Nearly half of all US farms now have superweeds

Qualitymark

These 'superweeds' have grown in response to Roundup, used on plants genetically engineered to resist Roundup http://www.motherjones.com/tom-philpott/2013/02/report-spread-monsantos-superweeds-speeds-12-0

bob charles

its part of nature, organisms change to adapt to their circumstances. If your into sensationalism you call grass and a few other weeds "superweeds"

reilig

Qualitymark wrote: »

These 'superweeds' have grown in response to Roundup, used on plants genetically engineered to resist Roundup http://www.motherjones.com/tom-philpott/2013/02/report-spread-monsantos-superweeds-speeds-12-0

This story was written by a blogger who has a long history of writing reports which criticise Monsanto. Now I'm not supporting or criticising Monsanto because I don't know an awful lot about them - most of it is what I read by bloggers like this guy. He makes his living by writing critical reports about this company. Like many things in life, we never hear both sides of the story. Paper never refuses ink and if a person shouts loud enough and for long enough, people start to believe what they are saying whether it is right or wrong!

Manoffeeling

But nature has its ways over overcoming breeding obstacles. Remember Jurassic Park!

bbam

Rushes have to be a super weed, round these parts anyway !!
And any politician that calls to the door !

Qualitymark

reilig wrote: »

This story was written by a blogger who has a long history of writing reports which criticise Monsanto. Now I'm not supporting or criticising Monsanto because I don't know an awful lot about them - most of it is what I read by bloggers like this guy. He makes his living by writing critical reports about this company. Like many things in life, we never hear both sides of the story. Paper never refuses ink and if a person shouts loud enough and for long enough, people start to believe what they are saying whether it is right or wrong!

On the other hand, large companies will generally sue like a shot if anyone writes anything that might by any stretch be considered untruthful about them.

reilig

Qualitymark wrote: »

On the other hand, large companies will generally sue like a shot if anyone writes anything that might by any stretch be considered untruthful about them.

Do some research on it - I think you'll find that that's already happening!

bb12

so GM crops basically will lead to the use of stronger pesticides rather than using less of them...God help the remaining bees.

bob charles

bb12 wrote: »

so GM crops basically will lead to the use of stronger pesticides rather than using less of them...God help the remaining bees.

the opposite is in actual fact what happening using GM tech

Qualitymark

reilig wrote: »

Do some research on it - I think you'll find that that's already happening!

Naah. You do the research, and post your links here, to cases taken and to cases won.

reilig

Qualitymark wrote: »

Naah. You do the research, and post your links here, to cases taken and to cases won.

www.rt.com/usa/news/monsanto-california-37-measure-182/

www.huffingtonpost.com/.../monsanto-wins-supreme-cou_n_619657...

www.stltoday.com/.../monsanto-wins...court.../article_4e... - United States

www.mothering.com › ... › The Kitchen Sink › News and Current Events

www.rollcall.com/.../farmers_use_of_modified_seeds_re... - United States

www.oklahomafarmreport.com/.../00547_MonsantoWinsRRAlfalfaCase06...

www.bloomberg.com/.../monsanto-wins-supreme-court-ruling-on-lift...

https://twitter.com/stopbeingfamous/status/288815934242697216

www.naturalsociety.com/monsanto-headed-supreme-court-case-own-grow...

www.lindercroft.net/.../monsanto-wins-supreme-court-case-genetically-mo...

Conflats

bb12 wrote: »

so GM crops basically will lead to the use of stronger pesticides rather than using less of them...God help the remaining bees.

No, the use of GM is not just for herbicide tolerance it has being shown to work for resistance to fungal diseases and no better one for Ireland then Potato Late Blight. People gave out when the potatoes were being sprayed too much now they complain over the thought of potatoes which have Naturally occurring genes taking from the relative of the potato.

The use of Glyphosate tolerant crops only helped speed up the natural phenomenon of selection pressure, look at the sulfonylurea herbicides used in Ireland plenty of known cases of resistance or in the fungal population with septoria and the commonly used fungicides like triazoles or the case in 2002 were strobilurins failed completely.

Glyphosate resistant crops that are in current form are of no benefit to Irish agriculture.

Qualitymark

Conflats wrote: »

People gave out when the potatoes were being sprayed too much now they complain over the thought of potatoes which have Naturally occurring genes taking from the relative of the potato.

I'm giving out because I prefer to choose what to eat. If I choose to eat beef, I don't want horse. If I choose to eat potato, I want to eat potato, not some relative of the potato. If I choose to marry, I want to marry a human, not something with extra genes sewn in from a tomato or a pear.

reilig

Qualitymark wrote: »

I'm giving out because I prefer to choose what to eat. If I choose to eat beef, I don't want horse. If I choose to eat potato, I want to eat potato, not some relative of the potato. If I choose to marry, I want to marry a human, not something with extra genes sewn in from a tomato or a pear.

I'm not being critical towards you. I take it from this post that you prefer natural things. Things that have naturally evolved over time to survive threats against them. Not things that have been genetically modified. It might not seem like it, but I'm not in favour of genetically modified foods either. I can see some of the advantages of GM, but I don't like something which has been tampered with by scientists and of which we don't know what future consequences will be.

In linking all of this back to your post which you started this thread with. The superweeds are a natural response to their changing environment. They grow naturally. They haven't been developed by modifying their genetics. In fact, they have grown in response to genetic modifications of plants around them and are therefore natural. They have modified themselves in order to survive. Isn't this what plants, animals and humans have been doing for millions of years????

bob charles

Qualitymark wrote: »

I'm giving out because I prefer to choose what to eat. If I choose to eat beef, I don't want horse. If I choose to eat potato, I want to eat potato, not some relative of the potato. If I choose to marry, I want to marry a human, not something with extra genes sewn in from a tomato or a pear.

best not eat any current day potato so as there is a huge amount of plant breeding gone into them. Mixing and matching different traits to try and produce what sort of a potatoe is most desirable by the consumer. You dont have to use gm to get other plant genes into a plant

Qualitymark

bob charles wrote: »

best not eat any current day potato so as there is a huge amount of plant breeding gone into them. Mixing and matching different traits to try and produce what sort of a potatoe is most desirable by the consumer. You dont have to use gm to get other plant genes into a plant

I've nothing at all against plant breeding.

nilhg

Qualitymark wrote: »

I've nothing at all against plant breeding.

How much do you know about some of the techniques used in "old style" non GM crop breeding?

Have a read of the after WW2 section here,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plant_breeding

Quite a lot of the stuff that is being done with the "GM" techniques can be done the old way with the various methods outlined there but the problem is its very scattergun, there is no way of knowing that you have all the properties you are hoping to combine in any new variety without testing thousands of potential offspring.

bob charles

GM really speeds up plant breeding, what used to take 15 years to bring a variety to field scale production can be done with GM in a fraction of the time and using no crazy techniques