto always wins these suits because it always comes to light the farmers knew they were breaching contract. A few well publicized cases has lead the suit rate to be of mythological proportions and now everyone has an uncle who got sued when it's never happened. The article you linked is a great representation of that. The organic group lost because the courts reviewed their data and Monsanto has never sued anyone for the exact reason they were 'pre-emptively' suing Monsanto for so they threw out the case. Huffington post isn't a great source of data either...
Really, some second hand nonsense from butchering two hogs raised separately without knowing anything else about how they were raised is just bad


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## camero7

2 hogs don't make a story. There are thousands of perfectly healthy steers, hogs, chickens, etc. slaughtered after being fed GMO grain. I say hogwash.


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## peterloringborst

Deleted by author


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## JRG13

What if I told you I fed all my hogs exclusively on GMO's and nothing was wrong with them.... best meat I ever seen in my life.... what if I blogged about it.... I'd be a complete liar of course, but just because it's on the internet makes it true...

If you don't understand the science, don't report what 'you heard' on it, most of what you hear is someone pushing an agenda based on nothing but baseless science or flat out lies or misunderstanding. If I were to biochemically analyze GMO corn fed to that 'sick hog' it would probably be 99.9999999% similar to non gmo corn. Don't tell me a bt toxin expressed to kill beetle larva in minute quantities is going to make a hog sicker than death, because quite frankly it's a load.


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## peterloringborst

This week's New Yorker Magazine has a story on GMOs:



> For years, people have been afraid that eating genetically modified foods would make them sick, and Shiva’s speeches are filled with terrifying anecdotes that play to that fear. But since 1996, when the crops were first planted, humans have consumed trillions of servings of foods that contain genetically engineered ingredients, and have draped themselves in thousands of tons of clothing made from genetically engineered cotton, yet there has not been a single documented case of any person becoming ill as a result. That is one reason that the National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the World Health Organization, the U.K.’s Royal Society, the French Academy of Sciences, the European Commission, and dozens of other scientific organizations have all concluded that foods derived from genetically modified crops are as safe to eat as any other food.
> 
> Monsanto is certainly rich, but it is simply not that powerful. Exxon Mobil is worth seven times as much as Monsanto, yet it has never been able to alter the scientific consensus that burning fossil fuels is the principal cause of climate change. Tobacco companies spend more money lobbying in Washington each year than Monsanto does, but it’s hard to find scientists who endorse smoking. The gulf between the truth about G.M.O.s and what people say about them keeps growing wider. The Internet brims with videos that purport to expose the lies about genetically modified products. Mike Adams, who runs a popular Web site called Natural News, recently compared journalists who are critical of anti-G.M.O. activists such as Shiva to Nazi collaborators.
> 
> The most persistent objection to agricultural biotechnology, and the most common, is that, by cutting DNA from one species and splicing it into another, we have crossed an invisible line and created forms of life unlike anything found in “nature.” That fear is unquestionably sincere. Yet, as a walk through any supermarket would demonstrate, nearly every food we eat has been modified, if not by genetic engineering then by more traditional cross-breeding, or by nature itself. Corn in its present form wouldn’t exist if humans hadn’t cultivated the crop. The plant doesn’t grow in the wild and would not survive if we suddenly stopped eating it.


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## Ian

Country Roots said:


> GMO Hog...
> 
> ...
> 
> NON-GMO Hog...


this obviously looks to be a set of unbiased observations! lol

how many butcher animals inspected daily in the world... hmmm


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## franktrujillo

about time i wonder what gave them the first clue about gmo's and pesticides.


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## Daniel Y

peterloringborst said:


> there is no "mass die off of pollinators." GMOs have never been linked to any harm whatsoever. To ban them would be a triumph of superstition over science. Not that that is anything new.


Others might say it is a triumph of right over wrong. or even moral over immoral. Accepting your place as a man rather than god.

As for opinion of mass die off. Aren't you the one that said somewhere else that 83% losses are acceptable? So just what would you consider a "mass" die off? It is also my understanding from comments in the same post that you may not consider losses losses if they are replaced.

I on the other hand consider anything over 10% losses the start of mass die off. Which means according to those that track such things we have a mass die off times 3 every year on average.

I have seen a lot of claims that larger operations take much higher losses than that.

As for GMO's not being linked to any harm whatsoever. That depends on what you consider harm. Is it a situation that harm must be enough to count? As far as I can see enough harm to count may be near extinction for you to consider it counts.

It is far to easy to claim "No great losses" but such a comment is subject to what you consider great. How about no fraction of losses? That would in fact be "None". I don't think your no harm claim would hold up under just the fact soil was tilled and planted. So take for example soil that is tilled and planted where it would not have been due to the existence of GMO's. This would count as harm to bees due to GMO's.

The questions that remain are. Is the harm significant, and or, is the harm unacceptable. At this point I consider any harm unacceptable. it is time to remove the favor from crops and make some consideration for other life forms including bees. It is not a question of if enough food can be grown. they have been able to grow enough food since long before any of these methods existed. It is a matter of increased profits. A desire that can never be satisfied.


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## peterloringborst

> As for opinion of mass die off. Aren't you the one that said somewhere else that 83% losses are acceptable?


I wrote a long article on the history of bee die offs. Large scale bee die offs are not new.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5dxtbosHna7bklaZ0ZEaGVkdkE/edit?usp=sharing




> As for GMO's not being linked to any harm whatsoever. That depends on what you consider harm.


OK. What do you consider harm and was it caused by GMOs?


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## peterloringborst

> OK. What do you consider harm and was it caused by GMOs?


Still waiting for an answer on this one.


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## tanksbees

I love GMOs, and living in the Bay Area I have grown sick and tired of uninformed paranoid morons bad mouthing them.

History is full of ignorant morons preaching superstition over science, or in a modern version, polarized flavor of the week "superstitious science"

GMOs come with problems, just like every other option for managing crops, pointing out the problems without understanding the benefits is willfully choosing ignorance and superstition over science.


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## NDnewbeek

There will be a lot of hungry, starving people in the world (here as well as in other countries) without GMO plants.

Starving bees too.


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## deknow

The thing that concerns me most about GMOs is the fact that the technology, as it actually gets used, either produces a toxin (bt) that pests get resistant to faster than they would if it (bt) were applied to actual infestations rather than produced by all the crops.....or it allows the wide broadcast spraying of roundup. In both cases, GMO tech still gets sprayed with most of the pesticides that non GMO crops are using, _and_ they dramatically shorten the number of years that an available environmentally responsible pesticide (bt) will be of use to anyone.

If GMO tech were used differently in the real world of agriculture, I might feel differently...but the way it is actually used is less responsible then traditional pesticide application. I don't support GMO bans, but I am an intelegent thinking person who sees the tech is being used in a way that doesn't really help anything, and actually causes a great deal of harm. Let's use GMOS in a way that advances our responsibility towards our environment...not move backwards.

Deknow


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## Haraga

Deknow, no disrespect, but please elaborate on how you would grow GMO canola for example.


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## deknow

I don't really understand your question.


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## Haraga

You said " if GMO tech were used differently..." What do you mean by that?


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## deknow

It could be used to reduce the amount of pesticides used, increase nutrition, stagger the blooms to foster poll8nators, etc. The way it seems to be mostly used is to allow for more intensive pesticide application as a way to increase yield.


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## Haraga

In sorry for not quite getting it this early in the morning but why would seed companies do that?


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## deknow

....to produce a product that serves the end customer better?

Don't get me wring, I understand the motivation behind it. 

It's the motivation of folks who dismiss concerns about GMOs and never discuss the fact that more pesticides get used in growing GMOs that I'm less certain about.


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## FollowtheHoney

http://www.ucsusa.org/food_and_agri...tem/genetic-engineering/failure-to-yield.html

Increased pesticide use and marginal increase in yields. I am curious what there is to like about GMO 's. also a great number of seed varieties have been taken out of circulation, which is never a good idea when trying to deal with disease and pest pressure.


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## JRG13

A bunch of hogwash again, in general pesticide use is down and gene stacking is being used to slow down resistance but poor stewardship of product has lead to most of the issues. Mainly growers not planting the required 'forage' acreage. Are all the farmers lying when they say it allows them to spray less? GMO's haven't yielded, what a joke. How much farm land has been recovered because of the technology and GMO's are bred into the elite varieties which should have no intrinsic yield differences if grown 'conventionally' anyways so that is a stupid argument.


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## tanksbees

I'm thinking that the best use of GMOs right now involve water conservation. I've read that it might be possible to make plants consume less water, or grow in salt water. Agriculture is always limited by one thing and that is water. Take a theoretical example, what if scientists could design tasty crops that grew in ocean water? It's not that far fetched, plenty of plant life grows in the oceans. 

Crippling GMO tech over superstition and paranoia should be a crime, the promises it holds for mankind could be huge.


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## FollowtheHoney

has pesticide use decreased in gmo crops. 

Just googled these exactly. Do you have info to share regarding reduced use of pesticides? Because a quick search indicates just the opposite.
I don't necessarily have a problem with GMO's as they are easy to avoid. I do take issue with all the side issues that have developed around control of seed varieties and taking legal action against farmers who save seed. Why should a farmer spend hundreds if not thousands of dollars each year for new seed when they can save a percentage of seed. A practice that has been around for generations. 
I do not see this technology being used for good, just profit.


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## Haraga

FollowtheHoney said:


> has pesticide use decreased in gmo crops.
> 
> Just googled these exactly. Do you have info to share regarding reduced use of pesticides? Because a quick search indicates just the opposite.
> I don't necessarily have a problem with GMO's as they are easy to avoid. I do take issue with all the side issues that have developed around control of seed varieties and taking legal action against farmers who save seed. Why should a farmer spend hundreds if not thousands of dollars each year for new seed when they can save a percentage of seed. A practice that has been around for generations.
> I do not see this technology being used for good, just profit.


Finally somebody gets it!


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## Dave Burrup

Farmers do not have too plant GMOs. They plant them because they want to. If they wanted the old varieties they would be available. Do not tell me this is not so, I was involved directly in the seed production business. Have you ever heard of the National Small Grains Storage? They maintain almost all of the varieties and germplasm that has ever been collected or developed. If you want to grow almost any variety, even old turkey red wheat, you can get a small sample, and increase the seed all you want. 
If you take the patenting option away from seed production companies, do you remove patenting from everything else too? 
As far as lawsuits go have you actually read the court transcripts or do you just listen to all the mis-information presented on this forum. The actual transcripts are easily found with a google search. The people sued were flagrant violaters. They are really dull reading though compared to the juicy lies that are so often promulgated.
As far as pesticide use going up or down I will give you one example I am familiar with. Before roundup ready beets the beets were sprayed with herbicide every 7 days for 6 weeks. The mix of herbicides was made up of 4 herbicides. Now they are sprayed once with roundup.
One of the herbicides used on corn for years was Atrazine. It leeches directly into the water table, and is present in may wells in the corn growing region. Roundup attaches so tight to soil particles that it does not leech. The only way roundup gets into the water is by erosion.


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## Ian

Dave Burrup said:


> Atrazine.


because of its heavy residue properties, it also blew as dust up into the atmosphere, and dropped with rain fall in places far north where the chemical was never used... 
GM corn cropping solved that issue


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## wildbranch2007

Dave Burrup said:


> One of the herbicides used on corn for years was Atrazine. It leeches directly into the water table, and is present in may wells in the corn growing region.


not helping your arguments with this one, did the govt and chemical co. know this when they sold it? If so what are they not telling everyone about the GMO's.


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## Ian

that was studied and well documented, just as everything involved with GM crops. The only difference is GM is a buzz word and everyone's opinion about GM foods stops at the buzz word. 

The point is, with the use of GM corn cropping, chemicals like Atrazine has been decreased


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## deknow

Ian, many of us go well beyond buzz words in our understanding of these things....to dismiss all objections as baseless is.....baseless.

Deknow


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## Ian

most of the objections I hear are based on mistrust... which is also baseless, isnt it?


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## Daniel Y

JRG13 said:


> A bunch of hogwash again, in general pesticide use is down and gene stacking is being used to slow down resistance but poor stewardship of product has lead to most of the issues. Mainly growers not planting the required 'forage' acreage. Are all the farmers lying when they say it allows them to spray less? GMO's haven't yielded, what a joke. How much farm land has been recovered because of the technology and GMO's are bred into the elite varieties which should have no intrinsic yield differences if grown 'conventionally' anyways so that is a stupid argument.


Spraying less what? You then mention recovered farm land. This could in fact create a situation that less spraying per acre is happening. but due to increased acreage that a total increase of pesticide is being applied.

The comment was not "No yield" it was "marginal yield increase".

Increasing acreage to maintain similar harvest is not in fact a "Yield" increase. You could in fact have a greater number of bushels harvested but due to the increase in acreage it would in fact be a decreased yield.

Foremost in my mind is the situation with Almonds. Acreage is on a constant increase. So are bushels per acre harvested. As growers get better at what they are doing, Support efforts increase, and groves mature. Yield per acre increases as well as number of acres planted.

I am not nearly as interested in how well they can be grown if they cannot pass the sniff test for being a quality product. Increased production has a tendency to also make something as valuable as dirt. it is abundant also.

I did a little self research thing a while back. looking at how prices have increased on an hours worked to purchase basis. It was interesting to find that since the 1960's food was the only thing that has actually declined in cost in relation to average income. Many of the reasons are controversial though.


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## FollowtheHoney

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121002092839.htm
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2014/08/19/gm-crops-pesticides-herbicides.aspx
http://www.forbes.com/sites/bethhoffman/2013/07/02/gmo-crops-mean-more-herbicide-not-less/
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2014/08/19/gm-crops-pesticides-herbicides.aspx
http://gm.org/2011/02/20/impact-of-gm-crops-on-pesticide-herbicide-use/

Assuming you are referring to the use od chemicals on gm crops, yes it is well documented and there use has increased. Atrazine became unpopular due to its staying power in the environment and likely was on its way out before gm crops became the mainstay.


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## Daniel Y

Ian said:


> The point is, with the use of GM corn cropping, chemicals like Atrazine has been decreased


Again a misleading claim due to no baseline of measure. Decreased to what? How many lbs have not been applied that would have otherwise? What precentage of usage does that represent?

Quote:

Estimated 76.4 million pounds are applied annually.
Usage on corn accounts for approximately 86% of total U.S. domestic usage (in pounds), followed by sorghum at 10% and sugarcane at 3% (all other uses take up the remaining 1%).

And another:

In the U.S. alone, 60-80 million pounds are used per year.

I also take issue with the claim it is GMO's that reduce the use of Atrazine when the manufacturer of it has placed their own restrictions on it's use. Less use is hardly due to GMO's. It is due to the harm it causes not being acceptable. Another harmful product is not the answer to the last harmful product. Cause a problem and then because you changed the nature of the problem you claim to have fixed something. Most are saying. go back to no problem behavior. You want to think that making a problem you caused less of a problem is now a good thing. It would be like if I stole $1000 from you last year and you got upset. so this year I stole $900 and told you how relieved you should be that I am solving your problem. In fact you should probably fund my crime prevention efforts.


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## jim lyon

I think it's a bit of a misnomer to assume that because pesticide usage has increased since the advent of "roundup ready" technology that there is a direct cause and effect. Yes, there's no doubt that glyphosate was a bit oversold as a panacea but a deeper look at these numbers show there is a certain amount of murkiness and many assumptions being made to arrive at these conclusions and secondly herbicide numbers are usually lumped together with insecticide numbers to arrive at an estimated pesticide total. Farm ground is more and more intensively managed and weed, insect and disease infestations are less and less tolerated by farmers. It's much of the reason why per acre yields have and continue to steadily increase. Most farmers are hiring monitoring specialists that regularly check their fields for insects, weeds and diseases and then recommends treatment options. It's so much more complex than just spraying for weeds. Yes, there are some glyphosate resistant weeds as there are weeds resistant to other herbicides but often the problem is that weeds that germinate later become the issue and for that pre-emergents may still be the better option. Does anyone here really believe pesticide usage would have declined had roundup ready technology never been used? It's really nothing more than a WAG how much and what kinds would have been used. Glyphosate is just one tool to be used in maintaining productive crops and to simply state that RR technology leads to more pesticide usage really makes a lot of assumptions and tends to over simplify a complex issue.


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## deknow

I'm not one that thinks roundup is particularly harmful
..I think there are a lot of great uses for it.

On the other hand, there is a direct cause and effect between GMO tech being used to create roundup resistant strains and the amount of large scale spraying of fields with roundup.
.it seems rather obvious, that is the point of all the modification.

I'm not so sure that small scale safety scales up to thousands of acres. I can easily harvest trees on a small scale without impacting the forest...but taking out all but one kind of tree for thousands of acres is a whole diffe re nt story (and an admittedly imperfect analogy).

It is extremely difficult to talk about more/less pesticide usage comparisons because the toxicity and delivery methods are always murkey. I don't recall off the top of my head what the dose of neonicotinoids on coated corn seed is (per kernal), but it shocked the heck out of me.....and this is also on the bt GMO corn seeds.

Deknow


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## jim lyon

Your quite right Dean in that there is an inherent overuse of glyphosate just as there is with most any other large scale chemical application. One only needs to look at the size of the equipment that sprays it on to understand why. The thing is it is so cheap, (a little over $10 per acre including application) the rate is so low (about a quart of active ingredient per acre) and the biggest part of the investment has already been made when the decision was made to purchase rr seed......and agreeing to sign the proprietary seed agreement btw.


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## deknow

WRT: proprietary agreements involved in this technology I'll offer a few observations:

1. The case against Monsanto regarding suing farmers who inadvertently incorporate proprietary genes in their saved seed is overstated at best. Intentional breeding from their stock has been prosocuted, and it's hard to guess at what the details of the many settlements have been.

2. There are other stipulations involved in growing bt corn (specifically) that the manufacturers have failed to enforce.....like that some acreage (a very small amount) be planted with untreated seed so that the breeding population of the pest takes longer to become resistant to bt. As far as I can tell, this has never been enforced, and has lead to bt resistant corn root worm years before it would have otherwise. Bt has been used for years by organic farmers on an as needed basis...in a way that is unlikely to lead to resestsnce...Michael Pollan wrote about this in 96 (i think).


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## JRG13

You guys hit a lot of the points on the head. In general, use of pesticides is up, but then you need to look at the amount of acres being farmed now and it makes sense. The forage requirements are now mixed into the bag of seed but again, Deknow got it right, they were poorly enforced when it first became available and farmers felt like losing that 5-10% was worth the risk of not planting the forage requirements and it was very poorly enforced by the distributors.


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## deknow

The lack of enforcement was not an oversight or accidental...it creates a crisis that requires the next GMO development.


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## deknow

This was written by Michael Pollan in the NYT Magazine....1998:
http://michaelpollan.com/articles-archive/playing-god-in-the-garden/


> Monsanto executives offer two basic responses to criticism of their Bt crops. The first is that their voluntary resistance-management plans will work, though the company’s definition of success will come as small consolation to an organic farmer: Monsanto scientists told me that if all goes well, resistance can be postponed for 30 years. (Some scientists believe it will come in three to five years.) The second response is more troubling. In St. Louis, I met with Jerry Hjelle, Monsanto’s vice president for regulatory affairs. Hjelle told me that resistance should not unduly concern us since ”there are a thousand other Bt’s out there” — other insecticidal proteins. ”We can handle this problem with new products,” he said. ”The critics don’t know what we have in the pipeline.”


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## Ian

GM cropping is what is keeping us in business. It's all about weed control and soil health. Both of which has never been in better shape and because of it we are seeing better yields. Simply Roundup


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## thenameischill

From what I've seen there is a great difference between conventional GMO feed and a rather over priced non-GMO feed. Been raising 150 broilers and laying hens every spring and when it comes time to butcher those broilers its plain to see there is something quite wrong with these chickens. Livers are mottled in shades of reddish-orange to grey, I've found tumors that filled the visceral cavity, cartilage degradation in the knee joints, and to be frank, eviscerating those things is quite nasty. In the past few years now I've special ordered a non-GMO feed with markedly better looking chickens. I've been told the liver tells the story of a creatures health; and for those who still believe there is no difference between GMO and traditional feed, remember that the articles published in favor are no doubt financed by the chemical corporations


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## Ian

We run a 400 head cattle farm, fed GM corn silage. Our cull cattle sent to butcher from the herd are in tip top shape and our butcher and cattle buyers pay us premium prices for our stock. They dont pay premiums for un healthy animals. Up here anything with tumors and degradation is condemned and pulled off the line... 

"and for those who still believe there is no difference between GMO and traditional feed, remember that the articles published in favor are no doubt financed by the chemical corporations"

what a great fact to base your claims on... here is tip thenameischill... do a better job at raising your chickens and quit blaming all your failures on chemical companies.


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## Dave Burrup

Ian you will love this one. The other day I was talking to a nutritionist that I went to high school with. He was on a tear about GMOs. He told me that cattle fed on a GMO diet were hard to keep alive beyond two years. If your brood herd died at two years of age, how many calves would you get from them? When I questioned him he quoted a study.
That study was obviously done by the anti-chemical, anti-GMO groups.
Most of the meat producers I have rubbed shoulders with produce their own feed. If the GMO feed produced the quality problems that nameischill stated why would they grow the GMO crops?
Dave


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## Ian

exactly


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## Gypsi

I can't afford non GMO chicken feed, my chickens are just for eggs, they are free ranged some so they are tough and unless I cull the roosters when they die I generally put them in the trash. I don't know why they seem to only live 3.5 years when I hear tales to 5 to 10 year old chickens, but I am too busy to sort this out.

When I buy chicken to eat (and yes I do) I buy organic chickens from Costco.


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## Ian

Non GMO chicken feed... feed grade wheat, some calcium/vitamin supplement.
I use to feed my broilers on bins sweepings


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## Gypsi

I got a bag of it once. wheat, chickpeas maybe and sunflower seeds? (might have been organic chicken feed)

Hens wouldn't eat it


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## Ian




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## JRG13

News at 11, gmos are what's making us fat....


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## FollowtheHoney

I've been feeding my hens organically for 15 years. Of course they eat it Mine is barley corn and other grain, minerals.


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## Daniel Y

Ian said:


> We run a 400 head cattle farm, fed GM corn silage. Our cull cattle sent to butcher from the herd are in tip top shape and our butcher and cattle buyers pay us premium prices for our stock. They dont pay premiums for un healthy animals. Up here anything with tumors and degradation is condemned and pulled off the line...
> 
> "and for those who still believe there is no difference between GMO and traditional feed, remember that the articles published in favor are no doubt financed by the chemical corporations"
> 
> what a great fact to base your claims on... here is tip thenameischill... do a better job at raising your chickens and quit blaming all your failures on chemical companies.


So much for the reliability of your opinion. Earlier you stated that "most of the objections I hear are based on mistrust..." Then you clearly simply ignore any comment based upon observations.

I have seen for myself the quality of meat produced. And I will just say that Tip Top is obvious a relative term. Is tip top in your opinion meat that the customer refuses to eat? That is what I have seen. As for premium prices that would have to do with what you charge and what a few people that can be found would pay. People are going to eat. even if the food available to them is dirt poor and killing them. That a few suckers can be found to pay premium prices for none premium meat is no surprise.

You pole vault yourself over an entire paragraph of objections to the results of feeding GMO's to make the next comment. Sorry he did not base his claims on how chemical companies fund support of their product. and to think they would not is ludicrous. it is called promotion and advertising. He made his claim on a long list of physical conditions that indicate extremely poor health. That evidently vanished when he stopped feeding with GMO feed.

As for doing a better job of rearing chickens. He did, or did you just happen to miss that also. He started doing a better job by not feeding with GMO feed.

It is interesting how you fail to see your own advice when it has already been implemented. You seem to only observe what you wish to. leaving your opinion worthless. How many people raising chickens would think that quality of feed is some secondary concern? Exactly what other measures do you suggest a person take to increase quality of rearing chickens other than selection of quality feed? You are the one that said do a better job. so lets here your list of things that can be on the list of doing a better job with chickens that does not include feed.

All I saw in that post was choice of feed. And you evidently see reason for improvement. So with the evidence presented just what improvement do you see necessary? Or is it you making claims based upon inadequate evidence? Just exactly what it is you think you know that you make that "do a better job" comment on?


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## Haraga

Ouch Daniel. Did somebody wake up too early?


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## Ian

Haraga said:


> Ouch Daniel. Did somebody wake up too early?


ha haha ha

Daniel, if he is raising chickens full of tumors, id say he is doing a pretty lousy job at raising chickens...but hey, lets blame the GM feed and chemical companies! If only these chicken farmers knew how easy it was to find cheap non GM chicken feed... where oh where would they ever find that,


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## Daniel Y

How is it that I did not describe exactly what Ian did? Did Ian not tell him to do a better job of caring for his chickens? Or did I imagine that. And wasn't his after they had clearly explained what they had already done to to care for their chickens better? Or did I imagine that also?

Let's see they used gmo feed and observed problems. stopped gmo feeds and problems vanished. and Ian sees in that a need for further improvement. I am interested in just what improvement he suggests and what can be expected to be seen from it. It is to easy to simply make some unsupported comment like do a better job. I am asking for the details of that opinion. Nothing wrong with going beyond correcting a problem. maybe super chickens can be produced. who knows. I want to know what other problems Ian sees in those comments that need to be corrected. Evidently he sees them, he is the one that suggested increased care. he must see ways that can be done.


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## Ian

Let me guess... his bees are dying because they are feeding on GM crops as well...


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## Daniel Y

Who said anything about bees? I have seen others make claims to that effect. Not sure how reliable they are. I believe it has been looked at and conclusions so far are indecisive at best. But once again you use that same old tired misdirection tactic? Can you answer my question? What exactly should the chicken keeper do to improve the care they give their chickens. Not including changing feed he already did that. It worked. Was that due to GMO's? I cannot say there are a lot of factors involved in quality of feed. I know I don't like the taste of eggs produced by chickens kept on current commercial feed. And I was raised on farm fresh eggs so it is not something I am not used to the taste of. Free range chickens produce the best eggs as far as I can tell. Not to mention every day is an egg hunt. Maybe he simply let his chickens start roaming.


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## Haraga

Ian said:


> Let me guess... his bees are dying because they are feeding on GM crops as well...


C'mon Ian. It's silly to blame the GMO crops. It's the neonics that the seeds are treated with!😳😳


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## Ian

Daniel Y said:


> Can you answer my question?


>>>DANIEL<<< I am calling BS on this guy! 
You think after nearly 20 years of feeding GM foods to animals, the billions of animals butchered around the world, if GM feeds caused health issues in animals as this fellow here stated, you would think the anit GM lobbies would have that science wrapped up by now.

I mentioned bees, because this is a bee forum, guys like this make exactly the same broad reaching ridiculous statements against anything agribusiness. Same old same old. I stand behind behind actuals, and farm accordingly.


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## JRG13

Biochemically speaking, bunch of nonsense, I'd be looking more at what chemicals were present first before blaming gmo vs non gmo. If it's not nonsense, then you're telling me the Bt toxin and CP4 gene are toxic to mammals, which is laughable.


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## thenameischill

My word is hardly an authority, I'm only a bio student stating my observations. The broilers are free ranged within a section of pasture on rye grass for their short 8 week life, this is for family use; not a commercial operation. The only variable that changes is the feed source. So to the gentlemen suggesting I take poor care of my chickens, I resent that. Can you give me a viable explanation why a 2 month old bird raised on conventional feed should have tumors? And why when I changed to non-GMO(not organic though) feed the following spring I saw nothing atypical in their anatomy?


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## thenameischill

Ian said:


> They dont pay premiums for un healthy animals. Up here anything with tumors and degradation is condemned and pulled off the line...


I have a dozen head of Lowline Angus so I know a little about cattle. Why are yours growing tumors?


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## Dave Burrup

Our chickens are raised with 3/4 of their diet conventional feed, both processed pellets and scratch grain. The other 1/4 of their diet is clover. I have never had livers as described, nor have I ever seen a tumor. We rarely loose a bird, be it a fryer or a laying hen.

>>_You think after nearly 20 years of feeding GM foods to animals, the billions of animals butchered around the world, if GM feeds caused health issues in animals as this fellow stated, you would think the anti GM lobbies would have that science wrapped up by now.<<

I am with Ian if GMOs were causing the described conditions they would have been eliminated long ago. The meat producers grow the GMO feeds by choice. If their animals were being rejected due to tumors they would not be growing GMOs.


Dave_


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## Ian

thenameischill said:


> I have a dozen head of Lowline Angus so I know a little about cattle. Why are yours growing tumors?


they are not


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## Ian

thenameischill said:


> Can you give me a viable explanation why a 2 month old bird raised on conventional feed should have tumors? And why when I changed to non-GMO(not organic though) feed the following spring I saw nothing atypical in their anatomy?


Duplicate that exact scenario next season. In fact, if your theory holds true, if you fed half the GM feed, and fed the other half non GM feed, both feed sources providing exactly the same nutrition, you should see exactly what you have previously observed. 
right?

...be sure to check that tag on the bag...


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## Dave Burrup

One common problem with feeds, is fungal micro toxins. They can be visible on the feeds like mold due to too much moisture during the milling process. Or totally invisible to the naked eye. They can produce tumors, liver symptoms as described, or actually death. Feed processors test the raw ingredients to determine micro toxin levels, and reject the lot or add binding agents to render them harmless. Some years due to weather conditions they are more of a problem than other years. Corn is a prime breeding ground for these fungus organisms. Some of the toxins are strong carcinogens. Some like ergot are neuro toxins. The toxin from Fusarium scab is called Vomitoxin. This one is very hard on pigs.
Plant breeders select lines that are slower to develop these toxins. There is no difference between GMO, organic, or non-GMO conventional feeds unless the breeder selected for resistance. Organics may actually be a greater risk due to the fact that they are commonly produced from old heritage varieties that have no resistance to the fungal organisms. Molds on alfalfa hay are responsible for abortions, weak calf syndrome, and respiratory problems. A rabbit breeder that I know lost half of his monthly production due to mold on the pellets. The mold was a result of the pellets being bagged on the wet side.
So before you jump to the conclusion that the problem with your chickens was related to GMO you really should do some research into fungal contaminates.
Dave


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## Haraga

The people I get the biggest kick out of are the ones that tell me how they quit eating foods that are made from GMO wheat and now they feel so much better.


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## Dave Burrup

Especially since there are no GMO wheat varieties in production, and never have been. They are in the research pipeline, but have not been released. The problem in Oregon has not been resolved. It may have been an accident with experimental lines or industrial espionage.
Dave


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## Ian

Dave Burrup said:


> One common problem with feeds, is fungal micro toxins.


I agree, and usually the reason why these grains get moved into animal feed production. But they manage these grains very closely, only allowing certain animals consume only certain amounts, and for exactly the reason you stated. These micro toxins cause extreme health issues. 
We have all our feed grains tested and we have the analysis of all the prepared feeds brought onto the farm.


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## Vance G

A small patch of GMO wheat was just found in Montana. The first impression is that it is sabotage as the plants were clumped in the stand. Like someone broad cast some seed. The luddites must need a new panic point for the uninformed and flighty.


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## JRG13

The oregon material came out of lines bred in Canada, they were never trialed in Oregon to begin with, you do the math.....


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## Haraga

Why did canada try to ruin the domestic wheat market by trying to introduce GMO wheat in America? The US should get canada back. Maybe with a mad cow or something. 😳


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## JRG13

When Monsanto pulled the plug there were some disgruntled employees apparently and some germplasm walked off


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## Redbug

One thing added in some of the GMO corn and cotton is a gene from soil bacteria called Bt (_Bacillus thuringiensis_) that produces Bt-toxin. It's a pesticide; it breaks open the stomach of certain insects and kills them. I am not sure what effects that has on bees or other users. Using Bt corn, cotton and whatever other plants engineered with the gene does reduce pesticide use since the plant itself has the pesticide built into the plant. It is a systemic. I guess that may be better than having certain pesticides from being sprayed on the plant leaching into the soil, I don't know.

I also wonder about any GMO pollen being carried to other non-GMO plants and corrupting that crop. I don't see how any farmer could have a true heritage or organic crop with GMO or other varieties nearby.


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## Ian

Redbug said:


> I don't see how any farmer could have a true heritage or organic crop with GMO or other varieties nearby.


The GM plants have cross pollinated enough that if a farmer was trying to grow a GM free canola for sale overseas, the GM levels are over the allowed tolerances. Cross pollinated the same way all the other canola varieties do every year.


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## BernhardHeuvel

Cross pollinated as are the super-weeds...


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## Ian

which weeds?


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## Haraga

BernhardHeuvel said:


> Cross pollinated as are the super-weeds...


What is this "super weed"?


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## Dave Burrup

>>Cross pollinated as are the super-weeds...<<

This is blatantly wrong. Resistance to a pesticide, be it a insecticide or herbicide, come from the exclusive use of the same mod of action. Weeds survive and produce more seed with increasing resistance. With the exclusion of the wild Canola relatives, herbicide resistance had nothing to do with cross pollination of a GMO crop and a non-GMO crop. You cannot get genetic transfer from corn, soy beans, cotton, or potatoes to any of the common weeds.
Dave


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## Ian

Dave, all that was not as splashy as saying "super weed"


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## cg3

"Super weed" means something else here.


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## deknow

If it doesn't have to do with genetic transfer (i think the jury is out on that one....jumping genes are a pretty hot topic these days), it is directly a result of selection that could never happen if GMO tech didn't make large scale farm wide application of roundup. You can't really separate the issue of super weeds and GMO tech.....the latter is THE direct cause of the former.

These GMO seeds are also often/usually/always? Coated with systemics and/or have other pesticide applications.

Can anyone cite the use of GMO tech that has significantly reduced pesticide usage?



Dave Burrup said:


> >>Cross pollinated as are the super-weeds...<<
> 
> This is blatantly wrong. Resistance to a pesticide, be it a insecticide or herbicide, come from the exclusive use of the same mod of action. Weeds survive and produce more seed with increasing resistance. With the exclusion of the wild Canola relatives, herbicide resistance had nothing to do with cross pollination of a GMO crop and a non-GMO crop. You cannot get genetic transfer from corn, soy beans, cotton, or potatoes to any of the common weeds.
> Dave


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## Dave Burrup

Deknow roundup is not the only pesticide that has resistant species. A pesticide regardless of what it is will have resistance development over time. The frequency and the amount of usage along with the species ability to adapt control the development. Kochia has developed resistance to most of the herbicides thrown at it. The Colorado Potato Beetle is notorious for its resistance development. Oddly I have never heard of resistance to imid development in the CPB.
Sugar beets in our area were sprayed with a herbicide ****tail every 7 days for at least 6 weeks, now with roundup ready they are sprayed once. I think that classifies as a reduction.


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## Ian

deknow said:


> Can anyone cite the use of GMO tech that has significantly reduced pesticide usage?


It is not a study, but using my farm as an example. We use roundup in a two or three year cycle. It has controled the perennials and the resistant weed populations within our cropping rotation. There has been a reduction in herbicide use, we still cover the land to control the weeds on an annual basis but our tank mixes are very specific and targeted now. More of the weeds are controlled and our crops are cleaner, and I think you all understand that point while looking at farmers fields. We have reduced our field cultivation by 50%-100% which has saved our soil in regards to erosion, increased soil structure and cut our annual fuel bill. 

I doubt many will read that comment,... because its boring and does not relate to most people out there. 
If I get out my soil science book, I can show you how much soil we are building within our crop every year because of the GM technology we have adopted in our farming practice.


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## Redbug

What is a super weed? Does it mean a weed that is resistant to a certain herbicide?


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## Daniel Y

Redbug said:


> What is a super weed? Does it mean a weed that is resistant to a certain herbicide?


Is there actually any such weed?


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## Dave Burrup

Super weed is a hype term, probably media generated. The super weeds are resistant to a mode of action, and only resistant to herbicides with that mode of action. I know of no weeds that are resistant to multiple modes of action. Roundup resistant weeds can and are controlled by other herbicides.
Dave


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## BeeGora

Dave Burrup said:


> This is what I find the most irritating about the extremes in the green movement. They form their opinions based on emotion, and refuse to even consider any evidence that is contrary to their view. They will accept hands down very poor research as long as it supports their view and reject anything that is contrary to their view. The percentage of our population that has even a rudimentary knowledge of agriculture, and what it takes to produce our food supply is getting very small.
> Dave


Amen to that......:applause:


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## MikeinCarolina




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## gfbees13

:lpf:


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