More Info on GM crops and grains

Guest host: Sam the Farmer

http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/CommercialGoats1/?yguid=247130111

Sam 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.

Genetically Modified (GM) Plants and Grain

Plants have DNA in their cells just like we do. Using recombinant techniques, a gene is isolated from one organism and spliced into the genome of a receptor cell, which is now genetically modified. Insulin is produced this way.

An example would be if you took a gene for cold tolerance out of an alpine plant and put it into a domestic strawberry chromosome or genome, to impart cold tolerance. This is done at a cellular level. Each cell divides and replicates, the daughter cells now carry the new splice as if it is part of it's own genome, a hitchhiker if you like. Cells replicate and eventually form an organism, each cell of which will carry the "foreign" splice of DNA.

There are dangers and unintended consequences of this gene splicing. for example, pollen from a GM plant may be allergenic. While this doesn't sound particularly important, just think how dangerous allergies like nut allergies can be. Also, people are concerned about weird things happening like for example, herbicide resistant genes may cross with noxious weeds producing a really monster weed that would be herbicide resistant. Things like this.

I did run across the study referred to where the rats were shown to have reduced reproductive fitness. however, it was quickly noted that the gene spliced in was already known to be detrimental to reproduction and not to be the end product of this research.

The development of GM strains is difficult and costly and the manufacturers, best known is Monsanto, have been allowed to patent these things. Lawsuits about patents have gotten into the realm of the ridiculous. For example, some farmers' crops have been shown to have Monsanto GM patented genes and they have been sued for patent infringement. As Alice said, it keeps getting curiouser and curiouser.

Now, remember that GM foods and grains are going through digestion and the nucleic acids which are the building blocks of the DNA are broken down to A,C,G and Ts and salvaged in the cells to make other cell products. (There's nothing to "leach.") I think that the model folks have in mind is toxic chemical pollution. Toxic chemicals might interfere at the cellular level or even be toxic to the liver or kidneys which is trying to clear the body of these substances.