[video=youtube;eUd9rRSLY4A]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUd9rRSLY4A[/video] It's a long watch, but I suggest anyone questioning gmo being safe or bad should watch it.
Very scary stuff to me. I have wondered who was going to be the judge of good vs bad in the millions of ways this could affect us.
Hey you know Mags, You are not very far away from the only place a managed to play varsity basketball for a season. I saw Lancaster on the map as a back out of a campus shot the other day and thought of you.
Shit! Don't try to pin me down on the when, but you will hear a big hoot from the North when this boat gets launched. I very much want to run the Oregon offshore race next May. That's Astoria to Victoria.
Some how I don't see Obama stepping up and setting the standards here, Well that is no doubt a good thing but... something is missing!
LOL, I bet not a single one of you actually sat through this video. No wonder no one cares about the GMO generation. One day, you will look back and do a "face palm" and wish you would have just educated yourself.
I'm just curious Mags, are you more concerned about the GMO food itself or the pesticides they use because it's GMO and can resist the pesiticdes/herbicides.
I don't like the herbicide or pesticides, but the GM is what I'm mostly concerned with. If you watch the video, the rats that are only the GMO crop (without the pesticide) had the cancerous effects. The rats that ate only herbicide sprayed food stayed alive.
When I started farming again in the late 80s, I figured I had best get updated on agriculture so I went to UC Davis and bought their main course books on agriculture. It turned out to be but one book, but I still have it. It has nothing on this subject but a good book none the less. I raised about 300 acres of grain a year, rotations of Wheat, Barley, Oats, and a small patch of wild rice. I tried to rotate the cultivars of Wheat and Barley every two years. Keep the seed of the first year to plant the second but no more to attempt to keep the deceases under control. Doing completely organic farming of grains was out of the question because there is no way to get enough cow shit to fertilize nor is proper crop rotation possible due to the ag business structure. A rotation of say Wheat, Austrian Peas, Oats Austrian peas, wheat would work but the market to process the peas (controlled by Gordon Smith of Smith food) was too far away and would only accept pea delivered for to satisfy a guaranteed contract to deliver on the agreed date. Not really workable Then rotating the cultivars started becoming a problem as some of the newer disease resistant cultivars were being created so you could not grow seed. You had to buy seed from the seed producers of the genetically modified variety that was purposely being created to grow sterile seed. Farming is a tough business, much to know, much to keep up with and put up with.
Although 300 acres is a little hard to produce your own organic fertilizers, it is not entirely impossible. You can work in "Worm Composting" and use table scraps, dried up leaves, fresh leaves after harvest and varies minerals you would find in the surrounding areas. A lbs of worms can eat 1/2 lbs of organic matter per day. If you cycle in a large enough scale "compost farm", you can process roughly 300 lbs. of organic matter per day. Then after 60-90 days, that compost will turn into rich organic compost, that you can lay as ground dressing. Then you can make a "compost tea" by simply bagging this compost and adding varies minerals in the bag. Fill with water and let it soak for about a week. That "tea" can be spread at a rate of 1 gallon per acre, adding beneficial microbes, minerals and humus into the soil. As for the seeds… There are plenty of organic "seed cultivators" that you can purchase from for a good price. If you purchase anything "heirloom", there will be no sterilization. Farming is a hard process, but I believe the new wave is for communities to work together and form "community gardens"; growing their own fresh organic produce. A single family can feed themselves on as little as 100 sq. ft.
You make a grand case for the garden, I completely agree. But I get a little lost on just how to get it done for the 300 acres. Now I know how to do 20 of the 300 organically using the 280 to support the 20 but sort of stymied on how to do the 300 unless I only grow a crop for sale every 10 years and farm for soil enrichment the other nine. Damn you can grow some beautiful crops that way but no way in hell can you turn a profit on commodities like Wheat without industrial fertilizers. I didn't use any pesticide but by the tons in using Aqua Ammonia and Urea. Geez, today you might be suspected of running a bomb factory using Urea and diesel oil like I did.
Farmers have been genetically altering food for centuries. Selective breeding of animals and cross polinization of plants. Bigger, meatier fruits and vegetables, seedless, etc. Lower fat pigs and chickens with bigger breasts. Man making Evolution work in his favor.
But by natural means. The moment you start using DNA from a bacteria, then you aren't using a natural means for genetic manipulation. Looks like you haven't watched the video.
