Guest host: Sam the Farmer
http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/CommercialGoats1/?yguid=247130111Sam is at the right, with the full beard. R to L, his uncle Ray and Uncle Milf, all farmers.
I will explain the technology but do not have the time or
desire to get into a long and drawn out debate with
purists who think we should still be living in 1955.
There are two herbicide resistant traits, roundup ready
for glyposate use and liberty link for use with herbicides
by Bayer and Syngenta. So far liberty link is available
for corn only but a lot of crops are using the roundup
ready trait.
In corn if glyposate resistance occurs, liberty link will
kill them, and vice versa.
Liberty link will be available as time goes by in other
crops.
Bacillus Thuringiensis (Bt) is available for rootworm
control and another for corn borer. The most common
varieties of corn are now available as triple stacked
meaning they are either roundup ready or liberty link with
cornborer Bt and rootworm Bt.
These three traits have boosted corn yields 50% in
irrigated and even more in dryland fields at a very
reasonable cost.
To furthur explain, these traits are contained within the
genome of the plant. Roundup ready is expressed during the
whole life of the plant but Bt is expressed using triggers
to produce the protein at the right time for insect
control. Rootworm Bt is expressed from germination to
about kneehigh then goes dormant. Cornborer Bt is
expressed from about silking to shortly before dry down.
Although we use the term Bt for convenience it is not
really Bt in the plant. They transferred the gene from the
Bt that causes the Bt to produce an amino acid that shuts
down the digestive tract within the larva of the insect
being controlled. It is this gene spliced into the genome
of the corn plant that causes the corn to produce this
amino acid to control the insect.
It takes a different Bt strain to control each different
insect. The Bt that is toxic to rootworm will not harm
other larva.
The reason most folks are concerned is because the
environmentalistshave told them that it will kill the
larva of the monarch butterfly, honey bees, etc. and that
simply is not true.
As Linda stated in a previous post, the genome is
destroyed during digestion so no harm to anything eating
the grain products. Otherwise we would be in danger eating
any product as it all contains genes. It would be like
going to the sushi bar, eating octopus and then growing
eight arms. Doesn't happen and won't happen with any GMO
crop or organism.
Hope this explains it somewhat, there has been volumes
printed on this subject.
I have spent a lifetime studying genetics and it gets
complicated for me.
This science has been explored since the early 70s so has been well researched and tested.
Despite arguments to the contrary, this has been tested to death.
The roundup ready gene is from a plant in the South American rain forest can't remember the species but it is not related to anything else and is naturally resistant to glyposate. In order for this to get into the wild it would have to be transferred to a plant related to the crop being grown. Soybeans being a legume have many wild cousins but soybeans are selfpolinated often pollinating before the bloom is open so cross contamination would be a long shot and coupled with the fact that it does not have any relatives close enough to cross with makes even a longer shot.
Corn has no close relatives.
Cotton has many relatives but again none close enough to cross with.
Allergies are always a concern but Bt and the roundup gene have been tested for that but I'm sure that somewhere on the planet is a person that would react. The risks are minimal when compared to other allergens.
All of this is certainly a lot safer then the insecticides used to control rootworm and corn borer and the traditional herbacides used to control weeds.
Corn is the only plant using this technology that has wind blown pollen.
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Thank you for your post, Sam. Please leave comments with your feelings about this issue.
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